The most commonly played rules for the Royal Game of Ur were created by Irving Finkel, a curator at the British Museum. These rules are usually referred to as the “Finkel ruleset.”
Game Pieces
- 1 × game board.
- 4 × tetrahedral dice.
- 7 × pieces for one player.
- 7 × pieces for the other player.
Game Setup
- Clear the game board.
- Players start with seven pieces each.
- Roll the dice to decide the starting player. Higher roll wins!
- The starting player must roll again for their first move.
Roll the Dice
The tetrahedral dice are read by counting the number of black tips facing upward. Possible rolls could be from 0 to 4 spaces, depending on how many of the black tips are pointing up.
Move your Pieces
After rolling, select one of your pieces to move by the number of tiles that you rolled. One player moves their pieces along the path shown below, and the other player follows a vertically mirrored path.
You may have multiple pieces on the board.
If you land on an opponent, they are sent back to the beginning.
You may not move a piece if it would land on another of your own pieces.
Landing on a rosette earns another turn, you do not have to move the piece that landed on the rosette for this extra turn. Additionally, if you are on the rosette in the center (shared) row, you are safe from capture as an opponent may not land on you.
Rosette Tiles
The highlighted spaces are the rosettes, and as already mentioned:
- Landing on a rosette grants an extra roll of the dice.
- Pieces on rosette tiles are safe from capture.
Score your Pieces and Win the Game
Winning requires you to score all 7 of your pieces. You score pieces by moving them off the board at the end of your path. You need an exact roll to take a piece off the board. For example, to score a piece from the final rosette tile, you would need to roll exactly a one.
