Where and when was the chess game invented. Where chess was invented: interesting facts and myths
Almost every nation has preserved many legends and tales about such a subject as chess. The history of origin is now impossible to establish in its original form. It's not even really a game. This is philosophy. Not a single scientist has found its origins, although thorough studies of this issue have been carried out for several centuries. It is believed that it was the ancient Indians who invented chess. The history of their origin in Russia speaks of Persian roots: - the death of the ruler, this is how these two words are translated from Persian. Scientists argue not only about this. Even the time of the origin of the game cannot be more or less accurately determined. The most widespread opinion is that chess was born in North India in the first century AD. The story of its origin emerges only from legends, since this game is the prototype of wars and battles.
To the origins
Of course, chess is bloodless, but a war entirely consisting of the ability to defeat the enemy with intelligence, cunning, and foresight. The rulers of ancient states devoted a lot of time to such a useful pastime as playing chess. The history of its appearance suggests that there were cases when the rulers of two warring clans decided their disputes at the chessboard, thus not causing harm to any person from their troops.
Researchers present the world with a brief history of chess, which speaks of even more ancient game"Chuturanga", from which "Chaturaja" was gradually formed - already with sixty-four cells on the board. The figures, however, were located differently - in the corners, and not along the front. Excavations show that it was in the first century that this game spread, and therefore it is called the time of the birth of chess.
Legends
And what beautiful legends related to chess were composed! Short story, but very instructive, about how one clever peasant sold this game to his king, as an example. Somewhere it tells about a king, somewhere about a rajah, somewhere about a khan, somewhere about wheat, and somewhere about rice, but the essence always remains the same. Apparently, the legendary peasant devoted more time to studying chess than farming, because in return he asked for just wheat grains according to the number of cells on the board, but exponentially: the first cell is a grain, the second is two, the third is four, and so on.
It seemed to the king that the peasant was not asking so much for such an excellent game. But despite the fact that there are only 64 cells on the chessboard, the king did not have so many grains in the bins, the whole world would not have enough grain. The king was amazed at the peasant's mind and gave him all his harvest. But now he had a game of chess. The history of the emergence of this intellectual fun has been lost in the centuries, but their development has been preserved. great amount interesting legends.
Infinity
Just as it is impossible to collect grains in the sixty-fourth degree, even if all the barns in the world are emptied, it is also impossible to play all possible games on the chessboard, even if one does not leave it for a minute since the creation of the world. The history of the creation of chess, this ancient intellectual game, despite its "venerable age", is also constantly updated with more and more wonderful information. She was, is and will remain the most widespread and world-beloved board game... It has everything - sport, science and art. And its educational value is enormous: the history of the development of chess contains many examples of personal development with the help of this game. And also a person achieves success by perseverance, gets the logic of thinking, the ability to concentrate attention, plan actions, predict the course of thought of his opponent.
It is not for nothing that the history of chess is so interesting for children. Scientists psychologists and educators study personality traits by observing children who prefer fun. Even the capabilities of computers were tested by means of this game, when solving problems of an exhaustive type - choosing the best of all possible options. I must say that each country has its own name for chess. In Russia - with Persian roots - "chess", in France they are called "eshek", in Germany - "shah", in Spain - "ahedress", in England - "chess". This makes the history of chess in the world all the more different. Let's try to take a closer look at individual countries where this game appeared earlier than others.
Indians or Arabs?
In the sixth century, chaturanga was already widely played in the northwestern provinces of India. And it is still quite a little like a game of chess, since there were fundamental differences in it. The move was made according to the result of the thrown, not two, but four people were playing, and in each corner of the board there were: a rook, a bishop, a knight, a king and four pawns. The queen was absent, and the present pieces had much fewer opportunities in battle than the modern rook, knight and bishop. To win, it was necessary to completely destroy the enemy troops.
Then or a century later, the Arabs started playing this game, and immediately there were innovations in it. The book "History of Chess" (reference) describes that it was then that there were only two players, and each had two sets of troops. In the same period, one of the kings became a queen, but he only knew how to move diagonally. The dice were also abolished, each player made a move strictly in order. And now, to win, it was not necessary to destroy the enemy at the root. A stalemate or mate was enough.
