Playing with the Past: Reconstructing Ancient Games

The workshop will be run by board game historian Jacob Schmidt-Madsen and team. It will begin with an introduction to the field of historical game studies and the challenges scholars face when trying to understand how ancient games were actually played. This will be followed by a brief presentation of 4-5 games that we no longer know how to play and, in some cases, cannot even be sure were ever used as games.

Participants will then be divided into smaller groups, each of which will be assigned one of the games and tasked with reconstructing its rules. At your disposal you will have a physical replica of the game, boards, dice, and pawns, and a folder with circumstantial evidence in the form of textual passages, visual depictions, and information on other games and game mechanics from the same region and period. Paper printouts of gameboards and simple wooden components will aid you in developing and testing your reconstructions. The goal is not only to reconstruct the rules of play, but also to reflect on the social context and function of the game as well as any symbolic or representational value it might have had.

As you reconstruct the ancient games, the experience will be akin to puzzling out a solution to a murder mystery and will demonstrate how the act of reconstructing games is in itself a form of play.

At the end of the workshop, you will get to present your reconstructions to each other and reflect on how you arrived at them. You will receive feedback on your ideas and suggestions and also have a chance to invite people from other groups to play your games. This will happen in a casual format under the supervision of Jacob Schmidt-Madsen to ensure that everybody feels included and can enjoy the experience of playing and sharing board games together. 

After the workshop, you will also be able to take home a copy of your game and introduce it to the people around you!