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Chess and its History

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The history of chess can be traced back nearly 1500 years, although the earliest origins are uncertain. The earliest predecessor of the game probably originated in India, before the 6th century AD. From India, the game spread to Persia. When the Arabs conquered Persia, chess was taken up by the Muslim world and subsequently spread to Southern Europe. In Europe, chess evolved into roughly its current form in the 15th century.

"Romantic chess" was the predominant chess playing style from the late 15th century to the 1880s. Chess games of this period emphasised more on quick, tactical maneuvers rather than long-term strategic planning.[1] The Romantic era of play was followed by the Scientific, Hypermodern, and New Dynamism eras. In the second half of the 19th century, modern chess tournament play began, and the first World Chess Championship was held in 1886. The 20th century saw great leaps forward in chess theory and the establishment of the World Chess Federation (FIDE). In 1997, a computer first beat a chess world champion in the famous Deep Blue versus Garry Kasparov match, ushering in an era of computer domination. Since then, computer analysis – which originated in the 1970s with the first programmed chess games on the market – has contributed to much of the development in chess theory and has become an important part of preparation in professional human chess. Later developments in the 21st century made the use of computer analysis far surpassing the ability of any human player accessible to the public. Online gaming, which first appeared in the mid-1990s, also became popular in the 21st century.

Chess remains a highly popular pastime to this day. A 2012 survey found that "chess players now make up one of the largest communities in the world: 605 million adults play chess regularly". Chess is played at least once a year by 12% of British people, 15% of Americans, 23% of Germans, 43% of Russians, and 70% of Indian people.

recursors to chess originated in India during the Gupta Empire.[4] There, its early form in the 6th century was known as chaturaṅga, which translates as "four divisions (of the military)": infantry, cavalry, elephantry, and chariotry. These forms are represented by the pieces that would evolve into the modern pawn, knight, bishop, and rook, respectively.[5]

Chess was introduced to Persia from India and became a part of the princely or courtly education of Persian nobility.[6] In Sassanid Persia around 600 the name became chatrang, which subsequently evolved to shatranj, due to Arab Muslims' lack of ch and ng native sounds,[7] and the rules were developed further. Players started calling "Shāh!" (Persian for "King!") when attacking the opponent's king, and "Shāh Māt!" (Persian for "the king is helpless" – see checkmate) when the king was attacked and could not escape from attack. These exclamations persisted in chess as it traveled to other lands.

The game was taken up by the Muslim world after the Islamic conquest of Persia, with the pieces largely keeping their Persian names. The Moors of North Africa rendered Persian "shatranj" as shaṭerej, which gave rise to the Spanish acedrex, axedrez and ajedrez; in Portuguese it became xadrez, and in Greek zatrikion, but in the rest of Europe it was replaced by versions of the Persian shāh ("king"). Thus, the game came to be called ludus scacchorum or scacc(h)i in Latin, scacchi in Italian, escacs in Catalan, échecs in French (Old French eschecs); schaken in Dutch, Schach in German, szachy in Polish, šahs in Latvian, skak in Danish, sjakk in Norwegian, schack in Swedish, šakki in Finnish, šah in South Slavic languages, sakk in Hungarian and şah in Romanian; there are two theories about why this change happened:

  1. From the exclamation "check" or "checkmate" as it was pronounced in various languages.
  2. From the first chessmen known of in Western Europe (except Iberia and Greece) being ornamental chess kings brought in as curios by Muslim traders.

The Mongols call the game shatar, and in Ethiopia it is called senterej, both evidently derived from shatranj.

Chess spread directly from the Middle East to Russia, where chess became known as шахматы (shakhmaty, literally "checkmates", a plurale tantum).

The game reached Western Europe and Russia by at least three routes, the earliest being in the 9th century. By the year 1000 it had spread throughout Europe.[8] Introduced into the Iberian Peninsula by the Moors in the 10th century, it was described in a famous 13th-century manuscript covering shatranj, backgammon and dice named the Libro de los juegos.

