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hey john you don't have an exact quote from murray about this verse do you?
i'll post soon what i have concluded about this verse too, there's a couple of questions i have also about it.

yeah it does seem strange after a pretty detailed description of the game no info on pieces is given.
Pachisi doesn't sit too well either does it, because of the dice maybe? 
i looked on wiki about that game and it says it is played with 'shell' thingies for dice, and you use 6 or 7 of them to roll or each roll?
i'm guessing though you could play with dice?

Hey, i've noticed something about this mahabharata verse, and i don't think we have been looking at it in the right context. I'll tell you why.

First of all, to understand exactly what Yudhishthira is saying in this verse, you have to know what is going on in his life at this time. He and his brothers have just spent 12 years in exile and have one more year to go, but if they are detected in this final year, they must spend another 13 years in exile. So they plan to spend the final year in disguise, living in the city of Virata. So now, each brother speaks, telling the others ....

1. how they are going to disguise themselves
2. how they will spend their time in this disguise and go undetected till the year ends.

With this in mind, let's look at what Yudhishthira says. Sentences 1 and 2 ...

(1). Yudhishthira replied, 'Ye sons of the Kuru race, ye bulls among men, hear what I shall do on appearing before king Virata.  (2). Presenting myself as a Brahmana, Kanka by name, skilled in dice and fond of play, I shall become a courtier of that high-souled king. 

ok, this is clear, Yudhishthira tells his brothers how he plans to disguise himself as a pro-gamer, so to speak. Now sentences 3 and 4.

(3). And moving upon boards beautiful pieces made of ivory, of blue and 
yellow and red and white hue, by throws of black and red dice. (4). I shall entertain the king with his courtiers and friends. 

Now the 3rd sentence here is the one we are always told Yudhisthira describes a game, however, this is not true, Yudhisthira is actually describing HIMSELF PLAYING A GAME. He is telling his brothers how he will be passing his days in the king's court playing games. It is one thing to describe a game, but it is another thing to describe yourself playing a game, they are two different things. And look at the 4th sentence, it follows on from the 3rd, it shows the outcome of his playing games, he shall entertain the king.

In the 5th and 6th sentences, Yudhisthira then says how he will be undetected.

(5) And while I shall continue to thus delight the king, nobody will succeed in discovering me. (6) And should the monarch ask me, I shall say, 'Formerly I was the bosom friend of Yudhishthira.' 

And look at the last sentence ....

(7) I tell you that it is thus that I shall pass my days (in the city of Virata).

He finishes telling them 'it is thus that i shall pass my days ..'.

When you understand he is describing himself playing a game, rather than the game itself, it isn't such a big deal he has used the word 'board' instead of a more specific term. How many of us today use the word 'board' instead of 'chessboard', and as far as not describing the piece movements, what is the point?  If we ask these questions, 'why not board specific word' and 'why not describe piece movements', i think we are clearly not understanding what Yudhisthira is telling his brothers.

If you read the Mahabharata after Yudhisthira finishes, all his other brothers speak, telling how they will disguise themselves and how they pass their days in this disguise. Also, looking at the 3rd sentence of Yudhisthira, note his words 'And moving upon boards' and 'by throws of black and red dice'. He is painting a picture of himself playing the game. You will note in this sentence, he describes what the pieces are made of, the colors of the pieces, even the color of the dice, all the visuals.

Also i think it is interesting he says 'beautiful pieces', though you can conclude nothing from it. It is more easily imaginable this describes chess-like pieces rather than Pachisi pieces, though as i said, this proves nothing. Oh, one more thing, i think there is also no doubt Yudhisthira's brothers knew very well the game he was talking about playing.

So i think i have to go back to what i originally thought, this game could be a pachisi type game or it could be chaturaji.

The addition of cannons has really nothing to do with the discussion
between whether the original game is from Persia, India, or China. It's a
well known fact that the cannon was added in the Song dynasty which is a
few hundred years after chess appeared in India. By that time there was
already 8x8 in Persia and India, and 9x10 in China and/or Korea, so the
cannons don't really address which one came first or which one came from
which.

It is a fact that Xiangqi finished its development in the Song dynasty
which is at least 500 years before 8x8 finished its development in Europe,
so in the case of chess, the development of Xiangqi finished earlier, so
development of these 2 games was faster in China.

Regarding the 2 boards, it's possible to develop either from each other,
but my main point from the beginning has always been the apparently out of
place counselor in 8x8 chess. It moves 1 space diagonally and seems out of
place. The counselor in Xiangqi has a specific role to defend either the
side or the front of the general. In Xiangqi's original setup, the
counselor or scholar was behind the general (which was in the center of the
palace like in Janggi).

My point has always been the original pieces of both games are designed for
the 9x10 board and are out of place on the 8x8 board with no palace
suggesting that 8x8 is from 9x10 and not the other way around.

If you look at the Grand Chess page, the guy who designed the game writes
about how the original 8x8 pieces don't seem to fit the board, so the long
range bishop was developed, and the counselor or queen was improved to
combine the powers of a bishop and rook.

So its not as simple an issue of whether an 8x8 board is more intuitive or
a 9x10 intersection board. We also need to look at the earliest known
version of Xiangqi with just 1 counselor and 1 minister and the earliest
known version of 8x8 chess in India which already had 2 ministers
(elephants) with the back row filled out with pieces. The earliest known
version of Xiangqi has less pieces (12 per side) than 8x8 chess in India
(16 per side). Less pieces suggest an earlier game.

I've been talking to people with some knowledge of Xiangqi in Taiwan and
there does not appear to be any definitive description of the game detailed
enough in literature to confirm its origins before chess in India or Persia
as far as I know. There are references towards people playing some sort of
qi (chess game), but that could mean any kind of board game involving
pieces.

It is believed that the game is from the Spring and Autumn period and is
around 2,000 years old and did not finish its development until the Song
dynasty. Please remember, that this is just the general Chinese belief of
their own game and was not created to dispute the European theory that
Chess is from India in the 6th century. It is an internal Chinese opinion.
I'm not saying it is necessarily correct, but I am saying that this is a
general belief because many things were invented at that time and the game
is not believed to have a foreign origin.

Another interesting thing I heard is that the xiang in Xiangqi does not
mean elephant. It is from the word qi xiang. I mean the 2 characters put
together that mean weather. qi as in air. xiang as in image. qi xiang can
mean weather as in weather report, and other words related to the weather,
but qi xiang means 'atmosphere' or 'mood' in regards to the game.

If this is correct, it is totally not correct to say that Xiangqi is the
elephant's game and that the elephant was imported from India.

If you know Chinese, it's very believable that there are a number of
interpretations possible for a single chinese characters, and the xiang
character that is used for elephant only means elephant when it is with the
character for 'large', or da xiang.