The Arabs called this game shatranj, and the Persians called it shatrang. It was the Tajiks who gave them their present name. The Persians were the first to mention shatranja in their fiction ("Karnamuk", 600s). In 819, the first chess tournament was held with the Caliph Khorasan Al-Mamun. The three most powerful players of that time tested their own and their opponents' strengths. And in 847, the first book about this game appeared, by Al-Alli. That is why researchers argue about the history of the origin of chess and about the homeland, and about the time of its origin.
In Russia and in Europe
How this game came to us, the history of the game of chess is silent. But it is known when it happened. In the 820s, the Arabic shatranj with the Tajik name "chess" was described in the monuments that have survived to this day. Which way they came is now difficult to establish. There were two such roads. Either through the Caucasus Mountains directly from Persia, passing through the Khazar Kaganate, or through Khorezm from Central Asia.
The name quickly turned into "chess", and the "names" of the figures did not undergo major changes, since they remained similar both in meaning and in consonance with the Central Asian or Arabic ones. However, with the modern rules of the game, the history of the development of chess grew later, only when Europeans began to play it. The changes reached Russia with great delays, nevertheless, the old Russian chess was also gradually modernized.
In the 8th and 9th centuries, there were constant wars in Spain, which the Arabs tried to conquer with varying success. In addition to spears and arrows, they carried their culture here. Thus, the shatranj was carried away at the Spanish court, and after a short time the game conquered Portugal, Italy, and France. Europeans already by the II century played it everywhere - in all countries, even in the Scandinavian ones. It was in Europe that the rules were especially strongly transformed, eventually turning the Arab shatranj into a game that is known to everyone today by the fifteenth century.
For some time, the changes were not coordinated, and therefore for two or three centuries each country played its own games. Sometimes the rules were pretty bizarre. For example, in Italy, a pawn that reached the last rank could only be turned into a piece that had already been removed from the board. Until the appearance of a piece captured by the enemy, it remained an ordinary pawn. But even then in Italy there was castling both in the presence of a piece between the king and the rook, and in the case of a "bat" field. Books and reference books about chess were published. Even the poem was dedicated to this game (Ezra, 1160). In 1283, a treatise on chess by Alphonse the Tenth the Wise appeared, which describes both the moribund shatranj and the new European rules.
Books
The game is very widespread in the modern world, so much so that almost every second child declares: "Chess is my friends!" Almost every one of them knows the history of the emergence of chess, since there are many wonderful books: exciting - for children, serious - for adults.
All famous chess players have their own library of their favorite works about this game. And everyone has a different list! Much more fiction has been written about chess than about all other sports combined! There are amateurs who have collected more than seven thousand books on the subject of the game in their own library, and this is far from all that has been published.
For example, Yasser Seirawan, a grandmaster, a four-time world champion, who has written many excellent books about his favorite game, including textbooks, literally "under his pillow" holds the books of Mikhail Tal, David Bronstein, Alexander Alekhin, Paul Keres, Lev Polugaevsky. And each of these numerous works brings him, when re-read, in "continuous admiration." And an international master and researcher of the history of the emergence of chess (he also wrote books about this for children), John Donaldson adores the book by Grigory Pyatigorsky and Isaac Kazhden. Professor Anthony Sadie is a legend of the chess game, he managed to collect a huge library of chess and write several books himself, each of which has become a tabletop for all fans of this game in the world. And for some reason he reads most often Russians, but on the same topic: Nabokov ("Luzhin's Defense") and Alekhine ("My Best Games").
Chess theory
Systematic theory began to develop in the sixteenth century, when the basic rules were already universally accepted. The full textbook of chess first appeared in 1561 (Rui Lopez), where all the stages that have been identified and now were considered - endgame, middlegame, opening. The most interesting form was also described there - the gambit (the development of an advantage due to the sacrifice of a piece). Philidor's work published in the eighteenth century is of great importance for chess theory. In it, the author revised the views of the Italian masters, who considered the best style to be a massive attack on the king and for whom pawns were auxiliary material.
