Although Go is not the oldest game in the world, it is the only one that has maintained an active base of players for more than three millennia. How does a board game manage to beat time at its own game and escape oblivion? One of the keys is probably the simplicity of its rules and its depth, which, for some, make its existence an inevitability. Over the centuries, players' perception of Go has been transformed, thanks to the ease with which its system incorporates new interpretations. Thus, we can divide its history into eras from a pragmatic perspective. Mythical Era The origins of the game are uncertain, and the various theories are still debated by specialist scholars, so we will leave that discussion for another time. In any case, the earliest material remains we have belong to the Western Han Dynasty. It is this fragment of a board found in the Mausoleum of Emperor Jing Di, who reigned in the mid-2nd century BC. We know it's a Go board by the mark of the starting point. If we turn to the literature, ancient Chinese texts attribute its creation to the Mausoleum of Emperor Jing Di 景帝 (unearthed in 1990) various legendary emperors such as Yao (堯) or Shun (舜) (24th to 22nd centuries BCE), as an educational activity to instruct their sons. One of the oldest written references to have come down to us is the Analects of Confucius (6th to 5th centuries BCE), where, paradoxically, the negative effect the game can have on children is criticized, appealing to one of the foundations of Confucian thought: filial piety. The disciples of the sage found in Go a representation of Confucian virtues and reshaped their discourse accordingly, as we can see in the poem Yizhi (弈旨) by Ban Gu (班固), the first treatise devoted exclusively to Go, written during the first century of our era: The board must be square, so as to represent the Earth; the lines must be straight, so that the Virtues may manifest themselves. The stones are black and white, so that yin and yang may be divided; The stones are scattered across the board, to resemble the constellations. With these four elements, the game now depends on the players— Just as the governance of a kingdom depends on its monarch. Likewise, Taoism also regards weiqi (围棋) as a reflection of the universe, and it is one of the philosophies that has taken deepest root in our understanding of the game, contributing legends such as that of the woodcutter whose axe handle rots away while he watches a game of Go, which would become popular in Japan through waka poetry during the 9th century (Ranka, or 爛柯, is another way of referring to Go in Japanese, meaning to lose track of time while immersed in a game or some other activity). Although much later, the Qijing Shisanpian (or Thirteen Treatises on the Game of Go, 11th century) states that "The number of the ten thousand beings originates from the one. "Therefore, the three hundred sixty intersections of the Weiqi board also have their one." Here he is referring to the Tengen, or central point, quoting the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu (老子). The Tao, though difficult to define, is reflected in the game through concepts such as the flow of the stones, the intuition of the masters, or the struggle between Yin and Yang to maintain balance. We can see, then, that the simplicity of the rules and the abstract nature of Go lent themselves to multiple interpretations by different schools of philosophy, which imbued the game with their values and could thus use it as a vehicle for spreading them through the various strata of society in a playful way. Returning to the material evidence, the Go boards found in the grave goods of various Chinese emperors show that the game became a pastime of the elites and those close to them, with boards having been unearthed that belonged to the guard, and not only to the sovereign. This would be another of the most important dynamics for the game's survival: its adoption by the ruling classes, in China as well as in Japan, and its later spread to the classes that aspired to hold power. Courtly Era The arrival of Go in Japan has also been obscured by the veil of time, but it can be said with certainty that it came from China by way of the Kingdom of Baekje (present-day Korea), accompanied by Buddhism, at some point between the 6th and 7th centuries, with a 19x19 board. One of the oldest ever unearthed dates precisely from the 6th century. It belonged to the Sui Dynasty and was made of porcelain, Sui Dynasty (581-618), in the Henan Museum, China. Image taken from the Survey of Chinese Ceramics, with no space at the edges, so it is suspected that, since it was not playable, it was built specifically as a funerary object, a fact that gives it great ritual importance. In those days, China was regarded as a model of refinement by the Japanese courtiers. They adopted its clothing, its laws, its religion, and its pastimes as well. Thus Weiqi (围棋) became Igo (囲碁), and it was embraced with enthusiasm in Nara, the capital that would found the first Buddhist temple in Japan. So much so that the Taiho Legal Code of 701 