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Anyone interested in a game of Chaturanga?

This preset has regular pieces:
/play/pbm/play.php?game%3DChaturanga%26settings%3DAlfaerie

How do I play chaturanga ??  I once played the game verses the computer.
Your page seems to have changed since I visited last. Any information on
this topic whould be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for you
help.
matt

John Ayer's very complete and acute comments our remarks are so true. This form of chess never existed. At least with this set of rules that is just an erroneous conception of John Gollon. So this page should have already been at least corrected if you do not want to scrap it, which would be preferable; to end the discussion and stop people, especially the new ones to this site, to believe in a 'Lord of the Rings' kind of world -beautiful but non-existing.

Of course you would have to rewrite the very front page of chessvariants pages. I believe that for the sake of truth it is worth it.

The same goes to both Shatranj Kamil. All it is needed to do is to read carefully the pages on Murray's book the source of - good intentioned but in his case wrong - Gollon.

Does that apply for Star Trek 3D and Jetan, also?

Imagine Martians landing on Earth, and excavating our vanished 20th
century civilization. They could, without being able to read anything,
reconstruct the basic rules of chess from all the pictures. But could they
possibly know about 'touch rules'? And how long would they argue over the
details of castling and en passant vs passar battaglia? Yet, they would
have, and probably be playing, chess, in spite of their not officially
knowing the rules, or even being able to determine all the nuances of the
rules. We are currently in the same position vis a vis chaturanga that our
Martians are with chess. We know dice games, race games, the 4-sided and
later 2-sided setups, and we know the rules to its child shatranj. I
suggest that is enough to give the game legitimacy. We don't know the
rules, but we still have the game, especially in the wider sense of chess
variations. Ignoring it is the bigger sin.

Flowerman's at http://www.chessvariants.org/index/displaycomment.php?commentid=25071 is where we get the theory that Chess mutates every 500 years out of control. Roughly, 500 - 1000 Chaturanga, 1000 - 1500 Shatranj, 1500 - 2000 Strong mad Queen Shatranj. 500 year Comet Caissa is long period:
http://www.chessvariants.org/fiction.dir/poems/falconpoem4.html.
Then the Next Chesses from the top down this time, because CVers are far the more informed. Bodlaender may find here promotion differences too between Chaturanga and Shatranj, to the same Flowerman inquiry.  The five hundred years, 
http://www.chessvariants.org/index/displaycomment.php?commentid=22850, accord with Phoenix.

It's widely assumed by Western scholars that Indian chess was the first
form of chess, but it is also widely assumed that Asian forms of chess were
derived from it although there is no direct evidence of it other than the
fact that the pieces move in a similar fashion.

But what if there are historical documents or artifacts in China that
suggest that Xiangqi has been around since 2nd century B.C.? What if the
similarities between the early Indian version and Xiangqi were the result
of influence from the other way around?

Just because European scholars had no access to Chinese documents but did
with Indian archives, that does not mean it can be assumed that the first
game was from India. It seems since China was not a part of the British
empire, then its archives can be ignored and only regions of the world
which are a part of Britain's sphere of influence can be deemed as
inventing anything.

I have not done the research myself, but it is generally considered by
chess historians with access to Chinese archives that Xiangqi came much
earlier than the Indian version, so no scholar who can read Chinese would
think that the Indian version came first. This does not prove that the
Indian version came from China, but the similarities in the boards would
suggest that one is taken from the other but with a different board.

The 8x8 chess board used for the India/Western version is simply the 9x10
board for Xiangqi with the river removed. This removes a row, and results
in an 8x8 board if you play in the squares and not on the intersection
points. Therefore, in a way, the 2 boards are almost the same board.

What can be objectively pointed out is that the pieces for Xiangqi move in
a way that fit its board that has survived up to its modern form while the
moves for the counselor/Queen and elephant/bishop do not fit the gameplay
of the 8x8 board. That's why the pieces were logically improved or adapted
to fit the gameplay of an 8x8 board later on.