This is not evidence that Xiangqi was developed in the Spring and Autumn
period of course, but it does suggest that the origin or at least the name
of the game has nothing to do with elephants and therefore the original
version of 8x8 chess in India does not seem to have any direct influence on
Xiangqi, because the xiang piece which is written 2 different ways in a
Xiangqi set, does not mean elephant on either side. One side means zai
xiang or prime minister, and the other xiang could be from the name of the
game as it has the same sound as xiang from zai xiang.

In Chinese people's understanding of the minister, it is meant to be a
government official who stays in his own countryside and does not cross the
river to the other side. He moves exactly 2 spaces to show that he has a
high rank and can move swiftly about his own country as opposed to the
scholars who stay inside the palace only and can only move 1 space.

Therefore, for the purposes of our discussion here, the existence of an
elephant in Persian and Indian Chess should not be used a strong piece of
evidence that chess originated in India.

Anyway, I need to learn more, but so far, I have not seen much from the
history of Xiangqi that would suggest that it was derived from Indian or
Persian 8x8 chess.

@ Charles Gillman Have you seen the pre-cannon version of Xiangqi? It does
not resemble the earliest known version of 8x8 chess in India or Persia
which are basically the same. The earliest pre-cannon version of Xiangqi
has less pieces (12) per side with only 1 counselor and 1 minister on each
side with the general in the middle which does not resemble the first known
version of 8x8 chess anywhere.

It's assumed that the earliest known version of chess in India is the
first game and all games are derived from that, but why are there already
16 pieces in that game with 2 ministers/elephants? The game is more modern
looking than the first version of Xiangqi which suggests that it comes
after Xiangqi and not before.

If something looks older and has less pieces in its setup, it probably
predates a more modern looking formation, not the other way around.

The first version of 8x8 chess in Persia and India looks like a modern
version of Xiangqi with 2 minister and 2 counselors in it. The position of
the pieces is more similar. That suggests that the first version of 8x8
chess is derived from a more modern version of Xiangqi. That means 8x8 came
after the first known version of Xiangqi.

This assumption that the Chinese drastically changed a game that was
developed in India by moving to intersection points and putting in a
palace, river, and cannons goes against common sense if you look at the
timelines of the 2 games.

If Xiangqi's earliest known version had slow moving pieces like a 1 space
diagonal counselor (fers in 8x8 chess) and a 2 space moving minister
(elephant in 8x8 chess), then that means those pieces had to have come from
one game or the other originally. The fact that there was no improvement
needed for those 2 pieces in Xiangqi means that those pieces come from that
9x10 board to begin with.

That is not radical change. That means origin. If one is to argue that the
1 space moving counselor and 2 space moving minister came from 8x8 and were
moved to 9x10, then this a more hard pressed argument, because those pieces
never fit that game well to begin with which is why it took longer for
those pieces to evolve into the long range bishop and long range queen.

That is why Xiangqi's development ends around the year 800-900 A.D. and
Chess does not finish its development until 15th Century A.D. in Europe.

That means that those pieces were NOT developed for that 8x8 board no
matter how simple that board looks with the 64 squares. That means they
were borrowed from another game and needed to be altered to fit the new
board.

Therefore, based on the movement of the original chess pieces which had 1
or 2 counselors, and 1 minister with a 2nd being added later, the 9x10
board appears to pre-date the 8x8 board and it looks like the pieces on the
9x10 board were simply moved from the intersection points to the squares
and the river was not counted.

If you take out the river in Xiangqi and just count squares, you get 8x8.
Easy enough.

It would be harder for someone or a group of people to take the 8x8 board
and add a river in between as well as a palace.

Shogi which plays more like FIDE Chess or actually like Makruk, is
obviously a descendant of South East Asian Chess which is played in squares
on the 8x8 board, but the Japanese used a 9x9 square board instead. Shogi
finished its development in the 1600's.

Therefore, games that are based on another game, generally will finish its
development at a later date than its predecessor. This is not contrary to
common sense.

Xiangqi finished its development 500 years before 8x8 Chess in Europe, and
Shogi finished its development about 100 years after Chess in Europe.
Therefore, it is likely that 8x8 Chess comes from 9x10 Xiangqi, and 9x9
Shogi comes from 8x8 Chess or Makruk specifically.

Who's claiming that pre-Cannon Xiang Qi closely resembles Chaturanga? Perhaps there really is a Charles Gillman and for some reason I cannot see his comments! For myself I acknowledged that the differences were (a) considerable betwen Chaturanga and any kind of Xiang Qi; (b) considerable between Chaturanga and FIDE Chess; and (c) relatively slight between pre- and post-Cannon Xiang Qi. I simply added that it didn't follow that two considerable changes going west - Xiang Qi to Chaturanga to FIDE Chess - and a slight change in China were any more likely than one considerable change going west - Chaturanga to FIDE Chess - and one going east - Chaturanga to Xiang Qi.
	Saying that the General has 'only 1 counselor and 1 minister on each side' (perhaps that's where the rogue L came from) is puzzling, as that - on the basis that 1 of a piece each side of the General means 2 of that piece in the entire army - is what Xiang Qi still has and therefore there is nothing for it to be 'only' compared to. Or are you saying that there was only one short-range piece on each side, a one-step one on one and a two-step one on the other? If so, this is not a game that appears widely known of based on previous comments.
	I would not say that Chaturanga looks more 'modern' than any kind of Xiang Qi, only that it looks simpler. Why should 8 more pieces (4 aside) be any greater a sign of a more recent game than 26 more positions for them to occupy?
	The first 8x8 game certainly did not have '2 minister and 2 counselors'. It did have two Elephants - the Elephant=Minister pun was specific to China and did not work anywhere else - but there was one Counsellor with two Ls, not two with one each. That one 1-step piece does not fit 8 files as well as two fit 9 files does indeed mean that the latter case had 'no improvement needed', but it does not follow that the game not requiring improvement is the older one. It could equally be argued that the one not requiring improvement had already been improved a lot from some predecessor, and the one still needing improvement had not - and perhaps was that predecessor.
	The point about which change of board is more likely is, as far as I understand, unaffected by any known timeline. Are you saying that there was a time when Xiang Qi was known to exist and Chaturanga known not to? Otherwise what matters is which change seems more natural. Chaturanga's board with 8x8 squares or 9x9 corners had already been long in existence for the older game of Ashtapada. It is easy to imagine versions of this being made as two half-boards, each with 8x4 squares or, as a result of repeating one boundary, 9x5 corners. This is then easy to turn into the Xiang Qi board, complete with something that could be interpreted as the River. It seems far less likely that the River would be invented spontaneously and the Indians then 'take out the river', deliberately or accidentally.
	Your conclusion that 'games that are based on another game, generally will finish its development at a later date than its predecessor' sheds no light on anything. Chess with modern long-range Queens and Bishops was already only 'based on' an 8x8 game that had been in existence for many centuries, regardless of what that earlier game was in turn based on.

