Jaques Chess & Draughts sets

The Origin of Chess

A great deal has been written about the origins of chess and there is still a lot of debate on the subject. The earliest clear ancestor of chess is shaturanga or chaturanga which was invented by a 6th century Indian philosopher. It was a battle between four armies each under the control of a Rajah (king), two players being loosely allied against the other two and and each containing 4 corps - Infantry, Cavalry, Elephants and Boatmen. The board of 64 squares used for shaturanga, was borrowed from an earlier game called ashtapada, which was a race game played in ancient India.

Under Hindu law, gambling became forbidden early on in the Hindu civilisation and, to avoid the gambling laws, shaturanga players dispensed with the dice. Another early modification was the merging of the allied armies into a single army making the game a two player form and duplicating the pieces, both developments which have survived until today. Other changes also occurred and the resulting game was called shatranj. 

There are three versions of the story of arrival of shatranj in Europe - did it come from the Saracens via Spain, from the Byzantine empire as a present to Charlemagne or was it brought back from the Middle East by Knights returning from the Crusades? Nonetheless in Europe, the game developed into modern European chess now played worldwide while in China, Japan, Burma, Thailand and Korea, other variants became just as popular.

You can learn more about the History of Chess from The Online Guide to Traditional Games.

The Origin of Draughts

Draughts is a very ancient game indeed, the origins of which, like Chess, aren't completely clear. However, early forms of Alquerque, its venerable ancestor, have been found in Egypt dating at least as early as 600BC. Alquerque boards can be seen carved into the stone slabs which form the roof of the great temple at Kurna, Egypt, which was built in 1400BC (of course, they might have been carved at any point since). The game of Alquerque was played like Draughts on a 5 x 5 point board with the pieces starting in a non-symmetrical pattern. The game clearly had staying power - it is mentioned under the name of Quirkat in the Arabic work Kitab-al Aghani, the author of which died in 976 AD and was first brought to Europe by the Moors during their invasion of Spain. It was recorded as Alquerque in the Alfonso X Manuscript which was written between 1251 - 1282 at the command of Alfonso X, King of Leon and Castile.

The Madagascan game of Fanorona is a descendant of Alquerque. It seems to have been invented around 1680 AD and is still played today.

Sometime later, around 1100, possibly in the South of France, somebody decided to play Alquerque on a Chess board instead of the standard Alquerque board. The game was played with 12 pieces on each side and was called Fierges or Ferses at first although this changed to Dames later. The game did not force a player to take enemy pieces when the opportunity presented itself. The compulsory rule forcing a player to take whenever possible was introduced in France around 1535, the resulting new game being called Jeu Force. At this point the old game without huffing became known as Le Jeu Plaisant De Dames or Plaisant for short. Jeu Force is the game played in England today under the name of Draughts and the game was taken to America and called Checkers.

Most of the rest of Western Europe took to playing a different development of Le Jeu Plaisant De Dames which appeared in Paris in 1727 and which is now the internationally recognised game of Polish Draughts or Continental Draughts. This game is superior in complexity to English draughts by virtue of the fact that it is played on a board ten squares by ten squares and that capturing moves have an extended scope. It isn't believed to have been invented in Poland at all and they apparently know it as 'French Draughts' there! Polish Draughts was probably the name given in order to make it sound slightly different to West European ears in the same way as for Chinese Checkers and Russian Billiards. Some areas of South East Asia go one better and play on a board of twelve by twelve squares and 24 pieces each side. The Canadian Draughts variant is also played upon a board this size.

You can learn more about the History of Draughts from The Online Guide to Traditional Games.