The archaeology of board games in digital archives at Oxford

Tim Penn, Manar al-Athar Digital Archive

May 24, 2022

Board games in North Africa have a long and vibrant history. This StoryMap explores some evidence for board games in photos held in the University of Oxford’s Manar al-Athar Digital Archive (Classics) and the Historic Environment Image Resource—HEIR (Archaeology), as part of a wider research project I am conducting into board games in ancient and medieval North Africa.

How we study board games in archaeology

Board games like Senet were first played in Middle East and in Egypt around the middle of the 4th millennium BCE in the Nile Valley. They then gradually became popular across North Africa, from Egypt to Morocco.

(Photo: Walters Art Museum, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

In the past, some types of board games also went unnoticed or un-documented by archaeologists, who were more interested in studying stunning finds like inscriptions, statues, or architecture.

Severan Basilica, Leptis Magna (Ross Burns/Manar al-Athar)

Archaeologists can study board games using many different kinds of evidence, including gaming pieces, dice, images (sculpture, painting and mosaics) as well as gaming boards which were scratched or carved into stone.

We only get part of the picture because many gaming boards were made from materials which don’t survive very well in the archaeological record – like wood or cloth.

Painted and Inlaid Game Board, 17th century (MET, 1983.374) Metropolitan Museum of Art, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

And sometimes gaming boards are marked out in the earth or sand or on floors with charcoal or paint.

(Judith McKenzie)

Archaeologists study board games from many different perspectives: sometimes we reconstruct board games using this material evidence combined with historical texts and also draw on the testimony of modern people who still play similar games. We can also look at where and when people played board games – and who played them – as a way to explore social history of past societies.

Now let’s look at some board games from Roman and medieval North Africa

Marble runs

Many games were played in similar ways in different parts of the Roman world. For example, marbles runs can be seen on games in both the City of Rome itself, and in Leptis Magna, Libya. In both cases, these gaming boards are located in public places.

The one in Rome is located in the natatio (swimming pool) of the Baths of Caracalla, one of the grand bathing establishments of this ancient megacity. It isn’t difficult to image people playing games in between dips as part of their wider leisure routine.

(Ethan Doyle White, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

A similar gaming board appears on some steps in the Old Forum at Leptis Magna, Libya. The appearance of gaming boards in public places across the ancient world is a common feature of late Roman public places.

(Andrew Wilson/HEIR)

We don’t fully understand the rules of this game, but it was clearly popular, and is possibly mentioned by the late antique author St Augustine (Confessions, 1, 19, 30) when he talks about playing ‘piluli’ with other children during his boyhood.

People probably played games while waiting for important meetings or other business, and playing games in public – where people could see you, commentate, bet, offer advice, or even help you cheat – seems to have been an important part of ancient gaming culture.

XII Scripta or Alea

Boards for playing a game known as XII Scripta or Alea—an ancestor of the modern game backgammon—comprise three rows of 12 markings, which can be squares, circles, letters or lines.

They are known from across the ancient Mediterranean, as this example from Aphrodisias in Caria (now in Turkey) shows.

(wneuheisel, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

At Leptis Magna, a Roman city in Libya, one board for playing this game comes from the portico behind the theatre, shown here.

(Anna Leone/Manar al-Athar)

The letters often spell out rude words or jokes. In this case, even though the inscription is fragmentary, it is close to a common board type, where the letters spell out (in Latin): “You cannot win a point; you do not know how to play.”

(Redrawn from Caputo "Il Teatro di Leptis Magna")

Mosaics from other parts of North Africa, like Thysdrus, now in Tunisia, also depict people playing a game called duodecim scripta, an ancestor of modern backgammon. The choice to show it in a mosaic indicates that the subject was considered to be relatively important and worth depicting in relatively expensive art.

(Photo: Courtesy of Livius.org)

Unknown games

We don’t always know what games were played on markings on floors or pavements, or even if they were used for board games at all. For example, in several places in Leptis Magna, there are markings in the form of a circle with various different designs on the interior.

Here’s one in the Baths of Hadrian at Leptis.

(Andrew Wilson/HEIR)

And here are some more in the Old Forum, again at Leptis Magna – with some stones in place as gaming pieces – but there are plenty of others from elsewhere, like in the Severan Basilica.

(Andrew Wilson/Manar al-Athar)

Some scholars have suggested that these designs were used for a game like the modern merels or three-/nine-men’s morris. This game might have been mentioned by Ovid (Ars Amatoria, II, 203-208 & III, 353-366), though he could be talking about a different game.

A man playing a board game at Leptis Magna (Sophie Hay)

But others argue that this doesn’t lead to a very good game because the player who makes the first move basically always wins.

Other researchers have suggested that these designers were used for throwing games, where players had to aim for specific parts of the design to score points, like this one shown in a mosaic from the villa at Piazza Armerina, Sicily.

(Ulrich Schädler)

Alternatively, they might not be for playing games at all. Some people think they had a religious significance, or were used rituals and ceremonies, to mark out the paths of processions or as part of divination.

The truth is, at the moment, we just don’t know which is the best interpretation, and more work is needed!

Board games after the Romans

Moving into the period after the end of Roman rule, we start to know both less and more about board games. This is because the available texts have received less attention from historians but at the same time, games played in the post-Roman period are often closer to the ones people still play today. It is sometimes difficult to tell exactly when carved or scratched gaming boards were made because some of the designs were often in use for a very long time.

In such cases we can often only say that the gaming board was made after the floor was laid. Archaeologists call this a terminus post quem (Latin for "limit after which”).

Sabratha

The ancient city of Sabratha in Libya is best known for its Roman-period remains.

These include the Capitolium, a 2nd-century temple facing onto the forum.

(Ross Burns/Manar al-Athar)

On the steps were a series of gaming boards. This one is a 7 x 7 grid made up of carved depressions.

(Andrew Wilson/Manar al-Athar)

These boards could be ancient, but it is more likely that they are medieval or later, as they can be used for playing Seeja or Zamma — strategy games which are both still played across North Africa today.

(Andrew Wilson/Manar al-Athar)

The game was first recorded in Egypt in the 19^th century but it is probably older. It can be played on boards in a 5×5, 7×7 or 9×9 grid. At the start of the game, the board is empty, and players take turns placing two pieces in any empty cell, apart from the central cell. Then, players move their pieces trying to jump over their opponent's pieces to remove them.

Alternatively, it could be used for another game, called Zamma, which is also still played in North Africa. The game is similar to Alquerque and draughts and is played on 5x5 or 9x9 square grids.

Wadi Tabaqah

Similar designs are known elsewhere in North Africa, particularly in Libya.

Here's the shelter in Wadi Tabaqah, near the Ghadāmis Oasis.

(Graeme Barker/Manar al-Athar)

And inside, a gaming board like the one we saw in Sabratha—again probably for playing Seeja or Zamma. It isn’t hard to imagine that people travelling as part of caravans through this extremely hot and arid landscape taking a rest in this cave and playing games.

(Graeme Barker/Manar al-Athar)

Conclusions

There is still a lot to find out of about board games in Roman and post-Roman North Africa, but as this StoryMap shows that these are both a way to think about the experience of everyday life and play in the past, and there are many questions that remain unanswered. I will be exploring these questions in relation to a larger dataset of published and unpublished gaming boards in my future work.