toy, popular in the 1980s, that was designed by Hungarian inventor Erno Rubik (Rubik, Erno). Rubik's Cube consists of 26 small cubes that rotate on a central axis; nine coloured cube faces, in three rows of three each, form each side of the cube. When the cube is twisted out of its original arrangement, the player must then return it to the original configuration—one among 43 quintillion possible ones.