I have just bought a copy of this game in a charity shop, I found the written instructions a bit complicated. This explanation is really good, thank you for putting this on here.
This information MIGHT be correct. King Tut was buried with four boards. Scholars have surmised how it might have been played by looking at pictures of games in progress. This lack of positive info. is mentioned in most other videos. The accepted rules given here are the best modern guess.
Seven years after this video is posted, I’ve just seen an exhibition of Tutankhamuns Treasures, which included a lovely little Senet board of Ivory... and I started to think how I could reproduce it in slightly more pedestrian (and legal) materials...and now, I know what it’s supposed to do if I DO make one!
thank you so much,I am learning to paly this game in school and our homework assignment was to go home and research a video of how to play the game of senet.Hope I get a good grade!88888(fingers crossed)8888888
Between this and the various apps, there seem to be a lot of wildly different rule variants. Were these all in use at different times, or are we mostly just taking guesses at how it _might_ have been played?
You might want to check out the Royal Game of Ur which was found in archeological digs in Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq). At first glance I had thought that Ur was sort of a missing link between Senet and Backgammon, since the Ur board game and direction of play mimics Senet somewhat, and the game play and strategy certainly elements and strategies of Backgammon. The Romans brought Backgammon into the forefront, which explains why in the late era of Roman expansion Ur may have become less popular (or it may simply have been that Backgammon was a deeper game with more possibilities for strategy). Like Senet, the original rules of Ur are somewhat speculative, but archaeologist Irving Finkel found “late-era” rules on a clay cuneiform tablet which described a somewhat complex variation of Ur played at about 200 B.C. For comparison, Senet dates back to about 3,1000 BCE, Backgammon to roughly 3,000 BCE, and the oldest Ur boards that have been discovered in the Middle East date back to 2,600 BCE. So my revised theory is that Backgammon and Senet may actually have been developed separately, and Ur may actually be inheriting from these two games. But that’s just my theory as a gamer, and will have nothing to do with archaeologists might believe to be their histories. The best intro tot he Royal Game of Ur is in a video in which Finkel teaches a quite simplified “basic” set of rules to gaming enthusiast Tom Scott. The rules are far simpler than Senet, but the strategy can be quite deep and the game play a lot of fun. I’m a total fan of Ur, and now coming up to speed on Senet as well. th-cam.com/video/WZskjLq040I/w-d-xo.html
Was just about to say that this game immediately reminded me of Ur. They share some similarities (exp. exact throws to score a point) but everything else seems too far off to be connected. Its weird that Im enjoying ancient board games much more than today's, they just feel and look very simple, while having some depth to them
If you cannot make a forward move, and your only valid backward move has an unprotected opponents piece, can you make the backwards move and swap, or is that not allowed?
Yes. Moving backward and swapping with the opponent's unprotected piece would be the legal move. (Sorry to keep you waiting for the answer that long - Hope you didn't get stuck within a game session waiting for that info :))
It is more like a cousin of backgammon, both games are extremely old. And the rules are different because: 1- the original gameplay has been lost and it had to be reconstructed from various snippets of text; 2 - some historians believe the game never had a fixed set of rules and it varied from place to place.
@@refulgent_fanta The game certainly never had a fixed set of rules, since no game does if it doesn't have a regulatory body, especially before rulebooks.
I was 9 we hada. Class trip to istanbul archeological museum and the tour laidy asked if antone heard of this game I said I know how to play because I learned this game from a cartoon I dont remember the cartoon but it was a mumy in the museum came alive
Ur is really nice, this one too, at times it can be a little like ... traffic jam ..but still alot of fun (if you play it in real life not on a PC or some app but that goes for all board games i guess Ur included):)
Antea Šolić Well you see ,when you opened your book to study ,you fell into another demention, landing you on this youtube CHANNEL! It happens all the time! This is a game I grew up with, but I forgot the rules, so that's why I'm here!👱♀️🌷🌻🌷🌻🌷🌻
No, The Royal Game of Ur (or The Game of 20 Squares) is the oldest game. We know this because Sumer came before Egypt. Otherwise great video. Thank you.
It is sad this game have lost a long time for the World. It looks very interesting because it requires luck and tactics like backgammon. I suppose I would have loved to play it when I was a kid if it were known by widely.
