Hey look, we have a new piece out for @theconversation.com! Check out our thoughts on these 12.000 year old dice and play in general!

New piece out in @theconversation.com with @apolitopoulos.bsky.social and @docrandom.bsky.social on those early Native American dice everyone’s talking about: theconversation.com/archaeologis...

🎲💻🕹️ Download free-access research on #games & #gaming, from #Cambridge's #Classics and #Archaeology journals. 🔗➡️ https://cup.org/4tj9nfe Access is free (where not already OA) until 31 May. #archaeogaming @saa-aap.bsky.social @antiquity.ac.uk @classicalassociation.org @archaeologyeaa.bsky.social

phys.org/news/2026-03... The earliest known dice in human history were made and used by Native American hunter-gatherers on the western Great Plains more than 12,000 years ago.

Stolen Romanian helmet has been recovered: Dutch media www.dutchnews.nl?p=265965

I was a guest on the podcast What We Did Before, where I talk about all things ancient games! Check it out here: pod.fo/e/3d24b5

NEWS: Syracuse is expected to hire Siena head coach and former Orange star Gerry McNamara as its next men’s basketball head coach, according to multiple reports.

Medieval chess promoted racial harmony and mutual respect, say historians. phys.org/news/2026-03...

Roman anti-cheating gaming accessory! This Roman ‘turricula’ (dice tower) was used to ensure a fair roll of the dice! 🎲🎲🎲 Dice dropped into the top, tumbled over sloping internal levels, and appeared randomly below. From Froitzheim, Germany, AD 300-400 📷 LVR-Landesmuseum Bonn #Archaeology

Timeless design! Roman rock crystal gaming die marked one to six like modern dice 🎲 1st-2nd century AD. 📷 British Museum www.britishmuseum.org/collection/o... #Archaeology

Some analog #archaeogaming on NPR yesterday: finding the rules of an ancient Roman board game with @waltros.bsky.social and others: www.npr.org/2026/02/23/n... #classics

Researchers have used artificial intelligence to model possible rulesets for a Roman board game, concluding it was a kind of game previously unknown in Europe until the Middle Ages, pushing back evidence of their play by several centuries. A playful #AntiquityThread 1/13 🧵 🏺 #Archaeology

The second union of archaeologists in Greece taking a stance on the EAA saga. They represent the contract archaeologists, the largest sector; they call for a boycott: the majority of the local archaeological community in Greece does not support the Athens EAA meeting, under the current leadership.

Ok everyone jk, it’s not a game it’s actually cheese

AI has helped scientists from Heerlen, Maastricht and Leiden confirm a mysterious Roman stone is a real board game—and even reconstruct its rules nearly 2,000 years later. The discovery pushes strategy games further back in time. Curious to play it yourself? 🎲 Read more: edu.nl/u6cgy #AI

Forbidden chocolate chip cookie (Roman board game made out of a rock)

Fancy trying out the game yourself? You can play with the ruleset online here: ludii.games/details.php?...

NEW AI simulation helps calculate the rules of a previously unknown Roman board game, pushing evidence for the playing of blocking games in Europe back centuries! 🆓 doi.org/10.15184/aqy... 🏺 #Archaeology @waltros.bsky.social @eric-piette.bsky.social @Dennissoemers.bsky.social

The first issue of the year is out now! Featuring great #archaeology such as: 🎲 Calculating the rules of an unknown Roman board game 🕳️ The purpose of Peru's iconic 'Band of Holes' 🍷 Glass trade from the Roman-Islamic period in Jordan & more! www.cambridge.org/core/journal... 🏺

Really proud of this work, where we combined traditional archaeological methods and AI simulation to say that yes, this object was more likely than not a game board. How did we do it? I’ll explain 👇👇 doi.org/10.15184/aqy...

The lines worn into an engraved limestone object from the Netherlands are consistent with the idea that it was a Roman game board, according to an AI analysis

This carved rock may have been a board game, according to a study in which AIs played out thousands of games with slightly different rules against each other to reproduce which moves might have led to the wear and tear seen on the board. 🧪 🤖 🎲 www.newscientist.com/article/2514...

www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/news/2026... Researchers discovered that the wear on the stone is most likely linked to the playing of so-called blocking games: board games in which the goal is to prevent the opponent from moving.

My work with @eric-piette.bsky.social @dennissoemers.bsky.social et al. using AI-simulated play to identify rules that produce piece movement that matches use-wear patterns on an object from Roman Coriovallum is getting picked up in the popular press 😁

Roman rock-crystal icosahedron (20-sided dice) used in fortune-telling. Each face has a Latin letter on it and a corresponding Roman numeral, then matched with pre-prepared oracle answers in a divination handbook. Currently at the Louvre. #Witchsky

One of the Lewis Chessmen - currently on display at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. Found in 1831 on a beach at Uig on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, the Chessmen dates to the late 12th or early 13th century. 📸 My own. #FindsFriday #LewisChessmen #NMS

*Almost* true. Cats ambled into Europe millennia earlier then demanded to be let out again.

