Nard — The Original Backgammon

The Story of Nard's Invention

The story goes that an Indian king sent Sassanid Persia a game of chess with a challenge: explain how it works, or pay tribute. The king's vizier Bozorgmehr (Wuzurgmihr, ~498–590 CE) solved the puzzle, then invented his own game — Nardashir (نردشیر, "Nard of Ardashir") — and sent it back to India with the same challenge reversed. When the Indians could not deduce the game's rules, Persia collected tribute from them instead.

This story is preserved in the 6th-century Pahlavi text Wicarishen i Chatrang ud Nihishen i New-Ardashir (Treatise on Chess and the Invention of Backgammon), written by Bozorgmehr himself. The earliest independent confirmation is in the Babylonian Talmud (Ketubot 61b), dated 500–600 CE, which mentions "Nardashir" as a game familiar enough to serve as an everyday legal example — suggesting the game spread rapidly across the late-antique world.

"He made two dice of ivory with figures the colour of ebony. He then arranged the army similar to that of chess; he placed the two sides in order of battle and distributed the troops, ready for battle and for the assault of the town, among eight houses."

— Firdawsi, Shahnameh, c. 1010 CE (describing a related but distinct game)

Note: Firdawsi's Shahnameh describes two different things both called Nard. The passage above — with 8 soldiers, a king, and an 8×8 board — describes a latrunculi-derived war game, probably introduced to Persia by Roman legionaries. Bozorgmehr's original Nard, documented in the Chatrang Nama and clearly depicted in Shahnameh illuminated manuscripts, is the backgammon-family game implemented here. The manuscript illustrations consistently show a backgammon board, not an 8×8 grid.

The Cosmic Board

Bozorgmehr embedded Zoroastrian cosmology directly into the game's structure:

4 quadrants — the four elements (fire, water, earth, air) from which everything was created
6 points per quadrant (24 total) — the six Amesha Spentas, the divine manifestations of Ahura Mazda; also the 24 hours of the day
2 dice — one for the revolution of the firmament, one for the revolution of the constellations
15 white pieces — Ahura Mazda, the good; 15 black pieces — Ahriman, the evil; they move in opposite directions, as the two principles oppose each other in all things
30 pieces total — the 30 days of the month
Initial positions — encode the 12 constellations (point 12), 7 planets (point 7), 6 divine creations (point 6), and the primeval man and bull (points 1 and 3)

Play Nard — vs AI

Rules: Bozorgmehr's original rules (Chatrang Nama, 6th century CE) as reconstructed by ancientgames.org. White moves anticlockwise (points 1→24); Black moves clockwise (points 24→1). You play White. The AI plays Black using a greedy strategy — it prioritises hitting single blots and building blocks. No doubling cube (not in the original rules).

نرد · Nard — The Original Backgammon Click "New Game" to begin

⚪ White (You)0 off

⚫ Black (AI)0 off

Turn—

Dice

🎲

Roll to move

Bar

White: 0 · Black: 0

نردشیر awaits…

Bozorgmehr's Rules

Setup — Bozorgmehr's original positions
White starts with: 2 on point 1, 3 on point 12, 2 on point 3, 2 on point 7, 3 on point 6, 3 on point 8.
Black mirrors this from the opposite end (points 24→1 direction).
White moves anticlockwise: 1→2→…→24, then bears off. Black moves clockwise: 24→23→…→1, then bears off.

Movement
Roll 2 dice. Each die is a separate move. One checker may move the sum if both intermediate and final points are open. Doubles are not played twice (unlike modern backgammon — Bozorgmehr's rules make no mention of doubling).

Blocking
A point occupied by 2 or more of your own pieces is closed to the opponent. Any number of your own pieces may stack on the same point (no limit).

Hitting
A single checker on a point (a "blot") can be hit by an opponent's piece moving to that point. The hit checker goes to the bar.

Re-entering from the bar
A player with checkers on the bar must enter them first. A die value equals the entry point number in the opponent's home board. If both dice are blocked, the turn is lost.

Bearing off
Once all 15 checkers are in your home board (points 19–24 for White), you may bear them off. An exact roll removes the checker from that point; a higher roll removes from the highest occupied point. You cannot bear off if you have checkers on the bar.

Two Nards in the Sources

Nard I — Bozorgmehr's tables game (this page)

The backgammon-family Nard described in the Chatrang Nama and confirmed by Talmudic reference. Uses a 24-point board, 15 pieces per side, 2 dice. Movement is in opposite directions. Single blots can be hit. This is the ancestor of modern backgammon, which reached Europe via the Arab world in the medieval period.

Nard II — Firdawsi's war game (related to Petteia)

A separate game described in the Shahnameh using an 8×8 board, 8 soldiers and 1 king per side, with custodian capture and 2 dice for movement. H.J.R. Murray interprets this as Ludus Latrunculorum modified with dice, possibly introduced to Persia by Roman legionaries guarding the eastern frontier. This game provides the key clue about the Roman dux piece: the king in Nard II is invulnerable to capture, exactly the rule applied to the dux in our Petteia page.

Primary sources: Bozorgmehr (Wuzurgmihr), Wicarishen i Chatrang ud Nihishen i New-Ardashir (Chatrang Nama), 6th century CE, translated by Tarapore (1932). Firdawsi, Shahnameh, c. 1010 CE. Babylonian Talmud, Ketubot 61b (500–600 CE). Secondary: Murray, H.J.R., A History of Board-Games Other Than Chess, Clarendon Press, 1952; Parlett, D., Oxford History of Board Games, 1999. Web sources: Tatas, M., "Nard – The Original Backgammon," ancientgames.org, 2024; Walker, D., "Nard," cyningstan.com. Intangible heritage: Intangible Cultural Heritage in Tajikistan, UNESCO documentation, 2022.

Nard — نردشیرThe Original Backgammon