• Eiri@lemmy.ca
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    4 months ago

    I’d never questioned it before now, but … How come the towers move? Who had that idea?

    The jesters moving diagonally because they’re whimsical I guess but the towers are quite odd.

    • Samsy@lemmy.ml
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      4 months ago

      Okay since nobody did a serious answer, here we go:

      tl;dr: its a translation/interpretation error.

      The first documented forms of chess are all “war machines” of their time the tower was a Charioteer.

      When chess hits Europe someone translated charioteer with tower. Idk why, maybe because the used figures looked like a tower.

      And a charioteer move on a battlefield would be a storming through everything in one direction.