Thanks for the video, I want to play Senet now. It looks like the strategies involved are similar to Backgammon and Chess and maybe even a little bit of the game Go. I could see how both Backgammon and Chess could have evolved from this, if Charles Darwin was right. There are others that feel divine intervention created all three games, the debate goes on. Does anyone know if senet played earlier than Go? Go seems more simplistic than Senet to me. Not in strategy but the components of Go are simpler, all you need is rocks to play Go and draw some squares on the ground.
Senet is similar to Royal Game of Ur and Backgammon, while Chess and Xiangqi descended from Indian Chess iirc? But however Go/Weiqi seems to be made by the Han chinese on their own.
What happens next if your stone in House of waters and you decide to roll again and fail to roll 4 ? How long it's stay there ? How can you take it out from house of waters?
We Egyptians now prefer Tawla (Tapa, Backgammon), similar rules in concept (pieces move with dice, extra turn or get twice the number of exact moves if you get two matching dice , the goal is to remove all pieces)
Its length combined with the simplicity could be why the, similarly basic but more dynamic, Game of Twenty Squares/Ur was equally popular in its land of origin, funnily enough. Maybe it mostly kept on due to tradition and divination... a little like Monopoly.
@@StopFear Nothing that precise. However, in the 6th Dynasty, senet seemingly acquired a meaning as a communication with the dead via iconographic depiction, and by the 12th Dynasty it was certainly believed that it could channel a person's ba. In the 20th Dynasty, a ritual also involved recreating the journey of Ra through the Netherworld, where an enemy of Ra would ultimately be drowned in the waters, that is the 27th house/square. This was done as a way to facilitate the passage of one's ba. Known from the Book of the Dead, Coffin Text Spell 405; Great Game-Text, respectively.
Ah, the good old days of TH-cam when content was intimate and not just a series of cashgrabs.
Of all the tutorial I have watched this had been the far most easy to understand
Yeah, super well structured!
I have just bought a copy of this game in a charity shop, I found the written instructions a bit complicated. This explanation is really good, thank you for putting this on here.
Such a well explained tutorial. Helped me do my history project in minutes. Thank you so much
This is a great game. I’m addicted to it. Very good explanation.
ive seen a lot of different rules about the game, but this was the first one ive seen so this is how i will play
Its an exciting game, it really feels like souls passing through death to the afterlife.
Strange Person Are you sure?
Thank you guys!
Enjoy the game (and many more) on BGA!
You make one video and quit. What the heck?
This is not the original game rules. Actually no one knows. That's why he made one video and left.
It's an ancient game, rules are guaranteed to vary, but this was helpful.
Thank you C: This game is so cool! Your explanation and visuals were on point!
These rules are also my favorite rule variant that I've come across so far!
Thank you so much for your detailed explanation!
Excellent job, thank you for helping me understand! Very interesting!
Tomb Raider has you play this game to pass a level inside it's game.
Really? Which one, TR1?
@@privatkatze9186 The Last Revelation, in the Tomb of Semerkhet level.
This information MIGHT be correct. King Tut was buried with four boards. Scholars have surmised how it might have been played by looking at pictures of games in progress. This lack of positive info. is mentioned in most other videos. The accepted rules given here are the best modern guess.
Great video, thank you for sharing the rules with us
Seven years after this video is posted, I’ve just seen an exhibition of Tutankhamuns Treasures, which included a lovely little Senet board of Ivory... and I started to think how I could reproduce it in slightly more pedestrian (and legal) materials...and now, I know what it’s supposed to do if I DO make one!
thank you so much,I am learning to paly this game in school and our homework assignment was to go home and research a video of how to play the game of senet.Hope I get a good grade!88888(fingers crossed)8888888
Thank you very much for your effort. Now its time to play Senet.
Never played it as an option for the water. It was an automatic go to square 15. Never seen this as a variant either.
oh, so that's where we got those sticks from. the korean game yut nori has the same sticks and we play it during korean holidays
Maybe but apparently the game, Senet, at least originally is supposed to be the oldest board game.
Throwing sticks for the purpose of random numbers were most likely invented multiple times across the world, rather than having one origin point.
Between this and the various apps, there seem to be a lot of wildly different rule variants.
Were these all in use at different times, or are we mostly just taking guesses at how it _might_ have been played?
My understanding is that no ancient rules set has been found so these are just imaginings of the rules.
Yes, these are all reconstructions, as we only know a few of the details of gameplay. However, many variants certainly existed.
Trust me, this game is so powerful that it gave life to 5 gods/goddesses with a wisdom god playing against the moon god (and winning)
I’ve played this before and it’s really fun!
This game is a lot like backgammon. I bet this game is a predecessor to it.