After the appearance of this book, the positional style of playing chess really began to develop, when the attack ceases to be reckless, and a strong and stable position is built systematically. The shots are precisely calculated and directed to the weakest positions. For Philidor, pawns have become the "soul of chess", and defeat or victory depends on them. His tactics of promoting the chain of "weak figures" have survived the centuries. But what is really there, it became the basis of chess theory. Forty-two editions have survived the book of Philidor. Still, the Persians and Arabs wrote about chess much earlier. These are the works of Omar Khayyam, Nizami, Saadi, thanks to which this game was no longer perceived as a war. Many treatises were written, peoples composed epics, where they associated chess games with everyday vicissitudes.
Korea and China
Chess has gone not only to the West. Both chaturanga and early versions of shatranj penetrated Southeast Asia, since two players participated in different provinces of the same China, and other features were visible. For example, the move of the pieces for a short distance, there is no castling, either. The game was also modified, acquiring new features.
National "xiangqi" is very similar to ancient chess in its rules. In neighboring Korea, it was called "changi", and along with similar features, some differences from the Chinese version were observed in it. Even the pieces were placed in different ways. Not in the middle of the cell, but at the intersection of the lines. Not a single figure could "jump" - neither a knight, nor an bishop. But their troops had "guns" that were able to "shoot", killing the figure over which they jumped.
In Japan, the game was called "shogi", it had its own characteristics, although it was clearly derived from "xiangqi". The board was much simpler, closer to the European one, the pieces went into a cage, not on a line, but there were more cells - 9x9. The pieces knew how to transform, which the Chinese did not allow, and this was done cleverly: the pawn simply turned over, and at the top it had a piece sign. And it is also interesting: those "warriors" that were taken from the enemy can be set as their own - arbitrarily, almost anywhere on the board. The Japanese did not play in black and white. All the figures are of the same color, and the position will be determined by the setting: the sharp end to the opponent. In Japan, this game is still much more popular than classical chess.
How did the sport begin?
Chess clubs began to appear in the sixteenth century. They were attended not only by amateurs, but also by almost professionals who gambled. And two centuries later, almost every country had its own national chess tournament. Books about the game are being published in large quantities. Then periodicals appear on this subject. First, single, then regular, but rarely published collections are published. And in the nineteenth century, the popularity and relevance forced publishers to put this business on a permanent basis. In 1836, the first purely chess magazine "Palamed" appeared in France. It was published by one of the best grandmasters of his time, Labourdonnais. In 1837 Great Britain followed the example of France, and in 1846 began publishing its own chess magazine in Germany.
International matches have been held in Europe since 1821 and tournaments since 1851. First " chess king"- the strongest chess player in the world - appeared in London at the competitions in 1851. It was Adolf Andersen. Then in 1858 Paul Morphy took this title from Andersen. And the palm tree was taken to the USA. chess player already in 1859. And until 1866 he had no equal. And then Wilhelm Steinitz won, unofficially.
Champions
Steinitz again became the first official world champion. He defeated Johann Zukertort. It was also the first match in the history of chess, where the world championship was stipulated. This is how the system appeared, which still exists in the continuity of the title. The world champion can be the one who wins the match against the reigning champion. Moreover, the latter may not agree to the game. And if he accepts the challenge, he independently sets the place, time and conditions for the match. Only public opinion could force the champion to play: a winner who refused to play with a strong opponent could be considered a weakling and a coward, so most often the challenge was accepted. Typically, the match agreement provided for the right to a rematch for the loser, and winning it would return the champion to his title.
Since the second half of the nineteenth century, time control has been used in tournaments. At first they were hourglass limiting the chess player's time per move. It was not convenient. That is why a player from England Thomas Wilson invented a special clock - a chess clock. Now it has become easy to control both the whole game and a certain number of moves. Time control entered chess practice quickly and firmly, it was applied everywhere. At the end of the 19th century, matches were no longer held without watches. At the same time, the concept of time trouble reigned. A little later, they began to hold "rapid chess" matches - with a limit of half an hour for each of the players, and a little later a "blitz" appeared - from five to ten minutes.
