Games are made of many materials. Here are some resources that may be apropos when examining and researching games.
Wood
Game boxes have been made of wood, sometimes with a sliding wooden lid and sometimes with a hinged lid.
Game pieces have been made of wood, such as chess and checkers pieces, dominoes, tiddlywinks cups, and dice.
Some game box bottoms have paper-covered wooden sides but a cardboard base.
Cardboard and Paper
By far the most common material used in games is cardboard and paper. In fact, a game industry inside joke is to call games “twisted cardboard”.
Vegetable Ivory
Vegetable ivory is a material used in game pieces derived from plant sources. Vegetable ivory was used as a cheaper and more adaptable resource for game pieces than bone and ivory. The following resources discuss vegetable ivory:
- Eugene T. Doren, “Vegetable Ivory and Other Palm Nuts/Seeds as an Art/Craft Medium”, October 1997 issue of Principes (archived)
- W. P. Armstrong, “Vegetable Ivory, Saving Elephants and the Rain Forest”, updated 2010 (archived)
Ivory
Ivory is obtained from the bones of mammals. Ivory game pieces are generally associated with games produced substantially before 1900. While some games before and mostly thereafter may suggest that they have “ivory” pieces, truth be told that most games in the late 19th Century and beyond do not include true animal ivory. They are more likely to include “vegetable ivory” and then, in the 1920s and beyond, Bakelite materials. In any case, the following resources discuss ivory:
- Identifying Different Types of Ivory (archived)
- Storage and Handling of Ivory (archived)
- Cleaning and Repairing Ivory (archived)
Plastics
Plastics pervade the modern era. Many modern games (1930s and beyond) include plastic pieces. These involve Bakelite, Catalin, Celluloid, and the many modern plastics thereafter.
- Identification of Plastics
- Celluloid (French Ivory): Distinguishing bone, ivory, and celluloid
- Bakelite: History and identification of Bakelite, Lucite, and Celluloid