Geography Atlas
Things this atlas does not know. Each entry is a question that specialists
have posed and not settled, recorded with what would actually resolve it and which
expertise the answer needs.
These are kept deliberately, rather than quietly omitted. An atlas that shows
only what it is sure of implies a confidence it has not earned, and the gaps are often where
the interesting work is. Several sit exactly where two fields fail to meet: identifying the
hyssop of the Hebrew Bible needs a botanist and a philologist of Biblical Hebrew, and neither
one settles it alone.
Grouped by the part of the atlas the question sits in. Start here if you know the territory better than the technique.
Not Yet Classified 7
Senet
What were the original playing rules of Senet?
Open Senet
Why It Is Open Ancient Egyptian graves and tomb art preserve Senet boards, pieces and depictions of play across three thousand years, but no surviving Egyptian text records the turn sequence, throw values or capture rules the game actually used.
What Would Settle It A surviving ancient Egyptian text describing how Senet was played, which has never been recovered. Modern rule sets, including the reconstruction proposed by Egyptologist Timothy Kendall, are scholarly inference from board and artwork evidence rather than an attested original ruleset.
Expertise Needed Egyptology
Question posed in
The Oxford History of Board Games.
Nine Men's Morris
Where and when did Nine Men's Morris originate?
Open Nine Men's Morris
Why It Is Open Boards matching the Nine Men's Morris grid are scratched into stone across Africa, Asia and Europe, some far older than the game's own securely dated literary record, but a carved grid alone does not prove play took place at that site or identify which culture first originated the game.
What Would Settle It A securely dated depiction or written description of actual play, earlier than every rival claim, which has not been identified.
Expertise Needed Archaeology
Question posed in
The Oxford History of Board Games.
Oware
Is Oware's origin genuinely Ashanti, or does the tradition preserve a later legend rather than documented history?
Open Oware
Why It Is Open Sources describe Oware's Ashanti origin as widely believed rather than documented; the marriage naming legend itself is oral tradition, and no independent archaeological or textual evidence fixes a date or founding community for the game.
What Would Settle It Archaeological or documentary evidence, such as a dated textual reference or an excavated board, that independently confirms or displaces the Ashanti-origin tradition.
Expertise Needed African archaeology / game history
Question posed in
Wikipedia, Oware, History section.
Bao
Does the 1658 French account of a game among the Sakalava of Madagascar (Fifangha) describe an ancestor of Bao, or an unrelated game too readily linked to it by later scholarship?
Open Bao
Why It Is Open The 1658 account is sometimes cited as the earliest reference to Bao, but specialists are reluctant to positively identify Flacourt's game with Bao itself; the true depth of Bao's history before the earliest confirmed board (Malawi, no earlier than 1896, now in the British Museum) is unknown.
What Would Settle It A documented, unambiguous textual or archaeological link between the Flacourt account and the Bao tradition, or a securely dated board or reference earlier than 1896.
Expertise Needed East African / Indian Ocean game history
Question posed in
Wikipedia, Bao (game), History section.
Sungka
Are Sungka and Congkak one underlying mancala tradition carried by migration, or two traditions that converged on nearly the same board and rules independently?
Open Sungka
Why It Is Open Sungka is described as closely related to Congkak, differing mainly in direction of play, but the documented distribution of Southeast Asian mancala games across two separate waves, an early-19th-century wave into Malaysia, Indonesia and the Maldives and a 20th/21st-century Philippine wave, leaves the exact relationship (common ancestor, direct derivation, or convergent local variants of a shared regional form) unsettled.
What Would Settle It A documented chain of transmission (trade routes, colonial-era records, migration records) connecting a specific historical Congkak-playing community to the Philippine game, or clear evidence of Sungka's independent local development.
Expertise Needed Southeast Asian game history / ethnography
Question posed in
Wikipedia, Sungka, History section.
Carrom
What decade, generation, or specific community in India produced Carrom, and when did it take its present form?
Open Carrom
Why It Is Open No concrete evidence for the game's actual origins survives beyond a general eighteenth-century estimate and an unverified maharaja-palace tradition evidenced only circumstantially by a surviving glass-surfaced board at Patiala.
What Would Settle It A documented textual or archaeological reference from before the nineteenth century that securely describes carrom-like play.
Expertise Needed South Asian game history
Question posed in
Wikipedia, Carrom, Origins section.
International Boxing Association (IBA)
Will the IBA or World Boxing be recognized as amateur boxing's permanent Olympic governing body?
Open International Boxing Association (IBA)
Why It Is Open The IOC expelled the IBA from Olympic recognition on 22 June 2023 over governance, finance and corruption concerns and ran the Paris 2024 boxing tournament directly through its own Boxing Unit rather than through IBA. In February 2025 the IOC granted only provisional recognition to a new rival body, World Boxing, as the federation for the 2028 Olympics, not a final or permanent determination. IBA disputes the IOC's characterization of the 2023 decision and has pursued legal challenges, including an appeal to Switzerland's Federal Supreme Court, so neither body's status as boxing's lasting Olympic governing body is settled.
What Would Settle It A final ruling on IBA's appeal to the Swiss Federal Supreme Court, or a permanent (non-provisional) IOC recognition decision for the federation governing boxing at and beyond the 2028 Olympics.
Question posed in
Wikipedia, International Boxing Association, IOC Suspension and Expulsion section; Current Status section.