Chess spread throughout the world and many variants of the game soon began taking shape.[9] Buddhist pilgrims, Silk Road traders and others carried it to the Far East where it was transformed and assimilated into a game often played on the intersection of the lines of the board rather than within the squares.[9][10] Chaturanga reached Europe through Persia, the Byzantine empire and the expanding Arabian empire.[11] Muslims carried chess to North Africa, Sicily, and Iberia by the 10th century.[9]

The game was developed extensively in Europe. By the late 15th century, it had survived a series of prohibitions and Christian Church sanctions to almost take the shape of the modern game.[12] Modern history saw reliable reference works,[13] competitive chess tournaments,[14] and exciting new variants. These factors added to the game's popularity,[14] further bolstered by reliable timing mechanisms (first introduced in 1861), effective rules,[14] and charismatic players.[15]

India

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Krishna and Radha playing chaturanga on an 8×8 Ashtāpada

The earliest precursor of modern chess is a game called chaturanga, which flourished in India by the 6th century, and is the earliest known game to have two essential features found in all later chess variations—different pieces having different powers (which was not the case with checkers and Go), and victory depending on the fate of one piece, the king of modern chess.[9] A common theory is that India's development of the board, and chess, was likely due to India's mathematical enlightenment involving the creation of the number zero.[7] Other game pieces (speculatively called "chess pieces") uncovered in archaeological findings are considered as coming from other, distantly related board games, which may have had boards of 100 squares or more.[9]

Chess was designed for an ashtāpada (Sanskrit for "having eight feet", i.e. an 8×8 squared board), which may have been used earlier for a backgammon-type race game (perhaps related to a dice-driven race game still played in south India where the track starts at the middle of a side and spirals into the center).[16] Ashtāpada, the uncheckered 8×8 board served as the main board for playing chaturanga.[17] Other Indian boards included the 10×10 Dasapada and the 9×9 Saturankam.[17] Traditional Indian chessboards often have X markings on some or all of squares a1 a4 a5 a8 d1 d4 d5 d8 e1 e4 e5 e8 h1 h4 h5 h8: these may have been "safe squares" where capturing was not allowed in a dice-driven backgammon-type race game played on the ashtāpada before chess was invented.[16]

The Cox-Forbes theory, proposed in the late 18th century by Hiram Cox, and later developed by Duncan Forbes, asserted that the four-handed game chaturaji was the original form of chaturanga.[18] The theory is no longer considered tenable.[19]

In Sanskrit, "chaturanga" (चतुरङ्ग) literally means "having four limbs (or parts)" and in epic poetry often means "army" (the four parts are elephants, chariots, horsemen, foot soldiers).[6] The name came from a battle formation mentioned in the Indian epic Mahabharata.[9] The game chaturanga was a battle-simulation game[6] which rendered Indian military strategy of the time.[20]

Some people formerly played chess using a die to decide which piece to move. There was an unproven theory that chess started as this dice-chess and that the gambling and dice aspects of the game were removed because of Hindu religious objections.[21]

Scholars in areas to which the game subsequently spread, for example the Arab Abu al-Hasan 'Alī al-Mas'ūdī, detailed the Indian use of chess as a tool for military strategy, mathematics, gambling and even its vague association with astronomy.[22] Mas'ūdī notes that ivory in India was chiefly used for the production of chess and backgammon pieces, and asserts that the game was introduced to Persia from India, along with the book Kelileh va Demneh, during the reign of emperor Nushirwan.[22]

In some variants, a win was by checkmate, or by stalemate, or by "bare king" (taking all of an opponent's pieces except the king).

In some parts of India the pieces in the places of the rook, knight and bishop were renamed by words meaning (in this order) Boat, Horse, and Elephant, or Elephant, Horse, and Camel, but keeping the same moves.[16]

In early chess the moves of the pieces were:

Original name Modern name Version Original move
king king all as now
adviser queen all one square diagonally, only
elephant bishop Persia and west two squares diagonally (no more or less), but could jump over a piece between
an old Indian version two squares sideways or front-and-back (no more or less), but could jump over a piece between
southeast and east Asia one square diagonally, or one square forwards, like four legs and trunk of elephant
horse knight all as now
chariot rook all as now
foot-soldier pawn all one square forwards (not two), capturing one square diagonally forward; promoted to queen only

Two Arab travelers each recorded a severe Indian chess rule against stalemate:[23]

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  • A stalemated player thereby at once wins.
  • A stalemated king can take one of the enemy pieces that would check the king if the king moves.

