Anthropeum

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Ten museum objects a day: guess where and when each was made.

Play Anthropeum

on anthropeum.com

Anthropeum round 1 answered: the 'Simonetti' Carpet from Egypt, ca. 1500, with the pin near Aleppo, Egypt shaded on the map and the 250-year guess on the timeline

Anthropeum shows you ten artifacts a day from museum open-access collections. For each one you drop a pin where you think it was made and pick a period on a timeline, and points come from how close you get on both. At the end you see how your total compares with everyone who played that day.

About Anthropeum

Anthropeum is a daily guessing game built on museum photography. Each day brings a set of ten objects drawn from the open-access collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art: pots, jade, masks, textiles, metalwork, paintings, spanning about 5,000 years of human history.

Every round has two guesses. You tap a world map to place the object's origin, then choose a block of time on a timeline. Points are scored for distance on the map and for how far your period is from the object's date. After the tenth round the game shows your total on a distribution of everyone who played the same set that day, and keeps your streak and past scores on your device.

You get three hints a day, which cost no points: a time hint narrows the date to a 1,000-year span and a place hint names the world region. The site says its set is weighted away from the European paintings that dominate museum collections, so expect plenty of ceramics, metalwork and objects from cultures you may not know well.

It suits players of photo games like TimeGuessr or WhenTaken who want objects instead of photographs, and anyone who enjoys wandering museum galleries.

How to play Anthropeum

Open anthropeum.com and press Play today's game.
Study the photos of the first artifact and read its medium. Open the photos larger to see material and detail.
Click the map to drop a pin where you think the object was made.
Click or drag the timeline to choose a 250-year block for when you think it was made, then press Submit guess.
Read the answer. The map shades the area of the culture that made the object and the panel gives its name, date and story.
Use up to three free hints during the day if you are stuck. One narrows the date and one names the region.
Finish all ten rounds and compare your total with everyone who played that day.

Screenshots

Anthropeum at phone size: a knotted wool carpet with its photo strip, the timeline above, the hint button and the world map below

Tips

Look at the material first: the site's own tips note that nephrite jade points to East Asia and jadeite to Mesoamerica.
Wood, paper and wool rarely survive more than a few hundred years, so an organic object is often recent.
Within one region, style moves over time; stiff formal Egyptian work tends to be older than flowing detailed work.
Hints cost nothing, so spend them on the rounds where you have no idea rather than saving them.