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How Did Ancient Egyptians Entertain Themselves Without Screens? — Transcript

by Egyptory · 3,216 words · 544 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00It's around 1,400
0:02BC. Somewhere on the west bank of the
0:05Nile, the river has risen again. Fields
0:08that normally demand hours of work are
0:10now covered by floodwater, and the
0:12rhythm of farming has changed with them.
0:15The sun is still brutal. The afternoon
0:17is still long,
0:19but for once, there is no urgent task in
0:22front of you.
0:23Today, that would barely be a problem.
0:26You'd reach for your phone before you
0:27even noticed you were bored. A video, a
0:30game, a message, anything to keep your
0:33brain occupied for another 30 seconds.
0:35But here, there is no screen glowing in
0:37your hand, no streaming, no endless
0:40feed. Just heat, time, and other people
0:43trying to figure out what to do with
0:45both. And this is where ancient Egypt
0:48becomes much more familiar than the
0:50pyramids make it seem. Because when
0:52Egyptians had time away from work, they
0:54didn't simply sit around waiting for
0:56something important to happen. They
0:58played, they drank, they listened to
1:00music, they competed, they told stories.
1:04And some of those ordinary pleasures
1:05became far more important than simple
1:07entertainment. One small game, played on
1:10a board of only 30 squares, would
1:12eventually become meaningful enough to
1:14appear beside the dead. Why? To
1:17understand that, we first have to
1:19understand something even more basic.
1:21When the Nile changed the work day, how
1:23did Egyptians fill the hours it left
1:25behind? To understand Egyptian free
1:27time, you first have to forget the
1:29modern work week. There was no Monday to
1:32Friday schedule running independently of
1:34nature. For farming communities, the
1:36Nile helped decide what kind of work
1:38could happen and when.
1:40Each year came Akhet, inundation.
1:43Roughly from July to October, the river
1:45rose across the floodplain, covering
1:47farmland and leaving behind the fertile
1:49silt that agriculture depended on.
1:51Fields that had demanded constant
1:53attention were suddenly underwater.
1:55Normal farm work changed because the
1:57land itself had changed. That didn't
1:59mean everyone simply stopped working for
2:01months. Some labor could be redirected
2:03toward large, communal, or state
2:05projects. There were still families to
2:07feed, tools to maintain, supplies to
2:10manage, and countless ordinary jobs that
2:13didn't disappear just because the river
2:15rose.
2:16But, the rhythm was different. Ancient
2:18Egyptian life did not move at the
2:20steady, mechanical pace we expect today.
2:23Work expanded and shifted with the
2:25river, the agricultural season, and what
2:27the land allowed people to do. And that
2:30matters because whenever work loosens
2:32its grip and for an afternoon, people
2:34find ways to fill the space. The
2:36Egyptians were no exception. They had
2:38music, beer, stories, physical contests,
2:43hunting, and fishing. But, one of the
2:45clearest surviving clues to how they
2:47spent those quieter hours is remarkably
2:49small. No giant monument, no golden
2:52coffin, just a rectangular board divided
2:55into 30 squares. It was called Senet.
2:58And Egyptians had already been playing
2:59it for an astonishingly long time. Senet
3:02reaches back to around 3,100 BC, near
3:05the beginning of dynastic Egypt. That
3:07means Egyptians were moving pieces
3:09across Senet boards long before many of
3:11the monuments we now associate with
3:13their civilization even existed.
3:16The board itself was simple.
3:1830 squares arranged in three rows of 10.
3:21Players moved sets of pieces using
3:23casting sticks or knucklebones, the
3:25ancient equivalent of letting chance
3:27decide how far you could move. Part
3:29luck, part strategy, and apparently
3:32compelling enough to survive for
3:33centuries.
3:35But, the most revealing thing about
3:37Senet isn't how it worked, it's who
3:39played it. Archaeologists have found
3:41elaborate boards made for the wealthy,
3:44carefully crafted from expensive
3:45materials. Yet, much rougher versions
3:48also survived simple grids scratched
3:50into stone by people who had no need for
3:52a beautiful gaming table. The evidence
3:55suggests Senet crossed social
3:56boundaries. A queen could sit before a
3:58finely made board. A worker could make
4:00do with lines carved into whatever flat
4:02surface was available. Different lives,
4:05different resources, same 30 squares.
