Finnish Chessmen

I managed to finally pick up a set of traditional Finnish chessmen today. No one seems to be manufacturing them anymore and so they are becoming harder to find. (Especially in good condition.)

Sadly there is no manufacturer information or date on the box. The text on the box simply says "Chess Game" in Finnish and Swedish.

Their design is very interesting and, as far as I know, unique to Finland. I love the plain forms of all the pieces and especially the squat wide pawns. The king's plume finial is also very classy and I like that it is left unpainted for the black king.

The king is 88 mm (~3.5") in height and has a 35 mm (~1.4") base, as does the queen. All the other pieces have 28 mm (~1.1") wide bases. The pieces are featured here on a very traditional finnish folding cardboard chess board with 55 mm (~2.25") squares. As can be seen in some of the pictures, the paper "felt" has come loose on several of the pieces and in some cases it is missing entirely.

The chessmen are (most probably) fashioned out of Finnish birch and the black pieces are painted. Most of the pieces are made out of a single piece of wood, including the knights, but the kings plume finial is a separate part. Pragmatically the king and queen are identical except for their finials.

The pieces are usually unweighted but in (at least) recent years they were also available in weighted form. The finishing of these pieces is rough, even when compared to the most humble chessmen from Amritsar.

My grandfather had a set just like this one, that also included a similar (perhaps even identical) cardboard folding chess board.

This style of chessmen have been produced since at least the 1950's as can be evidenced from the photo in this thread. Further pictures can be found in this gallery from the 1952 Chess Olympiad in Helsinki.

From the early 1990's and until recently this type of chessmen were manufactured by the Tanni-family. I inquired about purchasing a set a couple of years ago and they told me that they were sold out and could not say when they would be available again. Now their website is closed.

This issue of the Finnish Chess Federations youth-magazine SHAKKI! has an article about the Tanni-family and it includes pictures and descriptions of their manufacturing process. The sanding of the pieces was done en masse in the drum of an old washing machine.

If anyone reading this knows more about these chessmen, please chime in and educate us all.

The pawns remind me of knubbel pawns.

Yes, they are similar and it is funny considering that the rest of the pieces are so slim and elegant.

Maybe the predecessor to the swedish "SCHACKPJÄSER" 

Thanks, I'm glad you found it interesting and that I'm able to give something back. Your posts (and others) have given me much joy over the years.

Let me know if you require a human translator for the Finnish.

There is some slight similarity, but on the whole the Swedish pieces are much closer to the standard Staunton designs IMHO.

Doyou know anything about the history of the Swedish chessmen? I'd be interested in learning about them.

I take it you're joking. 🙂 From the few pictures I've seen the pieces produced from the 90's onward may have been a step up in quality compared to this older set. But be that as it may, they were certainly no luxury pieces.

No, that design is older. From 20s or 30s.

Basically, those pieces are similar to the Finnish ones in the sense that they're very robust and cheap to produce, and of a very simple design. The knights are clearly hand-carved double-quick, and often all four are noticeably dissimilar. There were a couple of models prior to this one which were more closely resembling the traditional Staunton model. Here's a photo of one of them with GM Gösta Stoltz:

AFAIK we don't know how old the Finnish design is. Chessmen of this type were used in 1952, but they might very well have existed far before that. But apart from that, I also don't think the Finnish and Swedish chessmen are closely related, if at all.

I think that the Finnish chessmen have more in common with Baltic and Russian chessmen. The very slender bodies, the lack of crosses and miters, and the opposite colored finial of the black king all speak for this I think.

The lack of a miter for the bishop might also be explained by the fact that the bishop is called "lähetti" in Finnish which translates to messenger, or courier. In Swedish (Finland has two official languages) the bishop is called "löpare" which again means runner, or messenger.

Interestingly the pawn is named "sotilas" (soldier) in Finnish and "bonde" (farmer) in Swedish. The knight is called "ratsu" (fin) and "springare" (swe) which means mount, or horse in both languages.

burke3gd: I wasn't trying to imply that the Swedish and Finnish designs are related (that was in reply to Nordlandia who wondered whether the Finnish design was a predecessor),  only that both designs are fairly simple (a bit 'rough and ready', if you get my meaning). As for the origins of the Finnish design, it's probably older than the early 1950s, but I actually think it is purely Finnish, rather than inspired by Baltic or Russian sets.

Also, my guess is that both designs were at least partly dictated by the fact that they were mass-produced and cheap to buy. The Swedish set originally came with an inexpensive and simple board made from stiff paper or cardboard with a sheet of paper glued onto it (see the Stoltz photo above), later the boards were made from masonite with the squares painted on (if you come across such old masonite boards, the paint is often worn through in the middle of the squares). This was because both Finland and Sweden were two of the poorest countries in Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, and before World War I organized chess before had predominantly been practised by people who were more well off (having the time and money to spare to indulge in this pastime).

I prefer the Finnish Smoothies. You will have to scroll down a bit on the page link but it is there.

http://www.chess-museum.com/staunton-style.html

Thanks for the link. I haven't seen those before.

@burke3gd The collars remind me of The Jetsons.

That's a good one.

Burke, wood from the northern boreal forests is very good quality, so it's probable that Finnish chess sets have good quality pieces and board.  If you're interested in collecting old chess set, I will try to keep my eyes open if I wander into any kipputori.  Never know what gems are hidden in those places

Now those are pawns. If I ever have a set made that's how my pawns will be. They make me.want to go curling.

Kiitos/thanks!

Curling pawns. That's what we will call them from now on, thanks!