There is some in-country variation that's ignored in this article. In Poland, names of pieces will vary based on family you come from (as this game is usually learnt at kindergarten age from your parents/grandparents). For example, in my family we refer to the knight as "koń" (horse) rather than "skoczek" (jumper), and instead of using the more Polish-sounding "goniec" for the bishop we use "laufer" borrowed from German. Also, even though the official (as in: approved by some chess institutions in the country) name for the queen is "hetman", I'd say 90%+ Poles say "królowa" (literally queen).
That is similar in Hungary, for example the pawn is either a walker or a peasant, and the queen is either a visir or a queen (but it's a ruling queen, királynő, rather than queen consort, királyné, which I find nice :) )
Do you have any source for the 90% figure? Some casual players do indeed use the alternative names, but pretty much everyone I know uses „hetman” for the queen. (I’ve even heard the colloquial abbreviation „heć”.) Literature uses the official names exclusively.
The problem is that we want names with distinct first letter for the simple chess notation and "horse" and "queen" conflict with "king" and each other.
The story I heard about the Queen was that she started off being able to move a single square in each direction[1], but the upgrade to let her move the full diagonals, ranks and files was done as a tribute to Queen Isabella of Spain.
I sure hope the knight is not called "calvary" in that many countries as suggested by the legend in the second map. Unless there is a connection between the knight's movements and crucifixion?
Strange he mentions Chinese but not Chinese Chess (Elephant Chess).
In Chinese Chess, more or less all the original names have been retained, whereas they have changed radically in Western chess as discussed.
Chinese chess pieces (and their rough positional but not power equivalents in western chess) are: the General (king), the Advisor (queen), the Elephant (bishop), the Horse (knight), the Chariot (rook), the Soldier (pawn), and famously the Cannon.
> While it may seem logical that the king has a queen by his side, that’s not how things started out. In the Indian original, this piece was the king’s “counselor” (mantri in Sanskrit). The Arabs used wazir (“vizier,” i.e., the ruler’s minister/secretary), which was Latinized to farzia, which became the French vierge (“virgin”).
Just the other day I was wondering what a stupid name for the Queen's piece. Not at all logical. It's battlefield and not wedding/ceremony for queen to be by-his-side. Vazir is popular piece name in India as well.
In Hindi, Persian and Arabic variations of the game, the bishop piece was referred to as a "camel". I don't know where the author got this concept of "second elephant".
"It was used in standard chess before being replaced by the bishop in the 15th and 16th centuries. [...] The alfil is a very old piece, appearing in some very early chess variants, such as Tamerlane chess and shatranj. It was originally called an elephant, hastīn or gāja in Sanskrit. [...] When chess spread to China, the piece became the elephant in xiangqi. [...] When chess came to Persia from India, the Sanskrit name was translated to pil, and when chess came to the Muslims from Persia, the move had not changed, and then the name changed into Arabic to fil, the already existing cognate to pil which comes from the Akkadian language and ultimately from the Egyptian language. The name thus became fil and then alfil (prefixing the Arabic definite article, al)."
> In the Chinese example, Mandarin and Cantonese speakers can read and understand the same text, even though they use different words for the same concepts.
Written mandarin is different from written Cantonese and the differences are more than simplified vs traditional characters
Written Cantonese exists, but most Cantonese-speakers write in standard written Chinese (which is what you’re calling “written Mandarin” here), and pronounce the characters in Cantonese, regardless of whether they can speak Mandarin.
Yeah, not a good example. Written vernacular mandarin started in the Ming dynasty and more or less was forcefully promoted in the Qing and later Republic of China as _the_ way to write Chinese, meaning other dialects lost out on developing a common written vernacular form. In this example most Cantonese speakers learned mandarin grammar and vocabulary, at least to read and write it.
But did written Chinese not exist before then? Before, the literate people in East Asia used Classical Chinese, which was essentially a similar forced standardization from the dominant vernacular 2000 years ago, very similar to Europe's use of Latin. Issac Newton could read and write Latin because he learned it, not because English naturally gets written as Latin!
So, contrary to the "reasonably educated people play chess" trope, I do not play chess and was quite ignorant of it. During a programming job interview, I was presented with what is apparently a sample problem of moving around a piece. I had to ask how the piece "moved" but didn't get the name.
Although the problem was easy, I still remember the interviewer flinching slightly each time I called it "the horsey piece."
In Norwegian the knight is called "springer", as mentioned in the article, but many call it "hest" ("horse") too. They are both valid names.
The translation of "springer" is a bit imprecise. Instead of simply "jumper", it describes a "human or animal that can jump". A horse fits that description well
"Springer" is actually sometimes used to describe a knight's horse instead of the most common word. So "springer" has connections to both horse and knight.
Can you cite some example articles? It's a for-profit Series-B startup [0] in an ever-worsening digital publishing market [1] and article sourcing is paid writers not peer-reviewed crowdsourced, so I expect parts might be worse than Wikipedia, and certainly have very selective coverage. But at first glance I didn't see any glaring errors. Also I expect they won't have an openly exposed peer-review editing process, so if an article turns out to be bad they might delete or hide it (but I can't find any such).
A small nitpick: the rook from the original game was a mythical bird of prey called Rukh/Roc. The chess piece was a bird. It became a tower later. So, the theory is birds were often used as figureheads on boats, that's why it is called a boat in Turkey/Russia.
Also the other, outdated name (but still in use) for a rook in Russian is "Тура"/Tura, which is of course a (siege) tower.
> the rook from the original game was a mythical bird of prey called Rukh/Roc. The chess piece was a bird.
That doesn't seem to be the mainstream explanation: the original piece in the game would be a chariot -thought the connection with the name rukh is not clear- and the alternative bird representation would have been an Arab innovation.