History emergence and development chess counts for many centuries. Archaeological excavations indicate that games in which it was necessary to move chips on a board existed as early as around the 4th-3rd centuries. BC. According to an ancient legend, the game of chess was created by a certain brahmin. In exchange for his invention, he asked the Rajah for a seemingly insignificant reward: as many grains of millet as would fit on a chessboard, if one grain was put on the first cell, two grains on the second, four grains on the third, etc. in fact, it turned out that there is no such amount of grain (1.845 × 10 ^ 19 grains, which can be stored in a storage with a volume of 180 km³) on the entire planet. It is not known whether this really happened or otherwise, but, one way or another, India is considered the birthplace of chess. A history this once again emphasizes the fact that in chess the number of combinations is infinite, due to which this ancient an interesting game will never exhaust itself.
The oldest form of chess - war game chaturanga - appeared in the first centuries AD. NS. In India, a type of army was called chaturanga, which included war chariots (ratha) - boats, elephants (hasti), cavalry (ashva) and foot soldiers (padati). The game symbolized a battle involving four types of troops, which are controlled by a leader. The pieces were located at the corners of a square board (ashtapada) in 64 cells, 4 people took part in the game. The movement of the figures was determined by throwing the dice. To win the game, it was necessary to destroy all the enemy troops. Chaturanga existed in India until the beginning of the 20th century, and its name changed over time to "chaturraja" - the game of four kings; the figures began to be painted in 4 colors - green, yellow, red and black. The successor to chaturanga was the game shatrang (chatrang), which arose in Central Asia in the late 5th - early 6th centuries. In this variation, the game had two "camps" of figures and a new figure depicting the king's advisor - farzin; only 2 opponents began to take part in the game. The goal of the game was to checkmate the opponent's king. Thus, the "game of chance" was replaced by the "game of mind". In the VIII-IX centuries. shatrang penetrated from Central Asia to the East and West, which became known under the Arabic name shatranj. In the shatranga (IX-XV centuries), the terminology and arrangement of the shatrang figures have been preserved, however appearance figures have undergone changes. The fact is that religion was against the use of living beings to designate chess pieces, therefore, the Arabs began to use abstract figures in the form of small cylinders and cones for this purpose. This greatly simplified their creation, which, in turn, contributed to the further spread of the game among the masses. The development of the game was rather slow, so only the rook, king and knight moved according to modern rules, while the range of action of other pieces was extremely limited. For example, the queen moved only one square diagonally.
So, the use of abstract images to create chess pieces contributed to a change in the perception of chess - they ceased to be perceived as a symbol of war, battle, and began to be associated with everyday vicissitudes, which was reflected in the epic and treatises on the chess game (Omar Khayyam, Saadi, Nizami), opening new page in chess history.
The development of chess.
During the early Middle Ages (VIII-IX centuries), the Arabs, as a result of the conquest of Spain, moved shatranj to Spain. After that, this game began to spread in Western Europe, where further transformation of the rules continued, which as a result turned shatranj into modern chess.
Chess acquired its modern appearance only by the 15th century, although due to the inconsistency of changes, several centuries in different countries there were their own, sometimes quite bizarre, features of the rules. For example, in Italy, until the 19th century, a pawn that reached the last rank could only be transformed into those pieces that had already been removed from the board, and it was not forbidden to move a pawn to the last rank in the absence of such pieces. In this case, the pawn remained a pawn and turned into the first piece captured by the opponent at the moment when the opponent took it. Castling was also allowed if there was a piece between the rook and the king and when the king passed a broken square.
Chess history quite rich and as they spread in Europe, chess and art works began to appear, telling about this game. The first poem about chess, written by Ezra, appeared in 1160. In 1283, the first chess book in Europe was published - a treatise by Alfonso X the Wise. This book is of considerable interest in the study chess history, as it contains a description of both new European chess and the already moribund shatranj. Around 820, the Arab shatranj under the Central Asian name "chess" appeared in Russia, acquiring the name "chess" already known to all of us in Russian, having come, as it is believed, either directly from Persia through the Caucasus and the Khazar Kaganate, or from the Central Asian peoples, through Khorezm. In any case, the Russian name for the game is inherited from the Tajiks or Uzbeks, the names of the figures in Russia are also consonant or similar in meaning to the Arabic or Central Asian ones. Changes in the rules, later introduced by the Europeans, penetrated into Russia with some delay, and gradually turned the old Russian chess into modern chess. The emergence of the so-called descriptive notation is also associated with the Arab period, thanks to which it became possible to record the games played.