The initial known version of Xiangqi has one minister in front of the
general at the top of the palace and one counselor or scholar behind the
general where the general is located at the start of the game in the modern
version of Xiangqi. I also pointed out that Janggi has the general in the
middle of the palace like in the initial version of Xiangqi which suggests
that having the general or king there is the actual initial placement of
the general/king. Please refer to David Li's book for the diagram for the
initial look of Xiangqi. I am not endorsing the story he tells in his book.
Just pointing out the diagram in the book.

Take the middle column of the palace in Xiangqi, and put the counselor on
the first rank, the general on the 2nd rank, and the minister on the 3rd
rank. That was the original setup. That plus 5 pawns or foot soldiers in
the initial positions and a chariot and horse in the corners of the board.
There were no other pieces on the back rank. Therefore, out of 9 possible
points on the back rank, only 5 of them were occupied.

My point is that the initial version of Xiangqi which I have just described
does NOT look like it is developed from Chaturanga because it has less
pieces and looks less developed with the back rank unfilled. A game with
its back rank filled to begin with is more developed and is probably
developed at a later date, if we assume that Chaturanga and Xiangqi are
related games with similar pieces on different boards.

Once again, a game that has 16 pieces in it to start with is probably more
modern than a game with 12 pieces that eventually became 16 a side also. In
Xiangqi's development, the 2nd counselor and 2nd minister were only added
after a period of time and perhaps at the time the cannons were added. In
Chaturanga, or Persian Chess, or any version of 8x8 chess, all have 2
ministers/bishops to start with suggesting that they appear later in the
timeline of chess. They never had more than one counselor or fers because
there is only 8 spaces on the back rank of an 8x8 board.

I didn't say the first 8x8 game had 2 counselors, but it did have 2
elephants/ministers in it which Xiangqi initially did not have.

How do you argue that a game where the pieces need development is the
earlier one and a game where the pieces do not need to be changed is a
later one? The chances of that are against game design common sense.

If the 1 step moving counselor and 2 step moving minister do not need to be
improved in Xiangqi, that means that those pieces were designed for that
board. If the original chess was from 8x8, why would anyone put those
pieces there? They don't seem to fit. It's more likely that they came
from another game and the game stayed that way for centuries because of
tradition, but the game was not a fully developed game.

You say it can be argued that a game not requiring improvement of the
movement of the pieces could have been improved from a predecessor. Where
is it then? They cannot find a version of Xiangqi earlier than the one I
have just described, and a one step moving counselor seems pretty basic to
me  as well as a 2 step moving minister. Both are about as simple as pieces
as I can think of. What could have preceded a 1 step diagonal moving
counselor? A non-moving counselor that just sits there and cannot move? If
we assume that chess pieces have always been able to move at least 1 space,
there is no piece that could have preceded a 1 step moving piece.

I am not saying that your argument cannot be true. I am just saying that it
is unlikely that the counselor and minister had any kind of movement to it
that could have been different. Only the placement of those pieces and the
number of them changed over time according to the information we have about
Xiangqi's development.

Once again, if we assume that chess games have a common origin, the
earliest known movement of the pieces would probably fit the board its been
placed on. Chaturanga and Xiangqi have similar moving pieces and 2 of them
fit in Xiangqi and do not fit in Chaturanga. That means that those 2 pieces
suggest that they were from Xiangqi and not Chaturanga.

Isn't it common sense that a civilization or person developing a game,
would design movement for pieces that fit the board they are being played
on? No one would do something illogical unless there was a matter of
tradition involved.

As in 8x8 Chess was played with a 2 space diagonal jumping bishop in Europe
for several centuries until the long range bishop was finally accepted as
the standard piece. Russia played with the 2 space moving bishop and the 1
space moving fers for about 2 centuries while Western Europe moved to the
long range bishop and long range queen in the late 15th century. This was
due to tradition that they did not want to break in Russia because chess
had already been played like that for centuries.

There's more than one way for the river to be added and the river to be
taken out. I am not insisting it happened one way or the other. It is quite
easy to look at a 9x10 intersection board with the river in it and just
play within the squares. Any trader traveling between China and Persia can
do that spontaneously and essentially create a different but related game.
It's harder to take the 8x8 board and add the river because that would
take more thinking. My argument is that there is precisely an 8x8 board of
square within a 9x10 intersection board because the river has no lines
going through it so if you count only squares on a 9x10 intersection board,
you get 64.

I am saying that in the timeline of Xiangqi within Chinese historical
circles who do not look at Western sources, there is no one who believes
that Xiangqi was developed during the Tang dynasty which is what the 6-8th
century was in China. Although the specific timeline is not agreed upon
among Chinese scholars, the Spring and Autumn period is the most agreed
upon period of time that Xiangqi was originally developed. One of the
reasons was because the pieces and the palace concept is from the Spring
and Autumn period and the Warring States period. That is 5th-2nd century
B.C. That means Xiangqi's believed timeline among Chinese historians who
study Xiangqi's history or supposed history, believe the game was first
developed around 700-1000 years before Tang dynasty.

This conclusion was not made to counter Western arguments that all forms of
chess were developed from Chaturanga in 6th century A.D. It was made
internally and with no intention of starting a war of words between the
East and West.

I do agree that the 8x8 Chess can be linked back to 6th century India or
2nd century Persia, but there is no reason either from game design
development or anything in history to suggest that Xiangqi is borrowed from
a different game. What we do know is that similar games with similar moving
pieces and slightly different boards popped up in India, Persia, and China
by the 6th century. Which game came from which is a matter of opinion as we
don't have any hard evidence of it going one way or the other.

Therefore, it shouldn't be some hard fact that chess comes from India 6th
century because similar games already appeared in Persia and China 400
years or more before chess is known to have appeared in India.

What do you mean that my argument that games finishing their development at
different points means nothing? We know when the long range bishop and long
range queen were agreed upon to be in the 8x8 game. Late 15th century in
Europe. This is not in dispute. The bishop was taken from the Courier in
Courier Chess in Germany which comes from 13th century approximately.

So what do you mean, in existence for centuries? That seems kind of
generalized.

I am only stating 2 accepted dates of the final development of modern 8x8
Chess in Europe and 9x10 Xiangqi in China.

