A likely and common source for the origin of the gravel game known as GO lays on the way of the Zhou dynasty. Man’s warlike nature caused the heaven’s order to Fate to become entirely about war. Most of the content in the ancient scriptures is War related, and most prophecies are of whom and how many men would die in battle.
Thus it’s not hard to imagine the battlefield as a huge game-board, alternately painted in black and white and with gravel pieces of the same colors (which represent life and death, accordingly). It’s very easy to vision the game evolving these ancient times, when priests and warlords played it using bones and rocks just to simulate the fighting in the background.
Although never proven and strictly speculative, this version seemed to be the favored amongst go lovers, because of its romanticism or perhaps for its dark evolution. If this version is even remotely true, then the game will celebrate its 2,500th birthday sometime this century. But no matter what the game’s origin (or when), it became a well-used metaphor for war in the scriptures, although not in modern times (unlike Chess).