Xiangqi Elephant Rant

Logically, Chinese Chess should be called like the Japanese name.

Shogi = 將棋. The game of the general. The game of the Shogun.

As 將 the general is the center piece of the game, not the elephant.

It is called

象棋 Elephant + Game

to commemorate its Indian origin.

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/chess-terms-in-all-languages-of-this-planet?page=4#comment-93228725

Great question.

Great question is more important than great answers.

Too bad the Chinese themselves don't honestly ask this question. They just say Chinese Chess came from China, because they say so.

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/chinese-chess-came-from-india

I learned in Lacrosse, the defenders cannot cross the midfield.

Again, great question. The Chinese people do not ask that question. They make up excuses.

象 doesn't mean elephant, it means symbol, representation, symbolic

it means elephant.

象棋 Elephant Game means a game from India.

A lot of "Chinese" things are not Chinese.

The Shaolin Temple, Indian origin.

Buddhism, Indian origin.

Quan Yin, Indian origin.

There are 30,000 Sanskrit words calqued into Chinese.

That is a whole dictionary, Grasshopper.

Yeah, and in my opinion, while the Elephant is an interesting piece, the fact that it can't pass the River makes it somewhat useless and less fun.

The River is a cool concept though. I think if Pawns would be able to move and attack backwards (in addition to left and right) after passing the River it would make the game more interesting.

It's a hard game. Seems more dynamic. Less static. I could never figure it out.

About the radicals part, as a Chinese speaker, I'm pretty sure that radicals are only to show semantics and are not meant to show pronunciation. Some characters do have semantic and phonetic components, like "河," which means river, and has the radical for water but the phonetic component "ke3," so it is pronounced "he3." Also, there are definitely more than 200 phonemes in the Chinese language. Phonemes in different languages are categorized differently, but in Chinese, it's initial and final. Also, I wouldn't count finals with tones as separate phonemes because they are basically the same.

Anyways, I think the elephant in 象棋 is horrible. It's not that good, and it's mainly just used for defense.

Well very nice

I know how to play it but I suck (my dad is really good at it)

Abstract nouns come from concrete nouns.

"balance" is an abstract noun. It means equal on both sides.

It comes from a concrete noun. A mechanical device with 2 pans (bi-pans) to measure weight.

And "concrete" comes from the building material, concrete .

It means Elephant Game in this context.

Think about it. What is a more accurate name?

Shogi? The Game of the Shogun (General)?

It is perfect because chess came from India.

The elephant is the mascot of India.

If you say to an alien from outer space, "We are going to play The Elephant Game."

They would understand. A war game from India since the days of war elephants.

Chess = shah = king.

We're going to play The Game of Kings.

They would not understand what, where, or when.

Is it cards? It has kings.

Is it Blackjack?

But that's not even clear. You have Jacks, Queens, and Kings.

To be clear you have to call it by it's original name. Twenty and One.

Why is Blackjack called black jack?

You can have red jack.

King or queen.

It rhymes.