[History of MAHJONG - Front page]

Evolution of Various Forms of Mahjong (1890-2001)
by Thierry Depaulis and Cofa Tsui (January 2007) (Updated February 26, 2007 - See log at bottom for details)

Introduction

It took a long time to set it up, but we can say we have come to a satisfying tabulated presentation of the most prominent features which characterise the main variants of mahjong in China over the past century, starting with Wilkinson (1890) and ending with Amy Lo (2001). The presentation is located at http://www.imahjong.com/maiarchives205d_3.html where current and updated data will be maintained.

The idea, which was Thierry Depaulis's, was at first tabulated by Tom Sloper (http://www.sloperama.com/mahjongg/analysis.html), and slightly revised later. However, Cofa Tsui wanted the purposes of the chart to be for comparing features of any newer variants of mahjong in relation to the older forms, so as to provide a convenient mean to view the evolutions/developments of various forms over time, and this would require more features to be included, something which Thierry encouraged him to sketch. They have decided to cooperate.

This was an opportunity to check all features in the quoted sources (see "References to Sources"), to discuss and discuss again any difficult point, so to reach an agreement. We decided to drop the "Hallmark feature" highlight, since we thought it is too subjective. We have tried to be as "neutral" as possible. We also decided to remove feature "Self-pick rewarded" from our initial chart. Thierry noticed that "self-pick win" is rewarded in all known variants, either in the form of "points" or "fans," hence there is nothing discriminant for this item to be kept in the chart.

We now have 9 distinctive features, for which we have tried to say whether YES or NO the said variant is in agreement. When no data was available we have left the cell blank; when we had doubts, we have put a question mark.

From this analysis table it clearly appears that the mahjong game as played in the Late Qing novels, from Han's "Flowers of Shanghai" (1892) to Lu Shi'e's "Ten-Tailed Turtle" (1911) -- eventually extended to the Anonymous Zuijin guanchang mimi shi ("The Officials' Latest Secret History"), 1922 -- is a better candidate for a "classical" form, as played in Shanghai, the then homeland of mahjong. This is why we have chosen it as "reference gameplay", using simple terms YES or NO to mean whether a feature in another ruleset was the same (YES) or the opposite (NO) and different background colours to enhence the visual effects (where your print media supports).

We also assigned a location (region) to each variant, at least when enough data tell us.

This improved analysis table is certainly not definitive, and comments, suggestions, corrections are most welcome.

Thierry Depaulis and Cofa Tsui
February 12, 2007
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Chart Showing Evolutions of Various Forms of Mahjong (1890-2001)

References to Sources

1890 Wilkinson = Sir William Henry Wilkinson. Mah-Jongg [ma que]: a memorandum. Amsterdam : Continental Mah-Jongg Sales Co., 1925. See thread "Mahjong rules... in 1890", 4 Dec 2002. [LINK]

1892-1911 Late Qing = Late Qing Chinese novels from Shanghai (by Han Bangqing, Sun Jiazhen, Li Boyuan, Ouyang Juyuan, Zhang Chunfan, Lu Shi'e and others, from 1892 to 1912). See threads Earliest Chinese reference to "ma que" (Nov-Dec 2006), Charting archaic rules (Jan 2007), Analysis of rules - A game of the year 1903 (Jan 2007), Excerpts of ancient Chinese novels mentioning Maque (Jan 2007), etc.

1915 Mauger = George Edward Mauger, "Quelques considérations sur les jeux en Chine et leur développement synchronique avec celui de l'empire chinois", Bulletins et Mémoires de la Société d'Anthropologie de Paris, VI (1915), pp. 228-81 (rules of "Ma-Tchio-Pai" pp. 271-7).

1920s CC-like = mainly based on Joseph P. Babcock, Babcock's rules for Mah-Jongg : the red book of rules, Second edition revised and enlarged including full code of official laws and examples of illustrative hands. San Francisco : Mah-Jongg Sales Company of America ; Shanghai : Mah-Jongg Company of China, 1923, chapter VIII "The Chinese Game"

1920s New Method = Babcock 1923 + Tchou Kia-Kien [Zhu Jiajian], Le jeu de mah-jong tel qu'il est joué par les Chinois, Paris, 1924.

1930s Japanese Classical = based on "Japanese games: Classical and Modern, written by Mr. ITO Kazuo, minor editing by Alan KWAN Shiu Ho" at http://home.netvigator.com/~tarot/Mahjong/Japanese-en.txt

1940-1950 Shanghai New Style = as in Perlmen & Chan 1979 and Lo 2001

1950 Nguyen (HKOS) = Nguyên Xuân Mai. Le mah-jong : guide complet. Jeu avec les 8 rois supplémentaires. Haiphong : selfpublished, 1950. (TD's collection)

1979 HKOS Perlmen & Chan = Samuel K. Perlmen & Mark Kai-Chi Chan, The Chinese game of Mahjong. Hong Kong : Book Marketing, 1979 (reprinted 1984, 1989).

2001 HKOS Amy Lo = Amy Lo [Lu Meizhen], The book of Mahjong: an illustrated guide. Boston / Rutland, VT : Tuttle Publishing, 2001.

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About the authors:

Thierry Depaulis, Paris, France. Played mahjong in the 1980s but has switched to game history. Playing-card and games collector. Chairman of the International Playing-Card Society. Editor and prepress manager.

Cofa Tsui, Vancouver, Canada. Started playing mahjong (HKOS) in the mid-1970s. Owner of the IMJ Infoweb (iMahjong.com). Real estate licensee in the province of British Columbia.

Copyright 2007 Thierry Depaulis and Cofa Tsui.
(File: IMJ\maiarchives205d_3.html)

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Updates Log:

2007-02-26: Minor correction made to fields along the row of feature "FEWER or NO special hands."

2007-02-23: Feature "Self-pick rewarded" was put back to the table - Thanks to participants in the discussions of the MJ newsgroup. Changed the year period of Shanghai New Style and rearranged the column position.