Iran (Persia)

 

 

The Karnamak-i Ardeshir-i Papakan, a Pahlavi epical treatise about the founder of the Sassanid Persian Empire, mentions the game of chatrang as one of the accomplishments of the legendary hero, Ardashir I, founder of the Empire.[25] The oldest recorded game in chess history is a 10th-century game played between a historian from Baghdad and a pupil.[11]

A manuscript explaining the rules of the game called "Matikan-i-chatrang" (the book of chess) in Middle Persian or Pahlavi still exists.[26] In the 11th-century Shahnameh, Ferdowsi describes a Raja visiting from India who re-enacts the past battles on the chessboard.[22] A translation in English, based on the manuscripts in the British Museum, is given below:[25]

One day an ambassador from the king of Hind arrived at the Persian court of Chosroes, and after an oriental exchange of courtesies, the ambassador produced rich presents from his sovereign and amongst them was an elaborate board with curiously carved pieces of ebony and ivory. He then issued a challenge:
"Oh great king, fetch your wise men and let them solve the mysteries of this game. If they succeed my master the king of Hind will pay tribute as an overlord, but if they fail it will be proof that the Persians are of lower intellect and we shall demand tribute from Iran."
The courtiers were shown the board, and after a day and a night in deep thought one of them, Bozorgmehr, solved the mystery and was richly rewarded by his delighted sovereign.
(Edward Lasker suggested that Bozorgmehr likely found the rules by bribing the Indian envoys.)

The Shahnameh goes on to offer an apocryphal account of the origins of the game of chess in the story of Talhand and Gav, two half-brothers who vie for the throne of Hind (India). They meet in battle and Talhand dies on his elephant without a wound. Believing that Gav had killed Talhand, their mother is distraught. Gav tells his mother that Talhand did not die by the hands of him or his men, but she does not understand how this could be. So the sages of the court invent the game of chess, detailing the pieces and how they move, to show the mother of the princes how the battle unfolded and how Talhand died of fatigue when surrounded by his enemies.[27] The poem uses the Persian term "Shāh māt" (check mate) to describe the fate of Talhand.[28]

The philosopher and theologian Al-Ghazali mentions chess in The Alchemy of Happiness (c. 1100). He uses it as a specific example of a habit that may cloud a person's good disposition:[29]

Indeed, a person who has become habituated to gaming with pigeons, playing chess, or gambling, so that it becomes second-nature to him, will give all the comforts of the world and all that he has for those (pursuits) and cannot keep away from them.

The appearance of the chess pieces had altered greatly since the times of chaturanga, with ornate pieces and chess pieces depicting animals giving way to abstract shapes.[30] This is because of a Muslim ban on the game's lifelike pieces, as they were said to have brought upon images of idolatry.[7] The Islamic sets of later centuries followed a pattern which assigned names and abstract shapes to the chess pieces, as Islam forbids depiction of animals and human beings in art.[30] These pieces were usually made of simple clay and carved stone.[30]

East Asia

Thailand and Cambodia

The Thai variant of chess, makruk, and the Cambodian Ouk-Chatrang are considered the closest living relatives to chaturanga, retaining the vizier, non-checkered board, limited promotion, offset kings, and elephant-like bishop move.[16]

China

As a strategy board game played in China, chess is believed to have been derived from the Indian chaturanga.[31] Chaturanga was transformed into the game xiangqi where the pieces are placed on the intersection of the lines of the board rather than within the squares.[9] The object of the Chinese variation is similar to chaturanga, i.e. to render helpless the opponent's king, known as "general" on one side and "governor" on the other.[31] Chinese chess also borrows elements from the game of Go, which was played in China since at least the 6th century BC. Owing to the influence of Go, Chinese chess is played on the intersections of the lines on the board, rather than in the squares. The game of Xianqi is also unique in that the middle rank represents a river, and is not divided into squares.[32] Chinese chess pieces are usually flat and resemble those used in checkers, with pieces differentiated by writing their names on the flat surface.[31]

An alternative origin theory contends that chess arose from xiangqi or a predecessor thereof, existing in China since the 3rd century BC.[33] David H. Li, a translator of ancient Chinese texts, hypothesizes that general Han Xin drew on the earlier game of Liubo to develop an early form of Chinese chess in the winter of 204–203 BC.[33] The German chess historian Peter Banaschak, however, points out that Li's main hypothesis "is based on virtually nothing." He notes that the "Xuanguai lu", authored by the Tang Dynasty minister Niu Sengru (779–847), remains the first real source on the Chinese chess variant xiangqi.[34]

Japan

Main article: History of shogi

A prominent variant of chess in East Asia is the game of shogi, transmitted from India to China and Korea before finally reaching Japan.[35] The three distinguishing features of shogi are:

  1. The captured pieces may be reused by the captor and played as a part of the captor's forces.
  2. Pawns capture as they move, one square straight ahead.[35]
  3. The board is 9×9, with a second gold general on the other side of the king.