However, the Christian church throughout chess history took a sharply negative position, equating them to gambling and drunkenness. But, despite the church prohibitions, both in Europe and in Russia, chess was spreading, and among the clergy the enthusiasm for the game was no less (if not more) than among other classes. And already in 1393 in Europe, the Regenburg Cathedral removed chess from the number of prohibited games. Note that in Russia there is no information about the official cancellation of the church ban on chess, but at least from the 17th-18th centuries this ban did not actually work. Ivan the Terrible played chess. Under Alexei Mikhailovich, chess was widespread among the courtiers, the ability to play it was common among diplomats. In Europe, documents from that time have survived, which say that Russian envoys are familiar with chess and play it very well. Princess Sophia was fond of chess. Under Peter I, assemblies were held with indispensable chess games.
In the XIV-XV centuries. traditions of oriental chess in Europe were lost, and in the XV-XVI centuries. the departure from them became obvious after a number of changes in the rules of pawn, bishop and queen moves. But by the 15th-16th centuries, the rules of chess were basically established, thanks to which the development of a systematic chess theory began. In 1561, the priest Rui López, the author of the popular opening "The Spanish Game", published the first complete chess textbook, in which the currently distinguished stages of the game - the opening, the middlegame and the endgame - were considered. He was the first to describe the characteristic type of opening - "gambit", in which the advantage in development is achieved by sacrificing material.
A great contribution to the development of chess theory in the 18th century was made by the famous French musician François-André Danican Philidor, who had a huge influence on the development chess history... He seriously revised the views of his predecessors, first of all, the Italian masters, who believed that the best style of play was an aggressive attack on the opponent's king with all available means and using pawns only as auxiliary material. Philidor developed the so-called positional style of play. He believed that the player should not rush into reckless attacks, but systematically build a strong, stable position, deliver precisely calculated blows to the weaknesses of the opponent's position, if necessary, resort to exchanges and simplifications if they lead to a profitable endgame. The correct position, according to Filidor, is, first of all, the correct arrangement of pawns. According to Philidor, “Pawns are the soul of chess; only they create attack and defense, victory or defeat depends entirely on their good or bad disposition ”. Filidor developed the tactics of advancing the pawn chain, insisted on the importance of the pawn center and analyzed the struggle for the center, was the author of the well-known "Philidor Defense". In many ways, his ideas formed the basis of the chess theory of the next century. Philidor's book "Analysis of the Chess Game" became a classic; it went through 42 editions only in the 18th century and was reprinted many times later.
Modern chess.
In 1886, the United States hosted the first official world championship match in chess history... The struggle unfolded between Steinitz and Zukertort. Having won this match, Steinitz became the first world champion. He was not only the strongest chess player, but also the creator of the school of positional play. Steinitz, as it were, decomposed the position into its constituent elements, singling out the most significant ones, allowing it to objectively evaluate and outline the most expedient, most effective plan of action. In fact, he proposed a fundamentally new approach to the game. The foundations of his strategy consisted in the gradual accumulation of small advantages, in maneuvering in order to strengthen his position and weaken the enemy.
Meaning positional school for the development and spread of chess is difficult to overestimate. Instead of a game based only on a specific calculation, a purely scientific method was proposed based on an objective assessment of the pros and cons of a position.
At the beginning of the 20th century, a new trend appeared in painting, sculpture and music - modernism. And at the same time such a trend as "hypermodernism" or "neo-romanticism" was born in chess. The hypermodernists criticized a number of attitudes of the positional school. For example, they believed that the positional school overestimates the role of the pawn center and developed the concept of a piece-pawn center, when not only pawns, but also pieces exercise control over the central squares. This led to a number of new beginnings: Reti's opening for White, the Nimzowitsch Defense, the Grunfeld Defense, the King's Indian and King's Indian Defense, and the Alekhine Defense for Black.
