The Origins of Chess

When There is no End to a Good Game
by Ian Riddler

Some board games have been played for 1,000 years.

Here is an article by Ian Riddler from Issue No. 31 of British Archaeology, February, 1998, presenting an excellent synopsis of the history of various board games, some of which historians believe are precursors to our modern Goddesschess. Ian Riddler works at the Canterbury Archaeological Trust and is a specialist in medieval games.

 

It has been said that good games never die, but they continue to evolve. It is certainly the case that some modern board games have had a remarkably distinguished history; in particular chess and backgammon, which have been played in Britain continuously for about 1,000 years, and elsewhere for much longer.

Historical study of board games, rather like the games themselves, was long considered a frivolous occupation, beneath the dignity of serious scholars. Yet in recent years it has acquired a new respectability, with the compilation and re-evaluation of historical sources, accompanied by reviews of the burgeoning archaeological evidence.

Medieval and earlier games can roughly be divided into "war games" involving skill, and race games relying more on luck. The favourite Roman war game was ludus latruncularum, in which two players battled with a number of pieces of equal value. A complete set was recently found in Colchester. How exactly it was played is unclear, though, and the game had died out by the medieval period.

The Anglo-Saxons had a different war game, which they referred to as taefl. It was, it seems, the only board game they knew. Here, the outnumbered associates of a king, initially grouped at the centre of the board, attempted to escort him to the edge of the board, and to defend themselves against being taken by assailants. The game has Germanic origins which go back to the 1st century AD at least, and its unusual feature is the use of two sides of unequal numbers. The game is associated, in the Viking Sagas, with nobility. A late medieval source has King Cnut playing chess, which is most unlikely; but he almost certainly played taefl. Everyone did. In the Orkneyinga Saga, skill in the game is accounted one of a noble's nine accomplishments, along with pulling an oar well and walking on snow-shoes.

At the turn of the millennium the situation began to change radically, and two centuries later England and Europe had entirely succumbed to the appeal of an Indian war game known as chess and to the reintroduction of a Mediterranean race game called tabula; an early form of backgammon. This, in an earlier incarnation as ludus duodecim scriptorum, had helped to satiate the Roman love for gambling.

The origins of chess remain obscure but its development can be traced from India westwards to the Islamic world. It appeared in southern Europe shortly before the millennium and spread northwards, acquiring the familiar chequered board as it did so. Historical and archaeological evidence indicate that it reached England after the Norman Conquest.

At first, chess was not a popular game. It was played with abstract figures and some, including the rukh (or chariot) and the elephant, were unfamiliar to a northern audience. The "old chess" was a slower game than the modern variant, and both the queen and the bishop were relatively powerless. Games could last for days and occasionally, as with two 13th century incidents in London involving men of Essex, they could lead to deaths. By the end of the 12th century, however, the conquest of taefl by chess was complete. Figurative pieces had been introduced, the rukh was gradually supplanted by the castle or its keeper (although the name "rook" persists), the bishop replaced the elephant, and the queen evolved from the vizier.

The Church, however, didn't approve. A letter written in c 1061 by the Italian bishop Petrus Damiani, for example, denouncing his fellow Bishop of Florence for chess playing, prefigured a series of official ecclesiastical prohibitions all over Europe from the 11th to the 13th century. The game was associated with frivolity and the sin of gambling. The Bishop of Florence's defence, that chess involved skill and was therefore "unlike other games", formed a precedent for the counter-arguments of the following decades. During the 13th century, however, the Church gave in. The game had become too popular amongst the educated classes, many of whom were clerics. Finds of 12th and 13th century pieces come mostly from castles, manor houses, and ecclesiastical contexts such as abbeys and priories.

