Cultural Transmission in Printed Games of Cupid: Tracing Lines of Descent

The study traces the descent of printed Game of Cupid versions, a dice-based race game derived from the Game of the Goose, across France, the Low Countries, and Britain between roughly 1600 and 1850. Its central thesis is that the game's printed evolution can be modelled as a single tree of descent, driven by vertical cultural transmission from a common prototype rather than by horizontal borrowing among competing publishers. The authors examine twelve surviving examples, applying thirteen markers such as entry-gate icons, toll payments, the "death" space, track decoration, centre motifs, and end spaces, alongside more than fifty high-level attributes of rules, layout, numerology, and iconography.

The analysis identifies the Veuve Petit game (c. 1610) as the French prototype, from which Flemish and Dutch derivatives, notably those of de Jode and Visscher, descend, while Garrett's game serves as the prototype for later British versions. Strikingly, at least three quarters of the attributes examined show no variation across the sample, which the authors read as evidence of direct copying rather than independent invention. A comparative marker table and a quantified tree-of-descent table record how many of each game's thirteen markers derive from each predecessor, providing the study's principal empirical support.

Beyond lineage, the authors argue that the game's development was driven mainly by a shift away from medieval numerology and symbolism toward a more modern, rational outlook. Their most consequential conclusion is that rules and board design evolved through the same transmission process, which challenges the assumption that different attributes of board games change along separate trajectories. The methodology, combining rules analysis, iconography, and printing history, offers a model for tracing lines of descent in printed games more broadly.