Vintage Chad valley snakes and ladders board game

Vintage Chad valley snakes and ladders board game personally I think this would make a fantastic art piece framed and hung in a child's bedroom etc some age related wear 37 cm square ( price is for board only)

The history of Snakes and Ladders can be traced back to ancient India, where it was originally known as Moksha Patam or Mokshapat:

Origin

The game was invented in the 13th century by the Marathi saint and philosopher Sant Dnyaneshwar as a way to teach children about morality.

Gameplay

Players roll dice and move their game piece along a board, climbing ladders and avoiding snakes. The board is divided into squares, each representing a virtue or vice. Players move up the board to represent a life journey, with ladders representing good deeds and snakes representing bad deeds. The goal is to reach the top of the board, which represents enlightenment.

Early versions

The game was originally played with cowrie shells as dice, and the board was decorated with images of animals and deities. The original Hindu version had more snakes than ladders, representing the difficulty of a moral path.

Other names

The game has also been known by other names, including Gyan Chauper, Leela, and Paramapada Sopanapata.

Introduction to the United Kingdom

The British colonial community in India adopted the game, and it was introduced in Victorian England in 1892. The Victorians adapted it to reflect Victorian ideas of morality.

Other versions

A similar game called Chutes and Ladders was published by the Milton Bradley Company starting in 1943.

The company has its roots in a printing business established by Anthony Bunn Johnson in Birmingham in the early 19th century. Under the management of his son Joseph and grandson Alfred the company moved to the suburb of Harborne, in the valley of a stream called the Chad Brook, giving its name to the Chad Valley district, from which the company name is derived.

Chad Valley made a decision to expand their range to soft toys before World War I. They mass-produced their new Teddy bears in Harborne[1]

In 1938 the company received a royal warrant as 'Toymakers to H.M. The Queen'.[2] When Princess Elizabeth acceded to the throne in 1952 the warrant was changed to read 'Toymakers to H.M. Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother'.[1]

The company moved away from manufacturing toys in the Second World War. Instead they produced goods to help the war effort such as wooden instrument cases, cases for the barrels of anti-aircraft guns, hospital beds and electrical coils and starters.[2]

The box cover of a 1930 Jigsaw of Cunard's RMS Aquitania made by the Chad Valley company

In 1945 the company resumed toy production. Tin plate toys were produced for the first time although manufacture was outsourced to Metal Box, a company with the skills and machinery needed to produce printed toys. This new tin plate range was such a success that in 1946 the company moved production in-house. They purchased the Birmingham metalworking company AS Cartwright to cut and fold metal, Winfield to produce clockwork mechanisms and Barronia Metals and True to Type Products to produce precision engineering equipment.[3]

The radio broadcaster Kenneth Horne was Chairman and Managing Director of the company from 1956 to 1958.[4]

The company was one of the UK's leading toymakers for most of the 20th century; by 1960 it was operating seven factories and employing over 1,000 people. In the 1970s, however, it closed several factories and cuts were made in staffing and production, and 1975 saw only two factories remaining. The company was taken over by Palitoy in 1978.[2]

The brand name was bought by Woolworths in 1988 and remained in use until that company's insolvency in 2009. Home Retail Group, the parent company of retailers Homebase and Argos, purchased the brand for £5 million in January 2009.[5] The Chad Valley brand is now available exclusively at Argos. In March 2016, Sainsbury's bought Home Retail Group for approximately £1.4 billion and Chad Valley became a brand of Sainsbury's.[6