this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2025
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The Royal Game of Ur is a two-player strategy race board game of the tables family that was first played in ancient Mesopotamia during the early third millennium BC. The game was popular across the Middle East among people of all social strata, and boards for playing it have been found at locations as far away from Mesopotamia as Crete and Sri Lanka. One board, held by the British Museum, is dated to c. 2600 – c. 2400 BC, making it one of the oldest game boards in the world.

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[–] minnow@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago (3 children)

The video that Tom Scott did about this game was FANTASTIC

https://youtu.be/WZskjLq040I

[–] ech@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 week ago

Came in to post the same link. Such a good video.

[–] pelespirit@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 week ago

That is amazing. How tf did they make me want to watch that entire thing.

[–] redhydride@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 week ago

Great video!

[–] clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.works 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Play it online here. It's fun but pretty simple by modern board game standards. https://royalur.net/

[–] eah@programming.dev 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

It's such a well-done implementation of the game. Beautiful website.

[–] clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 week ago

I play it often!

[–] Seigest@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 week ago

And here I thought this was just some Rimworld lore thing

It's a lot like Backgammon.