Trictrac is the classic French equivalent of Backgammon and played on a virtually identical board with two parallel rows of 12 triangular ‘points’ each, yet it could hardly be more different. In most of the dozens of games played with the same equipment the object of play is for each player to move their 12 pieces from one corner, around the board to the opposite corner, and finally to bear them all off. In Trictrac their object is to score 12 score-points, indicated by moving pegs around holes drilled in the longer sides of the board (à la Cribbage), whether or not all their pieces have been borne. Given that the card game Impérial has been described as Piquet with the scoring of tennis, Trictrac might be described as Backgammon with the scoring of card games. Not surprisingly, it reached its heyday in the 17th Century court of Louis XIV, the self- styled Sun King, which has been described as the gambling-house of state.
In the first treatise on the game, dated 1634, Euverte Jollyvet quite reasonably goes along with the assumption that the name Trictrac onomatopoeically represents the sound made by the pieces clacking on the wooden board. (Even today, no self-respecting Backgammon-player should descend to playing on a relatively soundless leather surface.) Given its status a classic national game, the rules of its 18th Century version ‘Grand Trictrac’ have hardly changed since they were codified by the Abbé Soumille in 1738. They can be seen in all their glory at trictrac.org/PDF/lois_et_regles_du_trictrac.pdf, but, to save you from translating, as Google Translate does, into such nonsense as “In the trictrac march, the ladies can walk the apron from their heel to their corner of rest (twelfth box), then pass on the return to the opposing heel”, you can instead see a virtually identical account in proper English by simply taking a look at the Wikipedia entry for Trictrac.
A possible ancestor of Trictrac, albeit not recorded before the 17th Century, may be reflected in the children’s game of Tourne-Cas. Each starts with three pieces in hand and the winner is the first to get them piled on their twelfth point (coin de repos). Two dice are used, and movement is restricted by the facts that only one piece may occupy one point at a time (other than home), and that no piece may overtake another. The two side’s pieces remain on opposite tables, but one can capture another by landing on the point directly opposite. Variants and similar games included Toccateglio (Italy), Tokkadille (Germany) and Schuster (Sweden).