AI helps archaeologists solve a Roman gaming mystery

AI helps archaeologists solve a Roman gaming mystery Skip to content Subscribe today Every print subscription comes with full digital access Subscribe Now Menu All Topics Health Humans Anthropology Health & Medicine Archaeology Psychology View All Life Animals Plants Ecosystems Paleontology Neuroscience Genetics Microbes View All Earth Agriculture Climate Oceans Environment View All Physics Materials Science Quantum Physics Particle Physics View All Space Astronomy Planetary Science Cosmology View All Magazine Menu All Stories Multimedia Reviews Puzzles Collections Educator Portal Century of Science Unsung characters Coronavirus Outbreak Newsletters Investors Lab About SN Explores Our Store SIGN IN Donate Home INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM SINCE 1921 SIGN IN Search Open search Close search Home INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM SINCE 1921 All Topics Earth Agriculture Climate Oceans Environment Humans Anthropology Health & Medicine Archaeology Psychology Life Animals Plants Ecosystems Paleontology Neuroscience Genetics Microbes Physics Materials Science Quantum Physics Particle Physics Space Astronomy Planetary Science Cosmology Tech Computing Artificial Intelligence Chemistry Math Science & Society All Topics Health Humans Humans Anthropology Health & Medicine Archaeology Psychology Recent posts in Humans Health & Medicine A simple shift in schedule could make cancer immunotherapy work better By Elie DolginFebruary 12, 2026 Health & Medicine This baby sling turns sunlight into treatment for newborn jaundice By Elie DolginFebruary 12, 2026 Health & Medicine Antibiotics can treat appendicitis for many patients, no surgery needed By Laura DattaroFebruary 10, 2026 Life Life Animals Plants Ecosystems Paleontology Neuroscience Genetics Microbes Recent posts in Life Ecosystems Food chains in Caribbean coral reefs are getting shorter By Erin Garcia de JesúsFebruary 11, 2026 Paleontology Fossilized vomit reveals 290-million-year-old predator’s diet By Jay BennettFebruary 11, 2026 Health & Medicine Tell Me Where It Hurts sets the record straight on pain — and how to treat it By Laura SandersFebruary 10, 2026 Earth Earth Agriculture Climate Oceans Environment Recent posts in Earth Earth Earth’s core may hide dozens of oceans of hydrogen By Nikk OgasaFebruary 10, 2026 Animals Some dung beetles dig deep to keep their eggs cool By Elizabeth PennisiFebruary 4, 2026 Climate Polar bears in the Barents Sea are staying fat despite rapid sea ice loss By Rebecca DzombakJanuary 29, 2026 Physics Physics Materials Science Quantum Physics Particle Physics Recent posts in Physics Physics A precise proton measurement helps put a core theory of physics to the test By Emily ConoverFebruary 11, 2026 Physics The only U.S. particle collider shuts down – so a new one may rise By Emily ConoverFebruary 6, 2026 Physics A Greek star catalog from the dawn of astronomy, revealed By Adam MannJanuary 30, 2026 Space Space Astronomy Planetary Science Cosmology Recent posts in Space Astronomy This inside-out planetary system has astronomers scratching their heads By Adam Mann17 hours ago Space Artemis II is returning humans to the moon with science riding shotgun By Lisa GrossmanFebruary 4, 2026 Physics A Greek star catalog from the dawn of astronomy, revealed By Adam MannJanuary 30, 2026 News Archaeology AI helps archaeologists solve a Roman gaming mystery The researchers used virtual players to test possible combinations of pieces and moves A game “board” is inscribed on a flat piece of limestone found amid the ruins of Coriovallum, a Roman-era town in what’s now the Netherlands. Courtesy of Restaura By Tom Metcalfe February 9, 2026 at 7:01 pm Share this:Share Share via email (Opens in new window) Email Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window) Reddit Click to share on X (Opens in new window) X Click to print (Opens in new window) Print Listen to this article This is a human-written story voiced by AI. Got feedback? Take our survey . (See our AI policy here .) An old, flattened piece of limestone inscribed with a crisscross of grooves looks like the board for a game, but for nearly a century, no one knew how the game was played. Now, researchers have used artificial intelligence to reverse-engineer the rules, revealing the board was probably part of a “blocking” game played by the Romans. The innovative approach to solving how the game was played had virtual game players run through more than 100 sets of possible rules. The researchers’ goal was to determine which set of rules best created the wear patterns on the limestone, Leiden University archaeologist Walter Crist and his colleagues report in the February Antiquity. Sign up for our newsletter We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday. Archaeologist Véronique Dasen of Switzerland’s University of Fribourg called the study “groundbreaking” and added that the technique could be used to investigate other “lost” games. “The research results invite [archaeologists] to reconsider the identification of Roman period graffiti that could be actual boards for a similar game not present in texts,” she says. The board, just 20 centimeters across, was found in the Dutch city of Heerlen and put on display in a local museum. Heerlen sits atop the ruins of the Roman town of Coriovallum. The board’s archaeological context is unknown, and there are no records of such a game from Roman times, which lasted until the fifth century in this region. Given the board’s size, the game probably had only two players. The researchers used the AI-driven Ludii game system to pit the two virtual players against each other in thousands of possible games, derived in part from the known rules of later games. Ludii uses a specialized “game description language” to drive its virtual players; in this case, the games were designed to test different configurations of pieces and moves so that the researchers could determine which rules might have produced the wear patterns. “We tried many different kinds of combinations: three versus two pieces, or four versus two, or two against two … we wanted to test out which ones replicated the wear on the board,” Crist says. The game, called Ludus Coriovalli, or the “Coriovallum Game,” can now be played online against a computer. The result suggests that, on limestone at least, one player took turns placing four pieces in the grooves against an opponent’s two. The winner was the player who avoided being blocked the longest. Blocking games like this weren’t thought to have been played in Europe until the Middle Ages, Crist says. Go and Dominoes are modern blocking games, but Ludus Coriovalli doesn’t resemble either of those. Some archaeologists of games say the study is the beginning of a breakthrough. “If more were known about the board’s context and potential game pieces, more i