1. Gabata is played on a 3-by-6 board.

2. Gabata requires 54 BEADs of any colour.

3. 3 BEADs are placed on each of the spaces to start the game.

4. Each player owns the 6 spaces on the row closest to them the 3, and spaces on their right in the middle row.

1. Both players pick up all the BEADs in their left-most space and race to redistribute BEADs in a counter-clockwise direction along the row closest to them.

2. Continuing onto the 3 spaces on the right of the middle row, across their opponent’s row and the last 3 spaces on the middle row before returning to their starting position.

3. Once the first 3 BEADs have been distributed, the player picks up all the BEADs in the space that the last BEAD was placed in and start again.

4. The race continues until a player drops their last BEAD onto an empty space.

5. The race winner starts the next phase of the game.

6. Play starts now with players taking turns to pick up all the BEADs from any of their play spaces and redistributing them in a counter-clockwise direction.

7. .If the final BEAD is placed on a space that has BEADs, they pick up all the BEADs and continue redistributing on their 9 spaces only.

8. If the final BEAD is placed on a space with no BEADs the player captures any BEADs in their opponent’s spaces in the same column as the last BEAD played.

9. If the player makes a capture, they continue their turn.

10. If no BEADs are captured, then the player’s turn ends and the second player starts to redistribute.

11. If a player cannot start their turn because none of the spaces has a BEAD, their opponent automatically captures all the BEADs on the board.

12. The player who was unable to start their turn takes all the BEADs they captured and places 3 BEADs on each of their spaces.

13. When the player runs out of BEADs, their opponent can fill the final space so that it has 3 BEADs and then fills their own spaces, matching the number of spaces filled. All additional BEADs are kept off the board.

14. Players then resume redistributing BEADs.

To win the game, a player must capture all the BEADs.

1. Gabata is a three-rank Mancala game from Ethiopia, it was first recorded in the 19th century. It is represented by a race at the beginning, with players moving simultaneously until one player sows a piece into an empty hole.

2. The history of this game is not known, but it was first recorded in western literature in 1893, in the book - Sacred City of the Ethiopians. It was thought obsolete and forgotten until 1971, when Richard Pankhurst recorded, in the Ethiopia Observer, that it was still being played.