You might want to check out the Royal Game of Ur which was found in archeological digs in Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq). At first glance I had thought that Ur was sort of a missing link between Senet and Backgammon, since the Ur board game and direction of play mimics Senet somewhat, and the game play and strategy certainly elements and strategies of Backgammon. The Romans brought Backgammon into the forefront, which explains why in the late era of Roman expansion Ur may have become less popular (or it may simply have been that Backgammon was a deeper game with more possibilities for strategy).
Like Senet, the original rules of Ur are somewhat speculative, but archaeologist Irving Finkel found “late-era” rules on a clay cuneiform tablet which described a somewhat complex variation of Ur played at about 200 B.C. For comparison, Senet dates back to about 3,1000 BCE, Backgammon to roughly 3,000 BCE, and the oldest Ur boards that have been discovered in the Middle East date back to 2,600 BCE. So my revised theory is that Backgammon and Senet may actually have been developed separately, and Ur may actually be inheriting from these two games. But that’s just my theory as a gamer, and will have nothing to do with archaeologists might believe to be their histories.
The best intro tot he Royal Game of Ur is in a video in which Finkel teaches a quite simplified “basic” set of rules to gaming enthusiast Tom Scott. The rules are far simpler than Senet, but the strategy can be quite deep and the game play a lot of fun. I’m a total fan of Ur, and now coming up to speed on Senet as well.
th-cam.com/video/WZskjLq040I/w-d-xo.html
Was just about to say that this game immediately reminded me of Ur. They share some similarities (exp. exact throws to score a point) but everything else seems too far off to be connected.
Its weird that Im enjoying ancient board games much more than today's, they just feel and look very simple, while having some depth to them
Very clear explanation! Thanks!
Thank you. Taking a History of Gaming course and needed to know how to play this.
There's a History of Gaming course??? Lucky. When I was in School/College gaming classes were nonexistent.
@@Jersa7 yes at my community college they had it. I know there are a lot more courses like this now from the time I posted this 6 years ago
Thank you for this tutorial very much! !
Very well explained! Thank you!
Interesting Game. Thanks for lesson !
Excellent explanation
The modern day version of this game is called "L.C.R." the game has changed through time.
If you cannot make a forward move, and your only valid backward move has an unprotected opponents piece, can you make the backwards move and swap, or is that not allowed?
Yes. Moving backward and swapping with the opponent's unprotected piece would be the legal move. (Sorry to keep you waiting for the answer that long - Hope you didn't get stuck within a game session waiting for that info :))
One of the ancesters of Backgammon? There seem to be a lot of different rules to p-laying this game, if You Tube is any indication.
It is more like a cousin of backgammon, both games are extremely old. And the rules are different because:
1- the original gameplay has been lost and it had to be reconstructed from various snippets of text;
2 - some historians believe the game never had a fixed set of rules and it varied from place to place.
@@refulgent_fanta The game certainly never had a fixed set of rules, since no game does if it doesn't have a regulatory body, especially before rulebooks.
finally something simple to understand thanks
I was 9 we hada. Class trip to istanbul archeological museum and the tour laidy asked if antone heard of this game I said I know how to play because I learned this game from a cartoon I dont remember the cartoon but it was a mumy in the museum came alive
No ANY throw, exact ONE throw.
When I play the game on BGA, two or even three and more stones don't protect each other when the opponent throws 5 or 4.
Tell me sir, where did you get these rules from. Because there's no recording of any rules for this game. Did you make this up?
Google is your friend....
the man in black taught me
Lovely and clear. Thank you!
THANK YOU FOR SHARING....I LOVED YOUR EXPLANATIONS AND EXAMPLES....
ALL THE BEST FOR 2021....JAN 1 2021...
I wish we could see the entire game board.
are extra turns cumulative? You keep building them on the same turn?
How can you loose extra turns when moving to the House of Water if you can only et there with a 1?
Really helped me with a school protect☺
If only the USA Senate moved this easily and quickly.
Good discription thanks 👍
Very similiar to the Royal Game of Ur
First time watching 9 years old video of TH-cam
Now its covid season
I prefer the royal game of ur. It's more concise yet very ingenious.
Ur is really nice, this one too, at times it can be a little like ... traffic jam ..but still alot of fun (if you play it in real life not on a PC or some app but that goes for all board games i guess Ur included):)
Nice tutorial easy to understand thanks
How did i get here? I never heard of this game! I don't want to even learn how to play it. I am supposed to be studying.
