Ancient Games

Throughout this academic year of the course, I have been shown several very interesting board games from ancient history. I wanted to spend a bit of time to talk about some of these games and to give my thoughts on them each individually.

The Royal Game of Ur

Also known as the "Game of twenty squares", the Game of Ur was found in Iraq; which was was part of ancient Mesopotamia. I shall not here go through the exact rule set of the game, but one can see Irving Finkel's book Ancient Board Games to get a full description of how exactly it is played. After having played the game, I can say that I did enjoy it more than I was expecting; as a very competitive man my focus is almost always on winning whatever I'm playing, and the game certainly felt like it had a variety of ways to play - it didn't feel as if my decisions were meaningless or too obvious. The goal is incredibly simple, get all your pieces to the end before your opponent, but as there is a mechanic for players to take each other's pieces there can be a focus on aggressively taking enemy pieces to reset them to the start; or to defend all of one's own pieces over anything else.

Senet

Senet is an Ancient Egyptian game that shows some symbolic significance of the process of passing into the afterlife; a topic which I know from experience with my studies of ancient history is commonly explored by older cultures.It's one of the oldest known board games, and its rules can also be found in Finkel's book. I found it to be far less well constructed than Ur, it felt somewhat unrefined as a game. There are some enjoyable dynamics a player can use to block the opposition and attempt to gain the upper hand in a game that way, but certainly this game felt far less competitive than Ur - which in itself is not a bad thing, but it is something I personally look for a lot.

Duodecim Scripta

As an early forerunner to backgammon, this game spikes my interest by merit of being Roman. I have a particular fondness for Roman history as one of the more intriguing points of humanity's past. The name of this game effectively means "Game of twelve markings", which is incredibly descriptive of the game itself. To me this likely means that the game is played mainly for the game play itself, as opposed to some spiritual utility as some other ancient games are purported to be.

Hnefatafl

A medieval Scandinavian game, this game is quite clearly a 'tafl' variant. All games of this style are direct conflicts between two players with asymmetrical forces and goals, this is something that I find very engaging. These games allow for a variety of different strategies and ways to play, and are clearly competitive in the struggle to outwit and outmanoeuvre your opponent. I enjoyed playing this game immensely.