4:08One of the most famous images comes from
4:10the tomb of Queen Nefertari, wife of
4:12Ramesses II.
4:13She sits before a Senet board, calmly
4:15reaching toward the pieces. And
4:17Tutankhamun took the connection even
4:19further. Several Senet sets were placed
4:21in his tomb, including an elaborate
4:23example built like a small piece of
4:25furniture, complete with storage for the
4:27playing pieces and legs shaped like
4:29animal feet.
4:31Think about that. Tutankhamun was buried
4:33surrounded by objects worthy of a king.
4:36And among them were board games. At
4:38first, that seems almost charmingly
4:41ordinary. A young king liked games, so
4:44games went with him. Maybe. But Senet
4:47will return later in our story with a
4:49very different meaning. Because those 30
4:51squares did more than help Egyptians
4:53pass an afternoon. For now, leave the
4:55board beside the dead king. There were
4:57other ways to play, and some were
4:59stranger than Senet. Senet wasn't the
5:01only game competing for an Egyptian's
5:02free time. During the Old Kingdom,
5:04another board game appeared, Mehen. Its
5:07board looked nothing like Senet. Instead
5:10of neat rows of squares, Mehen curled
5:12inward like a coiled snake, its body
5:15divided into spaces. Players used pieces
5:18shaped like lions along with small
5:20balls.
5:22Exactly how the game worked is still
5:23unclear.
5:25And then, strangely,
5:27Mehen largely disappeared from the
5:29archaeological record. We don't know for
5:32certain why. Maybe tastes changed. Maybe
5:35another game replaced it. Whatever
5:37happened, Egyptians clearly didn't stop
5:39playing. By the Middle Kingdom, another
5:42game had become popular, the game of 58
5:44holes, often called Hounds and Jackals,
5:47because some surviving playing pieces
5:49have animal-shaped heads. The board was
5:51filled with holes and players moved pegs
5:54along a route toward the finish. Simple
5:56idea, but give humans a game involving
5:58luck, competition, and an opponent and
6:02sooner or later somebody is probably
6:04going to want to make things a little
6:05more interesting. The surviving evidence
6:07includes hints that games such as Senet
6:09could involve stakes. We can't know how
6:11common gambling was or exactly what
6:14every player risked, but the possibility
6:17is surprisingly familiar. A few pieces
6:19on a board, a lucky throw, someone
6:21convinced the next move will finally
6:23turn everything around. Some things
6:25apparently require very little
6:27technological progress. But board games
6:29were still the quieter end of Egyptian
6:31entertainment because if you wanted
6:33something more social, something
6:34involving friends, celebration, and
6:37considerably worse decisions,
6:39ancient Egypt had another option, beer.
6:42And in Egypt, drinking could become much
6:44more than a way to kill an afternoon.
6:46Beer in ancient Egypt wasn't just
6:48something you opened when the work day
6:49was over. It was part of everyday life.
6:52Workers received beer as part of their
6:54rations and because it carried calories
6:57and nutrients, it functioned as both
6:59drink and food. But sometimes beer moved
7:02far beyond the ordinary. One of the
7:05strangest examples comes from a
7:07religious celebration known as the
7:09Festival of Drunkenness. Its story
7:11begins with violence. In the religious
7:14myth, the sun god Ra sends Hathor
7:16appearing in her terrifying form as
7:19Sekhmet to punish humanity.
7:21But the destruction becomes so extreme
7:23that even Ra decides it has to stop.
7:26The solution, beer. A huge quantity of
7:30it is colored red to resemble blood and
7:32poured out for Sekhmet. She drinks and
7:35keeps drinking
7:37until she becomes so intoxicated that
7:39the killing ends. Egyptians later
7:42reenacted this story through a festival
7:44involving heavy drinking, not simply as
7:46a party, but as an act connected to
7:49religious ritual. Archaeological work
7:51associated with Betsy Bryan at the
7:53Temple of Mut in Karnak has been linked
7:55to evidence for these celebrations. That
7:57changes the picture. Beer could be a
8:00worker's ration. It could be shared
8:02socially, and under very different
8:04circumstances, intoxication itself could
8:07become part of a sacred story. To modern
8:10eyes, those categories can feel
8:12completely separate. Religion over here,
8:15entertainment Ancient Egyptian evidence
8:17doesn't always divide them so neatly.
