Pente Grammai means "five lines" and was an Ancient Greek game. It has been suggested that this is the game that Ajax and Achilles are shown playing on Greek vases such as the one above, but this is unlikely as the game on the vases uses more than a five-lined board (more than five stones are evident) and is most surely Petteia (aka Polis or City). Pente grammai is played with stones on a five by five board and the game uses dice throws to determine each players moves. This game may be, like other Greek games (i.e. Diagramismos or Grammai), a derivative of an Egyptian game. In the Onamasticon by Pollux he describes the games as follows:
Each of the players has five men on five lines, so that Sophocles naturally says 'five-lined boards and throws of the dice'; and of the five lines on either side there was a middle one called 'the sacred line', and a player who moved a piece from it gave rise to a proverb 'he moves the piece from the sacred line.'
The image above shows what the pente grammai board might have looked like with the sacred line colored. If dice were indeed used in this game then presumably the playing pieces would be lined up (i.e. as in Petteia) and that their moves were determined by throws of the dice in a similar fashion as in Senet, Tabula, or Backgammon. However, it is not entirely clear whether dice were indeed used in this game and the rules are likewise uncertain. Nothing more can be said at this point.
- For further information, see: Greek Board Games