If we assume that one game influenced the other and was the first version
of it known to man, then it is more reasonable to assume things went from
China to India based on the fact that the 9x10 board actually fits that
movement and the 8x8 board does not suggesting the initial movement of
those pieces was borrowed and does not fit the 8x8 board.

Also if one assumes it went from India to China, it is unlikely that pieces
would become more restricted. 

This is a misnomer. The main reason why the pieces can jump over pieces in
the Indian version is because the board is smaller and the pawns are right
in front of the horse/knight and elephant/bishop requiring the rules to be
adapted so they could move right away rather being blocked right off the
bat.

Western researchers conclude that pieces become more restricted when going
East and more free when moving West. But does that really make any logical
sense?

Are our cultures so different that Asians like to restrict, and Indians,
Persians, and Europeans like to make things more free?

That makes it sound like Westerners or countries colonized and/or
influenced by the West like to make things better while the people in the
Far East like to make things 'worse'.

It's more reasonable just to look at the different boards and notice that
a major difference between the 9x10 board and 8x8 board (other than the
size difference) is that the pawns are not blocking the main pieces in the
9x10 board so the pieces can move right away.

The fact that the knight and elephant can be blocked in Xiangqi is
reminiscent of Weiqi where the 2 sides are 'blocking' each other from
going to further territory albeit with stones rather than pieces.

How come no Westerner or scientist has noticed the similarities between
Weiqi and Xiangqi?

Also, let's not forget the bigger picture in terms of board games in
China.

If Weiqi was first recorded in the 4th century B.C. and now there are
claims that Xiangqi was first played in 2nd century B.C. and has
similarities in the blocking concept, why is that so hard to believe for
Western Chess historians?

Because it has already been stated and stressed in European literature that
Chaturanga was the first game, so why would an entire continent of people
want to revise their thinking and basically admit that they did not
consider an entire region's documents simply because that would be
tantamount to admitting either ignorance or basically a condescending
attitude towards 'yellow people' who could not have possibly invented
anything first.

So 2nd century B.C. is not that much of a stretch for board games in China.
Actually, the origin of chess in China makes a lot more sense because the
cannon was not added until much later when that kind of technology was
invented, so that's a more probable reason why the cannon has no
corresponding piece in Indian/Western chess. A version without the cannon
was brought over earlier before it was recorded in India first.

And its the version with the cannon that seems to have been brought over to
Korea and Japan. i.e. It went to those regions later on.

Why does the origin of those games have to be from India also when they
resemble the modern Chinese game more than the original Indian game?

It goes back to the original assumption that not enough Western
writers/scientists or whatever you want to call a person with a right to
have an authority on this subject, said that India was first and that is
the end of the conversation.

One would think that if there was a different version of Go that is widely
played in Europe and India, Western scholars would also insist the origin
was India by only looking at Indian documents that support their thesis
without bothering to look at any records in Chinese.

So when the Chinese come forward with so called records, they are refuted
by European chess historians as being inaccurate! So Europeans also know
Chinese history better than Chinese people. Well, that is something I had
not thought could happen.

Or is it just Western arrogance as we have all become accustomed to in this
world?

In no way, am I attacking this website or anyone in particular. I am just
frustrated with why even things that can be viewed objectively, are not
being viewed objectively like the awkward movement of certain pieces in the
Indian version and fluid movements of those same pieces in Xiangqi.

That is an objective observation anyone could make but instead other
theories that do not seem reasonable are put forward without the converse
ever being considered.

If the question is which chess game was first and therefore could have been
the father of all others, then shouldn't archives and other related
evidence from all over the world be considered before declaring any one
country or region as the first game?

The possibility of a Chinese origin is mentioned on the Xiangqi page.