Drops were not originally part of shogi. In the 13th century, shogi underwent an expansion, creating the game of dai shogi, played on a 15×15 board with many new pieces, including the independently invented rook, bishop and queen of modern Western chess, the drunk elephant that promotes to a second king, and also the even more powerful lion, which among other idiosyncrasies has the power to move or capture twice per turn. Around the 14th or 15th centuries, the popularity of dai shogi then waned in favour of the smaller chu shogi, played on a smaller 12×12 board which removed the weakest pieces from dai shogi, similarly to the development of Courier chess in the West. In the meantime, the original 9×9 shogi, now termed sho shogi, continued to be played, but was regarded as less prestigious than chu shogi and dai shogi. Chu shogi was very popular in Japan, and the rook, bishop, and drunk elephant from it were added to sho shogi, where the first two remain today.

Chu shogi declined in popularity after the addition of drops to sho shogi and the removal of the drunk elephant in the 16th century, becoming moribund around the late 20th century. These changes to sho shogi created what is essentially the modern game of shogi.

Mongolia

Chess is recorded from Mongolian-inhabited areas, where the pieces are now called:

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  • King: Noyon – Ноён – lord
  • Queen: Bers / Nohoi – Бэрс / Нохой – dog (to guard the livestock)
  • Bishop: Temē – Тэмээ – camel
  • Knight: Morĭ – Морь – horse
  • Rook: Tereg – Тэрэг – cart
  • Pawn: Hū – Хүү – boy (the piece often showed a puppy)

Names recorded from the 1880s by Russian sources, quoted in Murray,[16] among the Soyot people (who at the time spoke the Soyot Turkic language) include: merzé (dog), täbä (camel), ot (horse), ōl (child) and Mongolian names for the other pieces. This game is called shatar; a large 10×10 variant called hiashatar was also played.

The change with the queen is likely due to the Arabic word firzān or Persian word farzīn (= "vizier") being confused with Turkic or Mongolian native words (merzé = "mastiff", bar or bars = "tiger", arslan = "lion").[16]

Chess in Mongolia is now played following standard rules.

East Siberia

Chess was also recorded from the Yakuts, Tunguses, and Yukaghirs; but only as a children's game among the Chukchi. Chessmen have been collected from the Yakutat people in Alaska, having no resemblance to European chessmen, and thus likely part of a chess tradition coming from Siberia.[16]

Arab world

Main article: Shatranj

Chess passed from Persia to the Arab world, where its name changed to Arabic shatranj. From there it passed to Western Europe, probably via Spain.

Over the centuries, features of European chess (e.g. the modern moves of queen and bishop, and castling) found their way via trade into Islamic areas. Murray's[16] sources found the old moves of queen and bishop still current in Ethiopia. The game became so popular it was used in writing at that time, played by nobility and regular people. The poet al-Katib once said, "The skilled player places his pieces in such a way as to discover consequences that the ignorant man never sees... thus, he serves the Sultan's interests, by showing how to foresee disaster."[7]

Russia

Chess has 1000 years of history in Russia. Chess was probably brought to Old Russia in 9th century via the Volga-Caspian trade route. From the 10th century cultural connections with the Byzantine Empire and the Vikings also influenced the history of chess in Russia. The vocabulary in Russian chess has various foreign-language elements and testifies to different influences in the evolution of chess in Russia. Chess is mentioned in folk poems as a popular game and is documented in the Old Russian byliny. Numerous archeological finds of the chess game have already been found in the regions of Old Russia. From 1262 on chess was called in Russia shakhmaty. Various foreign travellers commented that in the 16th century, chess was popular among all classes in Russia. Ivan IV the Terrible, who ruled Russia from 1530 to 1584, is said to have died while playing chess.[36] In 1791 the popular chess book Morals of Chess by Benjamin Franklin was translated into Russian and published in the country. Chess enjoys a very high status in Russia and was gradually introduced as a school subject in all primary schools since 2017.[37][38][39]

Europe

Early history

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Shatranj made its way via the expanding Islamic Arabian empire to Europe.[11] It also spread to the Byzantine empire, where it was called zatrikion. Chess appeared in Southern Europe during the end of the first millennium, often introduced to new lands by conquering armies, such as the Norman Conquest of England.[12] Previously little known, chess became popular in Northern Europe when figure pieces were introduced.[12]

In the 14th century, Timur played an enlarged variation of the game which is commonly referred to as Tamerlane chess. This complex game involved each pawn having a particular purpose, as well as additional pieces.[40]

The sides are conventionally called White and Black. But, in earlier European chess writings, the sides were often called Red and Black because those were the commonly available colours of ink when handwriting drawing a chess game layout. In such layouts, each piece was represented by its name, often abbreviated (e.g. "ch'r" for French "chevalier" = "knight").