8x8 Chess in Europe was late 15th century, and Xiangqi was Song dynasty in
China which is about 500 years or more before late 15th century. That
suggests, but does not prove that Xiangqi is an earlier game because it
finished its development much earlier than Chess and did not need to change
the movements of any of its pieces. In fact all Xiangqi did was add the 2
cannons and an extra counselor and minister to finish the game. That was an
easier development than Chess which required more changes.

Not just to the bishop and and queen, but 2 space moving pawns, en passant,
and castling. Moves like castling and en passant, and 2 space moving pawns
are definitely more modern concepts in Chess than anything in Xiangqi which
plays very much more like an archaic game.

Please be more specific when you say that the bishop and queen in their
modern form had already been around for centuries. From which point? If we
go back to the earliest known long range diagonal moving piece in Europe,
it was in Courier Chess played on a 12x8 board which also had the 2 space
moving minister in it also. All of this took place after Xiangqi was
finished in its development. This suggests but does not prove that Xiangqi
has an earlier start date because less work was needed to finish the game.
To believe the opposite is more likely is saying that a game that takes
longer in its development process and needs really special rules like en
passant and castling precedes a game that did not require much change 500
years beforehand.

It's not impossible, but it's unlikely. That's why I think it's silly
that the Western world says with absolute authority that chess comes from
India without a second thought to it and that China and Japan just copied
it. That seems like a bully kind of mentality and not a commitment to
actually studying what most likely happened in history.

I think it is adequately established that both the ashtapada and the Chinese chess board were taken from previous uses, so trying to derive either from the other is pointless.

You say that 'the Spring and Autumn period is the most agreed upon period of time that Xiangqi was originally developed. One of the reasons was because the pieces and the palace concept is from the Spring and Autumn period and the Warring States period. That is 5th-2nd century B.C. That means Xiangqi's believed timeline among Chinese historians who study Xiangqi's history or supposed history, believe the game was first developed around 700-1000 years before Tang dynasty.' This is new to me. Please explain how the pieces and the palace concept are specific to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period.

More later.

Jason L.:

'Take the middle column of the palace in Xiangqi, and put the counselor on the first rank, the general on the 2nd rank, and the minister on the 3rd rank. That was the original setup. That plus 5 pawns or foot soldiers in the initial positions and a chariot and horse in the corners of the board. There were no other pieces on the back rank. Therefore, out of 9 possible points on the back rank, only 5 of them were occupied.'
	I was not aware of that. Nor have I seen any evidence from the comments that any other contributor was except you. That would certainly make a difference. If Xiang Qi used a pre-existing board it means that the board wasn't derived from the 8x8 one in the 'two half-boards' that so many here consider intuitive. It does not however mean that the reverse derivation happened either, as the 8x8 board too was a pre-existing one. It means that the half-boards misunderstanding never happened in either direction, and that the boards therefore have no bearing on which game came first.

'How do you argue that a game where the pieces need development is the earlier one and a game where the pieces do not need to be changed is a later one? The chances of that are against game design common sense.'
	Have you never seen an advertisement selling something as - 'new, improved!'? Think of FIDE Chess. Outside variant circles that is generally considered a game that does not need improvement. The reason is that is a product of improvements of something that did need improving. That how it works. Of course a game that needs improving is older than a game based on it but with improvements made. You are not arguining that because FIDE Chess does not need improvement for most players means that it too is older than Chaturanga, are you?

'You say it can be argued that a game not requiring improvement of the movement of the pieces could have been improved from a predecessor. Where is it then?'
	We all agree that the predecessor to Xiang Qi with Cannons was Xiang Qi without. As to what the predecessor to that was, most contributors here seem to say Chaturanga, and you yourself say this earlier middle-file-heavy Xiang Qi.

'Please be more specific when you say that the bishop and queen in their modern form had already been around for centuries.'
	That was not what I said. I was pointing out that those pieces were added to an 8x8 game without them that had, in the form of Chaturanga and Shatranj, existed for many centuries.

Lastly, Jason, you should stop claiming racial grievance and imputing improper motives to everyone else. We mongrels of the western world have explained repeatedly that we have nothing to gain or lose by whether chess originated in India, China, Egypt, or Antarctica. Nor is it true that we have announced a doctrine and then refused to reconsider. We have made an interpretation of the (alas! imperfect) evidence, but eagerly examine every new bit of evidence, and every new argument. This is why we consider everything you have to say, and keep asking for evidence.

To Charles G.: When I say 'finished in development', what I mean is that
the fact that 8x8 Chess could be improved at least 500 years after
Xiangqi's last improvement before it was 'finished', suggests that the
original 8x8 game comes after the original Xiangqi game. It's not full
proof, but generally if 2 games come from the same source, it should be
faster for the original game to finish its development first because there
should be less changes necessary.

And my point is that there were less changes needed to be made from
pre-cannon Xiangqi to cannon Xiangqi as opposed to 8x8 Chess with 1 space
moving counselor and 2 space moving minister and 1 space moving pawns and
no castling and obviously no en passant.

Chess' complexity is approximately the same as Xiangqi (state-space) and
Xiangqi would have been more complex than Chess before the bishop and queen
were made long range and the pawns 2 spaces. In Xiangqi, pawns only move 1
space, the 2 counselors only move 1 space in the palace, and the minister
still moves 2 spaces exactly. That means all they did was add an additional
minister, counselor and the 2 cannons in the only place they can fit on the
board. That's an easier development process than what happened with 8x8
Chess in Europe.

So if both games have those same moving pieces and they come from the same
game, then Xiangqi is more likely the first game because those pieces still
move the same on the board.

I'm not making a strong argument about which board comes from which. Just
that the in terms of game development, a game that does not need to change
the movements of its pieces is probably precedes another game with the same
pieces on a different board and different setup.

In order to say logically that the original moving pieces are borrowed from
8x8 Indian Chess in its first known form, the Chinese would have had to
take the one space moving counselor and 2 space moving minister and change
the board dimensions to make those pieces work properly. That is not
impossible, but it is less likely. Generally, a civilization would change
the movements of pieces and rules of the game when developing a game and
not the board.

When I say 'finished its development' I know it is a matter of opinion
what 'finished' means, but I am saying that the fact that the minister
and counselor needed improvements for 8x8 Chess to be as good as Xiangqi
with the cannons, suggests that the game came later and the movement of the
pieces are borrowed.

Logically speaking, if 8x8 Chess came first, the Indian/Persian
civilizations would have put in the long range bishop/minister to begin
with and not made a 1 space moving counselor which does not make much sense
next to the king. If the king can move to all of its 8 spaces around it,
why would you want to put a piece right next to it that can move 1 space
diagonal only? It seems out of place and not logical. And the minister or
bishop moving exactly 2 squares seems silly also because that piece can
only reach 25% of the squares on the board.

