John Jefferys

John Jefferys, is the first game designer to whom a game design can be definitively ascribed (in the Anglophone world).[1]

For the clockmaker of the same name (1701-1754), see John Jefferys (clockmaker).

Life

He is the designer of the 1759 game A Journey Through Europe, which was based upon Game of the Goose.[2][3][4][5] The game is inscribed "Invented and sold by the Proprietor, John Jefferys, at his house in Chapel Street, near the Broad Way, Westmr. Writing Master, Accompt. Geographer, etc. Printed for Carrington Bowles, Map & Printseller, No 69 in St. Paul's Church Yard, London. Price 8s. Published as the Act directs, September 14th, 1759."[6] The game was among the oldest English cartographic board games.[7][5]

As with most 18th century British original board games, it is a track game, with the kind of game mechanics familiar in track games today (e.g., landing on certain spaces advances you or sends you back to other spaces). Rather than using dice, players used a teetotum, a multi-sided top, with a number on each side, players moving the number of spaces indicated by the uppermost side when the top falls. (Dice were considered gambling instruments, and not appropriate in Christian households.) The game was designed to help players learn about geographical features of the European Continent.[8]

References
  1. Marsden, Rhodri (13 September 2014). "Rhodri Marsden's Interesting Objects: The first British board game". Indy/Life: Independent Print Limited. The Independent. Archived from the original on 13 June 2022. Retrieved 26 September 2019.
  2. Margaret Drabble (September 2010). The Pattern in the Carpet: A Personal History with Jigsaws. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. p. 107. ISBN 978-0-547-38609-6. Retrieved 26 September 2019.
  3. Dove, Jane (2 January 2016). "Geographical board game: promoting tourism and travel in Georgian England and Wales". Journal of Tourism History. 8 (1): 1–18. doi:10.1080/1755182X.2016.1140825. ISSN 1755-182X.
  4. Seville, Adrian (31 December 2008). "The geographical Jeux de l'Oie of Europe". Belgeo. Revue belge de géographie (3–4): 427–444. doi:10.4000/belgeo.11907. ISSN 1377-2368.
  5. Seville, Adrian (April 2008). "The Sociable Game of the Goose". Proceedings of Board Game Studies Colloquium. XI: 1005–1006 – via Academia.edu.
  6. FRB Whitehouse: Table Games of Georgian and Victorian Days, London, 1951, revised 2nd edition Priory House (Herfortshire) 1971, p. 6f.
  7. Edney, Matthew H.; Pedley, Mary Sponberg (15 May 2020). The History of Cartography, Volume 4: Cartography in the European Enlightenment. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-33922-1.
  8. Kelly, John F. "The Dice of Life". The Washington Post. Retrieved 3 January 2021.


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