Alquerque (ancient checkers)

Origins

El Qirkat”, Arabic القرقات, came to medieval Europe via Spain. In France adapted to chessboard, leading to modern draughts/checkers.

Setup

Goal

Capture or lock in all of the opponent’s pieces. The game ends when a player has no pieces left or cannot make any moves.

Game play

Players take turns, each time using only one of their pieces:

"End game"

As soon as only 8 pieces are left on the board, the game moves to the inner 3x3 square:

Differences to checkers