10 OLDEST Board Games In History

6. Royal Game of Ur (2500 BCE)

If I asked you to name one of the oldest still playable games in the world and you answered ‘errr’, congratulations you’re smart. The Royal Game of Ur, named after the first place it was discovered, at an archaeological dig in the Royal Cemetery of Ur, which is in modern day Iraq, and was originally part of Ancient Mesopotamia, home to one of the earliest civilisations in human history. Unlike most games from this time, we actually know how to play as a clay tablet, dated back to Babylonia in the 2nd century BCE, was used by historian Irving Finkel, an absolute madlad, to recreate the games rules. It’s one of the earliest rule books in existence, no pictures though, bad rulebook design, amiright gamers? The game is very similar to backgammon. Player pieces move around this board by rolling four-sided dice, entering the board at one end, and trying to hop off at the other, all while trying to avoid being captured and sent back to the start by their opponents. Ur game boards have been found all across the middle east, in Iran, Syria, Sri Lanka, as far as Crete and Egypt. Bloody loved a racing game back then, and speaking of which…