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The History of Sudoku
The
popularity of Sudoku has increased rapidly over the last few years,
in this article we'll be looking at the history of Sudoku.
The name sudoku is a japanese word, "Su" is the japanese word for
number whilst "Doku" is a reference to the single square each number
can fit into on the Sudoku puzzle board.
Most people assume Sudoku originated in Japan (since it has a
Japanese name), however you may be surprised to learn that Sudoku
actually has European and American origins.
It all began with a concept known as "Latin Squares", which was
developed by Leonhard Euler a Swiss mathematician. A Latin Square
consists of a square table, it is cleverly filled with symbols so that
each one can only occur once in each row and once in each column.
Dell Magazine started publishing these latin squares in the 1970's,
however they used a 9 x 9 square grid. At the time the puzzle was
named Number Place, and it would eventually become known as Sudoku. It
was developed by a man called Howard Garnes, who was an independent
developer.
In the mid-1980's Sudoku was introduced to Japan and became very
popular, this is how it happened. The president of Nikoli Inc (a big
puzzle company), advised the company to publish their own version of
Number Place, since it was successful in the US. The company took his
advice and changed the games name from "Number Place" to "Sudoku".
However Nikoli did not only change it's name, they actually helped to
refine the game by limiting the amount of revealed numbers to 30.
The History of
Sudoku In Britain
Eventually Sudoku began to appear in the daily papers and magazines
throughout Japan, however it took nearly 20 years for Sudoku to reach
the shores of Great Britain.
The first British Paper to pick up Sudoku was The Times newspaper in
London. And this was mainly due to a retired Hong Kong judge called
Wayne Gould. In 1997 Mr Gould came across Sudoku whilst he was in
Japanese bookshop. Over the next several years he developed a computer
program that generates Sudoku puzzles. In the latter part of 2004 he
convinced The Times to publish daily Sudoku puzzles generated using his
software. The first Sudoku puzzle appeared in The Times on the 12th of
November 2004. Other British Newspapers followed this trend and within
months they began publishing their own Sudoku Puzzles.
The History of
Sudoku In America
By the latter part of 2005 major Sudoku puzzles were appearing in major
papers in the US. Some of the first papers to jump on the Sudoku
bandwagon include, USA Today, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the New
York Post.
Sudoku is still developing, it can now even be played on mobile phones.
Several different variations have appeared such as 16x16 puzzles, and
Sudoku puzzles that use symbols or letters instead of numbers, for
those who like tough challenges.
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