If Xiangqi came from 8x8 Persian/Indian Chess, then there would probably be
changes to the movements of the pieces and not the other way around to fit
the different 9x10 intersection board. Instead, we have the same moving
pieces on both games and they need to be changed on 8x8 and not 9x10.

The 1 space moving counselor in Xiangqi makes sense because the general or
emperor moves only 1 space orthogonal and therefore the counselor(s) moves
differently than it. The 2 compliment each other. In 8x8 Chess, the 2
pieces in the center do not compliment each other.

I am not pointing fingers at anyone on this board, but the general attitude
of most Western sources that say with authority that Chess comes from India
at a certain time without doing any research into how related chess games
were developed in other parts of Asia. That seems like the European world
wants their version of Chess to be the first one. The original one and
arguably the best.

I often read in places, that Shogi and Xiangqi are not as good and
appealing as Chess. It looks like bigotry to me or at least ethnocentric
thinking which all cultures are like to a  certain degree. However, I have
noticed that Asian cultures like Japan and China don't automatically say
that FIDE Chess is junk and should be disregarded because its just copied
from Xiangqi or Shogi. That kind of attitude is not as prevalent although
the Japanese and Chinese also have their own superiority issues.

You guys say that no one on this board has any stake in whether the game
comes from Persia, Afghan, India, China or any other place, but I think
there is something at stake. Maybe not necessarily with everyone on the
board here, but with the Western world in general.

Since the Western world plays the best and most commonly accepted form of
Chess on an 8x8 board with Staunton pieces, if it were to be said that the
birthplace of Chess comes from China and not India, it would in a way
damage the image of the game as being the original and best one. The
concept being sold is that India is the birthplace and Europe improved the
game to what it is today. If people start saying the Indian version is
borrowed from the Chinese version on a different board, then Chess loses
its mystique and 'credibility' almost.

If you love 8x8 Chess or any form of chess, you naturally do not want to
say it is just copied from another game because it hurts your pride as a
person who plays that game as well as to perhaps your culture too.

I talk to Westerners, Chinese, Korean, and Japanese people and none of them
want to say that their game was from another game. They all like saying
their game is original to their culture and they came up with it on their
own. Since we know for sure 8x8 Chess doesn't come from Europe, it has to
be linked to some where and India/Persia are the earliest known places the
game comes from which is fine.

What is not fine is to say that other related games are assumed to be
copied from the first known cases of 8x8 Chess. That's an assumption that
should not automatically be made because as in the case of the Chinese
civilization, the Western world is telling the Chinese world that they
cannot make certain conclusions or estimations based on their own history
without proper evidence.

I'm saying that its wrong for people to demand evidence from a
civilization that they have proof that their own game comes from their
region. If they want to say it comes from their region, that's their
business. You don't have to agree with it, but it seems that for Chinese
Xiangqi historians, they are automatically wrong to think Spring and Autumn
period or Warring States period without sufficient evidence.

I see what you mean that if the 'finished' version of one is later the 'original' is later too, but that pre-supposes that the two have no common 'original'. That would mean that pieces with similar moves in similar positions were created independently in India and China. Most contributors (apparently including yourself) consider this unlikely.

I have already acknowledged that FIDE Chess is a bigger change from Chaturanga than post-Cannon Xiang Qi is from pre-Cannon Xiang Qi, but I do not see it following that the game that needed more change had already been greatly changed from another game. Surely it is more likely that the game that needed less change was the one that had the most prior change.

To call Xiang Qi an improvement on Chaturanga is not to put down China compared to Europe, which also improved on Chaturanga. To call Chaturanga a worsening of Xiang Qi is to say that India cannot even improve a game, let alone create one from scratch. Why should anyone change a game to make it worse? Repositioning pieeces to 'make them work properly' seems far more likely than repositioning pieces that already work properly so that they do not.

A better argument for Chatruranga being derived from Xiang Qi is the Pawn, which does look like an improvement. I concede that this strengthens the case for Chaturanga being derived from Xiang Qi, as does your evidence of pre-pre-Cannon Xiang Qi. How did you find out about that game? On the other hand, does anyone know whether there was a pre-Pawn Chaturanga with a front rank more like Xiang Qi or Shogi? I have read discussions on the Rook having a precursor (the Dabbaba - and where would that come from in a Chinese-origin theory) but never the Pawn.

Jason, I never said that Chinese chess is derived from shatranj. I suggest that both are derived from Shatranj al-Kamil, V.1 (John Gollon's listing), which was played on a 10x10 board. My reasoning is at http://www.goddesschess.com/chessays/johnayer.html .

I think the names 'India' and 'China' are having an undue effect, making people think of the modern nation-states, which are rivals. Gerhard Josten, of the Initiative Group Koenigstein, postulates that proto-chess was invented in the Kushan Empire, fusing elements of Greek origin (from the game of poleis or petteia) brought by the Macedonian army with elements of Indian origin (taken from a race game) and elements of Chinese origin (from liubo). His essay is at http://www.mynetcologne.de/~nc-jostenge/ in a pdf. I would like to hear what you think of it. Myron J. Samsin, also of the IGK, argues for a somewhat earlier date in the same area http://www.schachquellen.de/15122.html .

I would also like to hear why you think that the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period are a particularly likely setting for the origin of chess.

Who says Xiangqi is 'finished'? (Or Chess, for that matter?) I think Asia rules for Xiangqi were proposed less than 50-years ago. And in the first half of the 20th century they still played Chess with a different initial setup (with someof the Pawns already advanced).

Aren't we trying to improve on Chess every day?

Asto the rest of the discussion: I don't think that moving back the Pawn rank with Pawns that don't have an initial double-push can count as an improvement...

Thanks for putting up the diagrams Charles. However, I am not sure about
the last form of Xiangqi before the cannons were added. It's possible the
2nd minister and 2nd counselor were only added along with the cannons, but
I really don't know. I don't know how long the heavy middle-file version
was played or how widely it was played. The 2nd counselor and 2nd minister
could have been added independently before the cannons were added.

I wasn't saying that pieces were brought to a new board and made worse on
purpose. I don't necessarily believe the Indian civilization did such a
thing. There is a theory proposed in Li's book (which is just a theory)
that the 8x8 square board comes from China and is a simplified version of
the 9x10 intersection board which is exactly 1/4 of a 19x19 full Go (Weiqi)
board. If you add up 10x9 4 times, you will get 19x19.

Therefore, if the 8x8 square board comes from China, then the same pieces
were used, but they did not work properly until they were fixed in Europe
several hundred years later.

Another possibility is that between China and Persia or China and India,
the pieces some how got moved over to the squares as a matter of cultural
preference and essentially a different but similar game was created by
playing on squares instead of intersection points.