In addition, the hypermodernists abandoned the play by Black, preached by supporters of the positional school, to gradually extinguish White's initiative and equalize the game. They strove for counter-active actions, to seize the initiative, to counterplay.
The representative of the hypermodern chess school Nimzowitsch also deserves credit for the development and practical application of various maneuvering techniques in the middle of the game - maneuvering, prevention, limitation of mobility, blockade, etc.
The main achievement of the hypermodernists, which had the greatest influence on the further chess history- they made chess interesting again, brought back tactical game full of sacrifices and combinations. Emphasizing the leading role of strategy, the positional school unwittingly belittled the role of tactics. Meanwhile, Nimzowitsch has repeatedly emphasized that the combination should logically follow from the strategy itself. It is also significant that in their games the hypermodernists showed the beauty of strategy, demonstrated in practice that it, like tactics, is fertilized by inspiration, fantasy and intuition. Thus, they further expanded the concept of chess as an art.
However, representatives of the positional school still dominated the chess Olympus, and in 1921 the Cuban Jose Raul Capablanca (1888-1942) became the third world champion. For understanding the position and technique of positional play, he was called a "chess machine" and was considered invincible. In 1927, having won the match against Capablanca, the Russian Alexander Alekhin (1892-1946) became the fourth world champion. In 1935 Alekhine, in a match held in various cities of Holland, lost to the Dutchman Max Euwe, who became the fifth world champion, but in 1937 he regained the title of champion by winning a rematch.
After the end of World War II, the USSR joined the chess federation - FIDE, and Soviet chess players began to dominate the world chess arena. Of the eight chess players who were crowned with the laurels of the world chess champion in the postwar years, seven grandmasters represented the USSR: Mikhail Botvinnik, Vasily Smyslov, Mikhail Tal, Tigran Petrosyan, Boris Spassky, Anatoly Karpov, Garry Kasparov. Soviet chess players Lyudmila Rudenko, Elizaveta Bykova, Olga Rubtsova, Nona Gaprindashvili, Maya Chiburdanidze became world champions among women.
Universal computerization and the Internet of the late 20th - early 21st centuries. greatly influenced the development of chess. In 1997, the computer (Deep Blue) already wins the match against the world champion. Thus, we have entered the 21st century - the age of computer chess programs.
In the fifth grade, a classmate invited me to a chess club. Classes were held at school after school, and we had a great coach who loved his job very much. It was from him that I first heard the history of the invention " games of kings».
Where chess was invented
Chess was invented in India around the 5th-6th centuries. Interesting story associated with this event. One brahmin, as gratitude for his game, asked the rajah to put on each square of the chessboard so much grain that it was equal to a number equal to twice as much as in the previous square. Raja agreed, without thinking that such a quantity of grain simply does not exist physically.
The first progenitor chess was a game chaturanga:
- Were playing four people in pairs.
- There was no queen(queens) and only 4 pawns, one king, knight, rook and bishop. There were 4 kings on the board at once: two white and two black.
- The pieces were positioned in a completely different way and moved too.
- The movement of the figures was influenced by dice .
Further, chess penetrated Arab territory, where they got their transformations and a new name - shatranj... After the game was distributed in Thailand, on the territory of Russia, in Europe. Exactly at Europe the game brought by the eastern conquerors gained modern look and rules.
Chess in Russia
There is only one in the world in Russia city of chess... In fact, this is a district of a Russian city Elista located in Republic of Kalmykia... This area was built specifically for 33rd Chess Olympiad 1998.
At the moment, it has even acquired a special status, has its own management. Personally, upon learning about such a city, I immediately remembered the book "The Glass Bead Game". There, too, there was a similar place, which had its own structure and government.
Russian chess history has a huge number of great chess players:
I advise everyone to master this game, which helps to think logically, build strategies and develops foresight thinking.
Chess was invented many centuries ago, and it is still unknown who invented it. Due to the remoteness of events, the appearance of this game has overgrown with many myths and legends.
