Where do these whimsical names come from?

I was checking out the King's Indian defence today and suddenly realised that I didn't have the faintest idea what the name means. Since most of the names of defensive plays come from the person who first uses them, I thought it might have been thought up in Bombay during the days of the British Empire by the Royal Grandmaster. But then I thought better. It must relate to either the bishop or the knight on the King's side. Why "Indian"?

And there's also NimzoIndian. Where on earth did the "Nimzo" come from? Any other whimsical names that can be put in historical perspective?

Knowing the history might help me remember the defensive strategy better.

(One can always hope)

I suppose the nimzo-indian is derrived from Aron Nimzowitsch

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aron_Nimzowitsch

The Hypermodernists chose the name "Indian" only because they thought this was exotic; there is absolutely no chess-related significance to the term.

"Nimzo" comes from the great Aron Nimzowitsch, who invented the opening and was one of founders and exponents of the Hypermodern School, which espoused the control of the center by pieces rather than by pawns (among other strategies).

There are both King's and Queen's Indian attacks and King and Queen's Indian defenses. What they all have in common is a fianchettoed Bishop. So the word "Indian" could refer to the Knight pawn, advanced to prepare for the fianchetto.  But it's more likely that it refers to the bishop itself, since in the NimzoIndian defence black does not fianchetto his King's bishop, but moves moves it to B4 to pin white's knight at C3.

It could be that the fianchettoed Bishop acts as a proverbial "Indian" (Native American) sniping from a covered position with his bow on unsuspecting cavalry...    ;-)

Long, long ago...in a land faaaar away...chess or it's precursor was popular in India, before these new-fangled modern ideas like pawns having their two-square jump. In such a slow and dull version of the game a pawn shifting out of the way to let a bishop stand behind it was a common ploy, hence the term 'Indian' when we see such arrangements today.

Under "fianchetto", wikipedia:

"It (fianchetto) also regularly occurs in Indian defences, so-called since fianchettoing was the standard practice in chess as it was played in ancient India."

So it looks like you are correct, aadaam. Go to the top of the class!

The term "Indian defense" was first used in 1884, because Moheschunder Bannerjee from India played this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_defense