Yes, I agree that it does not make sense to make a game worse, but I don't
know who or why someone would switch the same pieces to a slightly
different board.

All I do know is that its more logical for those original pieces to come
from a board where they fit. Also, we shouldn't view the prime minister
piece as an elephant because the whole concept of the prime minister not
being able to cross the river is more about the minister not leaving its
own countryside and not about an elephant not  being able to cross a
river.

I also have no idea how the placement of the pawns are different in each
game and most importantly, why the pawn in 8x8 Chess captures diagonally
instead of straight forward. For a pawn to be able to capture diagonally
and be a different movement is a more advanced concept than just pawns
capturing straight forward and then to the side later on after it crosses
the river.

I believe that a pawn that captures diagonally but moves by going forward
is a more modern concept than the Xiangqi pawn which is very straight
forward. It wouldn't conclude anything based on this, but would lean
towards the 8x8 pawn as being more of an evolution of chess and thus being
later in the development stage.

Anyway, I am making a simple game development observation. The 2 space
moving minister and the 1 space moving counselor seem to come from the
Xiangqi board and not the 8x8 Chaturanga or the other Shatranj. Whichever
board those pieces fit better, means they are more likely to have been
developed for that board.

The goal is to figure out which game likely came first, not to figure out
why someone or a civilization would move pieces to a slightly different
board so they wouldn't work right. There are a lot of explanations for
that, but to me that's a separate issue because I am not trying to figure
out how the migration actually happened.

Also, I think its highly unlikely that the Chinese could have gotten those
pieces from a game that wasn't working right and applied a board that made
those pieces fit right. Because, you've got to be a little lucky to do
that. It's not impossible, but it's not how a game development process
usually works.

If the 8x8 game came first, the pieces would fit it and when they were
moved to 9x10 intersection board, the movements would need to be changed in
order to fit that board.

It's strange to me to say that Xiangqi is an improvement of Chaturanga
because that does not necessarily mean that Xiangqi came after Chaturanga
just because its better. Chaturanga can come after Xiangqi and be the worse
game because the original pieces were moved over to an 8x8 board and
didn't work right anymore.

It's an assumption to say that the better game must be dated after the
worse game.

There's more than one explanation for why Xiangqi works better than the
original Chaturanga.

Therefore, I never looked at which game was better. I just looked at the
movements of the pieces and which board they seem to naturally fit.

Also, nothing else from the history of Xiangqi points to any sort of Indian
origin or borrowing from any foreign culture but looks inherently of
Chinese origin.

The 9x10 board can be derived from an already existing 19x19 Weiqi board.
There is no indication of a palace in Chaturanga or a concept of a
countryside and the prime minister needing to stay on its own side. These
are all Chinese concepts and the Xiang piece has nothing to do with an
elephant but just has the same sound of the word for elephant in Chinese.
Xiang Qi's Xiang means 'live atmosphere' or 'live pieces'. That is the
pieces are alive and can move around as opposed to static pieces in Weiqi.
Remember, I said that the xiang comes from the Chinese word Qi Xiang.
Elephant is Da Xiang.

I know that knowledge of the Chinese language is perhaps beyond the purpose
of this forum, but I think it should be pointed out because its critical to
understand that Xiangqi has nothing to do with elephants either in names or
the 2 space diagonal moving piece. It's a very big misunderstanding to
think that the elephant was borrowed from the Indian army.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaturanga

Another thing to point out about the original Chaturanga board. The
king/generals do not face each other. They are asymmetric. This could be
because of the rule in Xiangqi that the generals cannot face each other due
to their attack capability like a chariot(rook).

This suggests that Chaturanga's placement of pieces could have been
influenced by this rule in Xiangqi but was later abandoned in Shatranj.

I don't think there's sufficient evidence of the game going from anywhere
to anywhere, so I don't insist that Chaturanga comes from Xiangqi. I only
insist that if we assume the 2 games have a common origin, that the pieces
fit the Xiangqi board better. As far as how the migration could have
happened or where the 8x8 board really comes from, I'm not sure.

But to go back to the issue of what civilizations claim, I think that any
civilization has the right to claim their own game as having come from
within itself if it chooses to. As far as I know, I have not heard any
Chinese scholar claim that India or Persia copied the game from China. They
just say that Xiangqi comes from within China probably during the Spring
and Autumn period. That's it. They don't claim that India and/or Persia
copied it because there is nothing in literature or anything else that
suggests this.

Therefore, the Chinese scholars should have the right to make a claim about
their own history unless we are saying here that the Chinese don't have
that right. I am reading some writings by British authors in the late
1800's and they seem to indicate with strong authority that India is the
birthplace and that 'China' has admitted to getting the game from India.

How can anyone write that China or the Qing dynasty at that time has
'admitted' to getting the game from India?

If the earliest indication of 8x8 Chess is from Persia or India in the 6th
or 2nd century A.D., that's fine with me. I'm not insisting that the
board comes from China. That's not the point. The point is, if the Chinese
say their game is from a certain period of time in history, they should
have the right to do so. That's the only 'grievance' that I really have
because its kind of upsetting when its assumed that everything must be
copied from an original 'Western' source even though India was not a part
of the Western world in the 6th century.

Even the name 'Chess' suggests precisely that its the original one. For
people who grow up calling chess 'Chess' and may not be aware of Chinese
Chess or Japanese Chess, would naturally think that if the Western version
of the game is simply called 'Chess' and those others are called Chess
with Japanese or Chinese in front of it, then that means (Euro or Western)
Chess is the original or orthodox one. The most correct one instead of
being just another form of chess in the world.

I've seen an 11x10 version of Xiangqi and that version of Xiangqi
definitely comes during the Song dyansty when some experimentation of
Xiangqi was happening because they couldn't find a way to put the cannons
on the back row. There was an apparent attempt to expand the board from the
original 9x10 to 11x10 to fit the cannons, and it did not work. Finally,
the cannons were left floating 2 points ahead of the horse and left there.

So I appreciate the link you have, but I am pretty sure that 11x10 comes
much later.

If Murray uses the Song dynasty 11x10 as evidence that Xiangqi looks like
that and suggests that it comes from a 10x10 board, I am sorry, but he
didn't look hard enough. We all know that the original Xiangqi did not
have cannons, so why would he show that board as an 'early' version of
Xiangqi when he should have just said it was an 'a failed experiment'
during the Song dynasty?

It seems manipulative to show that 11x10 Xiangqi game as an earlier
predecessor. There is no indication that there is any board pre-dating the
9x10 board in Xiangqi.

I think the Weiqi theory makes perfect sense to me. You can cut up a 19x19
Weiqi board into 4 pieces and you will get four 9x10 boards.