Antea Šolić same for me :'(
Antea Šolić Well you see ,when you opened your book to study ,you fell into another demention, landing you on this youtube CHANNEL! It happens all the time! This is a game I grew up with, but I forgot the rules, so that's why I'm here!👱♀️🌷🌻🌷🌻🌷🌻
lol 🤣🤣🤣🤣
LOL I am studying on last minute - couldn't be bothered to do it for the last month, i have a whole project on this tomorrow LOL
Antea Šolić Same, I'm supposed to be studying Discovering Tut in English
No, The Royal Game of Ur (or The Game of 20 Squares) is the oldest game. We know this because Sumer came before Egypt. Otherwise great video. Thank you.
It is sad this game have lost a long time for the World. It looks very interesting because it requires luck and tactics like backgammon. I suppose I would have loved to play it when I was a kid if it were known by widely.
Thanks for the video, I want to play Senet now.
It looks like the strategies involved are similar to Backgammon and Chess and maybe even a little bit of the game Go. I could see how both Backgammon and Chess could have evolved from this, if Charles Darwin was right. There are others that feel divine intervention created all three games, the debate goes on.
Does anyone know if senet played earlier than Go? Go seems more simplistic than Senet to me. Not in strategy but the components of Go are simpler, all you need is rocks to play Go and draw some squares on the ground.
Senet is similar to Royal Game of Ur and Backgammon, while Chess and Xiangqi descended from Indian Chess iirc?
But however Go/Weiqi seems to be made by the Han chinese on their own.
Senet had been played much, much earlier than Go, as far as we know.
this is extremely helpful
Nice explanation
great tutorial
It’s 6 if it’s all dark sides
awesome tutorial Thank you :)
epic review,thanx
What happens next if your stone in House of waters and you decide to roll again and fail to roll 4 ? How long it's stay there ? How can you take it out from house of waters?
Utku you can't stay in the House of Waters; you go immediately to the House of Rebirth ( with the Ankh)
Not much, but it's like backgammon. :D
you are explaining rather different rules from those I am aware of...
weirdly, a definitive rule book has never been found. If you do a little research you will see there are MANY slight variations
Very nice game
I'm here from house of anubis
You sound like Jeremy Irons in Die Hard 3. TOMORROW WE DECIDE WHICH COUNTRY WE WANT TO BUY!
6 years huh?
I wonder how you are doing now?
Thank you very much
The House of Waters!!!
Dunno why but I already know how to play this.
We Egyptians now prefer Tawla (Tapa, Backgammon), similar rules in concept (pieces move with dice, extra turn or get twice the number of exact moves if you get two matching dice , the goal is to remove all pieces)
Very interesting!
I don't understood any tutoriel.
Interesting game
note: Senet is released on bc's
house of anubis, anyone?
RacetaTM yup
I installed a senet app and got to 3rd world with this tutorial, highly recommended. Go and chess still take more skill tho.
Yep
Thank you
Yo, what's jabeling jabel?
NICE
i came here because of yu gi oh (season 0) Lol
3:50
Blue kachina
older than UR?
Yep. For ur , the earliest games date from 2600 -- 2400 BC. Senet is from around 3100 -- 3500 BC. :)
5 Religions ...
what does yd mean
House of Anubis.
Backgammon
I tried this like 1,000 times and it doesn't work! Wtf?!
Good instructions but horrible sound
I think I'll stick to chess. Good tutorial though.
High noon
and is the game any fun?
Heh heh throw the sticks
Where’s senet 2
Machina
Jablinski
This game is aesthetically pleasing and important. But it is an exceptionally boring game with very shallow depth.
Its length combined with the simplicity could be why the, similarly basic but more dynamic, Game of Twenty Squares/Ur was equally popular in its land of origin, funnily enough. Maybe it mostly kept on due to tradition and divination... a little like Monopoly.
@@lilemont9302 do you know anywhere where people explain how to do divination on these boards?
@@StopFear Nothing that precise.
However, in the 6th Dynasty, senet seemingly acquired a meaning as a communication with the dead via iconographic depiction, and by the 12th Dynasty it was certainly believed that it could channel a person's ba. In the 20th Dynasty, a ritual also involved recreating the journey of Ra through the Netherworld, where an enemy of Ra would ultimately be drowned in the waters, that is the 27th house/square. This was done as a way to facilitate the passage of one's ba. Known from the Book of the Dead, Coffin Text Spell 405; Great Game-Text, respectively.