Senet

An Egyptian board of thirty squares. Fragmentary boards come from First Dynasty tombs (around 3100 BCE), and the earliest image that can be confirmed as senet actually being played is in the tomb of Hesy-Ra (around 2686–2613 BCE). The figure of 3500 BCE that often circulates is one this map could not trace back to a scholarly source, however far it searched — so here it is held loosely, written as among the oldest known. The game was played for more than three thousand years, and Tutankhamun's tomb held a lavish set along with four or five portable ones. He meant to keep playing after death. In time the board became linked to Chapter 17 of the Book of the Dead, which depicts the deceased playing against an unseen opponent. Who is that unseen opponent? Accounts differ: the deceased's own soul, the serpent Mehen who guards the sun god, an enemy of the underworld, or no opponent at all, the deceased simply playing alone. Who sat across from that board four thousand years ago is still not settled.