Discovering Mah-Jong

According to tradition the game of mah-jong originated in China in 472 BC as an amusement for the ladies of the court. This cannot be substantiated, but there is no doubt that mah-jong has been held in high regard in China for a very long time, and within the last century it has spread to Japan, the United States and Europe. Though superficially a complex game, the basic idea of mah-jong is very simple. the aim of each player is to complete a mah-jong hand, that is a hand consisting of tiles formed into pungs (sets of three identical tiles), quongs (sets of four identical tiles), and chows (sets of three consecutively numbered tiles), plus a pair of identical tiles. This book tells you how to play mah-jong, from the elaborate starting procedure to the calculation of the scores, and describes the Chinese, Japanese, and American variations in play.