prohibited monks from betting on games of Go. Interpretation of a scene from chapter 3 of the Genji Monogatari, made c. 1852 by the artist Utagawa Toyokuni (歌川豊国), in which Prince Genji spies from behind a screen on Lady Utsusemi and her stepdaughter as they play Go. From its arrival in Japan until the 14th century, Go enjoyed enormous popularity at the Heian court, in present-day Kyoto, as attested by the literary classics The Tale of Genji and The Pillow Book, whose characters display a specific knowledge of the game that must necessarily have been shared by both their authors and the courtly audience of the time. For example, the author Sei Shonagon uses game-related metaphors to speak in code about the romantic relationships of various characters. The importance of the Fujiwara family in court affairs, which devoted itself to marrying its daughters to emperors in order to maintain its hegemonic position for hundreds of years, is also worth noting for its fondness for organizing games and wagers, making it a great promoter and spreader of the game beyond the Imperial Palace. By bringing the game to more distant provinces, they shared court culture and fostered socialization and diplomacy through the board. Later compilations of tales and stories such as the Konjaku Monogatari (13th century) show us that it was during this period that the idea of the handicap first appeared and the foundations were laid for the Japanese rules we play by today, unlike the variants on the Asian continent, which still began the game with stones placed in advance. The refinement of the arts for which the Heian period has gone down in history is therefore not limited to literature or painting, but extends to Go as well. Game between Kanren (right) and Emperor Uda (left, in orange), from the Yamato Monogatari As mentioned, the Chinese model of imitation brought arts and customs of all kinds to Japan, which also continued to exist on the mainland. In the case of Go, it became one of the four arts that every good gentleman at the court of the Tang dynasty (618–907) was expected to master: painting, calligraphy, the guqin (a traditional stringed instrument), and weiqi. Buddhist Era The first kifu recorded in Japan is attributed to a game between the monk Nichiren (founder of the sect of the same name) and his brother and disciple Kichijomaru (or Nichirou), in 1253. Although the copy that has come down to us is considered a forgery, the relationship between the Nichiren school and Go endured for many years. In fact, the first Honinbo was a monk of this school, as we will see later. As we have already said, the game reached the land of the rising sun hand in hand with Buddhism, so why distinguish a Buddhist era? Because its adoption brought certain changes and new dynamics that would help Go withstand the passage of time. The first curiosity is that the monks cut off the sleeves of their robes so as not to accidentally move the stones on the board with them; the second, unfortunately, is the exclusion of women from the game, since monasteries usually had only male members, unlike the court. This gender segregation was gradual and pressing, and it would not be broken until well into the Meiji era, in the late 19th century. Finally, because the game was taught in the monasteries, the seed was planted for what would become the great Go houses, several of them, incidentally, associated with the Nichiren school. The Kamakura period (1185 to 1333) is characterized by the establishment of a new military government, or Bakufu, the first shogunate in the history of Japan, as well as by new Buddhist schools with more popular roots and, therefore, a vocation to spread Go beyond the upper social classes. Monks preserved the game by passing it from masters to disciples, and with the importation of Buddhism Chan (known in Japan as Zen) elevated the status of Go from a simple pastime and a source of sin, owing to its tendency toward gambling, to a meditative practice that connected players with their Buddha nature. In this regard, the Rinzai school's belief in spontaneous enlightenment through artistic, recreational, and martial activities made it a philosophy that was very easy to practice, and therefore attractive to a range of social classes. The relationship between Buddhist monks and Go is one more way in which the game became attached to the elites of Japan, and it has a great deal to do with its adoption by the court. When the tradition began of Japanese emperors taking Buddhist vows upon retiring, many brought their favorite pastime with them and spent the rest of their lives devoted to it. Just as the game was adapted by the Heian court as a way of imitating the courts of China, the Kamakura Bakufu also drew inspiration from the earlier cultural refinement as a means of legitimizing its dominant position. This ushered in a new era during which most players were no longer monks and courtiers, although their customs would endure, giving way to the country's new elite: the samurai. Published in La Esquina #011 (November 2026). Download the complete magazine as a PDF
