Charades is a word-guessing party game in which one player silently acts out a word or phrase, often using conventional gestures to indicate categories such as book, movie or number of words, while the other players try to guess it within a time limit. The game's name and word-puzzle format originate in eighteenth-century France, where it began as a literary riddle performed in verse before evolving into the acted-out, non-verbal form now most familiar; the game spread to England and became a common parlor game in the nineteenth century and remains a standard party and team-building game today.
Facts
Originating Region Game TypeParty word guessing game 1 Classification
Player CountLarge Group or Variable 1 Connections
Ancestor Of
Pictionary creator Rob Angel first played an early form of the game with roommates who called it charades on paper before he developed and published it in 1985, crediting charades as its direct conceptual predecessor with drawing substituted for acting.
Associated With
Taboo, Games Taboo and charades both belong to the broader family of party guessing games in which one player conveys a word or phrase to teammates under a restriction, acting only in charades and speech under forbidden-word restrictions in Taboo; no documented direct line of descent connects the two games.
In the Other Atlases
- Also in Geography Atlas: Europe, found in there.
Sources
1. Charades, Wikipedia
Section: Literary charades
A charade was a form of literary riddle popularized in France in the 18th century
Lead paragraph, first sentence
is a parlor or party word guessing game
entity record, description lead (player-count)
Charades is a word-guessing party game in which one player silently acts out a word or phrase, often using conventional gestures to indicate categories such as book, movie or number of words, while the other players try to guess it within a time limit. The game's name and word-puzzle format originate in eighteenth-century France, where it began as a literary riddle performed in verse bef
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