At Goddesschess John Ayer rejects also the received genealogy, 
http://www.goddesschess.com/chessays/johnayer.html.
Http://www.goddesschess.com/chessays/chessaystoc.html, afore index of many historical chess articles.
___________And another specific one of those from their Goddesschess history index:
http://www.goddesschess.com/chessays/needham1.html.
________________The Silk Road: 
http://www.goddesschess.com/chessays/remus.html.

Are there any such documents? Last fall someone argued in the English Wikipedia that Chinese chess is the earliest and original version, but the only substantial source offered was a Chinese document at http://ent.veryeast.cn/ent/26/2006-4/23/0642309574393496.htm . Can you translate this for us?

Prof. David Li stated that Xiangqi was invented about 200 B.C., but in the first section of his book, in which he described this invention, he adduced not a single source of any type.

'Just because European scholars had no access to Chinese documents but did with Indian archives, that does not mean it can be assumed that the first game was from India. It seems since China was not a part of the British empire, then its archives can be ignored and only regions of the world which are a part of Britain's sphere of influence can be deemed as inventing anything.' Britain was heavily involved in China in the nineteenth century, and quite influential, and British savants could probably have gotten access to Chinese documents. We are aware that China invented many things, including gunpowder and rockets.

'How come no Westerner or scientist has noticed the similarities between Weiqi and Xiangqi?' I don't know about Weiqi, but Gerhard Josten, of the Initiative Group Koenigstein, argued in his essay 'Chess--A Living Fossil' that the ancient Chinese pastime of Liubo was one of the ingredients that went into chaturanga.

'Also if one assumes it went from India to China, it is unlikely that pieces would become more restricted. This is a misnomer.' A misnomer is an inaccurate name. Probably 'This is a fallacy' was meant.

'So when the Chinese come forward with so called records, they are refuted by European chess historians as being inaccurate!' What records?

To John Ayer: Weiqi is the Chinese name for Go. The similarities are that players take turns and that there is no chance or hidden information involved.

There is also possibility that both of these games have been invented independently, or that they both took ideas from an earlier game (which might be a Chinese game). But I don't know these things, and I am not Chinese or Indian.

Please read that book yourself and not rely on just the wiki site. It's
very persuasive, but I cannot vouch for any of his so-called sources. Also,
his book does not talk just about the 2 B.C. thing, but others which are
not mentioned on the wiki site for the origin of chess. Wikipedia on the
chess games and their origin fit in line with the common Western thinking.

The Li book looks at the arguments of writers in the West and in general,
they say they can't really give good arguments for how it could have gone
from India to China, but they say that India was the first is not
refutable. i.e. basically using their authority to say they are right.

When other writers or scientists proclaim that might not be so because of
such and such reasons long before 7th century in India, the next writer
just says, well, then India did it before that whether we have reason to
believe so or not.

The reasons to believe Xiangqi was developed well before 7th century A.D.
are numerous and not just that little story during the civil war.

I'm not a chess historian, so I'm not the person to talk to.

The main point of my post was that it shouldn't be assumed that chess went
from India to China just for the sake of it because that's what seems to
be going on. We should consider the entire world and not what Europeans
want the world to be.

Also, it shouldn't be assumed that there were no elephants in China. Yes,
elephants are big in India as we all know, but one has to be pretty
knowledgable of Chinese history for thousands of years to make that kind of
statement.

I saw the posts on the Xiangqi page, and I don't agree with the 64 to 90
comment on the squares. That poster is basically saying that in order to
make the awkward moving pieces move right, the Chinese developed a 90 point
board from the 64 one. The boards are essentially the same, with the river
removed and played in the middle of the squares instead of on the
intersection points.

90 to 64 is reasonable and so it 64 to 90 depending on how you think about
it.

Since I have not examined the so-called documents, artifacts, and whatever
else you want to call evidence of chess being in China like 700 to 1000
years before India, I can only look at the earlier version of the Indian
game and as soon as I did that, it was obvious to me which game came from
which.

