Warri Board Game

Warri is a board game, variants of which are played all over Africa. The Sierra Leone version consists of a carved wooden board in which two rows of six cups are set alongside one another, with two larger receptacles at either end. It is played by distributing counters anti-clockwise. This example has a hollowed out base, with a rectangular cavity for storing counters. the cavity is decorated with incised geometric patterns. There is a similar example at the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, collected in the 1850s, and thought to be Vai. This was originally part of the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum collection. It was acquired by the British Museum in 1954.

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Further Information

• Type: Games, toys, models
• Object: Warri Board Game
• Materials: Wood
• Culture Group: Vai
• Dimensions: 615mm [L] x 130mm [W] x 185mm [C]
• Production Date: Pre 1954
• Associated Places: Unknown
• Associated People: Wellcome Historical Medical Museum
• Museum: British Museum
• Accession Number: BM:Af.1954.23.2933

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