Cat's cradle

Independent versions of this game have been found in indigenous cultures throughout the world, including in Africa, Eastern Asia, the Pacific Islands, Australia, the Americas, and the Arctic.

[2]: page 161 [3][4] The simplest version of the game involves a player using a long string loop to make a complex figure using their fingers and hands.

The origin of the name "cat's cradle" is debated but the first known reference is in The light of nature pursued by Abraham Tucker in 1768.

[1] An ingenious play they call cat's cradle; one ties the two ends of a packthread together, and then winds it about his fingers, another with both hands takes it off perhaps in the shape of a gridiron, the first takes it from him again in another form, and so on alternately changing the packthread into a multitude of figures whose names I forget, it being so many years since I played at it myself.

[15] Jane Muir and Robyn Lawrick completed 22,700 changes of cat's cradles in 21 hours at Calgary Market Mall, Alberta, Canada on August 25, 1976.