In response to the deluge of messages on casting in The Odyssey: Helen was born from an 🥚 Don’t talk to me about historical veracity.

Melted marbles from Moria, the largest migrant camp in Europe, which burnt down in 2020. The material culture of border crossings is often intentionally erased. Preserving and studying it is essential to understanding this contemporary #archaeology 🏺 🆓 doi.org/10.15184/aqy...

He laid out the m.o. of modern pseudo-archaeology, i.e., repeat false claims and never correct them: " “Chariots of the Gods” was followed by more than two dozen similar books, spawning a literary niche in which fact and fantasy were mixed together against all historical and scientific evidence."

🚨Urgent‼️ The EAA has doxxed members who have been working to reestablish justice, democracy and accountability in the association. This is a chilling move. We must take action. ALL EAA MEMBERS OUT FOR THE SPECIAL MEETING THIS FRIDAY JAN 9TH! #EAAforDemocracy

Archaeologists discover unique mosaic patolli board at Guatemalan Maya city. phys.org/news/2025-11...

Le patolli est un des plus vieux jeux de société d’Amérique. Le premier plateau de patolli en mosaïque jamais trouvé vient de l’être à Naachtun, une cité maya du Peten. Daté du Ve siècle ap. J.-C., il était intégré au sol d’une résidence phys.org/news/2025-11...

This fragment of #gaming board & counters were found at the #Trimontium fort site. Probably used by #Roman soldiers to play Latrunculi or Ludus Latrunculorum, the counters are made of recycled Samian ware & glass. 📷 Board & counters, Trimontium Trust Ludus latrunculorum, Spain CC BY-SA 4.0

We are glad to announce that the calls for our grant scheme have been published on our website. Find there all information about the application process for: -ITC Conference Grant -Short Term Scientific Missions -Dissemination Grants -Young Researchers and Innovators Conference Grant Link below

🚨IOF STEALING HERITAGE The IOF stormed the town of Al-Maza'a Al-Sharqiyah in the West Bank and stole an ancient column from it! Does the leadership of @asor-research.bsky.social - who had no problem hosting and partying with many 🇮🇱 archaeologists at their congress 2 weeks ago - have anything to say?

We found a game board on top of the Temple of Taffeh at @rmoudheden.bsky.social 😁

𝗪𝗮𝘁 𝘇𝗶𝗲 𝗶𝗸 𝗱𝗮𝗮𝗿 𝗼𝗽 𝗵𝗲𝘁 𝗱𝗮𝗸? Ism Daniel Soliman (RMO) troffen archeologen @apolitopoulos.bsky.social & @waltros.bsky.social (@unileiden.bsky.social) een bordspel aan op het dak van de tempel @rmoudheden.bsky.social 🎙️In deze podcast vertellen ze over de ontdekking⤵️ @leidencity.bsky.social

Academia Wrapped, 2025: Survived. Barely.

Also: The Spartans

Great doctoral student funding opportunity here that includes those who research on Cyprus. 🏺

Introduce yourself with 5 animals you have seen in the wild Moufflon (Cyprus) Diamondback rattlesnake (Arizona) Humpback whale (Massachusetts) European hedgehog (Netherlands) American black bear (New York)

Will anyone at this year's conference ask for ASOR to be held to account for its active complicity with the archaeology-washing of apartheid and genocide in Palestine? How are they complicit, you might ask? Here's a refresher 🧵 1/

Some 1,500 years ago, a child was buried with a set of game pieces made of animal bones. Single game pieces are frequently found in early medieval graves in south-west Germany, but complete sets are rare. Found in Herbolzheim, 500-550 AD. 📷 Landesmuseum Württemberg 🏺 #archaeology

Black American soldiers literally dug these WWII graves. Traumatic. To acknowledge that fact at a cemetery they helped construct is something the Heritage Foundation cannot accept. As Veterans Day approaches, never forget that this country both compels and disrespects Black military service. Always.

1/ The US Government has quietly removed a memorial to Black soldiers who died in World War II from the Netherlands American Cemetery in Margraten, South Limburg. The move follows a complaint from the right-wing Heritage Foundation to the American Battle Monuments Commission. ⬇️

BOYCOTT EAA-ATHENS 2026 🏺 This is not a BTC action but we are helping to disseminate this call, as the president of the EAA has shown great willingness for reprisals. Please distribute widely, particularly to offline colleagues.

Mamdani got a humanities degree. His win helps to illustrate that one of the central forces driving higher ed’s dissolution of the humanities is the fear that teaching people how power works can also lead to their interest in seizing it on behalf of the less powerful.

I ❤️ NY