What is Gonu?
Gonu is a family of traditional Korean two player games played on a diagram drawn in the dirt or on paper, moving pebbles one point at a time. You win by blocking your opponent so they cannot move, or by capturing their pieces.
Regional names include goni, kkoni, kkon and kkonu, and on Jeju Island it is called kkonja. Each board shape has its own name and rules, so there are many kinds. This page has three of the best known: Well Gonu (umul gonu), Pumpkin Gonu (hobak gonu) and Gonjil Gonu.
How are the three games different?
| Game | Pieces | Board | How to win |
|---|---|---|---|
| Well Gonu | 2 each | Square with diagonals, one side is a well | Leave the opponent with no move |
| Pumpkin Gonu | 3 each | Circle with a cross, a home at each end | Leave the opponent with no move |
| Gonjil Gonu | 12 each | Three nested squares, 24 points | Make lines of three until the opponent has two pieces |
How do you play Well Gonu?
Each player starts with two pieces on the corners. Take turns sliding one piece along a line to the empty point. If you cannot move on your turn, you lose. There is no line on the side with the well, so pieces cannot cross it.
- Board: a square with both diagonals and one side left open for the well. There are five points, the four corners and the center.
- First move: the first player may not move the piece next to the well into the center. That move would trap both enemy pieces at once and end the game on move one. The rule is so well known that Koreans have a saying about the "first move of Well Gonu".
- Outcome: with careful play on both sides the game never ends. Our computer checked all 58 positions that can come up and found no forced win for either side, so this version calls it a draw after 50 moves.
The board is almost the same as the Chinese game Pong Hau K'i.
What are the rules of Pumpkin Gonu?
Each player starts with three pieces in their home and moves one step at a time. A piece that leaves home can never enter either home again, and you win when your opponent has no legal move. It is also called sabal gonu (bowl gonu) or dwaeji gonu (pig gonu).
- Board: a round "pumpkin" with a cross inside and a home at the top and bottom. The three home points all lead to one entrance point on the circle.
- Blocking the entrance: pieces still at home are stuck as soon as the entrance is taken. Holding the entrance is the strongest idea in the game.
- Regional differences: some sources play with four pieces each, and some let a piece enter the enemy home but never leave it. Board drawings also vary a little. This version follows the Korean Ministry of Culture's description: three pieces and no entering either home.
- Move limit: no result after 60 moves is a draw.
How do you play Gonjil Gonu?
Players take turns placing 12 pieces each on a 24 point board. Three of your pieces in a row across, down or on a diagonal make a "kkon", and you take one enemy piece. You win when your opponent is down to two pieces or cannot move.
- Placing: put one piece on any empty point. A point where a piece was taken gets a stake, and nobody may place there.
- Moving: once all 12 are placed the stakes come out, and you slide pieces one step along the lines to make new rows of three. Opening a row and closing it again counts.
- Two rows at once: in this version, one move that makes two rows takes two pieces.
It is also known as chamgonu ("true gonu"), and it was considered the richest of all the gonu games. Sources describe the finish a little differently, either "two pieces left" or "fewer than three", so this version ends the game when a player has fewer than three. In the moving phase, 60 moves without a capture is a draw. The board is close to the African game Morabaraba and to Twelve Men's Morris.
How old is Gonu?
Nobody knows exactly when it began. A gonu board scratched into a piece from a Goryeo celadon kiln site in Jinan, North Jeolla, suggests people were playing it by the early Goryeo period.
A genre painting album by Kim Hong-do from the late Joseon period, now a Korean Treasure, shows boys who went to gather firewood playing gonu on the ground, though some read the scene as a different game. The name is said to come from an old word meaning "to compete". Because it was a game of ordinary people and children rather than the scholar class, written records are few. The American ethnologist Stewart Culin described it in his 1895 book Korean Games.
Tips
- In Well Gonu, check your opponent's reply before you move. Analysis shows that looking just two moves ahead is enough never to lose, so almost every loss comes from missing the trap right in front of you.
- In Pumpkin Gonu, guard the entrance. If your pieces are still at home when the opponent takes the entrance, they are all trapped. Always know how the rest of your pieces will get out.
- In Gonjil Gonu, build a swing row. A piece that can step back and forth and complete a row every time cannot be stopped.
- Block two in a row first. While placing, the empty point next to two enemy pieces in a line is about to become a kkon.
We worked out our Pumpkin Gonu board to the end by computer: the player who moves first can always win with perfect play. That is why Hard is tough to beat when the computer goes first. Wins, losses and draws are saved in this browser for each game and level.