An excavation in modern-day Turkey near what was once a Roman fortress revealed a pair of carved bone disk-shaped pieces ...

Both sides of a game piece. Image: (University of Bergen) Ludus latrunculorum, like other ancient Roman games, was similar to chess and backgammon.This game became popular among the Germanic ...

Humans have entertained themselves with board games for thousands of years. Some, like chess and go, continue to be played ...

On a cliff overlooking a narrow strait in western Norway, archaeologists have discovered rare game pieces, including odd-looking, elongated dice inside a burial mound dating to the Roman Iron Age ...

A one-inch-long gaming piece found at the site of a former Roman fort in Chester, England Cheshire West / Chester Council Archaeologists in Chester, England, have unearthed an array of Roman ...

Like many entries on this list, the exact origins of backgammon, a two-player game in which rivals race to “bear off,” or remove, all 15 of their pieces from the board, remain unclear.

1. The Royal Game of Ur. First played: As early as 2600 B.C.E. Who played it: Ancient Mesopotamians.The game also spread around Central Asia, from Iran to India. The backstory: No one knows what ...