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Ashta’s chess tales

The four arms of the army

Northern India, about 1,500 years ago · 2 minute read

Before it was chess it was chaturanga — and the army on the board was a real one.

If you had watched an Indian army march out fifteen hundred years ago, you would have seen it in four parts. Elephants, huge and slow. Chariots, racing in straight lines. Horsemen, who could wheel and leap where others could not. And foot soldiers, the most numerous of all, walking forward one step at a time.

In Sanskrit, “four arms” is chaturanga — and that became the name of a game. Someone, we do not know who, put that army on a board of eight squares by eight and gave each arm its own way of moving.

Look at a chessboard today and they are all still there. The chariot is the rook, still running straight. The horse is the knight, still jumping. The foot soldier is the pawn, still one step at a time. The elephant, after a long journey and several changes, is the bishop.

From India the game travelled west into Persia, then across the Arab world to Baghdad and on to Spain. Every country renamed the pieces in its own language and adjusted a rule or two. But the army of four arms was never taken off the board.

So when you set up the pieces, you are lining up an army that is fifteen centuries old.