Jigsaw Puzzling

Jigsaw Puzzling is the hobby of assembling a jigsaw puzzle, a tiling puzzle made of often irregularly shaped, interlocking pieces that mosaic together, with each individual piece carrying a portion of a larger picture that is only completed once the puzzle is solved. The hobby traces back to the eighteenth century, when a picture was painted onto a flat piece of wood and then cut into small pieces, giving the puzzle its name from the tools used to cut it, variously identified as jigsaws, fretsaws or scroll saws; London cartographer and engraver John Spilsbury is credited with commercializing the idea around 1760, cutting apart a map of the world along its national borders so students could reassemble it as a geography teaching aid. Today's puzzles are made mostly of interlocking cardboard pieces bearing a huge range of images, from nature scenes and buildings to castles and mountains, and a market of dedicated accessories, boards, cases, frames and roll-up mats, has grown up to serve enthusiasts who want to store or display an assembled puzzle. Competitive jigsaw puzzling has grown markedly in the twenty-first century, with regional and national competitions held in many countries and an annual World Jigsaw Puzzle Championship held since 2019.