In 1940 to celebrate the glorious victory of the German Army in the war the Berlin games manufacturer H. O. Puttkammer brought out a game called Gloria-Viktoria – Das Taktische Kombinations-Spiel (Glory-Victory – The Tactical Combination Game). Modelled on chess, the difference was that the winner had to eliminate all the other player’s forces, not just checkmate them. It was produced to help while away the long hours at the front while reinforcing German propaganda about the invincibility of their all-conquering forces.
The game consisted of a chequered playing board measuring 46 x 34 centimetres and thirty-six game pieces (eighteen red and eighteen blue) which had to be pressed out from two sheets. The game also came with detailed instructions, all of which were contained in a large paper envelope. On the front of the envelope was a picture of three triumphant, singing Wehrmacht soldiers, carrying their helmets with their Mauser K98k (Karabiner 98 kurz) rifles slung over their shoulders.
The game could be played by two people and was designed to accompany the field post so it could be sent to the soldiers at the front. It was another celebration of the Blitzkreig which had in a matter of months overrun North-West Europe culminating in the fall of France in June 1940. Consequently, the playing pieces reflected the glorious Wehrmacht including its victorious infantry, artillery, machine-gun units, stormtroopers, panzer tanks and aerial support from the Luftwaffe.
The origin of the game was inspired by a German children’s song which was first published in 1936 by the Nazis but dated back to the 1700s celebrating the discovery of America by the Italian explorer Christopher Columbus. Called ‘Ein Mann, der sich Kolumbus Nannt’ (A Man who called himself Columbus), each verse was made up of four lines separated by the artificial and amusing words ‘widewidewitt bum bum’ which acted as a bizarre rhyming link. The chorus read:
Gloria, Viktoria, widewidewitt, hurra,
Gloria, Viktoria, widewidewitt, bum, bum.
Gloria, Victoria, widewidewitt, yippee,
Gloria, Victoria, widewidewitt, bum, bum.
Gloria-Viktoria – Das Taktische Kombinations-Spiel (Glory-Victory – The Tactical Combination Game) was modelled on chess but the winner had to eliminate all the other players’ forces, not just checkmate them.
The game was also inspired by the deity Victoria who in antiquity was the goddess of military victory. The Greeks referred to her as Nike but it was the Romans who first started calling her Victoria (the English word victory is derived from the Latin victoria). Depicted as a beautiful young woman, she was always shown travelling quickly on large wings, often storming ahead and overcoming everything in her path. This included engaging in hand-to-hand combat with a variety of mythical beasts (paradoxically figures of her from the period are similar in design to Christian angels).
Gloria-Viktoria started to arrive at the front in the summer of 1940 as the Germans declared victory in the West after a series of stunning campaigns which saw most of Western Europe overwhelmed in just a few months and the British evacuated at Dunkirk. The game celebrated this new Blitzkreig or ‘lightning war’, its title being inspired by the discovery of ‘new worlds’ on the wings of the military goddess Victoria. The term Blitzkrieg has since entered the German and English languages as being synonymous with a surprise attack carried out using rapid and overwhelming force consisting of armour, mechanised infantry and close air support. However, ironically, the word was never used by the Wehrmacht itself as an official military term, except in propaganda. Hitler himself reportedly said of the term that it was ‘ein ganz blödsinniges Wort’ or ‘a completely idiotic word’.54