The Ancient History of Tic Tac Toe — From Roman Pebbles to the Viking Games Family

We're going to be upfront about something before we get into the history: Tic Tac Toe, as most people know it, is not a Viking game. There's no ship burial with an X-and-O grid carved into it. But the game's real ancestry runs straight through the same family of "mill" games that did reach Viking-era Scandinavia — including one we've already written about — and that lineage is genuinely interesting on its own terms.

Older Than You'd Think

Three-in-a-row grid games go back a very long way. Boards resembling a 3×3 grid have been found on Egyptian roofing tiles dating to roughly 1300–1400 BCE, though as with a lot of ancient game history, dating carvings precisely is difficult. What we can say with more confidence is that by around the 1st century BCE, the Romans were playing a game called Terni Lapilli — "three pebbles at a time." Boards have been found chalked and carved into paving stones, columns, and steps across the Roman Empire, from the Forum in Rome itself to Roman outposts in Britain and North Africa, likely spread by soldiers scratching boards wherever they were stationed.

Terni Lapilli wasn't quite modern Tic Tac Toe, though. Each player had only three pieces, and once they were all placed, you had to move them to open spaces to keep playing — there was no simply filling the board and calling it a draw.

The Real Family Connection: Three Men's Morris

Here's where it connects back to territory we've covered before. A close medieval relative of Terni Lapilli was known as Three Men's Morris — the smallest member of the same "morris" game family as Nine Men's Morris, which we know for a fact reached the Viking world: a Nine Men's Morris grid was carved into the reverse side of the gaming board found in the Gokstad ship burial. Three Men's Morris follows the same core logic as its larger sibling — form a line of your own pieces, called a "mill," to win — just scaled down to a simpler 3-pieces-per-player version played on a smaller grid.

The name "morris" itself, incidentally, has nothing to do with English morris dancing — it comes from the Latin merellus, meaning "gaming piece" or "counter."

To be clear: we don't have the kind of direct Viking-era evidence for Three Men's Morris that we have for its larger cousin on the Gokstad board. But it belongs to the exact same ancient lineage of three-and-more-in-a-row grid games that were circulating through Europe during and after the Viking Age — distant cousins sharing the same basic DNA.

From Pebbles to Paper

Three-in-a-row games persisted through medieval Europe under various regional names. The pen-and-paper version most people would recognize today — permanent marks instead of movable pieces — became popular in 18th and 19th century Britain, where it picked up the name "Noughts and Crosses" ("nought" being the British term for zero, describing the O). The now-familiar American name "Tic-Tac-Toe" settled into use in the early 20th century.

The game even has a foothold in computing history: in 1952, a program called OXO, built by British computer scientist Alexander S. Douglas, became one of the very first computer games ever created — and it was, fittingly, Tic Tac Toe.

Like Nine Men's Morris, the modern version of the game has been fully solved mathematically: with perfect play from both sides, every game ends in a draw. The fun, as always, is in the mistakes.

How to Play

The rules are simple enough to explain in under a minute — which is a big part of why the game has survived, in one form or another, for over three thousand years.

Setup

The board is a 3×3 grid of nine open spaces. Two players each take a set of markers — traditionally X and O, though on a physical set like ours, this is usually two different colors or shapes of piece.

Playing a Turn

Players alternate turns, each placing one of their pieces into any empty space on the grid. There's no removing or moving pieces once placed — each space, once filled, stays filled for the rest of the game.

How to Win

The first player to get three of their own pieces in a straight line — horizontally, vertically, or diagonally — wins immediately. There are eight possible winning lines in total: three rows, three columns, and two diagonals.

What Happens If Nobody Wins

If all nine spaces fill up and neither player has completed a line, the game ends in a draw. With two players who both play carefully, this is actually the expected outcome — Tic Tac Toe has been mathematically proven to always end in a draw with perfect play on both sides, which is exactly why it's often used to teach basic strategic thinking to kids before moving on to deeper games like chess or Nine Men's Morris.

A Simple Strategy Tip

If you're playing against a beginner, the single strongest opening move is the center space — it's part of four different possible winning lines at once (one row, one column, both diagonals), more than any other space on the board. Corners are the next best, since each is part of three lines. Edge spaces (top, bottom, left, right middle) are the weakest opening move, each only belonging to two possible lines.

A Genuinely Ancient Game, Reimagined

Our Viking Leather Tic Tac Toe Game doesn't claim to be a Norse artifact — it's a handcrafted leather take on a game whose roots reach back through Rome and, more distantly, through the same "morris" family that genuinely did travel with the Vikings. If you enjoyed the history behind Nine Men's Morris, this is effectively its scaled-down, much older relative — just wearing a more modern name.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can Tic Tac Toe ever be won with perfect play?

No. With perfect play from both sides, Tic Tac Toe always ends in a draw. This has been mathematically proven and is part of why the game is often used to teach basic game theory to children.

What's the best opening move in Tic Tac Toe?

The center square, since it's part of four different possible winning lines. Corners are the next-best choice with three lines each, while edge squares are the weakest opening with only two lines each.

Why is Tic Tac Toe called "Noughts and Crosses" in the UK?

"Nought" is the traditional British word for zero, referring to the O symbol, while "crosses" refers to the X. Both terms describe the same game, just regional naming.

Is Tic Tac Toe a game of skill or luck?

Pure skill; there's no random element involved. Losses typically happen because of a mistake, not chance.