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This page is written by the game's inventor, Florin Lupusoru.

HnefaChess

The Viking game Hnefatafl was famous in Europe until it was replaced by Chess. The goal of the game was for one King to escape from the centre of the board to the border, while the other King had to prevent it. It was a game of unequal armies and opposite strategies. 

Placing both Kings in the centre of the board, and forcing both of them to escape, while keeping both armies equal, was the idea of this game.  

Setup

The initial setup looks like this:. 

The initial setup is rotation symmetric rather than reflection symmetric, allowing the black King to take the place of the black Queen, and viceversa. 

The 28 green squares in the centre of the board are inaccessible for the game and cannot be jumped over. 

Pieces

Each player has a regular chess set of 16 pieces placed in the central 8x8 square. 

Each player has an additional set of pieces:

Both Horizontal and Vertical Pawns are omnidirectional Pawns. They move orthogonally (one square only) but capture diagonally.

Horizontal Pawns promote on the i file for white, and on the h file for black, inside the 8x8 chessboard.

Vertical Pawns promote on the 8th rank for black, and the 9th rank for white, inside the 8x8 chessboard.

Regular Pawns promote on the last rank inside the 8x8 chessboard. If a regular Pawn happens to exit sidewise the 8x8 chessboard through capturing, they will be allowed to make a diagonally forward move in order to unjam the gate they are into. If they happen to exit the gate outwards, they will allowed to promote on the same rank as in regular chess. 

Guards move one square orthogonally or diagonally in any direction like a non royal King.  . 

Rules

The central 8x8 chessboard has 4 gates. Each player controls two gates.

The objective of the game is for the Kings to reach one of the red squares in the corners of the 16x16 chessboard.

There is no castling. 

The Kings are still subject to check, but the player delivering checkmate will lose the game. 

Notes

In order to avoid confusion, Horizontal and Vertical Pawns are defined by the direction of their movement, not by the way they are placed on the board. 


This 'user submitted' page is a collaboration between the posting user and the Chess Variant Pages. Registered contributors to the Chess Variant Pages have the ability to post their own works, subject to review and editing by the Chess Variant Pages Editorial Staff.

By Florin Lupusoru.

Last revised by Florin Lupusoru.


Web page created: 2024-03-13. Web page last updated: 2024-03-22