Dou Shou Qi set

Dou Shou Qi is a small Chinese board game which is known in the West under a range of different names: 'animal chess', 'jungle', fighting animal game' and various permutations. 

I picked up a small boxed Dou Shou Qi set years and years ago in a Chinese shop in Soho, London. I was looking for xiangqi sets and this little boxed game looked like a fun curiosity.

Each player has eight pieces, representing eight different animals. These animals all move one square forwards, backwards or sideways and capture by displacement, so they are not distinguished by different moves. Rather, the animals have a strict hierarchy where a 'higher' animal can capture a 'lower' animal, but not the other way around. The only exception to this is that the lowest animal (the mouse) can capture the highest animal (the elephant), "by crawling into its ear and eating its brain". The board also has two lakes in the centre (which limit the movement of some, but not all, animals) and two dens at either end, surrounded by traps (which limit the power of opposing pieces). The winner is the player who gets one of its animals into the opponent's den. For anyone interested, full details of the rules are given here. 

Even though the game is included in the Classified Encyclopedia of Chess Variants and listed on chessvariants.com, I never considered it a chess variant myself. Until quite recently, that is, and that's why I'm including it in my chess collection and this blog.

First of all, although the origin of this game is obscure, there is no doubt in my mind that it is derived from, or inspired by (where do you draw the line?) xiangqi. The lakes in the centre and the two dens at either end strongly resemble the river and palaces in xiangqi, and I find it difficult to imagine that both these traits appeared completely independently in a country where xiangqi is so popular and well-known. But that's where the similarity stops: dou shou qi doesn't have any rooks, horses, elephants (well, it does, but that's a very different beast, pun intended), guards, cannons or pawns. And the moves and hierarchical way of capturing is completely different from xiangqi. And it doesn't have a king, whose capture is the goal of the game. That absence of a single piece that needs capturing for a win 'disqualified' it as a chess variant for me, even though it has some xiangqi DNA in it. 

Recently, I realised that dou shou qi actually does have a king, but it's hidden. Hidden in plain view ... Let me explain. Compared to FIDE chess, the general (=king) in xiangqi is limited in its movements: it can only move within the 9-point palace and can't leave that palace. Now restrict that movement even further, to its maximum. You then end up with a king piece that can't move at all, and is restricted to sitting in a single square. As the king is now completely immobile, there is not much point in having that piece as a physical piece, because it can't do anything. So you might as well not bother with that immobile king piece .... That is essentially the situation in dou shou qi, as I see it, where the object of the game is to occupy the opponent's den (and while doing that, capture the now invisible king). 

I'm well aware these are my own ideas, and people may well disagree with my reasoning. But, for me, that lifts dou shou qi into the realms of true chess variants, and therefore a place in my collection and this blog.

Henry VIII set

If you regularly read posts in this blog, you know the story by now: "saw this on eBay for not very much ..." The 'this' in this case is a lead (or, more likely, lead alloy) Henry VIII chess set.

First thing I needed to do was add some felt bases to the pieces, as the nibs that remain after pouring the lead hadn't been filed away (and I wasn't keen on doing that myself). But was an easy job! 

I felt a nice matching board was the leather board I got some time ago. 

Of course, one issue still remained .... the pieces were not painted or coloured in any way, so it would be hard to distinguish between 'white' and 'black'. I didn't want to loose the 'lead' effect of the pieces, so decided to paint them only partially, focusing on their clothes. Mostly blue and white for one side, and mostly red and black for the other.

And I think that partial painting worked well!

In Henry VIII's time, chess was going through the evolution from the old medieval forms to the modern unified form. So I thought it would be appropriate to set up the board for the short assize version of medieval chess. 

Note the very unusual starting position of the queen (which was one of the weakest pieces on the board back then, as this was before the emergence of the powerful queen we know now), and especially that it shares the field with the e-pawn in the initial array ....

Fly-over xiangqi

Many people have thought of 4-player versions of Western chess, and it's no surprise this has also happened for xiangqi. One of these 4-player xiangqi versions is fly-over xiangqi, and I thought it would be fun to make a board for that. 

