Cribbage was invented in the 1600s, and was created by a man from England called Sir John Suckling, although it evolved from a game called “Noddy”.

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Noddy was a game in the 1500s and was the first card game that had any sort of setup and structure to it.

Noddy was played similar to Cribbage except it never had the “Crib” to it, and was a game for either 2 or 4 players, where you partner up.

Each player would receive 3 cards from a regular deck with aces declared as low. The object is to peg points just like Cribbage up to 31, and then dealing again. So at no point do you count the cards in your own hand, like in Cribbage.

In the 1600s Sir John Suckling took “Noddy” and turned it into the game Cribbage. The basic rules of pegging are the same, however each player now gets 5-6 cards(depending on how many players are playing.

Cribbage really grew to popularity amongst submariners. The oldest submarine actually carries Rear Admiral Richard O’Kanes personal cribbage board onboard.

Cribbage also became famous due to Charles Dicken’s The Old Curiousity Shop, which involved characters teaching others to play Cribbage.

Additional Cribbage History Questions:

I was told recently that the traditional peg colors are blue and white. I have been making boards and would like to be correct in all respects. Any truth to the above?

The majority of cribbage boards in this day and age will always have three colours, which are red, blue and white. Those are the traditionally accepted colours these days.

Looking back in history – one of the earliest games, back when Cribbage was known as Noddy – the pegs were brown and white.

I’ve looked into the histroy of Cribbage boards, and I haven’t seen any definitive answer on what the colours used are. The colours that seem to be on every Cribbage board are actually red and blue. Then there are variants with white and green.

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