Histories

And, according to what they themselves say, the games now in use among them and the Greeks were invented by the Lydians: these, they say, were invented among them at the time when they colonized Etruria (region (general)), Italy, EuropeTyrrhenia. This is their story:

In the reign of Atys son of Manes there was great scarcity of food in all Lydia [27.516,38.683] (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Lydia. For a while the Lydians bore this with what patience they could; presently, when the famine did not abate, they looked for remedies, and different plans were devised by different men. Then it was that they invented the games of dice and knuckle-bones and ball and all other forms of game except dice, which the Lydians do not claim to have discovered.