1) If the Indian game came first, they wouldn't put the kings on opposite
sides of each other. That looks like the configuration of the pieces was
borrowed from Xiangqi and they changed it later to make it symmetric. 

2) The counselor/queen piece is useless on the 64 square board and the
elephant/bishop is also. The other poster thinks these problems were fixed
in 2 ways. The Europeans made the pieces move more spaces, and the Chinese
built a different board that fit those pieces and added a palace.

Well, I can't say that that is definitely not what happened, but I don't
think that it is that reasonable that the Chinese built a different board
and added a palace to fit the awkward movement of those pieces.

The counselors and elephant pieces move like that because that is how
Xiangqi was originally designed. To protect the king that can't leave the
palace.

Taking awkward moving pieces to a new board is a rather difficult
transition.

The fact that those pieces move right in Xiangqi is because they were
probably designed that way to fit the board, and that's why they still fit
in the modern game.

Making pieces move better on the same board is a much more logical
development for a game. An elephant becomes a bishop. A counselor or
whatever they call it, becomes a queen.

Li's book mentions that chess pieces were found in Russia in the 2nd
century along a trade route. That's an archeological find. This results in
a writer proclaiming that no matter how old findings of whatever nature
are, the Indian invention automatically predates is because we said so.

That's 4 centuries before the so-called Indian invention, but Western
writers don't care to question their thinking nor is trying to learn
Chinese or at least consult with Chinese historians let alone other Asian
countries is a priority to them.

In fact one writer said that research in multiple languages is important
for this topic. But then he says that only sources from India should be
considered.

In fairness to some writers and scientists from the West on this matter,
Li's book also cites a few that don't think the Indian version came first
but the other way around and they cite pretty logical reasons which of
course just get shot down by the next guy writing an article or book.

But those thinkers are in the minority. But its the points they make that
count.

If you want to debate with someone who has done the research who can at
least read English and Chinese, read Li's book on Amazon.

I don't agree with everything in his book, but if there is any merit to a
lot of the points in it, it is highly unlikely that Indian version traveled
to China.

I live in Taiwan and travel to Hong Kong and mainland China sometimes. No
Chinese person who plays Xiangqi thinks the Western version influenced
their game through India via trade routes. Of course, they haven't done
the research, but this is not common thinking among the Chinese crowd with
any knowledge of Xiangqi and Western Chess.

From a cultural standpoint, most Chinese people would think the game
developed just before the Han dynasty was founded because of the names of
the armies on the board. Those are the 2 armies that battled it out before
the Han won out. Of course, they can be named that well after that civil
war was fought, but considering that Weiqi or Go was developed a few
centuries before that, it isn't much of a stretch for a Chinese person to
think Xiangqi was developed around that time.

But thanks for the tip on 'misnomer'. I won't forget that mistake.

I understand that there were elephants in China, too.

There are different kinds of symmetry. FIDE chess has reflective symmetry: symmetry with respect to a line, as I think of it. The crossover pattern has rotational symmetry: symmetry with respect to a point, as I think of it.

I don't recall about the names of the armies. That could be suggestive.

I live in America, and it is no matter to me whether chess originated in India, China, Bactria, Iran, or Albania. I am simply trying to make the best sense I can of fragmentary evidence.

I think that anytime we say that one thing came from another, the converse
also needs to be considered because there is usually another line of
thinking the person has not considered just like I would have never have
thought anyone would think that Xiangqi could have come from Chauturanga
because the pieces in that game just don't move right. Shatranj is just a
better version of that game, but I am mostly looking at things from a
common sense standpoint.

I don't know anything about how games in different places influencing each
other or any of that because it doesn't appear there is any definite way
of confirming that in history, but it's just logical to me that Xiangqi
developed after Weiqi in China and that the Chinese are strong in
boardgames.

To say that Xiangqi developed Tang dynasty which is quite late in history
seems like this was stated just to be after the 6th century 'invention'
in India.

From a Chinese point of view, if Weiqi developed 5xx B.C. or much earlier,
it is not much of a stretch to think Xiangqi developed a few hundred years
later.

