It's a shame the views are so low because this is a really great video. Lot of information, very in-depth and you learn about all sorts from it including the context surrounding the game. Although not many people have seen it, I wanted to let you know I really enjoyed it. Also I subbed. One thing that always seemed strange was the orientation of the characters like in King Tut's board. They face to the right, which makes you wonder whether the game is played from right-to-left (following the direction you would read the heiroglyphs.) However I think that probably isn't how it's played since the alternating piece set-up makes the most sense for the starting position.
I would assume some boards that lack the Ankh, had it so if you fell on the water square, your piece is dead and you failed to reach the afterlife with that piece. But on boards with the Ankh, falling into the water would just send you back to that square (or behind that square if it's occupied.) Maybe it would make sense that games with the 7 pieces had the perma-dying square, while games with the 5 pieces had the Ankh rebirth mechanic? Just random ideas to try.
First of all, a big thank you to you sir! this put a smile on my face :) I will respond both of your comments here: As for the orientation of the pieces, it is unfortunately really hard to know it for sure, because the information we have is so scarce that we work mainly with hypothesis, other games like Royal Game of Ur have more information about the rules but either way we are speculating. I think what you mention might indeed be possible, since as you say that would make more sense to the Egyptian mind (to play the same way you read). However, that does not necessarily have to mean they played that way, since maybe Senet was influenced by other similar games that followed the left-right structure. Personally, the more I research this the more I think sometimes we give too much importance to the symbols on the board, after all, we also have a big amount that do not display any symbols. This, together with the fact that many representations do not display alternate piece setups - but 2 different rows next to each other (like in the thumbnail) - could mean that one player started in the top row and the other in the bottom one, and the game was played in a similar way to how we play backgammon in games such as fevga, plakoto… etc. In any case, I think the game was played in many ways and if we were to go back in time, we would probably find Egyptians arguing on how to play and what to play with the board, the same way you would argue today with friends about what to play with a deck of cards, how to play a specific game, etc. The religious-version or symbol-oriented version might have even been played as a solo game in a kind of fortune telling activity. As you see, in can be almost anything! It can be an interesting topic for a different video.
@@ancientgaming4698 Yeah like they could play the game solo basically almost like a tarot card reading, where you could maybe throw the dice and see which squares you land on on your path to the netherworld, and each square in the more decorated boards would have more "predictions" for your soul that have a superstitious, ritualistic meaning, but not any gameplay impact. And that may explain why certain murals had solo-Senet players (just randomly I despise tarot cards and other superstitions but that's neither here nor there lol.) I was part way through making a Senet board but stopped half way through since I discovered the rules are mostly guessed at. And part of my motivation for making it was I wanted to sort of bring to life Egyptian culture by playing their game, so it's a shame the exact rules are lost. But the guesses seem to be logical to me (although they're probably not 100% spot on.) Btw I do think it probably is placed in a Z direction not an S direction, but another point for the S direction IMO is that on many boards, the Ankh square is rotated. So if you do play the direction you read the heiroglyphs then the fact the Ankh square is rotated could signal to the player the direction (because it's rotated 90 degrees) Due to the symmetry of the symbol, if it wasn't rotated, the direction would be ambiguous, but because you know to always read heiroglyphs from top to bottom if they're stacked vertically, then you know the direction you're going on the board thanks to the Ankh's orientation. The question is then... is it reverse direction or same direction, but the directions of the heiroglyphs are not as ambiguous as they could be, it could actually be a hint at smart design language rotating that little Ankh like that. However if there are boards where they all face the same direction regardless of which row they're on, that would maybe show us that the direction of the heiroglyphs are irrelevant to your path around the board.
I explained that very confusingly... basically if the Ankh heiroglyph wasn't rotated relative to the other symbols, because it's a symmetrical symbol you wouldn't know which direction to read from. But rotating it now changes the line of symmetry, and makes it obvious you read from left to right (opposite direction to the symbols on the other row.) So that rotation of the Ankh symbol is pretty cool since it tells us that the direction of the game definitely flips when you get to the edge. But why would the direction you read be related to the direction you play, if it's the reverse direction to how it's read...? A bit odd, but then we also do that ourselves some times (count down rather than count up.)
Also just saw in the other video on Chess that you're spanish, and that's cool. I'm from UK and about to fly to spain for a week holiday next week. And I just want to apologise for all the awful UK tourists who give us brits a bad reputation lol. I will try not to be one of them bad apples next week. Fully vaccinated and boosted so hopefully I don't bring... the plague with me either. Completely pointless comment here but thought I'd post it anyway since I'm excited to fly to Spain again, and compliment your epic country.