For pieces, I got two magnetic travel sets (you'll see soon why I needed the pieces to be magnetic). I left one set red and black, and painted the other set white and green.

For the board, the idea was to 'raise' the playing area of the board, and so emphasise the 'fly-over' aspect. So I got myself some plywood, a bag of nails, and some metal wire.

The nails were only hammered into the plywood a bit, and were to form the 'points' on which the pieces sit and move. See why I needed them to be magnetic? 

The plywood was then painted black, which had the effect of making the tops of the nail almost appear to float above the board.

And then I used the wire to connect the nails, thereby creating the lines along which the pieces could move from their home part of the board to the other three parts.

The nails heads and wires were then painted yellow, whereas the nail heads and wires in the four palaces painted red, black, green and white, respectively. 

So this is what the completed board looks like; the yellow-painted wire strengthens the illusion of the playing area 'floating'.

Final step, as always, is to add pieces to the board!

Star Wars Episode 1 set

There are several Star Wars chess sets on the market, and I already have one of these in the collection. Another one I was keen to add is an Episode 1 set. Now this set is listed on eBay quite regularly, but there often is one problem: one or more of the light sabres are often broken or missing. As I didn't want an incomplete set like that, it was a matter of just biding my time .....

And good things come to those who wait!

All light sabres present, and none broken!

The board is the usual cardboard fold-up board, and like in the other Star Wars set I have, a8/h1 are black.

On the dark side, we see Darth Sidious, Darth Maul, Nute Gunray, Rune Haako, and Destroyer and Battle Droids.

And on the light side, we have Qui-Gon Jinn, Queen Amidala, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, Jar Jar Binks and R2-D2.

And here's the proof, if you still need it, that all light sabres are present and accounted for!

Bone 'barleycorn' set

I've always felt that there was a bit of a gap in my small collection of vintage chess sets: a late 19th century bone 'barleycorn' set. But there's one problem with that ... They're listed on eBay regularly, but always go for prices I just can't justify .... Until I came across one listing which just said 'chess set in old box', without any mention that it was a bone set. The pictures clearly showed it to be a bone 'barleycorn' set. Very likely it flew under the radar of people specifically looking for bone chess sets, but their loss is my gain, and I got it for way less than what these sets normally go for.

The set was complete, and without any major damage to any of the pieces (apart from the wear and tear you'd expect from a set of that age). So here's my vintage bone 'barleycorn' set on a modern chess board!

I thought I'd also put it on the much more elaborate board that came with my Egyptian set, and it doesn't look bad on that board either.

So what do you think? Does it look better on the modern wooden board or on the more elaborate mother-of-pearl board?

Either way, I'm very pleased I now have a bone 'barleycorn' set in my collection. From doing a bit of research on the internet, I reckon this set may well be over a century old ...

Bone(?) and horn(?) set

This set was listed as Egyptian made and bought. The pieces surely are Egyptian style, and there is a sticker on the reverse of the board stating it was made in Egypt, and with a price (I presume) in Arabic numerals. 

The board is very intricate, inlaid with what looks like wood, metal, and mother-of pearl.

As I already said, the pieces are clearly Egyptian in style.

But what are the pieces made of?

There are colour variations in the material used for the black pieces, which strongly suggest they're made of (cow?) horn. And that made me wonder about the white pieces. Although they resemble plastic in the first instance, it certainly isn't cheap plastic. And with the black pieces most likely made of horn, wouldn't it make more sense for the white pieces to be made of bone? 

Have to find a way to make sure ...

Mystery metal set

Saw this elegant metal chess set on eBay, and won the bidding with a pretty low max bid. It didn't come with a board, but I felt the slate and metal board I used for my skull set would be a good fit.

The pieces are quite heavy, and I assume the 'white' pieces are made from a copper alloy of some sort; I don't know about the 'black' pieces. 

The heads of the knights are silver-coloured; it looks original, but I can't really say for sure. It does give them some more character, though.

I have posted pictures of this set on several chess collectors Facebook groups, but haven't received any response (so far) as to where and when this set might have been made ... So if anyone reading this has any information, please let me know.