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Tiddlywinks is a game played with sets of small, thin discs called "winks" lying on a surface, usually a flat mat. Players use a larger disc called a "squidger" to pop a smaller disc into flight by pressing down on one side of the smaller disc. The objective of the game is to cause the smaller discs to land inside a pot or cup.

The game began as Tiddledy-Winks.

Contents 1 Tiddlywink Terms 2 Royalty 3 USA Tour 4 1965 - 5 External links

BLITZ: an attempt to pot all six of your own colour early in the game (generally before many squops have been taken).

BOMB: to send a wink at a pile, usually from distance, in the hope of significantly disturbing it.

BOONDOCK: to play a squopped wink a long way away, usually while keeping your own wink(s) in the battle area.

BRING-IN: An approach shot.

BRISTOL: a shot which attempts to jump a pile onto another wink; the shot is played by holding the squidger at right angles to its normal plane.

CARNOVSKY: a successful pot from the baseline (i.e. from 3 feet away).

COLOR ORDER: the order in which the winks are placed clockwise around the mat (starting at any corner) and the order of the turns in the game. The order is Blue, Green, Red, Yellow, using alpha-order in English. Dave Lockwood, former world champion, has suggested that the order be switched to Red, Yellow, Green, Blue, or color order following the color spectrum to accommodate for

CRUD: a physically hard shot whose purpose is to destroy a pile completely.

DOUBLETON: a pile in which two winks are covered up by a single enemy wink.

ETwA: The English Tiddlywinks Association.

FREE TURNS (and FAILURE TO FREE): When a partnership is squopped-out, free turns equal to the number of uninvolved mobile winks are given to the squopping partnership. Starting with the next partner using color order (PRTNR 1), the turns (for example, three) are given in this order: PRTNR 1, PRTNR 2, PRTNR 1, and on the fourth shot, PRTNR 2 MUST free one or more of the other partnership's winks. FAILURE TO FREE a wink during the ultimate "free" shot results in a do-over of the shot.

GOOD SHOT: named after John Good. The shot consists of playing a flat wink through a nearby pile in the hope of destroying it.

GROMP: an attempt to jump a pile onto another wink (usually with the squidger held in a conventional rather than Bristol fashion).

JOHN LENNON MEMORIAL SHOT: a simultaneous boondock and squop.

KNOCK-OFF: to knock the squopping wink off a pile.

LUNCH: to pot a squopped wink (usually belonging to an opponent).

NATwA: North American Tiddlywinks Association.

NEWSWINK: The NATwA magazine. Now published roughly once a decade.

PILE: a group of winks connected directly or indirectly by squops.

POSS: to squidge a wink a feeble distance in comparison to that intended. Named after Edric "Poss" Ellis (OUTS, early- to mid- 1990s).

POT: (noun) the cup that is placed in the centre of the mat; (verb) to play a wink into the pot.

ScotTwA: Scottish Tiddlywinks Association.

SCRUNGE: to bounce out of the pot.

SQUIDGER: the circular disk used to propel winks.

SQUOP: to play a wink so that it comes to rest above another wink.

SQUOP-OUT: the situation that occurs when all winks of a partnership have been squopped. Free turns result (q.v.). (SQUOP-UP: British term)

SUB: to play a wink so that it ends up under another wink.

WINKS: the circular counters used in the game.

WINKING WORLD: the official journal of ETwA. Published twice a year.

WP: abbreviation for World Pairs.

WS: abbreviation for World Singles.

In 1958, Cambridge students challenged Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (later to become Chancellor of the University in 1976) to a tiddlywinks match. The Duke of Edinburgh appointed the Goons as his Royal champions. Later in 1958, the English Tiddlywinks Association (ETwA) was founded. A trophy, the Silver Wink, has been awarded by the Duke since 1961 to the British university champions each year.

In 1962, the Oxford team toured the United States for several weeks, going undefeated against teams from the New York Giants, various American colleges, newspapers, and others. A very prominent article appeared in Life magazine in October 1962 with coverage of the Harvard team. In the next couple of years, Harvard and other colleges continued to play, though at a low ebb.

In the Fall of 1965, Severin Drix started a team at Cornell, and challenged his friend Ferd Wulkan of MIT to start a tiddlywinks team. The North American Tiddlywinks Association (NATwA) was founded on February 27, 1966.

The game is still played in Cambridge and Oxford, who compete in an annual Varsity match, and also around the UK and in North America, especially at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cornell, Harvard, and Ithaca High School in New York.

Contrary to general opinion, as reflected in English usage (cf R.Kipling: "I'm not playing tiddlywinks. I'm playing the game"), some people believe that the modern game is a serious one. The physical and strategic skills required for wink placement and for preventing the opponent from making his best move justify in their eyes a comparison of tiddlywinks with games like snooker, croquet and curling. The rules of the game are dictated by the English Tiddlywinks Association.

• English Tiddlywinks Association- founded in 1958
• North American Tiddlywinks Association - founded in 1966