# It began with "Dungeon Crawl" and grew from there during the development of the game Dungeons and Dragons. > According to [Gary Gygax (in an interview with Dungeon #112),][1] the first *dungeon crawl* was part of a wargame in which the invading force entered the enemy's castle through a former escape tunnel dug from the fortress's dungeon. The group had so much fun with this scenario that it was repeated over and over with increasingly complex > dungeons until the wargame aspect of the game was dropped in favor of exploring the dungeon. **An origin in Publication that formally establishes the *dungeon* as where Underground adventures take place** The *dungeon* as a place to conduct an *underworld adventure* is spelled out in the opening paragraphs of Volume III of the Original Publication of Dungeons and Dragons "Wilderness and Underworld Adventures" on page 3. (© COPYRIGHT 1974 • TACTICAL STUDIES RULES, by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson). > **THE UNDERWORLD** Before it is possible to conduct a campaign of adventures in the mazey **dungeons,** it is necessary for the referee to sit down with pencil in hand and draw these labyrinths on graph paper. Unquestionably this will require a great deal of time and effort and imagination. **The dungeons** should look something like the example given below, with numerous levels which sprawl in all directions, not necessarily stack neatly above each other in a straight line. # Why *Dungeons* and Dragons? The "[Dungeons and Dragons" game was going to be called "The Fantasy Game"][2] as far back as 1971. The founders of TSR had difficulty in selling the game initially. Gary Gygax had been working in game rules and fan magazine publishing since about 1965. He and his early partners (Arneson, Kaye and Blume) doubtless knew how important a title/name/brand was in getting a product to market, even the small market of miniatures and wargames enthusiasts. It appears to have been renamed in 1974, however the game rules indicate that "dungeon" had become standard jargon during the game's development. - Note: Alliteration is an old tool in publishing, witness how headlines get written in newspapers and gossip magazines in the golden era of print media. **Two Meanings of "Dungeon" in this context came with the game when it was released** By the time of the game's publishing, *dungeon* had two connotations in its new usage: 1. the generic setting for an underworld adventure and is below ground, dark, and dangerous 2. the D&D campaign/setting run by a given person. The second usage is probably as old as the playtests Arenson and Gygax undertook, 1970-ish in the adventures under Arneson's Blackmoor castle. This jargon (unique to a small community of gamers) is seen in the TSR published magazine/newsletter, *The Strategic Review #6* (Volume II No. 1, Feb 1976) explicitly on page 7 in one of E. Gary Gygax articles. : > DunDraCon I: Update > > Some of the misleading advertising has been clarified in regard to the > “Fritz Leiber” dungeon that has been advertised. The truth of the matter is that there exists a sprawling palace, complete with underground, that has been constructed/ populated by a friend of Mr. Leiber’s, with his aid and direction. It is said to contain hazards and treasures drawn from his stories. Fritz has also agreed to attend for a couple of hours, at least, on one of the two days. (We have been told the preceding facts, and have accepted them in good faith.) The jargon had apparently become so ingrained by the time of the initial publishing -- among the people playing in the settings Arneson (Blackmoor) and Gygax (Greyhawk) used to playtest original adventure milieus -- that the authors saw no need to explain why they used "dungeon" as opposed to something else. In [an interview with theonering.net Gygax][3] said that his initial vision was that this game would be for gamers. It took a little while for the TSR team to see, and capitalize on, its broader appeal. At the time of the initial set of rules being published, it was a case of "gamers publishing for gamers( and we all speak in the same jargon so we don't need to explain it)." Personal Experience: the second usage had spread, and was present as far back as 1975, when I first began to play Dungeons and Dragons. We would ask one another "whose dungeon are we playing in?" to decide who would be the game master/dungeon master for the next session. It obviously preceded our experience -- we lived in Virginia and the game spread from the Wisconsin-Chicago area (in our case, through a game store where a friend bought the first boxed set any of us had seen). There was no internet to spread memes or jargon at the speed that they now spread. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeon_crawl [2]: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/DnDArchives_FAQ.asp [3]: http://archives.theonering.net/features/interviews/gary_gygax.html