I’ve written quite a bit about Hanukkah in previous posts, specifically about the significance of latkes as traditional food during this holiday and about the meaning of the menorah as it relates to the eight days of miraculous oil, but I haven’t written anything about dreidels, so here goes:
As with anything to do with folk traditions, the origins of this item and the game you play with it are very murky, with several strands of meaning attached to them, and with some later interpretations being projected back onto the past. It is clear that games of chance such as this one, in which you win or lose depending on how an object lands after you spin it or throw it, are very ancient. Spinning tops specifically date all the way back to the ancient Babylonians, who played with clay versions as early as 3500 BC. And—get this—there was a wooden spinning top in King Tut’s tomb! Very, very cool.