Morabaraba

Morabaraba is a two-player abstract strategy board game from Southern Africa, part of the Morris family of games. It is traditionally played with a grid-like board and pieces often referred to as cows.

The board features 24 intersection points arranged as three nested squares connected at their midpoints, a layout common to Nine Men’s Morris. Each player typically has 12 pieces. The aim is to form mills—three of your pieces in a straight line on the board—to capture or remove the opponent’s pieces.

Gameplay consists of two phases. In the opening phase, players alternate placing their pieces on empty points until all pieces are placed. Whenever a player forms a mill, they remove one of the opponent’s pieces from the board, with the usual caveat that a piece in a mill cannot be removed unless there is no other choice. If all of an opponent’s pieces are in mills, any piece may be removed. In the subsequent moving phase, players slide one of their pieces along an adjacent line to an empty point, continuing to form mills to remove more pieces.

A common rule called “flying” allows a player with only three pieces to move any piece to any empty point, rather than just to adjacent points. The game ends when a player reduces the opponent to two pieces or blocks all legal moves.

Morabaraba is widely played in South Africa and neighboring regions, with regional variations in rules and naming. It is valued as a strategic pastime and cultural tradition.