8:20And beer wasn't the only place where
8:22those worlds touched.
8:24On painted tomb walls, the parties are
8:26still going. There are guests,
8:28musicians, dancers, and one very strange
8:31object sitting on top of their heads. If
8:34you want to know what an Egyptian party
8:35looked like, the tomb of Nebamun gives
8:37us one of the clearest surviving
8:39glimpses. The paintings show guests
8:42gathered together while servants move
8:43among them.
8:44Musicians sit nearby with harps, lutes,
8:47lyres, pipes, and flutes. Others shake
8:51the sistrum, an instrument closely
8:53associated with Hathor, the goddess
8:55connected with music, joy, love, and
8:58celebration.
8:59Women clap. Dancers move with the
9:01rhythm. For a moment, ancient Egypt
9:04stops looking silent. You can almost
9:06hear the room, and once again, pleasure
9:09and religion are standing surprisingly
9:11close together. Music could entertain a
9:13banquet, while instruments such as the
9:15sistrum also carried sacred
9:17associations. But look carefully at some
9:20Egyptian banquet scenes, and you'll
9:22notice something even stranger. Cones.
9:25Small objects balanced on top of
9:28people's heads. For generations,
9:30scholars debated what these things
9:32actually were.
9:33Were they lumps of scented wax or fat
9:36that slowly melted during a party,
9:38releasing perfume? Were they symbolic?
9:41Or were artists simply using them as a
9:43visual sign for fragrance and
9:45celebration? For a long time, there was
9:48a major problem. Paintings showed the
9:50cones, but archaeologists hadn't found
9:53convincing physical examples. Then, in
9:552019, a team led by archaeologist Anna
9:59Stevens reported something remarkable
10:01from cemeteries at Amarna. Actual
10:03cone-shaped objects made from wax had
10:05been discovered with human burials.
10:08And these weren't royal burials. They
10:10belonged to ordinary people.
10:12The discovery didn't solve every
10:14mystery. It still couldn't tell us
10:16exactly how the cones were worn, what
10:19they contained, or precisely what they
10:21meant. But it answered one important
10:23question. At least some of those strange
10:26cones were real. And Egyptian
10:28entertainment wasn't limited to sitting
10:30at a banquet, listening to music, or
10:32balancing mysterious objects on your
10:35head. Sometimes, having fun meant
10:37getting up. And sometimes, it meant
10:40getting thrown to the ground.
10:42Not every Egyptian wanted to spend free
10:44time sitting around a game board or
10:46banquet table. Some preferred something
10:49considerably more physical. At Beni
10:51Hassan, tomb paintings preserve an
10:53extraordinary collection of wrestling
10:55scenes. Hundreds of figures are shown
10:57grappling in different positions,
10:59grabbing arms, locking bodies, lifting
11:02opponents, throwing them, and hitting
11:05the ground. Some scholars have counted
11:07more than 200 individual wrestling
11:09pairs. The sequence is so detailed that
11:12parts of it almost resemble an
11:14illustrated wrestling manual. And
11:16wrestling was only one option. Egyptian
11:19art also shows swimming, boat races,
11:21stick fighting, hunting, and fishing.
11:24Some activities were practical as well
11:26as recreational. Others, especially
11:28elite hunting, could also display wealth
11:30and status. One famous example appears
11:33again in the tomb of Nebamun. He stands
11:36aboard a small skiff in the marshes
11:38surrounded by his family while birds
11:40explode from the reeds. Nebamun raises a
11:42throwing stick as his cat attacks among
11:44the birds. It is hunting, but the image
11:47is also carefully constructed to show
11:49abundance, skill, family, and status.
11:53And there is something worth noticing
11:54here. Senet survives in tombs. Banquets
11:57survive on tomb walls. Music and dancing
11:59survive there. Wrestling and hunting
12:02survive there, too. Again and again, the
12:04evidence showing Egyptians enjoying
12:06themselves comes to us from places built
12:08for the dead. That doesn't mean every
12:10leisure activity was automatically
12:12religious, but it leaves us with an
12:14increasingly interesting question. Why
12:16preserve so much of life's enjoyment
12:18beside death? We'll come back to that
12:20because there was another way Egyptians
12:22could escape an empty afternoon that
12:24required no board, no instrument, and no
12:27wrestling partner. All you needed was
12:30someone willing to say, "Tell me a
12:32story." Long before television, novels,
12:35or podcasts, Egyptians already
12:37understood one of humanity's simplest
12:39forms of entertainment. A good story.