The social value attached to the game – seen as a prestigious pastime associated with nobility and high culture – is clear from the expensive and exquisitely made chessboards of the medieval era.[41] The popularity of chess in the Western courtly society peaked between the 12th and the 15th centuries.[42] The game found mention in the vernacular and Latin language literature throughout Europe, and many works were written on or about chess between the 12th and the 15th centuries.[42] H. J. R. Murray divides the works into three distinct parts: the didactic works e.g. Alexander of Neckham's De scaccis (c. 1180); works of morality like Liber de moribus hominum et officiis nobilium sive super ludo scacchorum (Book of the customs of men and the duties of nobles or the Book of Chess), written by Jacobus de Cessolis; and the works related to various chess problems, written largely after 1205.[42] Chess terms, like check, were used by authors as a metaphor for various situations.[43] Chess was soon incorporated into the knightly style of life in Europe.[44] Peter Alfonsi, in his work Disciplina Clericalis, listed chess among the seven skills that a good knight must acquire.[44] Chess also became a subject of art during this period, with caskets and pendants decorated in various chess forms.[45] Queen Margaret of England had green and red chess sets made of jasper and crystal.[43] Kings Henry I, Henry II and Richard I of England were chess patrons.[9] King Alfonso X of Castile and Tsar Ivan IV of Russia gained a similar status.[9]

Saint Peter Damian denounced the bishop of Florence in 1061 for playing chess even when aware of its evil effects on the society.[12] The bishop of Florence defended himself by declaring that chess involved skill and was therefore "unlike other games," and similar arguments followed in the coming centuries.[12] Two incidents in 13th-century London, in which men of Essex resorted to violence resulting in death as an outcome of playing chess, caused further sensation and alarm.[12] The growing popularity of the game – now associated with revelry and violence – alarmed the Church.[12]

The practice of playing chess for money became so widespread during the 13th century that Louis IX of France issued an ordinance against gambling in 1254.[41] This ordinance turned out to be unenforceable and was largely neglected by the common public, and even the courtly society, which continued to enjoy the now-prohibited chess tournaments uninterrupted.[41]

 

 

Shapes of pieces

The pieces, which had been nonrepresentational in Islamic countries (see piece values in shantranj), changed shape in Christian cultures. Carved images of men and animals reappeared. The shape of the rook, originally a rectangular block with a V-shaped cut in the top, changed; the two top parts separated by the split tended to get long and hang over, and in some old pictures look like horses' heads. The split top of the piece now called the bishop was interpreted as a bishop's mitre or a fool's cap.

By the mid-12th century, the pieces of the chess set were depicted as kings, queens, bishops, knights and men at arms.[46] Chessmen made of ivory began to appear in North-West Europe, and ornate pieces of traditional knight warriors were used as early as the mid 13th century.[47] The initially nondescript pawn had now found association with the pedes, pedinus, or the footman, which symbolized both infantry and loyal domestic service.[46]

Names of pieces

The following table provides a glimpse of the changes in names and character of chess pieces as they crossed from India through Persia to Europe:[48][49]

A comparison of the terms for chessmen in Sanskrit, Bengali, Persian, Arabic, Turkish, Latin, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, and Catalan
Sanskrit Bengali Persian Arabic Turkish Latin English Spanish Portuguese Italian French Catalan
Raja (King) Raja (King) Shah Malik Şah Rex King Rey Rei Re Roi Rei
Mantri (Minister) Mantri (Minister) Vazīr (Vizir) Wazīr/Firz Vezir Regina Queen Reina/Dama Dama Regina Dame Dama/Reina
Gajah (war elephant) Hati Pil Al-Fīl Fil Episcopus/Comes/Calvus Bishop/Count/Councillor Alfil/Obispo Bispo Alfiere Fou Alfil
Ashva (horse) Ghora (horse) Asp Fars/Hisan At Miles/Eques Knight Caballo Cavalo Cavallo Cavalier Cavall
Ratha (chariot) Nowka Rokh Qal`a/Rukhkh Kale Rochus/Marchio Rook/Margrave/Castle Torre/Roque Torre Torre/Rocco Tour Torre
Padati (footman/footsoldier) Shoinnya Piadeh Baidaq/Jondi Piyon

Pedes/Pedin