International Cribbage Day Date in the current year: February 10, 2024

Cribbage, sometimes shortened to crib, is a fast-paced card game where players play and group cards in combinations to gain points. To win the game, one needs to be the first to score a certain number of points, usually 61 or 121. Cribbage is a two-player game, but it can be adapted for three or four players.

Cribbage developed from noddy, an English card game that originated around the 16th century. Noddy is the oldest card game of this type. According to English biographer John Aubrey, cribbage was invented by Sir John Suckling, an English poet who was also an avid and skilled card player. Suckling came up with the game sometime in the 1630s. The earliest rules of cribbage can be found in the second edition of John Cotgrave’s Wit’s Interpreter published in 1662.

English settlers brought cribbage to the New World where it quickly became popular among colonists. Fishermen and sailors readily adopted the game as a way to pass the time because it required only two players. During the Gold Rush, cribbage became popular among prospectors in the American West.

Cribbage is played with a standard 52-card deck (without the jokers). Although there are relatively few rules and they don’t seem complicated, cribbage has many subtleties that make it so interesting and popular. Players employ different tactics and strategies to become the first to score the required number of points and win the game.

Cribbage is one of the most visually recognizable card games due to its scoring board that has a series of holes (“streets”) for pegs (“spilikins”) that are used to tally the score. It is possible to play cribbage without a board and keep scores on a piece of paper, but playing with the cribbage board is much easier because scores need to be tallied throughout the game. Cribbage boards come in various designs.

The history of International Cribbage Day dates back to 2017, when the American Cribbage Congress (ACC) established National Cribbage Day. The ACC is a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting cribbage among people of all ages through sanctioned tournaments held across North America. Later on the UK Cribbage Association (UKCA), founded in 2017 to increase the number of cribbage players in the United Kingdom, supported the initiative, and Cribbage Day went international.

On the occasion of International Cribbage Day, the ACC and the UKCA organize demonstrations, workshops, and tournaments to get people interested in the game. You can celebrate the holiday by participating in one of these events or simply playing cribbage with your friends and family. Other ways to celebrate include learning more about the history of cribbage and its inventor, and spreading the word about the holiday on social media with the hashtags #International CribbageDay and #CribbageDay.