12:42And according to one surviving Egyptian
12:43text, even a pharaoh could get bored
12:45enough to need one. The Westcar Papyrus
12:48presents King Khufu, the ruler
12:49associated with the Great Pyramid, as
12:51restless and looking for entertainment.
12:53So, his sons begin telling him stories.
12:56Not ordinary stories, either. They tell
12:59him about powerful magicians, impossible
13:01feats, severed heads restored to life,
13:04and even a lake being parted so a lost
13:06piece of jewelry can be recovered.
13:09Whatever the historical reality behind
13:10these tales, the scene itself is
13:12wonderfully human. A king surrounded by
13:15power still wants the same thing people
13:17want around a fire, at a dinner table,
13:19or during a long journey. Something
13:22interesting to listen to.
13:23And the Westcar tales were hardly alone.
13:26The Shipwrecked Sailor tells of a man
13:27stranded on a mysterious island where he
13:30encounters a giant talking serpent. The
13:33story of Sinuhe follows a man who flees
13:35Egypt, lives abroad, and eventually
13:37longs to return home. Adventure, magic,
13:41danger, homesickness. Thousands of years
13:43later, those ingredients still work. We
13:46can't know exactly how every Egyptian
13:48encountered these stories or how often
13:50they were performed simply for
13:52entertainment. But, their survival shows
13:54that story telling occupied a real place
13:56in Egyptian culture.
13:58You didn't need an expensive board. You
14:00didn't need musicians. You didn't need a
14:02festival. Sometimes words were enough.
14:05And royal literature gives us only one
14:08side of that human picture.
14:10For something even more familiar, we
14:12have to leave the palace behind and
14:14visit a village of workers. Because
14:17there, Egyptians recorded something
14:19almost painfully modern. Why people
14:21didn't show up for work.
14:23For this, we go to Deir el-Medina, the
14:27village where skilled workers lived
14:29while building royal tombs near the
14:31Valley of the Kings around 1,250
14:35BC. Someone kept attendance records, and
14:38those records preserve something
14:40monuments rarely do. Ordinary excuses.
14:43One worker missed work because he was
14:45sick. Another had been stung by a
14:47scorpion. Another was absent because he
14:49was brewing beer.
14:51And then, there is perhaps the most
14:53memorable excuse of all. A worker was
14:55recorded as drinking with Khonsu.
14:58Exactly what that phrase meant in its
15:00original context deserves caution. But,
15:03the source presents it as sounding
15:05suspiciously like something every modern
15:07workplace would recognize. Someone may
15:10have had a very good night and a
15:12considerably less productive morning.
15:15Suddenly, ancient Egypt feels much
15:18closer. Forget the golden masks for a
15:21second. Forget colossal statues and
15:23divine kings. Here are workers with
15:26schedules, people who got sick, people
15:29who had responsibilities, people who
15:31brewed beer, people whose lives did not
15:33begin when they arrived at work and
15:35disappear when the shift ended. That may
15:37be one of the most revealing things
15:39about Egyptian leisure. The surviving
15:42evidence doesn't show a civilization
15:44permanently staring toward death. It
15:46shows people living between obligations
15:48finding time for games, drinking, music,
15:51stories, sports, friends, and
15:54celebrations. But there is still one
15:56problem we left sitting in a tomb much
15:59earlier. A 30-square board, Senet. If it
16:02was simply a way to pass the time, why
16:05did it keep appearing beside the dead?
16:07The answer changes the meaning of the
16:09game completely.
16:11Now, return to Senet. 30 squares, a few
16:14pieces, casting sticks.
16:16A game that could turn an empty
16:18afternoon into competition. But over
16:20centuries, Senet accumulated another
16:23layer of meaning. Its name has been
16:25associated with the idea of passing.
16:27And by the New Kingdom, surviving
16:29evidence connects the game increasingly
16:31with death and the journey beyond it.
