I saw a talk last week about a dig in Turkey that found a 3,000 year old board game set, pieces and all

3 comments

3 Comments

Consider the social side of that find. Games show how people spent free time together, which @betty_scott's story about the fragile piece really makes you picture. It's a direct link to regular life, not just kings and battles.

betty_scott25d ago

Oh, that's the dream find. You have to be so careful with the pieces, though. I worked on a site where we found what we thought was a game board. Someone used a regular brush on one of the markers and it just turned to dust. Now we keep tiny artist's brushes and distilled water nearby for anything that looks like it might be wood or painted clay. The water helps stabilize it if it's starting to crumble.

terry67725d ago

We had a Roman dice cup basically dissolve in someone's hand last season. Your distilled water trick saved a painted wooden comb for us just last month, it was already flaking.