Is Chronicles of Uruk historically accurate?

The world and characters of the adventure are invented, but the history they rest on is real and carefully researched. These pages keep the two clearly apart, so you can trust the record and enjoy the story.

Uruk stood in southern Mesopotamia, in what is now southern Iraq, near an ancient course of the Euphrates. Its ruins, called Warka today, can still be visited.

Who were the Sumerians?

The Sumerians were among the first city-dwelling peoples, living in southern Mesopotamia from roughly six thousand years ago. They built the earliest cities, invented writing, and recorded the oldest myths we still read.

Do I need to know any of this to play?

No. The game teaches as you play and assumes no background. These pages are here for the curious, and for anyone who wants the real story behind the fiction.

History

The real history beneath Chronicles of Uruk

The adventure is invented. The ground it stands on is not. Uruk was one of humanity's first great cities, and much of what the story touches, the kings, the gods, the writing, the myths, truly happened or was truly believed. These pages tell that history straight.

Where the story meets the record

We keep two things apart on purpose. The tale you play is fiction. The history it draws from is real and carefully researched. Here the history stands on its own, told plainly, so you always know which is which and can dig as deep as you like.

Start with a thread

Five ways into the world that was.

Uruk, the first great city

The Sumerian city that gave an age its name, home to the world's earliest writing and the king who became its oldest legend.

The Epic of Gilgamesh

Humanity's oldest surviving story: a restless king, a wild man made to match him, and a journey to the edge of death.

Inanna, queen of heaven

The goddess of love and war whose eight-pointed star became our mark, and the oldest story of a god who dies and returns.

The Anunnaki

Who the Anunnaki actually were in Sumerian belief, and how a family of ancient gods became a modern myth.

Cuneiform, the first writing

How marks pressed into wet clay five thousand years ago became the first writing, and what the tablets still say to us.

History, told with respect

Everything here rests on real Mesopotamian scholarship. No ancient-astronaut theories, no invented artifacts. Where the myths are strange, we let them be strange on their own terms. For a guided walk through six thousand years of it, stop by stop, the Long Record opens with a free account.

Common questions

Is Chronicles of Uruk historically accurate?: The world and characters of the adventure are invented, but the history they rest on is real and carefully researched. These pages keep the two clearly apart, so you can trust the record and enjoy the story.
Where was Uruk?: Uruk stood in southern Mesopotamia, in what is now southern Iraq, near an ancient course of the Euphrates. Its ruins, called Warka today, can still be visited.
Who were the Sumerians?: The Sumerians were among the first city-dwelling peoples, living in southern Mesopotamia from roughly six thousand years ago. They built the earliest cities, invented writing, and recorded the oldest myths we still read.
Do I need to know any of this to play?: No. The game teaches as you play and assumes no background. These pages are here for the curious, and for anyone who wants the real story behind the fiction.

Related dispatches

All dispatches

See the history come alive

The adventure begins where the record leaves off.

Keep exploring the Chronicle

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