Your explanation of the history and reference the goddesses is very precise. My fav goddess is Hathor. The game looks fun and if I would definitely play it.
Awesome video! Discovered Your channel yesterday and I can say that I am hooked… one thing tho… the link in description to board game arena seems to be broken and won’t open, had to cut “index.php” part for it to work. Looking forward to a new video.
Believe it or not, today is my birthday, and this is an amazing present 😂! I’m very happy you like them. I will make sure to change the link to BGA as well
I have watched a couple of your videos and I love how you put these together. If you want the learn the history you can watch the whole thing. If you just want to know how the game is play you can skip to a time stamp. You value your viewer's time and that is, sadly, rare among RUclips creators. Here, have a subscription.
A thousand thanks Sir :)! I like to make my videos the way I would like to watch them, and I understand many people do not care about the history behind the game (the same way there are others who are mainly interested on that!). In my case, my favourite part is the history, but I also want people to have access to the "full package" if they want, in an organized way and that lets them start playing right away.
I have a few questions. First, earlier on you mentioned that landing on 27 results in removing that piece from the board, but in game it either goes to 15 or you lose a turn. Which is correct? If you are on 26 and throw a 1, and an opponent is on 27,does their piece go to 26 or 15? Last,if 27 and 15 are both occupied, and someone either lands on 27 or a later square with a piece on it (so that piece would go to 27),what happens?
Incredible video. Big fan of this channel. Keep it going! I’d love to see a deep dive of Luibo!
It's a shame the views are so low because this is a really great video. Lot of information, very in-depth and you learn about all sorts from it including the context surrounding the game. Although not many people have seen it, I wanted to let you know I really enjoyed it. Also I subbed.
One thing that always seemed strange was the orientation of the characters like in King Tut's board. They face to the right, which makes you wonder whether the game is played from right-to-left (following the direction you would read the heiroglyphs.) However I think that probably isn't how it's played since the alternating piece set-up makes the most sense for the starting position.
I would assume some boards that lack the Ankh, had it so if you fell on the water square, your piece is dead and you failed to reach the afterlife with that piece. But on boards with the Ankh, falling into the water would just send you back to that square (or behind that square if it's occupied.) Maybe it would make sense that games with the 7 pieces had the perma-dying square, while games with the 5 pieces had the Ankh rebirth mechanic? Just random ideas to try.
First of all, a big thank you to you sir! this put a smile on my face :) I will respond both of your comments here:
As for the orientation of the pieces, it is unfortunately really hard to know it for sure, because the information we have is so scarce that we work mainly with hypothesis, other games like Royal Game of Ur have more information about the rules but either way we are speculating. I think what you mention might indeed be possible, since as you say that would make more sense to the Egyptian mind (to play the same way you read). However, that does not necessarily have to mean they played that way, since maybe Senet was influenced by other similar games that followed the left-right structure.
Personally, the more I research this the more I think sometimes we give too much importance to the symbols on the board, after all, we also have a big amount that do not display any symbols. This, together with the fact that many representations do not display alternate piece setups - but 2 different rows next to each other (like in the thumbnail) - could mean that one player started in the top row and the other in the bottom one, and the game was played in a similar way to how we play backgammon in games such as fevga, plakoto… etc. In any case, I think the game was played in many ways and if we were to go back in time, we would probably find Egyptians arguing on how to play and what to play with the board, the same way you would argue today with friends about what to play with a deck of cards, how to play a specific game, etc. The religious-version or symbol-oriented version might have even been played as a solo game in a kind of fortune telling activity. As you see, in can be almost anything! It can be an interesting topic for a different video.
@@ancientgaming4698 Yeah like they could play the game solo basically almost like a tarot card reading, where you could maybe throw the dice and see which squares you land on on your path to the netherworld, and each square in the more decorated boards would have more "predictions" for your soul that have a superstitious, ritualistic meaning, but not any gameplay impact. And that may explain why certain murals had solo-Senet players (just randomly I despise tarot cards and other superstitions but that's neither here nor there lol.)
I was part way through making a Senet board but stopped half way through since I discovered the rules are mostly guessed at. And part of my motivation for making it was I wanted to sort of bring to life Egyptian culture by playing their game, so it's a shame the exact rules are lost. But the guesses seem to be logical to me (although they're probably not 100% spot on.)
