Modern inventions › Rummikub
Rummikub
Hertzano, 1950s; rummy and mahjong
Sources
The documents this entry rests on, as published. Each can be opened and checked; nothing in this part is anybody’s reading of them.
Wikipedia. "Rummikub." canonical checked 2026-09-25
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rummikub
AI summary A tile game developed by Ephraim Hertzano in the 1950s, 'combining elements of the card game rummy and mahjong': 106 tiles, 14 dealt, sets played to the table.
Only cited here · bibliography #123
Analysis
Written by an AI model from the sources above. It is a reading of them, not a source in its own right: every figure in it points back to a numbered source, and where the two disagree, the source is right.
Assessment
- Confidence
- documented a published ruleset or rule description exists and is cited
- Evidence
- single-source only one source was found; nothing independent confirms it
Added by this compendium
The source chart does not carry this variant. It was added because the research turned up a ruleset the chart has no node for. Everything the chart does claim is unchanged.
Parent link: sourced — a source states this parentage
Wikipedia describes Rummikub as 'combining elements of the card game rummy and mahjong'. That is a claim of borrowing, not of descent from any mahjong ruleset, which is why it sits in the chart's group for inventions that do not descend from the mahjong line. The game is played with numbered tiles in four colours, not a mahjong set.
Cross-comparison
What each source was read to say, set side by side. The numbers are the sources above.
- [1] 'the proprietary board game that was developed and marketed by Ephraim Hertzano in the 1950s ... combining elements of the card game rummy and mahjong'. 106 tiles: 104 numbered 1-13 in four colours, two of each, and two jokers. Players start with 14 tiles and play sets (groups or runs) to the table. Hertzano, Romanian-born, emigrated to Israel after the Second World War and hand-made the first sets. Hertzano's Official Rummikub Book (1978) gives American, Sabra and International versions. It is Israel's best-selling export game, with more than 50 million units sold
Reading it
Only Wikipedia was read, so the verdict is single-source. The node records a borrowing, not a descent: Rummikub takes mahjong's tiles-on-a-rack form into a rummy game with numbered tiles in four colours and two jokers. It is here so the tree shows where the best-known mahjong-inspired tile game sits, in the chart's own group for games that do not descend from the mahjong line.
In the tree
Descends from Modern inventions, as the analysis above places it; the chart has no node for it.