Minotaur chess

I got this Minoan set quite a long time ago. My aim was to create a board for it, but good ideas for that never materialised, so the set remained in its box for some years. Recently, I thought that it would actually fit well on the mother-of-pearl board of my Egyptian set. And if I ever get a good idea for a custom-made board for it, there will be nothing stopping me doing so ...

For a Minoan chess set, there can only be one appropriate variant: Minotaur chess! Check the link for the backstory of this variant, as well as the full rules. A major difference with FIDE chess is that the non-moving queen is the target rather than the king.

One of the two bishops on each side, the one on the dark squares, can be placed on any of the remaining dark squares in front of the other pieces.

Even though capturing the queen is the aim for winning a game of Minotaur chess, and her powers are basically zero compared to the queen in FIDE chess, you still have to go through all the other pieces to get to her ...

Congo

Congo is a chess variant, invented in 1982 by Demian Freeling when he was just 7 years old. All the main pieces are (African) animals, each with different moves. The lion is the 'king', whose capture wins the game. More information on the moves of all the pieces, further rules, and more information is given here and here. The game is clearly and strongly influenced by Xiangqi: consider the river, the palaces and the 'flying general' rule. 

I decided to make my own version, using faux leather for the board, and small plastic animals for pieces (found two bags full of them on Amazon).

I still had quite some faux leather left from making the boards for my Klin Zha and Tablut sets; plenty for a Congo board. First, beige and tan leather squares were cut to size ...

... and then glued to the back of a sheet of black leather.

Board done!

Then the pieces. Congo's main pieces are African animals:

In front of the main pieces in the starting array in Congo is a row of pawns, but I decided to take the 'animal theme' one step further and to have the pawns also represented by animals. Not African, but Australian; plenty more animals in the bags I bought!

So here's the full set-up on the board:

Quite pleased with it!

Nigerian thorn carving set

I regularly post pictures of made or acquired chess sets, often with links to this blog, on my Facebook page. A friend of mine from the kite-flying community must have seen those, because he contacted me to ask if I was interested in a wee chess set, hand-made by someone in Nigeria. He wasn't using it, it was just collecting dust, so ...

Obviously I said "yes"!

The board is made of wood, and the pieces are carved from the thorns of a particular tree:

Thorn carving is a traditional Nigerian art form, and the material the thorns are made of is soft enough to lend itself to being carved. 

Two colours of thorn material, light brown and dark brown are used for the pieces.

I really should mention the name of the guy who made the set (or at least the name that was on the back of the board): Lawrence Ajibula.

Muppets set

The latest in my subcollection of 'fictional' chess sets: The Muppets!

The set features many of the key characters from the show: Rizzo the Rat acts as pawns, Statler and Waldorf as rooks, Animal and The Great Gonzo as knights, Fozzie the Bear and the Swedish Chef as bishops, and, of course, Miss Piggy as queen and Kermit as king. 

Really glad I managed to find it on eBay, as I'd been looking for it for ages!

Glass and gold xiangqi set

I've seen this xiangqi set on the internet with widely-varying asking prices, some well over £100. Now what you ask and what you get are two very different things of course, but it did look like a really nice set. A price of £100 was way above what I was willing to pay, but when I saw one on eBay with a very reasonable buy-it-now price ....

The board folds open to show a gold-coloured metal playing surface, with storage space for the glass pieces.

Once the pieces are placed on the board, the whole does really look nice.

Luxury set in my collection, for sure!

Art Deco set

Saw this Art Deco porcelain set on eBay, for very little. And it really mean very little. The reason given for the low 'buy-it-now' price was that some of the pieces were 'damaged'. But all pieces were present, and the pictures on the listing showed very little damage, so I took the punt ....

The set fits nicely on my 'Kasparov' board, which I also used for my replica ANRI Space Age set. And as to damage, one rook and one knight have indeed suffered damage and were repaired. The repairs are clearly visible if you look closely, but it really doesn't detract from the set as it is, so my punt paid off!

I have no idea as the provenance or age of this set, so if anyone reading this can enlighten me ...

Four xiangqi sets on a bamboo board

Some time ago, I bought a bamboo board which had the lines for go on one side, and for xiangqi on the other. 

The 'go side' has already been used for Alea Evangelii, but, clearly, the 'xiangqi side' had to be used as well!

Over time, I collected four different xiangqi sets that, in my opinion, work well on the bamboo board. First one is a wooden set which I got from Masters Traditional Games. Set comes in a nice box, and consists of good quality wooden discs.

Second set I got off eBay, and is made of honey onyx. 

The third set is made of acrylic, and I got it from Amazon; again, the set comes in a nice box

And then the final of the four sets, also off eBay, made from porcelain, and coming in a 'wire cage box'.

Four nice additions to my collection of xiangqi sets, and I have no doubt there will be more sets in the future that fit well on the bamboo board.