Check out Symmetric Chess, our featured variant for March, 2024.

Viking Chess

I hope you can help identify this chess game for me, made by Arne Basse in Denmark in 1966.

It was passed onto me from my parents, They said it was called "Viking Chess", but I haven't been able to find it among the variants at your website under that name (perhaps I have not looked hard enough).

It has 9 pieces per side (king, two bishops, two castles, 4 pawns). It has a spiral board with 36 cross shape places and a star in the middle.

I am trying to remember the rules as the original set are lost. My faint recollection was that each piece "entered" the spiral from the sides.

Here, attached, are some pictures of the board and pieces. Unfortunately the raw leather board suface is damaged, but still playable.