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A SHORT HISTORY OF PLAY

The oldest games
on the table.

People have raced counters across boards for thousands of years.

Egyptian Senet, the Royal Game of Ur from Mesopotamia and the medieval favourite Nine Men's Morris all survive as boards, pieces and the odd scrap of rules. Here is what museums and game historians can tell us.

Compare the games Read the short answer
Hands moving a counter on a replica twenty-square race game board with rosette squares, on a wooden table
AI-generated image, not a photograph of a real person or place.
01 Race games came first02 Boards travelled far03 Rules are often a puzzleFive thousand years of play

THE SHORT ANSWER

Race to the end,
or make a mill.

The oldest games were mostly race games.
Strategy games like morris came to Europe later.

MESOPOTAMIA

The Royal Game of Ur

Boards from the royal tombs at Ur date to around 2600 BC. More than 100 boards of this family have been found from Iraq to Crete.

Compare the games

EGYPT

Senet's thirty squares

Senet was played on 30 squares in three rows of ten, with casting sticks or bones instead of dice. Later boards marked the final squares with special symbols.

See the numbers

ENGLAND

Morris in the cloisters

Nine Men's Morris was widely played in England by 1300, and boards are cut into cloister seats at cathedrals including Canterbury and Norwich.

Where to find them

A QUICK GAME CHECK

How well do we
know the rules?

Pick a game to see what survives and how it was played. The bar shows how confident historians are about the rules.

Based on the Smithsonian's guide to ancient board games, the Met's Senet box and the Online Guide to Traditional Games.

Rules check

Choose a game
Mehen, the Egyptian snake gameRules unclear

Played on a coiled spiral track from around 3100 to 2300 BC by up to six players. It faded with Egypt's Old Kingdom, and its rules remain unclear.

SenetPartly known

Two players raced five to seven pieces each along 30 squares, moving by casting sticks or bones. Special squares near the end could send pieces back.

Royal Game of UrDebated

A cuneiform tablet from 177/176 BC gives rules for the later Twenty Squares form. Whether the Ur game was played the same way, and by which path, is still debated.

Nine Men's MorrisStill played

Make a row of three, called a mill, to capture an opponent's piece. A version called Morabaraba is still played competitively in Botswana and South Africa.

Sources: Smithsonian Magazine (2020); The Met, Gameboard and gaming pieces (01.4.1); The Online Guide to Traditional Games, Royal Game of Ur and Nine Men's Morris pages.

TWO NUMBERS WORTH KNOWING

Old, and
widely shared.

One figure on how old Senet may be,
one on how far the Ur game spread.

SENET · SMITHSONIAN

Earliest suggested date of play

≈ 3100 BC

Archaeological and artistic evidence suggests Senet was played as early as 3100 BC, making it one of the earliest known board games.

TWENTY SQUARES · GAME HISTORIANS

Boards of the Ur family found

100+

More than one hundred boards of this family are known from ancient sites in Iraq, Iran, Israel, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Cyprus, Egypt and Crete.

Game boxes often had two games: a Senet box at the Met, from a tomb at Abydos, is laid out for Senet on one side, and the underside would have held the game of 20 squares.

A Nine Men's Morris board of three nested squares carved into an old stone bench, with black and white pebbles on it
AI-generated image, not a photograph of a real person or place.

TRY IT AT HOME

Draw a board,
find some pebbles.

Nine Men's Morris needs nothing more than a drawn board and eighteen counters, which is why it turned up on village greens and tavern tables.

  1. Mark out a boardOld English players chalked boards on tavern tables or dug them into village greens. Paper and a pencil will do.
  2. Take nine counters eachBlack and white pebbles work, just as they did on old English greens.
  3. Make a millThree of your pieces in a row is a mill, and lets you remove one of your opponent's pieces.
  4. Play down to twoIn the version the Smithsonian describes, the first player unable to form a mill, or left with only two men, loses. Some versions use 3, 6 or 12 pieces.

WHERE TO SEE THEM

Games carved
into history.

Visitors to the cathedrals of Norwich, Canterbury, Gloucester and Salisbury, and to Westminster Abbey, can see morris boards cut into the cloister seats. Shakespeare mentions 'the nine men's morris' filled up with mud in A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Boards scratched into stone are hard to date. Morris boards cut into the temple at Kurna in Egypt are often said to show an Egyptian origin, but game historians caution that such graffiti boards could have been carved much later than the building.

A long replica Senet board of thirty squares in three rows, with cone and spool shaped pieces and flat casting sticks
AI-generated image, not a photograph of a real person or place.

QUESTIONS PEOPLE ASK

Frequently asked

What is the oldest board game?

Senet and Mehen from Egypt are among the earliest known, with evidence for Senet from around 3100 BC. The Royal Game of Ur was once thought to be the oldest, but older evidence exists for Senet and Mehen.

How was Senet played?

Two players raced pieces, usually five to seven each, along 30 squares in three rows of ten. They threw casting sticks or bones instead of rolling dice, and could block or send back an opponent's pieces.

Do we know the rules of the Royal Game of Ur?

Partly. A cuneiform tablet dated 177/176 BC gives rules for the later Twenty Squares form. How the much older Ur game was played, including the path pieces took, is still debated.

Where can I see an old Nine Men's Morris board in England?

Boards are cut into the cloister seats at the cathedrals of Norwich, Canterbury, Gloucester and Salisbury and at Westminster Abbey.

Is Nine Men's Morris still played?

Yes. It is known in England as morris, merrills or mill, and a version called Morabaraba is still played competitively in Botswana and South Africa.

SOURCES

Where the facts come from

Each figure on this page comes from the sources below. Check them for the full detail and context.

  1. Smithsonian Magazine: The best board games of the ancient world (2020)
  2. The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Gameboard and gaming pieces, New Kingdom, ca. 1479–1425 BCE
  3. The Online Guide to Traditional Games: The Royal Game of Ur and the Game of 20 Squares
  4. The Online Guide to Traditional Games: Nine Men's Morris