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Evidence for Jimafesosh
1 pieces of evidence found.
Id DLP.Evidence.1231
Type Ethnography
Location 11° 5'6.65"N, 39°43'53.35"E
Date 1971-01-01 - 1971-12-31
Rules 2x6 board. Four counters in each hole. In the opening phase, the player takes all of the counters in their rightmost hole and places them in the opponent's opposite hole. The player then takes the contents of the next hole, placing all of them into the hole following it, until the entire board has alternating holes with eight and zero counters. When the final hole is made with eight counters, these are picked up and the player sows as normal in an anti-clockwise direction. When the final counter falls into an empty hole, the counters are picked up and sowing continues. When the final counter falls into an empty hole, the player captures the counters in the opposite hole. If a player cannot play, they must pass their turn until there are counters available for them to play. Play continues until there is one piece or fewer on the board, the player to whom the row in which the single piece is located captures it. A second round is played, each player placing four counters into each hole starting from the rightmost hole in their row. The player with more counters gains a hole from their opponent for every four extra balls they've captured. If an opponent has three extra after counting in such a way, they also gain a hole, and if each player has two remaining counters ownership is determined by chance. Play continues in several rounds like this until one player takes all the counters.
Content "Jimafesosh. This game based on two rows each of six holes, with four balls per hole, is different...This Wallo game was played by Ibrahim Yusuf, a Baeda Maryam School student from Kombolcha who says it is known as jimafesosh. The game opens with a distinctive gambit, whereby the first player picks up the contents of his extreme right-hand hole and moves it to his opponent's opposite hole. Moving always in an anti-clockwise direction he moves the contents of his opponent's next hole into the following hole, and proceeds in this manner to redistribute all the balls in an 8, 0, 8, 0 pattern. On dropping the last group of four balls he picks up all eight balls from that hole and then drops them one by one into the following holes, and continues picking up and dropping in the usual manner until he drops his last ball in an empty hole. Captures are effected whenever a player drops the last ball in an empty hole, whereupon he takes the contents, if any, of the opposite row irrespectively as to the side on which this occurs. The ball effecting the capture is not itself taken and the move thereupon ends, it being the next player's turn to move. A characteristic aspect of the game occurs towards the end of a round, for when a player is unable to move for lack of counters, the game does not come to an end, as in some games, but he waits while his opponent plays, the counterless player resuming play whenever he finds himself with counters in any of his holes. Only when one ball is left does the game come to an end, with that ball being appropriated by the owner of the hole in which it is situated. At the end of the round the stronger player will capture holes from the weaker as for example in Game 20. If each player is left with two odd balls...his opponent then has to guess under which finger the grass is concealed, thus having a one in four or five chance of success." Pankhurst 1971: 179.
Confidence 100
Ages Adult
Genders Male
Source Pankhurst, R. 1971. Gabata and Related Board Games of Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia Observer 14(3):154-206.
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