Also, both games are played on intersection points and have similar tactics
with blocking pieces in so they can't flee.

It's easy for a Chinese person to believe that Xiangqi (without the
cannon) was developed around the Qin/Han dynasty. The pieces, the cultural
aspects, and the tactics seem to be from that period.

Whether we are overseas Chinese growing up in N. America or in Asia
somewhere, the Qin and Han dynasty period are very clear to us as far as
what was going on in China and what kind of warfare was used.

Xiangqi shows a civil war between 2 Chinese armies. Since Qin and Han
dynasty was all about civil war, we would think the game developed around
that time or a little after to represent what was going on at that time.

We would not think that just because several British/European thinkers
proclaimed that India was the origin in the 7th century or so and we wanted
to be some 800 years earlier to be superior.

We would think that Qiangqi was from Han/Qin,  independently of what the
Western world would think.

So to us, its not even a debate. We are not proclaiming that the
Indian/Persian versions were influenced by Xiangqi for sure, we just think
Xiangqi came from around that period of civil war.

If one says it was developed in the Tang dynasty, we would think it was
strange because the Tang dynasty was well organized and expansive. The Tang
dynasty was invading other regions of Asia and was not a period of civil
war. Or at least, that's what our impression of that period is. It's the
golden age of expansion and not Chinese fighting amongst Chinese as it
always is.

I know I gave a lot of reasons why I think the Indian version was developed
from Xiangqi, but my main point is that among a very large population of
Chinese people, if you were to ask them when Xiangqi most likely developed
whether it was an original invention or borrowed from India like Buddhism,
they would not say Tang dynasty. They would think Qin/Han dynasty. Problem
is, the Indian version only traces back to the 7th century, so there's a
discrepancy of 800 years or so implying that it might be the other way
around if the 2 are related.

I feel like this argument was really started by the West and Chinese people
are getting sensitive about it because we don't appreciate Westerners
assuming everything originated from there and nothing Chinese is really
Chinese. That may be true of nuclear and stealth technology, or a great
deal of technology developed from the 17th century and afterwards, but
China was technologically advanced up until the end of the Ming dynasty, so
we wouldn't automatically assume anything worth a grain of salt must have
come from the West before that period.

Plus, in regards to the issue at hand, China happens to be strong in board
games while India is strong in divinity and Chinese people acknowledge
that.

I haven't read through all of Li's book, but I think this issue is worth
delving further into on my own.

Of course, even if I found some kind of historical document that appears to
be dated like several hundred years before 600 A.D., that seems to be
referring to something like Xiangqi, I am sure that it would be
automatically refuted by the West because the exact word 'Chess' wasn't
written there. Of course, it wouldn't be. Chess is an English word, and
Chinese would just write 'qi', which means chess or a board game of some
sort, but that requires a translation into English and it isn't a precise
translation.

It seems that because there isn't a precise word in Chinese that means
'Chess' therefore, no document or historical etc., can be counted as
evidence because its a matter of semantics. If anything, the summary of
logic from the Western writers shows a definite bias towards Indian
documentation and not anywhere else.

If we want to say Int'l. or Western Chess is clearly derived from these
earlier Indian versions, that is fine with me, but it isn't necessary to
automatically proclaim that other forms of chess in other parts of the
world are all derived from that same version also.

I feel this debate that has been going on for centuries or whatever isn't
even totally necessary. Why can't we just look at how chess was developed
in different parts of the world instead of proclaiming that any one version
was the mother of them all?

That's like making comments on another country's history and culture and
making judgments for the sake of making a world claim on a board game in
another country as being the true one and all others are modified from it.

We should just leave Chinese history to the people who can read the
language and study it. There's no reason to tell another group of people
that they are 'incorrect' about their own estimations to when their board
game was developed.

If the Chinese don't make assertions about Indian history or any other
country or region's history, then why can't the same be done for the
Chinese or Han region too?