16:33Suddenly, the board begins to look
16:35different. A player moves forward. Luck
16:38sends a piece ahead. A bad throw causes
16:41trouble. Certain spaces help, others
16:43threaten progress, and eventually, the
16:45goal is to move safely through the board
16:47and out the other side. For Egyptians
16:49thinking about the dangerous journey
16:51after death, that structure could carry
16:53powerful symbolism. The dead were
16:55believed to travel through the Duat,
16:57facing dangers and obstacles before
16:59reaching a blessed existence. Senet
17:02could therefore become more than
17:03entertainment. It could evoke passage,
17:06progress, and the hope of reaching the
17:08other side successfully. Now, think
17:10again about Queen Nefertari. In her
17:13tomb, she sits before a Senet board, but
17:15no opponent is shown across from her. We
17:18should be careful not to turn that image
17:20into something more literal than the
17:21evidence allows. She is not necessarily
17:23playing against death in the way a
17:25modern fantasy story might portray it.
17:28What matters is that Senet itself had
17:30acquired funerary meaning. The same
17:32basic game that people could play for
17:34enjoyment had entered the symbolic world
17:36of the afterlife. That helps explain why
17:39boards could be placed in tombs. And it
17:41also changes everything we have already
17:44seen. The beer was not always merely a
17:46drink. Music was not always merely
17:49background entertainment. Celebration
17:51could overlap with ritual. Scenes of
17:53hunting, banqueting, games, and pleasure
17:57could appear in spaces created for
17:58eternity. The categories we
18:00instinctively separate fun, religion,
18:02daily life, death, did not always sit
18:05neatly apart in the surviving Egyptian
18:07evidence. That is the real surprise. We
18:10began by asking how ancient Egyptians
18:12killed boredom. But, perhaps that
18:14question is too small. Because what they
18:16chose to do with their free time could
18:18become part of how they imagined a good
18:20life, and eventually what they hoped
18:23might continue beyond it.
18:25Senet started as our 30-square boredom
18:28killer. By the time it reached the tomb,
18:30it could mean something much larger. And
18:33that brings us back to the person we
18:34left beside the Nile at the beginning.
18:37Because thousands of years later, we
18:39still have our own way of reaching for
18:41something when the silence gets too
18:43long. Picture an ordinary moment today.
18:45You're waiting in line, sitting alone in
18:47a quiet room, stuck somewhere with
18:49nothing urgent to do. A few seconds
18:51pass, and almost without thinking, your
18:54hand reaches for your phone. Not because
18:56something important happened, because
18:58nothing happened. Thousands of years
19:01ago, someone beside the Nile faced the
19:03same basic problem with completely
19:05different tools. Maybe they reached for
19:07a Senet board. Maybe they joined friends
19:10over beer. Maybe they listened to music,
19:13watched a wrestling match, went hunting,
19:15or simply asked someone to tell a story.
19:17We shouldn't pretend their world was the
19:20same as ours. It wasn't.
19:22Their beliefs, social structures,
19:25technology, and daily rhythms belonged
19:28to another civilization. But that small
19:30human impulse is surprisingly
19:32recognizable. When obligations loosen
19:35their grip, we look for something to
19:37fill the space. And the surviving
19:39evidence from Egypt suggests those
19:41choices could mean more than simply
19:43escaping boredom. Games could become
19:45symbols. Music could touch the sacred.
19:48Drinking could enter ritual. Scenes of
19:51celebration could be preserved for
19:53eternity.
19:54Even a little board of 30 squares could
19:56travel from ordinary play into the
19:58imagery of the afterlife. Maybe that is
20:00why studying how people had fun tells us
20:03something monuments alone cannot.
20:06Pyramids show us what Egyptians could
20:08build. Tombs show us what they wanted to
20:11preserve. But games, songs, stories,
20:15parties, and excuses for missing work
20:17let us glimpse something smaller and
20:20much more human.
20:21What people enjoyed when nobody was
20:23forcing them to do anything. The
20:25technology changed. The reaching didn't.
20:28So, if you were given one completely
20:30free afternoon in ancient Egypt, what
20:32would you choose? A game of senet? Music
20:35and beer? A story? Or would you take
20:37your chances in an Egyptian wrestling
20:38match? Choose carefully. You've got no
20:41phone to save you.

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