Btw I do think it probably is placed in a Z direction not an S direction, but another point for the S direction IMO is that on many boards, the Ankh square is rotated. So if you do play the direction you read the heiroglyphs then the fact the Ankh square is rotated could signal to the player the direction (because it's rotated 90 degrees) Due to the symmetry of the symbol, if it wasn't rotated, the direction would be ambiguous, but because you know to always read heiroglyphs from top to bottom if they're stacked vertically, then you know the direction you're going on the board thanks to the Ankh's orientation. The question is then... is it reverse direction or same direction, but the directions of the heiroglyphs are not as ambiguous as they could be, it could actually be a hint at smart design language rotating that little Ankh like that.
However if there are boards where they all face the same direction regardless of which row they're on, that would maybe show us that the direction of the heiroglyphs are irrelevant to your path around the board.
I explained that very confusingly... basically if the Ankh heiroglyph wasn't rotated relative to the other symbols, because it's a symmetrical symbol you wouldn't know which direction to read from. But rotating it now changes the line of symmetry, and makes it obvious you read from left to right (opposite direction to the symbols on the other row.) So that rotation of the Ankh symbol is pretty cool since it tells us that the direction of the game definitely flips when you get to the edge. But why would the direction you read be related to the direction you play, if it's the reverse direction to how it's read...? A bit odd, but then we also do that ourselves some times (count down rather than count up.)
Also just saw in the other video on Chess that you're spanish, and that's cool. I'm from UK and about to fly to spain for a week holiday next week. And I just want to apologise for all the awful UK tourists who give us brits a bad reputation lol. I will try not to be one of them bad apples next week. Fully vaccinated and boosted so hopefully I don't bring... the plague with me either. Completely pointless comment here but thought I'd post it anyway since I'm excited to fly to Spain again, and compliment your epic country.
I was waiting for this one long time ago! Best historical boardgames channel👌👌
oh my patata!! thank you sir
Your explanation of the history and reference the goddesses is very precise. My fav goddess is Hathor. The game looks fun and if I would definitely play it.
the quality of these videos and the interesting topic make me sad you aren't bigger!
Please, more videos! Los amo!
Please keep making videos...
Regards from 🏴 England
I hope you plan to return to this channel again. I'd love to see you cover Hounds And Jackals or maybe some other games I've never heard of
I would love if you would cover the Mayan game Puluc (Bul)
this video has been a massive help for my college assignment in game history thank you!
Severely underated
Awesome video! Discovered Your channel yesterday and I can say that I am hooked… one thing tho… the link in description to board game arena seems to be broken and won’t open, had to cut “index.php” part for it to work. Looking forward to a new video.
Believe it or not, today is my birthday, and this is an amazing present 😂! I’m very happy you like them. I will make sure to change the link to BGA as well
@@ancientgaming4698 Happy belated birthday.
@@ag-bf3ty Mil gracias :D!!
Great video!
I have watched a couple of your videos and I love how you put these together. If you want the learn the history you can watch the whole thing. If you just want to know how the game is play you can skip to a time stamp. You value your viewer's time and that is, sadly, rare among RUclips creators. Here, have a subscription.
A thousand thanks Sir :)! I like to make my videos the way I would like to watch them, and I understand many people do not care about the history behind the game (the same way there are others who are mainly interested on that!). In my case, my favourite part is the history, but I also want people to have access to the "full package" if they want, in an organized way and that lets them start playing right away.
"I am the Senet!"
Pharaoh Palpatine
I have a few questions. First, earlier on you mentioned that landing on 27 results in removing that piece from the board, but in game it either goes to 15 or you lose a turn. Which is correct?
If you are on 26 and throw a 1, and an opponent is on 27,does their piece go to 26 or 15?
Last,if 27 and 15 are both occupied, and someone either lands on 27 or a later square with a piece on it (so that piece would go to 27),what happens?
So this is the dice mechanism of Liubo 六博 (six sticks), (Parcheesi).
me encanta ☺
Will you be ding a video on Mehen? Thank you for the history of this game.
Gracias por esta nueva lección de Historia.
Amazing. A game infused to Egyptian mythology.
I can see immediately that it is the ancestor of backgammon.
If you thought Senet was crazy, just wait until you get to the House of Representatives.
Where'd you go?
tomb raider 4 the last revelation
People in Egypt still play senet & Ur