Mexican Lottery: What it is, History and How to Play

The Mexican Lottery is a traditional board game that has been an integral part of Mexican culture for centuries. Played in a similar way to bingo, this game combines elements of chance with art and folklore, offering fun for all ages. The Mexican Lottery has become a tradition that brings thousands of families together, offering them invaluable moments of fun. Here we tell you about the origin of this game.

What is the Mexican Lottery?

The Mexican Lottery is a game of chance that uses a deck of 54 cards, each illustrated with colorful images depicting characters, objects, and figures typical of Mexican life and culture. Each player uses a board containing a selection of these images in a 4x4 grid. How to win is established at the start of each game; you can win by completing a specific line, column, diagonal, or pattern on your board before the other players. The person who "Sings" the cards, that is, who calls them out as they come out, says the phrase "Run and run with...!". At the moment of winning, the winning person must say the word "Good!" or "Lottery!". The cards are "sung," that is, they are called out as they come out, by a specific person until someone wins. This person must give a set amount of time for each player to place the cards that come out on their board.

Currently, there are applications that are responsible for "singing" the cards of each round, as is the case of the official app of the Mexican Lottery Deck, available in the App Store and Google Play .

History of the Mexican Lottery

There are several games that are taken as the history of the Mexican Lottery. Such is the case of the keno tickets in China, played between 205 and 187 BC. This type of lottery is still in use in Chinese casinos and they are tickets that contained a total of 80 numbers. Each player selected 1 to 20 numbers and marked them on the tickets, then 20 numbers were randomly drawn. The player who won the prize was the one who had the highest number of matches between his bet and the numbers that came out in each round.

On the other hand, in the 15th century, there was a game called "Lotto" in Italy, which years later moved to Spain and later arrived in Mexico at the end of the 18th century. The game dynamic is to draw five numbers from a total of 90, each one had a representative image. The player who guessed the five winning numbers won. At first, Lotto was played only by the upper classes, however the lottery became popular among soldiers in the War of Independence. Although the game became popular, at that time there was still no official version; it was normal at that time for people to create their own versions with a variety of characters and figures.

The game as we know it today is thanks to Clement Jacques, a French businessman known for founding the first canned food processing company in Mexico. This version quickly gained popularity due to its distinctive designs and its strong allusiveness to Mexican culture. Characters such as "El Borracho", "El Soldado" and "La Bandera" were marketed on lottery cards at the end of the 19th century.

The tradition persists over the years

Once we define what the Mexican lottery is, we can realize how important it is to know this historical origin, which has remained for many years and to date remains one of the most representative games among the people of Mexico and even the world.

Promoting the lottery is not just about preserving the past, it is about giving it a new place in the present. If you are a fan of the Mexican Lottery game like us, you can take a look at our Lotetienda - Mexican Lottery Store . With our products, you take with you more than just a design: you take with you history, art and a tradition that deserves to be shared. 🌟