Royal Game of Ur

How to Play

The Royal Game of Ur provides a fascinating glimpse into ancient Mesopotamian culture, with its rules reconstructed by Irving Finkel, Assyriologist at the British Museum. This timeless game, one of the oldest in the world, was first played during the early third millennium BC and has left its mark on history.

The game begins with an empty board and seven pieces in each player's hand. Players take turns rolling the dice, typically four tetrahedral dice (each with two marked ends). Movement is determined by the number of marked ends facing up, resulting in a roll value from 0 to 4.

The first player getting all their pieces of the board wins the game. The players move along the path as shown in the diagram below. The middle path is shared by both players.

Rules

• Each square can hold only one piece at a time.
• Landing on a non-safe square occupied by an opposing piece sends that piece back to its starting area.
• Landing on a Rosette square grants an extra roll.
• If a piece lands on the Rosette square in the middle row, the opposing player cannot remove it from the board.
• A piece can be removed from the board by a roll matching the exact number needed to reach the last square, plus one to get of the board.
• If no move is possible, the player loses a turn.

History

Discovery and Origin

The Game of Ur is one of the oldest known board games in the world, with its earliest examples dating back to the early third millennium BC in ancient Mesopotamia. The game derives its modern name, The Royal Game of Ur, from the site where the most intact boards were discovered.

Between 1926 and 1930, English archaeologist Sir Leonard Woolley unearthed five lavish game boards during his excavations of the Royal Cemetery at Ur (in modern-day Iraq). Following this seminal discovery, similar boards or game sets have been found by archaeologists across a wide geographic range, including sites in Iran, Syria, Turkey, Sri Lanka, and Cyprus, demonstrating its extensive popularity across the ancient Near East and beyond. Notably, four boards featuring a similar track layout were also discovered in the tomb of the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun, highlighting the game's cross-cultural appeal.

Popularity and Fate

The Game of Ur was enjoyed by people from all social classes. It remains uncertain what precisely led to the gradual demise of the game during late antiquity, around the 7th century AD. One common hypothesis suggests that the core mechanics of the game survived and developed into backgammon and other similar race games.

The game was designed for two players, evidenced by the discovery of two distinct sets of playing pieces (typically seven pieces each, often distinguished by color or design) found alongside the boards. For gameplay, tetrahedral (four-sided) dice were used to determine movement.

The Reconstruction of Rules

For decades, the original rules of the game remained a mystery. However, in the early 1980s, British Museum curator and Assyriologist Irving Finkel successfully reconstructed the basic rules. Finkel based his work on a single, crucial cuneiform tablet discovered in Babylon (modern Iraq) in 1880, now cataloged as (Rm-III.6.b – 33333B) and housed in the British Museum.

This tablet, dated to 2nd century BC (meaning it describes a late version of the game), contained an almost complete set of playing instructions, including the number and names of the pawns and detailed information regarding the dice throws and special squares.

The Ambiguous Path

While Finkel's work clarified the rules of movement and capture, the original route players followed across the 20 squares of the board is not explicitly depicted on the cuneiform tablet. This missing visual information has led to multiple scholarly interpretations, demonstrating that the game’s core objective could be achieved using different paths. As a result of this ambiguity, there have been a few proposals by different researchers as to which path the players follow across the board. I will introduce four specific adaptations to the rules: R.C. Bell/I. Finkel, H.J.R. Murray's, J. Masters, and D. Skiryuk.

In unraveling the mysteries of the Royal Game of Ur, we journey through ancient boards and archaeological clues, discovering a game that transcends time. As the echoes of this ancient past reach us, we find ourselves immersed in a captivating blend of strategy, chance, and lost traditions. The Royal Game of Ur, with its enigmatic rules and enduring appeal, stands as a testament to the enduring human fascination with games that have spanned millennia, leaving an indelible mark on our shared history.