Chess Quest - The Origins of Chess

Dr. Grovert Westerveld: The Queen's Man
by Jan Newton
(October 31, 2004)

Painting:  portrait of Ferdinand and Isabella, worshipping at the throne of Mary and the Christ Child.  (Painted by an anonymous Spanish master of the Dominican Order in Avila)

I have exchanged periodic correspondence with Dr. Westerveld (1) since 1999, after having been "introduced" to him online by Dr. Ricardo Calvo.  Our relationship has been cordial, for although our methods and approaches to our respective areas of research vary greatly, Dr. Westerveld is not, and has not been afraid to champion the view of an overwhelming influence of a powerful woman in affecting the history of chess and draughts (known as checkers in the United States).  He is one of my heroes.

Dr. Westerveld, a native of the Netherlands who now makes his home in Spain, has, for the past twenty years, conducted extensive research on the influence of the Spanish Queen Isabella of Castille (also known as Isabella I and Isabella the Catholic) (1451-1504) on draughts and chess, and has written several books and treatises on his research.  Like our group at Goddesschess, Dr. Westerveld  prefers to maintain his independence, and has not affiliated or associated himself with any university or group while conducting his research.  Recently Dr. Westerveld contacted me regarding Marilyn Yalom's book, Birth of the Chess Queen, and another exchange of cordial and enlightening correspondence ensued.

Dr. Westerveld has a website regarding his research on Spanish draughts and chess; several of his treatises are available for download (in Spanish), free of charge   Dr. Westerveld informed me that he is now at work on another book, which he hopes to complete and publish sometime in 2005.

We at Goddesschess salute Dr. Westerveld's original approach to researching the history of draughts and chess, his dedication to proving his hypotheses, and his determination to maintain his academic independence.  Here is an interview that Dr. Westerveld gave regarding the influence of Queen Isabella on the queen in Spanish chess:

The Queen Piece of Modern Chess Was Inspired by Queen Isabella
from The History News Network

Elizabeth Nash, in the London Independent (March 2, 2004):

ISABELLA, QUEEN of Castile, the monarch who unified Spain and sent Christopher Columbus to discover America, was also the inspiration for the figure of the queen in modern chess.

The Arabs brought chess to Spain when they invaded it in the eighth century, but it was not until the late fifteenth century, when Queen Isabella was at the height of her powers, that the queen become the most powerful piece, according to research by chess historians.

"In its original form, the equivalent of the queen was male, a piece known in Spanish as alferza, from the Persian, meaning something like vizier or adjutant," said Govert Westerveld, a Dutch chess historian and former youth champion who lives in Spain.

"The figure was weak, and its movements limited. Later, around 1475, when Isabella was crowned queen of Castile, the figure became female but able to move only one square at a time, like the king. Not until 1495, when Isabella was the most powerful woman in Europe, were the present rules of chess established, in which the queen roams freely in all directions on the board," Dr Westerveld said yesterday.

Chess has always reflected the real world, says Dr Westerveld, who presented his book on the evolution of modern chess in Valencia last week.

It was, he said, no accident that the appearance of the first female chess piece, bearing a crown, sword and sceptre, coincided with the emergence of Queen Isabella, who astonished Europe with her powers of leadership, bravery and determination.

The game of chess represents a battle, a confrontation between two armies, in which the king is flanked by his castles, his bishops (originally elephants) and his cavalry, while the ranks of pawns represent the peasants or foot soldiers in the front line. The game was hugely popular throughout al-Andalus, as Moorish Spain was known, and reflected the constant clashes between rival Arab kingdoms, and between Christian warrior knights and the occupying "infidels".

The theory goes that these real-life warriors found the pace of chess too slow, so the queen was given more freedom of movement, combining the powers of the castle and the bishop. This loosened up the opening moves, gave more variety to the middle game and transformed the endgame by enabling a pawn to become queen on the final square. All this hastened the moment of checkmate, when "the king dies".

Jose Antonio Garzon, a Valencian historian who works with Dr Westerveld, said a Valencian poem called "Lovers' Chess", written in 1475, the year of Isabella's coronation, described for the first time the present day moves of the queen on the chessboard. The work is an allegory that describes a complete game of chess, and includes explicit allusions to the royal court of the time.

Posted by Editor on Thursday, March 4, 2004 at 7:17 PM

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I found the painting used in the introduction very interesting.  I discovered it by doing a web search at Google.com under "Isabella of Castille."  At the website where I found the graphic, it was not in color, so I concluded that it must be a scan from a book of the painting done in black and white. The Virgin Mary sitting on the throne with the infant Jesus on her lap could well be mistaken for Queen Isabella herself! Indeed, when I first saw the image, I thought that it was Isabella herself, with an infant on her lap!  If you read Yalom's history of the Queen in chess, you would understand why I made this assumption.

Instead - so the story goes - in the painting we find King Ferdinand on the left and Queen Isabella on the right, kneeling in prayer, facing each other across a checkerboard floor in front of the figure of the Virgin Mary with child.

Hmmm...  Is it just coincidence that one of the Virgin Mary's titles is "Queen of Heaven"?  And is it just coincidence that the "Queen of Heaven" is a title that has been held by successive goddesses going backward in time, from Asherah, Ashtaroth/Asthoreth (2), Astarte, Isis (Aset) and Inanna (Hannah/Anna/En Edu' Anna)?  And is it just coincidence that there is evidence relating the earliest board games from the Middle East to Inanna, an early Queen of Heaven?

We at Goddesschess have always known that Chess is the Game of the Goddess; perhaps Checkers is, too.

Footnotes:

(1)  Dr. Westerveld's name has also been spelled as "Westerfeld", and is referred to such in one of Dr. Calvo's articles at Goddesschess.

(2)  See, e.g., Bible, Jeremiah 7:18; Jeremiah 44:17; Jeremiah 44:19.