Shāh Māt

Shāh Māt, meaning king-kill in ancient Persian, or as we say today:  checkmate. It seems the game of chess may have originated in India around the sixth century A.D., before spreading to Persia and thence to Europe via the Muslim expansion. Early on, it was called chaturaṅga, which translates as "four divisions (of the military)":  infantry, cavalry, elephantry, and chariotry.  (No hawks?  -- and by the way, isn't it a shame that elephantry no longer figures heavily in our military traditions.)  It's not too surprising that infantry and cavalry would become pawns and knights, but I wouldn't have guessed that bishops started out as elephants or rooks as chariots.  The position now called a rook has been filled not only by chariots over the intervening centuries but also by boats, carts, and towers.  The original pieces next to kings were viziers, but transmuted into queens by a thoroughly obscure process.  Early queens, like early bishops, had much more limited moves.
The Cloisters in New York City are now featuring a traveling exposition of early chess pieces carved from walrus ivory, probably in eleventh-century Norway, which were discovered in 1831 on the Isle of Lewis off the western coast of Scotland.  In this set, the rook takes a human form:
Among the warders (rooks) in the exhibition, who are represented as foot soldiers, one bites the top of his shield, barely containing his frenzied eagerness for battle. Scholars have identified such figures as berserkers (the soldiers of Odin from Norse mythology), known from the Heimskringla — the Chronicle of the Kings of Norway — of the poet Snorri Sturluson (ca. 1179–1241).
H/t Maggie's Farm.

10 comments:

Grim said...

My wife bought me a replica of that chess set some years ago. It's a pretty interesting way to play chess; the pieces almost entirely fill the spaces, which changes the mental geometry of the board in surprising ways. Most contemporary chess sets have slender pieces that leave the spaces clearly visible even though the pieces have been set upon them; I always find it strange to play when the space is absorbed by the piece instead.

DL Sly said...

MH and I have a glass and crystal set on which we played weeks-long games with moves occuring on a daily basis -- sometimes more on the weekends when work or the weather weren't as cooperative as we'd like. That set is buried somewhere in storage in CA. Now that the VES has developed a love for the game, I can't wait to have all our stuff in one spot again so that she can join in.
0>;~}

Lars Walker said...

Aside from their other significance, the Lewis chessmen are valuable records of military and royal dress styles in that time period.

I thought I'd seen them once, a while back, in the Smithsonian traveling Viking exhibit. But on closer inspection, I found the pieces on display were copies.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

A discussion of the etymology:

http://bradshawofthefuture.blogspot.com/2008/03/king-is-at-loss.html

douglas said...

I'm surprised that Bishops started as elephants, and Rooks as chariots. I've seen lots of chess sets with a rook piece which was an elephant with a tower on it's back, and you'd tend to think of the chariot as weaving across the battlefield, and the elephant going directly ahead, perhaps not?

Joseph W. said...

...and by the way, isn't it a shame that elephantry no longer figures heavily in our military traditions...

We talked a little about it long ago - my memory is awful and I don't know if you were with us then - when I posted this. Sadly, the discussion is from the disappeared period; because I remember some of the commenters had an extra thing or two to tell me about elephants in battle.

Anonymous said...

Marilyn Yalom's book, Birth of the Chess Queen, is in interesting study on how the vizir became a queen, and the development of chivalry.

LittleRed1

raven said...

Cool- my daughter is going to the Cloisters today with her beau, who is a Norse history buff.!
Should travels ever take you to the Columbia river gorge,there is a small museum called "Maryhill",high on a bluff overlooking the river, originally the home of railroad baron Sam Hill. They have a nice collection of chess sets, one of which is my favorite- It is carved from wood, probably from Bavaria , with the pieces representing town folk from two different villages, each with their own style of dress. The thing that makes it so appealing are the different expressions on the faces of each piece, the Mayor, sheriff, woodcutters, bakers, etc. A very warm human set, the carver knew his subject well.
Side note to Grim- Washington 14 along the Columbia is a noteworthy motorcycle road-best taken west to east because of the sometimes astounding winds up the gorge.

Texan99 said...

AVI, are you suggesting I can't accept a Wiki article with uncritical confidence? Dang. Thanks for the link to a more cautious etymology.

BillT said...

-- and by the way, isn't it a shame that elephantry no longer figures heavily in our military traditions.

I might note that most military ballots these days are cast for Republicans...