I apologize about the comments about Westerners saying Chess is better than
Shogi and Xiangqi. I did not mean that this site endorses that kind of
thinking in any way. This site is certainly not about that kind of thing. I
was saying that this is a common perception in Western circles that Chess
is the best game and that Xiangqi has limited attacking power. Among my
Western friends, they seem to respect Shogi a bit more as a game.

But as an observation of the game play, while Xiangqi has no pawn structure
and therefore less positional complexity, and also has less attacking
pieces and no pawn promotion (queen), the draw rate in the game is still
lower than FIDE Chess which does not suggest inferiority. The game is more
checkmate oriented due to the small palace the general is confined to which
leads to more games ending in the middle game due to checkmate.

At the highest levels, Xiangqi masters draw about 20% less than GM's in
FIDE Chess, so the apparent lack of attacking material does not lead to
more draws in Xiangqi.

I'm not claiming either game is better than the other myself. I personally
prefer FIDE Chess because its what I grew up on. The games have different
kinds of complexities and I also correct the common Chinese belief that
Xiangqi is just way better designed and more complex than Chess because it
is certainly not the case in every regard.

'Therefore, if the 8x8 square board comes from China, then the same pieces were used, but they did not work properly until they were fixed in Europe several hundred years later.'
Who's saying that the 8x8 board came from China?
'Yes, I agree that it does not make sense to make a game worse, but I don't know who or why someone would switch the same pieces to a slightly different board.'
Well what's sauce for the Peking duck is sauce for the Bombay duck, as it were. If the Chinese wouldn't switch the same pieces to a slightly different board, why would the Indians?
'Also, we shouldn't view the prime minister piece as an elephant because the whole concept of the prime minister not being able to cross the river is more about the minister not leaving its own countryside and not about an elephant not being able to cross a river.'
Well this site's Xiang Qi page shows the Chinese characters for 'Elephant Game', not 'Minister Game'. Are these not the correct characters?
'Also, I think its highly unlikely that the Chinese could have gotten those pieces from a game that wasn't working right and applied a board that made those pieces fit right. Because, you've got to be a little lucky to do that. It's not impossible, but it's not how a game development process usually works.'
Lucky or skilful. They could have seen how well the Ferz and Elephant worked defensively on one side and experimented, switching from squares to intersections (on two half-boards) to get the symmetry that they desired. Perhaps they went through a stage with one aside of more pieces because they wanted to work wit the existing sets, and then decided to make ones specially deisngfed for their own game.
'The goal is to figure out which game likely came first, not to figure out why someone or a civilization would move pieces to a slightly different board so they wouldn't work right. There are a lot of explanations for that, but to me that's a separate issue because I am not trying to figure out how the migration actually happened.'
That's a pity, because finding out how might give a clue to who.
'There is no indication of a palace in Chaturanga or a concept of a countryside and the prime minister needing to stay on its own side.'
The Chinese could easily give two half-boards purely for ease of storage a game-play significance that it never had in India. That would give the River. The Palace or Fortress might be a later addition, perhaps influenced by the Xs at the corner squares of each 4x4 quarter of teh Chaturanga board but moved to fit Chinese culture. Are any of these features on the Wei Qi board?
'Xiang Qi's Xiang means 'live atmosphere' or 'live pieces'. That is the pieces are alive and can move around as opposed to static pieces in Weiqi. Remember, I said that the xiang comes from the Chinese word Qi Xiang. Elephant is Da Xiang.'
I refer the hon. gentleman to my previous point about this site's Xiang Qi page.
'Another thing to point out about the original Chaturanga board. The king/generals do not face each other. They are asymmetric.'
They also have Pawns in front of them, so facing would seem an irrelevance.

It's a possibility that the 8x8 chessboard comes from China or the pieces
were moved over to the squares in China, or they were moved over to the
squares some where between China and Persia or China and India. All of
these are possible.

What is not likely is the pieces from Persia/India were moved from the
squares to the intersection points some where between Persia/India to China
because the original Xiangqi design has less pieces than the 16 pieces
found in the first version of Indian or Persian Chess.

I was mistaken about the first known design of Xiangqi. The earliest one
appears to have no palace, no river, and no minister. It's the same design
as what Charles has posted, except with those changes.

If you look at that board, it looks even less like the first known version
of chess in India/Persia unless you believe the pieces were removed some
where between India/Persia to China. There's only 11 pieces per side in
Xiangqi originally as opposed to 16 in the original versions of Persian or
Indian chess.

A game with less pieces in its original design and one which does not even
have the 2 space moving minister, most likely predates a game with '2'
ministers. Xiangqi did not have 2 ministers until much later. At first it
had none, then one, then 2. That's a progression.

Indian and Persian versions start with 2. That suggests the 8x8 version
came later. Unless of course you believe that a progression of game design
includes removing pieces that were already there.

Another important thing to point out in the first version of Xiangqi, is
that the general or king is the character 'Han' . The same Han from Han
dynasty. Later version of Xiangqi had the generals changed to 'Shuai' or
'Jiang'. The character 'Han' is the same one you can see in Janggi.
That Janggi preserved the position of the general in the center of the
palace on the 2nd rank as well as the character used for the general, is a
strong indication that parts of Janggi are based on the earliest known
version of Xiangqi and then evolved as Xiangqi evolved, but the general
stayed on the 2nd rank.

This is often the case with Korean and Japanese culture. They seem to be
influenced by Han Chinese culture at certain points in history and
essentially preserve parts of it while Chinese culture moves on and forgets
what it was in the past. Therefore, Korean and Japanese culture are places
to look for hints of what Chinese culture was like at a certain point.

Regarding the elephant vs. minister confusion, with all due respect to this
site and every other form of research regarding the name and meaning of
Xiangqi, the Xiang means 'Alive, or atmosphere' as in the pieces move as
opposed to static pieces in Weiqi. If you think of Weiqi as being an
influence on Xiangqi, the pieces in that game are static while the pieces
in Xiangqi move around.

If you want to debate this issue, you will have to learn Chinese and go
into the literature of Xiangqi to dispute this. In Chinese, a character can
be used for different words. In the case of Xiangqi, 'qi xiang' means
'alive/atmosphere', and 'da xiang' means elephant. The xiang on one
side means prime minister and the other xiang takes after the name of the
game.

I've addressed that the main points I have written here are to try to
figure out which game likely came first. I don't claim to have all the
answers to how a game can migrate from place to place.

If we have what we believe to be reliable records that the earliest Xiangqi
does not resemble the earliest forms of chess in Persia and India, that is
good enough.

I'm also trying very hard to point out that there are some very big
misunderstandings as far as what the 'xiang' characters mean and the name
of the game. I am only sharing what I have learned from Chinese people who
know something about the history of Xiangqi and are unaware of the India
vs. China debate which originates from the West.

