An interesting academic controversy has been going on elsewhere regarding the origins of the game of Backgammon. As is well known, various different countries claim to have invented it, but the historical record is far from clear.

Three of the most interesting contributions to this debate are shown below. Names of contributors have been removed to protect the guilty. We must also apologise for some of the remarks towards the end of the first contribution, which contain generalisations offensive to Greeks and others.

The discussion appears here.