The 3 commenters are not mentioning yet 96 squares and 100 squares in pre-modern chesses.  John Ayer's revised genealogical timeline changes Courierspiel(96) as contributing to Modern Chess of 64 squares, rather than traditional thought of its being dead-end branch.  Is that only for the Bishop?  Then more importantly and maybe radically, Ayer's article posits I think something like 8 -> 10 -> 8 in the very early going, with Shatranj al-Kamil v.1 being the large size 100 10x10.

No one has suggested that Xiangqi was invented in China under the Tang Dynasty.

Yes, I am also aware that the Chinese developed printing with movable type, and that the idea likely reached Europe through a Chinese trade mission. Really, we are not enemies of China, and I wish you would stop imputing improper motives to us. The fact remains that the earliest definite reference to chess in China is later than the earliest definite references in India and Iran. You say you want to do further research on this subject. We will be delighted to hear what you find.

The study of chess, its origins and evolution, can be considered from many
angles. Let me offer an argument for the game of Chaturanga having
primacy:
http://www.goddesschess.com/chessays/Alex$20Kraaijeveld.pdf

Dr A Kraaijeveld has developed a phylogenetic approach to the origins and
relationships questions that uses internal evidence to set up a series of
evolutionary trees, each radiating from a different ancestor, to illuminate
the relationships among games. His findings strongly indicate Chaturanga is
much more likely the ancestor of all chess forms than any other game,
including proto-Xiangqi. 
Prof. Kraaijeveld has written 3 papers on various aspects of chess
phylogeny. SOmewhere, I hve an email with links. Should anyone be
interested, I'll try to find that email. The key paper [in my estimation]
however, is this one.

Have you guys looked at this site suggesting Egypt as an earlier place
where 'chess' like games have been played?

http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Timeline_of_chess

http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Origin_of_chess

I'm not insistent that Xiangqi is the first board game that has 'chess'
merits in the world myself, but am mostly annoyed that there is a Western
claim that the early Indian version is the first and only one and that all
others must have come from it when the reverse could easily be true.

I don't know the details about literary references in Chinese potentially
meaning different games and that was not my point about the gameplay
between Xiangqi and Chaturanga. I was saying that the pieces move in a very
similar fashion but they happen to fit the Xiangqi board naturally as if
that kind of movement was designed for a 9x10 board with a palace for the
king.

I think that is a very common sense observation of the counselor and
elephant. They fit in that game and they protect the king. Moving 1 space
for the counselor and 2 spaces for the elephant is all that is needed to
protect the king, but in the 8x8 board, the queen moving 1 space and the
elephant moving 2 spaces don't really seem to do anything defensively or
offensively, suggesting that those moves were not designed for that board
and set up. i.e. possibly taken from a different game.

Meanwhile, in most of the Western analysis of the game play differences,
the observation that there are stark similarities are there, but its
assumed that China copied India and therefore copied the West once again
because India is a part of the British empire. Of course those words are
not spoken directly, but the author's bias is clear.

If there were other board games representing war developed all over the
ancient world, then our discussion gets even more complicated, but I feel
that the Chaturanga vs. Xiangqi argument is really just head butting
between Western Europe and China.

That's why in the Li book you see the authors making very strange
statements like Chess pieces become better or more liberated moving West,
but become more constrained when moving East. That's not the only
explanation and its not necessarily even logical from a cultural
standpoint. I can't believe no one until now has noticed that 2 boards are
just the same thing with the river removed and the pieces being played
within the squares or on intersection points.

But anyone is entitled to their own opinion as far as which game influenced
the other. But I do think that reasons given by Western writers for how it
could have gone from India to China, don't seem logical to me from any
standpoint and that they never thought about it happening the other way
around which does in fact make sense to me from the standpoint that the
original game would have pieces that move better on its board.

Is that assumption too much to make? If you were developing a game, you
would make the pieces move with a sense of purpose.