English Chess Forum

"Perhaps the more erudite members of the forum will know where the OED got all that from? I thought that the current shape of the piece came from a representation of a military howdah; I don't know where I got that idea from - maybe because I grew up near to the Elephant and Castle in South London."

The OED's research is generally pretty good. I thought the rook was supposed to look like a howdah as well.

As for, "anatalogically", is someone suggesting Karpov knows everything? He might, I suppose...

I'll just say, in mitigation, that Francis posted this in General Chat.

If it had been posted in Chess History the criticisms would be justified.

Chess Questions might have been a better place for it.

Wow, new info.
Rukh means face in Persian. Also (rarely)an outstanding, moral top athlete/fighter

Hi Hoosh (hope you don't mind me calling you by that name?)

Always good to hear comments "straight from the horse's mouth" (hope you understand that is just a figure of speech and not an implication of anything personal!)

Can you tell me the names of all the chess pieces in your native language, please?

Hi.
رخ /rukh/for rook
اسب /asb/ for Knight
فیل /fil/for Bishop
وزیر /vazir/ for Queen
شاه /shäh/ for King
پیاده /piäde/ for pawn

Tim Harding wrote: ↑

Mon Jun 17, 2019 2:13 pm

Since the first edition of the OED (edited by Sir James Murray, father of chess historian Harold Murray), began in the 1880s and was completed in 1928, and had 10 volumes, while the edition currently in preparation is the 3rd, I think we can assume you are thinking of some other dictionary entirely, or else you have a total disregard for facts?

I do not consider myself to have a disregard for facts. I have seen and read many chess books and listened to other chess players. Sometimes a more elementary discussion is required. Isn't the point of the forum to discuss chess? Who will be deciding who is wrong and who is right? What is false and what is true?

Yes, when this thread ends up in "Not Chess!" those questions need to be asked.

"Hi.
رخ /rukh/for rook
اسب /asb/ for Knight
فیل /fil/for Bishop
وزیر /vazir/ for Queen
شاه /shäh/ for King
پیاده /piäde/ for pawn"

That is interesting - particularly the "vazir" for queen, because it has been argued I believe that originally the queen was really a "vizier", i.e. king's assistant, then as the game arrived in Europe, somebody used "queen" as they thought queens go with kings. So maybe the confusion goes back even further? Or maybe it was always meant to be a queen, and the vazir/vizier similarity confused people later!

No, it was mantri in India, meaning wise man.
/Vezr/ means burden, so vazir means he who carries the burden. He is minister, an advisor to the PM, and thus to the king

Thanks - so the confusion was later? Once words get translated, this tends to happen, and meanings change as well over time. But I am not going into that territory here!

You're welcome.
What confusion?
We always called it vazir,

We were confused in Europe! It probably made perfect sense where you are.

Were we? How is it different from saying that we are confused in Europe because the English say 'yes' the French say 'oui' and the Germans say 'ja'?

Though on the chess front we remain just as "confused" as ever. Take England and Germany:

Kevin Thurlow wrote: ↑

Sun Jun 30, 2019 1:02 pm

We were confused in Europe! It probably made perfect sense where you are.

You mean because some say Queen & some say Dama and some say Ferz?

It was more that in Europe, we call it a "queen" in most languages, although it originally seemed to be a "vizier". In Europe, we associate kings with queens, whereas maybe in your part of the world, the "vizier" had a bigger role. Kings and queens in UK have (or had) people who give advice, but probably most of the public have no idea who those people are. It is probably a committee anyway.