Which country is the birthplace of chess? According to the legends, the game originates in India.
Chess history
India is the birthplace of chess. It is believed that they appeared in the first centuries of our era. Later, chess was transferred to different parts of the planet, and each nation added something of its own: changed the name of the game, the shape of the figures, but the rules remained unchanged - to checkmate the king.
Chess historians are sure that the game was invented not by one specific person, but by a large team of different nations, supplementing and transforming it at different times. The opinions of scientists agree only on one thing: India is the country of the birthplace of chess.
However, there are some Chinese historians who do not believe that the Indian origin of chess is fully proven. They are looking for evidence to prove that the game came from China.
What is the homeland of chess? There are no confirmations refuting the Indian origin of the game, and the first mentions of it in Chinese literature date only to the 8th century AD. This only confirms that the birthplace of chess is India.
The legends of the origin of chess are very interesting and unusual, let's look at some of them.
Brothers Gav and Talhand
A description of this legend was found in the Persian poet Ferdowsi, who wrote the epic about a thousand years ago.
In one Indian kingdom lived a queen and her two twin sons Gav and Talhand. The time had come for them to reign, but the mother could not decide whom to make king, because she loved the sons of the lonely. Then the princes decided to arrange a battle, who won and would become the ruler. The battlefield was chosen on the seashore and surrounded by a moat of water. We created such conditions that there was nowhere to retreat.
The condition of the tournament was not to kill each other, but to defeat the enemy army. The battle began, as a result of which Talhand died.
Upon learning of the death of her son, the queen fell into despair. She reproached Gava who had arrived for the murder of her brother. However, he replied that he did not cause bodily harm to his brother, he himself died from exhaustion of the body.
The queen asked to tell in detail about how the battle took place. Woof, together with people from their entourage, decided to recreate the battlefield. To do this, they took a board, marked out the cells and placed on it figures depicting the belligerents. The opposing troops were placed on opposite sides and placed in rows: infantry, cavalry, and again infantry. In the middle row in the center stood the prince, next to him was his main assistant, then two figures of elephants, camels, horses and Rukh birds. By moving various figures, the prince showed his mother how the battle had gone.
Thus, it can be seen that the ancient one had 100 cells and the figures on it stood in three lines.
The most famous legend about chess and grain
This legend tells how the brahmin, who invented the chess game, outwitted the king.
Once a Brahmin living in India invented chess and demonstrated how to play it to the reigning king, who really liked it. For this, the king decided to fulfill any of his wishes. Then the brahmin asked to give him grain, while he said that he would not ask for much. It is only necessary to put one grain on the first cell, two on the second, four on the third, eight on the fourth, and on each next cell the doubled number of grains from the previous cell.
The king agreed, however, when he began to fulfill the promise, the seed of his kingdom ended, and there were still many cells left until the end of the board. Thus, the scolding outwitted the king.
Chaturanga game
Since the birthplace of chess is India, the chaturanga game is considered the progenitor of the modern chess game. The name denotes the presence of four components: infantry, cavalry, elephant, chariot. There should be four players. The board, consisting of 64 cells, was divided into 4 parts, and in each of them they put: 4 pawns, one bishop, knight, rook and king. The goal of the game is to crush and destroy the enemy. The game used dice, by throwing which the move was made.
Chaturanga from India moved to other eastern countries and changed over time. The troops merged and formed two teams, each of which had two kings. Then one king was replaced by an adviser. The pieces began to move on their own, without the use of the king it is impossible to kill, only to block its movement on the board.
Transforming Shapes
The existing one, according to legend, was eventually transformed into a rook. This is due to the fact that Islam forbade making images of living beings. Therefore, when chess appeared in Arab countries, the Rukh bird was changed, its wings were cut off: it turned out just small protrusions at the top of the quadrangle. This is how the bird was transformed into a boat.
Thus, the origin of the game itself is covered with many legends and fables, only one thing is known for sure that the homeland of chess is India.
The game, which appeared in ancient times, has gained popularity all over the world. From military it has turned into a cognitive, stimulating and developing memory, logic, attention, while requiring a certain perseverance.
