Who, then, but a woman could have routed the grand-vizier from the chess-board and taken his place?
The other piece altered is the bishop, which of course was not so called by the orientals. This piece with the Arabians and Persians was represented by an elephant, and named pil or phil. In southern Europe, the name was modified into alfil and aufin, and is found so in old writers; but at a very early period the bishop seems to have been generally adopted. In northern Europe, it was not so; the Russians and Swedes still retain the elephant. What we now call castle, and sometimes rook, was also called by the Saracens roc, and by the Persians rokh, signifying champion or foot-soldier, and shaped accordingly. This form is seen in some ancient chess-men in the British Museum, supposed to be of Icelandic manufacture; the Icelanders called this piece hrokr. These chess-men, many in number and carved in ivory—that is, the tusk of the walrus—were found in the year 1831, on the coast of the Isle of Lewes, and are referred by antiquaries back to the twelfth century. They are the remnants of seven or eight distinct sets, and are therefore supposed to have belonged to some dealer who was shipwrecked there. The carving on them, and the costumes, bear traces of being Scandinavian. The king is in a sitting posture, crowned, and has a sword in his hand, which he rests crossing his lap; the queen also is crowned, and holds a drinking-horn, such as the northern women used in serving mead and ale to their guests; one of them represents a bishop with mitre and crozier; the knights are on horseback, and are covered with armor; and here is the roc of the Saracens in its original form, a kind of foot-soldier, in place of the castle—which, however, is yet called rook. The remainder are pawns. Thus they are nearly identical with any set of modern chess-men, although fabricated more than seven hundred years ago.
The largest king in this collection, in his sitting posture, is more than four inches in height and near seven in circumference. The other pieces are smaller, but correspond. The chess-board which accommodated such pieces must have been a formidable weapon in a strong hand, and quite likely to "break heads and scatter brains."
Many old books are to be found in public and private libraries which contain descriptions of chess-men, rules for playing, etc. In the twelfth century, such a manual was composed by some devotee of the game in Latin verse. A little later, a volume was written in Latin by Jacques de Cessolas; it was translated into French by Jean de Vigny, and entitled Moralization of Chess. It may be seen in English in Caxton's Boke of Chesse, published in London, 1474.
Damiano, a Portuguese, in the fifteenth century compiled a book of directions for playing, with examples of eighty-eight games.
A little volume, very amusing in its quaint old English, was published in London in the reign of Elizabeth; it is dedicated to Lord Robert Dudley, afterward the celebrated Earl of Leicester. It is entitled, The Pleasaunt and Wittie Playe of the Cheasts, reviewed with Instructions both to Learn it Easily and to Play it Well. Lately translated out of Italian into French, and now set forthe in Englishe by James Rowbotham.
In it, among many other things, the author describes the chess-men:
"As for the fashion of the pieces, that is according to the fantasie of the workeman, which maketh them after this manner. Some make them lyke men, whereof the kynge is the highest, and the queene (which some name amasone or ladye) is the next, bothe two crowned. The bishoppes some name alphins, some fooles, and some princes, lyke as also they are next unto the kynge and queene, other some cal them archers, and they are fashioned accordinge to the wyll of the workeman. The knights some cal horsemen, and they are men on horsebacke. The rookes some call elephantes, cariynge towres upon their backes, and men within the towres. The paunes some cal fote-men, as they are souldiours on fote, cariynge some of them pykes, and other some javelyns and targets. Other makers of cheast-men make them other fashions, but use thereof wyll cause perfect knowledge."
Such has chess been through times past; it numbers still among its votaries the noble and the learned; and it is advocated by some of them with an enthusiasm surely never surpassed in the days long, long gone by in its oriental home.
It has floated down to us from those days like a leaf on some broad stream beneath whose waves mightier things have sunk.