For many people, the Isle of Lewis pieces personify medieval chess. The remains of at least four sets - together with pieces from other games, such as tabula - were found in a sand dune at Uig, sometime before April 1831. Recent work has confirmed that they are of Scandinavian origin, and they can be dated to somewhere between AD1150 and 1200. It is now thought they were intended for sale in Scotland, and were deposited in a container in the dune for safekeeping. In their figurative design, however, the Lewis chessmen were unusual. Abstract sets were the norm, and complete or near-complete sets of abstract pieces are known from Adelsdorf in Germany, Sandomierz in Poland, and Venafro in Italy; while the fragmentary remains of a late 11th century whalebone set from Witchampton in Dorset represent the best surviving early English pieces.

By the late 15th century, chess had more or less reached its modern form. Draughts and dominoes also first appeared in western Europe at this time. Draughts was a derivative of chess initially played only with pawns or tabula counters, and finds of early pieces are extremely rare. Dominoes are slightly less so. Recently Europe's earliest known domino, from the late 15th century, was found at Einbeck in Germany, while 16th century pieces are known from Oxford, very similar in form to those used today.

The other great medieval game, tabula, was played with 30 discoidal counters and with several dice, although these are seldom found with discarded sets, possibly because they were also useful in other games. In the last 15 years complete sets have been discovered at Gloucester (c 1120), St Denis near Paris (c 1150 - 1200), and Freiburg in Germany (c 1300), and these have revolutionised the study of the game. The Gloucester tabula set is elaborate, with carved antler figure scenes and highly decorative board points. It was an expensive, noble piece of equipment. Why it was thrown away remains a mystery.

The Freiburg set was played on a hinged wooden board, similar to those seen today, and the assemblage includes both chess and tabula pieces. The association between these two games was controversial for hundreds of years. In the earliest discoveries of chess and tabula pieces, and in the earliest documentary references to them (such as in wills), the games remain separate. Indeed, this separation presumably supports the Bishop of Florence’s defence of his actions.

However, the Lewis hoard, and an early mid 12th century assemblage from Loughor Castle in Wales, contain pieces of both games. They are also found together in the ecclesiastical residence at St Martinin-Palace Plain at Norwich of c 1180. A German nobleman, meanwhile, referred to both games in his will of c 1180. By the end of the 12th century, therefore, tabula seems to have become socially as acceptable as chess, even if it was not yet fully accepted by the Church. The English remains of both games were sometimes burnt, however, and their remains are fragmentary. In some cases the board games are burnt, but other objects from the same deposit are not, and it is possible that they were destroyed as ludi inhonesti, games which everyone knew it was rather naughty to play. Tabula required dice and some variants of chess were also played with them, as a means of accelerating a sometimes tiresome game. Dice, of course, were well known throughout this period as a vehicle for gambling, and the 12th century cleric and scholar John of Salisbury refers to ten different dice games, including tessara, calculus, dardana, pugna, taliorchus and vulpes. We know nothing of these games. Medieval dice are almost invariably cubical, whilst earlier Germanic dice included rod dice with four long sides and numbers placed in irregular arrangements, as with a recent example recovered from the Roman fort at Birdoswald.

From the Roman period onwards, dice could be loaded for cheating. Several Roman examples from Trier have been tested and found to roll mainly to specific numbers. A hoard of late medieval false dice have been found in London, with lead weightings skilfully applied within them, assuring that they would roll to particular numbers. In 1734 Karl Linnaeus, the great botanist, travelled to Lappland and witnessed the local game of tablut, a game derived directly from taefl and adapted to local circumstances, with the Swedes defending their king against the Muscovites. A modern version of the game, based on his account, evolved in Britain this century, and it remains a testament to the durability of a good game.

Now try this one

The most difficult medieval board game, devised in the early 11th century and known from books of the 16th century, was rhythmomacia.

It was played with round, square and triangular counters on an 8 x 16 board. In one version of the game, 28 of these were white, 29 black. Based on the idea that all numbers are multiples of one, except one itself, the aim was to form a harmony (either arithmetic, geometric, or harmonic) of three pieces on the opponent's half of the board. The pieces had different values and moves, and captures of pieces involved mathematical calculations of the relationships between the numbers on them.

The game never really caught on.