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Fox, George

Laurie & Whittle's new, moral & entertaining game of the mansion of happiness / invented by George Fox, W.M., author of The cottagers, and various poetical pieces.

13 Octr. 1800

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Laurie & Whittle's new, moral & entertaining game of the mansion of happiness / invented by George Fox, W.M., author of The cottagers, and various poetical pieces, London : Published ... by Robert Laurie & James Whittle, No. 53 Fleet Street, 13 Octr. 1800, Yale Center for British Art, Gift of Ellen and Arthur Liman, Yale JD 1957.




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  • Title(s)

    Laurie & Whittle's new, moral & entertaining game of the mansion of happiness / invented by George Fox, W.M., author of The cottagers, and various poetical pieces.

  • Additional Title(s)

    New, moral & entertaining game of the mansion of happiness
    Mansion of happiness
    At head of sheet: Virtue rewarded and vice punished

  • Published/Created

    London : Published ... by Robert Laurie & James Whittle, No. 53 Fleet Street, 13 Octr. 1800.

  • Physical Description

    1 game : hand-colored engraving ; sheet 47 x 58 cm, folded to 12 x 19 cm

  • Holdings

    Rare Books and Manuscripts
    Folio B 2021 1d
    Yale Center for British Art, Gift of Ellen and Arthur Liman, Yale JD 1957
    Accessible in the Study Room [Request]

  • Copyright Status

    Public Domain

  • Notes

    The rules of the game appear in the middle of the game sheet.
    Liman, E. Georgian and Victorian board games, pages 48-49
    Seville, A. Royal game of the goose: 400 years of printed board games, no. 69
    Whitehouse, F.R.B. Table games of Georgian and Victorian days, page 51
    Selected exhibitions: "Instruction and Delight: Children's Games from the Ellen and Arthur Liman Collection" (Yale Center for British Art, 17 January-23 May, 2019).
    This game was played with dice, unusual for the period because of its association with gambling. The path to the central panel, the "Mansion of Happiness" (a depiction of Oatlands Park, the home of the Duchess of York, Frederica Charlotte of Prussia, to whom the game was dedicated), was paved with various rewards and hazards. A player who landed on square labeled "Piety, Honesty, Sobriety or Gratitude,” for example, could move ahead six spaces, while the player landing on "Perjurer, Cruelty, Immodesty, or Ingratitude," 'must return to his former situation, till his turn comes to throw again, & not even think of Happiness, much less partake of it."
    "As the title indicates, this is a game of moral improvement, probably one of the earliest British board games, the most famous, influential, and, unfortunately for the artist George Fox, the most copied ..."--Liman.
  • Subject Terms

    Conduct of life -- Juvenile literature. |
    Educational games. |
    Liman, Ellen and Arthur -- Provenance.

  • Form/Genre

    Board games. | Engravings -- Hand-colored -- 1800. | Games -- Great Britain. | Recreations -- Great Britain.

  • Contributors

    Laurie & Whittle.

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Instruction and Delight: Children's Games from the Ellen and Arthur Liman Collection (Yale Center for British Art, January 17, 2019-May 23, 2019) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

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