Thursday 28th March: Orders being dispatched within 3 working days.

Medieval Chess Sets



The game of chess arrived in Europe around the ninth century as Arabs expanded into Spain. Traders would have bought carved ivory sets as gifts and merchandise. These sets would have been of Persian or Indian design. These would have been the early models on which European chess is based. They would have probably learned the game by watching it being played and then adapted it to their own European culture.

Chess appears in French tales such as the Arthurian legends. Noblemen and women were expected to be good chess players as were kings and queens.

Medieval Chess boards

Early medieval chessboards made of ivory and ebony were considered as worthy offerings for churches, however in some cases the churches discouraged chess playing regarding it as indolent. Such prohibitions may have prompted the development of the folding chessboard, which would look more like a book, thus having a more scholarly appeal. The medieval chess sets were also used as an ostentatious show of wealth, much in the same way as fine garments. Sometimes a medieval chess board would have been manufactured from leather.

In the thirteenth century an Italian Dominican friar, Jacobs de Cessolis had the brilliant idea of teaching moral behaviour through the game of chess. His book, called "Le jeux d'echecs moralise" (the moral game of chess) was written in Latin in beautiful illuminated manuscript. Cessolis used the relatively new but popular game of chess to describe an ideal society, using references to the Bible and classical literature to strengthen his argument.

Medieval Chess pieces

Medieval Themed Chess SetsThe role of each chess piece is carefully considered and it is shown how its relationships with the other players are supposed to work. For example, if the knight moves in front of the pawn it is because it is the knight's role and responsibility to protect the commoner. The commoner (pawn) in turn respects and serves the knight. The pawns represent a group of people such as doctors, innkeepers and apothecaries. Cessilis states that "Talents are distributed so that no one suffices by himself, but only has value in his relationship with others." Interestingly the medieval queen could only move one square diagonally, her superior powers were only conferred upon her in the fifteenth century. The king also was only allowed to advance to the first three rows of the board, his duty would have been to stay at home and guard the country.

No discussion about medieval chess sets would be complete without mention of the Lewis Chessmen; the most popular phenomenon to emerge from the medieval period has to be the Lewis chessmen. Carved mainly from walrus ivory, believed to have originated from Norway in the twelfth century, these pieces are little iconic statues of people created with such skill and humour that they are still able to charm people today. Most of these highly desirable objects now reside in the British Museum in London. Scholars have noted that the armour replicated on the pieces is a perfect reproduction of the armour worn in Norway at that period.

Content & Images Copyright © 2024 chesssets.co.uk Terms and Conditions