Tom Scott vs Irving Finkel: The Royal Game of Ur | PLAYTHROUGH | International Tabletop Day 2017

Why HN readers recommended it

Recommended in threads on ancient games and cuneiform as a charming match with an enthusiastic expert.

This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.

Video & recommendation details

Creator / channel

The British Museum

Topic

ancient board games

Format

demo

Level

general

HN recommenders in dataset

6

HN mentions in dataset

9

Recommendation years in dataset

2019–2025

These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.

From the original HN conversations

Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.

• He really is. He's got two incredible videos with Tom Scott where the two of them play what could be considered the worlds oldest game[0] and he introduces Tom and Matt to "writing" cuneiform[1]. He's so sharp in both, I love seeing him anywhere else …

• I was lucky enough to meet Irving Finkel a couple of times and he is as eccentric in person as he is in his brilliant lectures, talks, and videos. When I met him all the shelves, and even the floor, in his office was covered …

• I've gotten into ancient games recently, and I've tried Senet with various rule variations- I think it's kind of boring. I like much better the Royal Game of Ur- [VIDEO] I've also been playing with Indian Pachisi, two player is kind of boring, but I …