Rimau-rimau

rdf:langString Rimau-rimau

rdf:langString Rimau-rimau is a two-player abstract strategy board game that belongs to the hunt game family. This family includes games like Bagh-Chal, Main Tapal Empat, Aadu puli attam, Catch the Hare, Sua Ghin Gnua, the Fox games, Buga-shadara, and many more. Rimau-rimau is the plural of rimau which is an abbreviation of the word harimau, meaning 'tiger' in the Malay language. Therefore, rimau-rimau means 'tigers'. The several hunters attempting to surround and immobilize the tigers are called orang-orang, which is the plural of orang, meaning 'man'. Therefore, orang-orang means 'men' and there are twenty-two or twenty-four of them, depending on which version of the game is played. The game originates from Malaysia. Rimau-rimau is specifically part of the tiger hunt game family (or tiger game family) since its board consists in part of an Alquerque board. In contrast, Leopard games are also hunt games, but use a more triangular-patterned board and not an Alquerque-based board. Fox games are also hunt games, but use a patterned board that resembles a cross. Two versions of this game are described below: Version A and Version B. Both use two rimau-rimau (two tigers). The main difference is that Version A uses 24 orang-orang while Version B uses only 22 orang-orang. There is also a single rimau version to this game aptly called Rimau with very similar rules. Stewart Culin in his book Chess and Playing Cards: Catalogue of Games and Implements for Divination Exhibited by the United States National Museum in Connection with the Department of Archaeology and Paleontology of the University of Pennsylvania at the Cotton States and International Exposition (1898) briefly describes the game with an illustration and refers to it as "Dam Hariman or Tiger Game, the Malayan Game of Fox and Geese". Culin does not actually describe the rules, but since he compares it to Fox and Geese, then it can be assumed to be a hunt game; moreover it is in the section of the book that deals with hunt games. There are many names and variants of the game (see Variants section). From here on, the rimau or rimau-rimau will be simply referred to as tiger and tigers respectively. The same also applies to the orang and orang-orang, and they will be referred to as man and men respectively.