I'm a little confused by the reference to the Xiangqi site on this web
site chess variants.org. Are you saying that because this site says that
Xiangqi means 'elephant game', etc. that Chinese people don't know their
own language or history or not entitled to interpret their own history and
language without adhering to Western sources first?

This site claims that Chess comes from India first. Does that mean I am not
allowed to post any of these things here that suggest that it does not? So
because a site and a lot of other sources say Xiang in Xiangqi means
'Elephant Game', that I am not allowed to say that the Chinese Xiangqi
historians say it means 'Qi Xiang' and not 'Da Xiang'?

I didn't say the game means 'Minister's Chess' although if I wrote that
by accident at some point, I apologize. I mean that the chess pieces (red
side) means prime minister. The game uses the black side 'Xiang' which is
from 'Qi Xiang' (atmosphere, live) and not 'Da Xiang (elephant)'.

In short the game means moving and alive pieces as opposed to static stones
in Weiqi.

If that's the case, then there is no room for discussion or debate,
because it means that so-called established sources in English take
precedence over Chinese sources regarding Chinese history, language, and
the history of a board game.

Does this also mean that Chinese teachers must ask Westerners what the
meaning of their own language is before teaching Chinese to Westerners?

If you want to say it's more likely that the Chinese moved un-working
pieces to a different board so that they did work, I can't try to convince
you, but I think the evolution of board games is much more likely the other
way around.

When deciding how a chess piece moves, it has to be on a board with certain
dimensions. Therefore, it's a bit difficult to come up with the 2 space
moving minister on the 8x8 board, because it only reaches 25% of the
squares and doesn't reach any of the back rank squares at all.

The 2 space moving minister/elephant obviously didn't come from 8x8.

And I've also pointed out already, that the original Xiangqi design
didn't even have the minister in the game, so debating this point is
moot.

Regarding the facing each other thing, the fact that the kings do not face
each other in the original version, is another hint that they were reversed
essentially to prevent them from facing each other if the center pawns are
exchanged as they so often are with anyone who is familiar with playing
Chess. In the French Defense exchange variation, the e-file pawns get
exchanged and the kings face each other. Even in the original game where
pawns move 1 space only, the same thing can happen.

I'm not saying it's proof, but it's a possible reason for why the kings
do not face each other. There's other possible reasons of course.

Note that Xiangqi had no divergent pieces until the cannon was added, in the original version all pieces moved passively and captured in the same way. On the other hand, the Pawn in the various forms of early Indo-Persian Chess has been divergent since the earliest known times. If divergence is an evolutionary change, that suggests that Indo-Persian Chess is older that we currently think it is. On the other hand, it could be an import from some non-Chess Indo-Persian game, perhaps acquired from a Greek game at the time of Alexander the Great. This last factor does not apply at all to China.
Note that divergent Pawns are conspicuously absent from Xiangqi, Janggi, and Shogi, but do occur in various SE Asian variants, which have influences fom both China and India.

So I would propose the points:

1. Maybe both the Indo-Persian origin theory and the Chinese origin theory are wrong and two different but somewhat similar games were developed independently, perhaps with some mutual influence on one another.

2. My idea could easily be wrong (probably is).

3. So could anybody's idea be wrong, whether they think Chess originated in China, India, Atlantis, or Mars.

4. Documentary evidence is not definitive, nor is it likely to become so.

5. It ultimately doesn't matter, however interesting the question is.

6. It sure as hell isn't worth
   a. practicing racism, or
   b. accusing others of racism.

As I stated in my last post, the observation that Xiangqi has no divergent
pieces in it until the cannon does not apply because Xiangqi's earliest
known version had only 1 counselor and no minister. Later 1 minister was
added, and then another minister and another counselor were added. This
progression from 11 pieces to 14 to 16 where 8x8 chess always had 16 to
begin with and had the same moving pieces (not counting cannon) means that
Xiangqi predates and influenced 8x8 Chess.

The issue with the pawn in 8x8 Chess capturing differently than it moves
does not necessarily mean that the game is older than Xiangqi. That's like
saying a more modern game is older than we believe it to be because it has
more modern moving pieces instead of making the more obvious observation
that a more modern (pawn) is a later evolution of chess in general. If
there is a less modern version of the pawn in 8x8 chess, its predecessor
was obviously the pawn in Xiangqi which captures the same way it moves.

I don't know about any possible Greek influence, but the fact that the
position of the pieces and the movement of the pieces are the same in both
games on the back row, strongly suggests they have a common origin.

I also noted step by step how Xiangqi developed, and there is no apparent
influence from 8x8 chess, and 8x8 Chess looks like a more modern version of
Xiangqi.

It seems like I am using common sense logic, and I am being refuted with a
different kind of logic that I could not have come up with unless I saw the
responses to my posts here. It seems that there is no way I can state
something totally obvious to me here because it will always be looked at it
in a totally different way based on the assumption that 6th century A.D.
India Chess is first.

I am giving a great deal of detail, and it seems that I am getting back a
line of logic that is making my head spin.

It's like if I showed someone 2 cereal boxes. One looks like it is from
the 90's and the other clearly looks like it is from the 60's that are
similar to each other suggesting a common origin. I would say and most
would say that the box from the 60's is older, but I am hearing here that
the box from the 90's is actually older because of the advanced designs,
etc. suggesting a older origin.

It's like on this forum, things that seem newer and more modern are
actually older than something that seems more ancient because its evolution
process must be longer. Well, yes, a simple moving pawn moving straight
forward evolved into a pawn on the 2nd rank that captures differently than
it moves.

Why does a more modern pawn in 8x8 chess have to be from something other
than a simple moving pawn in Xiangqi? It seems like no matter what, some
form of logic not based on specific details must be stated in order not to
acknowledge something that is very obvious to me and others who do not have
a pre-set opinion regarding the matter as if it was their political
allegiance or something.

It's like saying that because Xiangqi has no queen in it, then it must be
the newer game because it has older moving pieces in it like the counselor
meaning that 8x8 Chess is an older game because it requires more change to
get where it needs to be.

That kind of thinking is prevalent here instead of the more obvious line of
logic that a 1 space moving counselor is probably from a game that requires
a 1 space moving counselor for the game to work right. i.e. Xiangqi and not
8x8 Chess. I know it survived in Makruk, but that piece is still out of
place to me and it's movement is essentially duplicated by the 'Silver
General' next to it.

I am not saying anything is for sure, but I am saying that from many points
of view, such and such is more likely than the opposite, and the initial
game design of Xiangqi strongly suggests that it has no influence from 8x8
Chess, but the opposite is true.