I suspect every time the article says "why's that so? nobody knows!", somebody actually knows and they would have found out if they had researched a little...
As usual, uBlock Origin with Firefox solves these issues. Although even with uBlock turned off Firefox's built-in tracking protection kills all ads except or one (for a book published by the website).
I'm guessing the only people on Hacker News who still see ads are the people in the ad industry and iOS users that hate Safari and are prevented from getting proper ad blocking in other browsers.
I don't have any ad-blocker installed and only see 2 ads at the very beginning of the article. Not ideal but far from constantly battering. Using Chrome on Android.
[+] [-] GolfPopper|2 years ago|reply
The Prophet, who is aware of the hands which move the pieces.
The Crows, placed on the board after the final turn.
And many more: https://twitter.com/thepatanoiac/status/439992435205083136?l...
[+] [-] paulddraper|2 years ago|reply
On an only slightly more series note, "fairy chess" has a number of alternative chess pieces: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairy_chess
Amazon = queen + knight
Chancellor = rook + knight
Crowned Rook = rook + king
Camel = knight that moves 1,3
Grasshopper = queen, but must jump over a piece and lands immediately past it
Nightrider = knight, but moves unlimited in the same direction
and many, many more
[+] [-] mcv|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] crazygringo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yakubin|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] riffraff|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nathell|2 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] Zickzack|2 years ago|reply
I thought "królowa" is reserved for Mary, Queen of Poles.
[+] [-] seanhunter|2 years ago|reply
Here’s a source for this although it’s not where I heard it https://medium.com/exploring-history/did-spains-queen-isabel...
[1] Including maybe jumping like a knight but I may have imagined it
[+] [-] roesel|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] robopsychology|2 years ago|reply
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavalry
Vs
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvary
[+] [-] SeanLuke|2 years ago|reply
In Chinese Chess, more or less all the original names have been retained, whereas they have changed radically in Western chess as discussed.
Chinese chess pieces (and their rough positional but not power equivalents in western chess) are: the General (king), the Advisor (queen), the Elephant (bishop), the Horse (knight), the Chariot (rook), the Soldier (pawn), and famously the Cannon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiangqi
[+] [-] pagade|2 years ago|reply
Just the other day I was wondering what a stupid name for the Queen's piece. Not at all logical. It's battlefield and not wedding/ceremony for queen to be by-his-side. Vazir is popular piece name in India as well.
[+] [-] fakedang|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kgwgk|2 years ago|reply
"It was used in standard chess before being replaced by the bishop in the 15th and 16th centuries. [...] The alfil is a very old piece, appearing in some very early chess variants, such as Tamerlane chess and shatranj. It was originally called an elephant, hastīn or gāja in Sanskrit. [...] When chess spread to China, the piece became the elephant in xiangqi. [...] When chess came to Persia from India, the Sanskrit name was translated to pil, and when chess came to the Muslims from Persia, the move had not changed, and then the name changed into Arabic to fil, the already existing cognate to pil which comes from the Akkadian language and ultimately from the Egyptian language. The name thus became fil and then alfil (prefixing the Arabic definite article, al)."
[+] [-] wodenokoto|2 years ago|reply
Written mandarin is different from written Cantonese and the differences are more than simplified vs traditional characters
[+] [-] umanwizard|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] z2|2 years ago|reply
But did written Chinese not exist before then? Before, the literate people in East Asia used Classical Chinese, which was essentially a similar forced standardization from the dominant vernacular 2000 years ago, very similar to Europe's use of Latin. Issac Newton could read and write Latin because he learned it, not because English naturally gets written as Latin!
[+] [-] heywhatupboys|2 years ago|reply
I understand that this is a heartfelt wish of contemporary cultural independence, but it is simply not true for 99 %+ of Cantonese speakers year 2023.
[+] [-] mbroncano|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Luc|2 years ago|reply
https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piezas_de_ajedrez
[+] [-] at_a_remove|2 years ago|reply
Although the problem was easy, I still remember the interviewer flinching slightly each time I called it "the horsey piece."
[+] [-] tintedfireglass|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] suzzer99|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway8338|2 years ago|reply
The translation of "springer" is a bit imprecise. Instead of simply "jumper", it describes a "human or animal that can jump". A horse fits that description well
"Springer" is actually sometimes used to describe a knight's horse instead of the most common word. So "springer" has connections to both horse and knight.
[+] [-] smcin|2 years ago|reply
[0]: https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/atlas-obscura
[1]: 1/2023 "Atlas Obscura wants to be profitable before raising funds in a tricky media market" https://digiday.com/media/atlas-obscura-wants-to-be-profitab...
[+] [-] nojonestownpls|2 years ago|reply
There's w0ke media for you. Changing existing characters into "strong female leads", making them OP for no reason... Unacceptable!
(/s)
[+] [-] paulddraper|2 years ago|reply
In the East, that's the vizir. In the West, that's the queen.
The game reflected the culture that surrounded it. (E.g. elephant -> bishop)
[+] [-] meese712|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Idiot_in_Vain|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cabirum|2 years ago|reply
Also the other, outdated name (but still in use) for a rook in Russian is "Тура"/Tura, which is of course a (siege) tower.
[+] [-] kgwgk|2 years ago|reply
That doesn't seem to be the mainstream explanation: the original piece in the game would be a chariot -thought the connection with the name rukh is not clear- and the alternative bird representation would have been an Arab innovation.
----
OF RUKHS AND ROOKS, CAMELS AND CASTLES
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Remke-Kruk/publication/...
[+] [-] paulddraper|2 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] teo_zero|2 years ago|reply