On Mar 16, 1:50=A0pm, richardhut...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
> This is the Wikipedia entry:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seirawan_chess
>
> The configuration starts the same as in regular chess. =A0Whenever a
> piece in the back row vacates it spot and leave it open, the player
> has the option of entering a Capablanca piece (Knight-Rook or Knight-
> Bishop) onto the board into the space vacated. =A0The Knight-Rook
> (Elephant) and Knight-Bishop (Hawk) are two pieces that remain off the
> board and can only enter when this happens. =A0It is a double move like
> castling, and works like en-passant in that you get once chance with
> the original piece moving off to do that.
>
> I was curious if anyone here had seen it, and your thoughts.
>
> It had been going by Seirawan Chess, while Mr. Seirawan would like to
> credit Mr. Harper for the design also, as he worked on it. =A0I might
> propose Sharper Chess as a name that might credit both them (S from
> Seirawan combined with harper for Harper).
>
> I see a variant off this where players before starting, can decide
> whether to have a queen, elephant or hawk in the queen space to start.
>
> Any comments?
> - Rich
It's not quite clear how many hawks and/or elephants there may be on
the board. Is the limit just one of each? Saying "Whenever a piece in
the back row vacates it spot, the player has the option of entering a
Capablanca piece," makes it sound like as many as eight new pieces per
side could be introduced, which could leave only 16 unoccupied squares
on the board.
How did they hit on "elephant" and "hawk," I wonder? "Elephant" was
originally the name given to the piece that moves like today's bishop
in the acient (circa 600-700 CE) Indian game Chaturanga. Capablanca's
names were Marshall (R+N) and Chancellor (B+N). Later Chancellor was
given to the R+N piece, and the B+N named Archbishop. Capa first
proposed a 10x10 board, later changed to 10x8.
The idea of adding two such pieces goes back well before
Capablanca. British master Henry Edward Bird had made a similar
proposal back in the 1870s, and before him the Italian Pietro Carrera
in Il Giuoco degli Scacchi (1617). See D.B. Pritchard's "Encyclopedia
of Chess Variants" for more information.
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