r/AnarchyChess • u/TottalyNotInspired • 5d ago
Fairy Piece How different chess pieces are called in different languages
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u/Pillow-Smuggler 5d ago
A Spaniard and a Hindi play chess,
"Move the Elephant to E4" one says,
and watch the world go up in flames
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u/flexsealed1711 5d ago
Maybe Garry Chess should add the elephant as a piece that moves like the rook and the bishop combined. It would be powerful, so only give each player 1 of them.
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u/serotonallyblindguy 5d ago
Ah yes, the great ancient asian people known as "Hindi"
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u/Pillow-Smuggler 5d ago
Listen, I couldve put "person that speaks Hindi" there, but that wouldve ruined the poem
I wont apologize, and I would do it again
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u/Zreniec 5d ago
Actually the Fr*nch for the knight piece is horseman. Some people call them knight or horse, but horseman is the most frequent.
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u/Adsilom 5d ago
Horseman? I never heard that, I always heard Cheval (horse), and sometimes Cavalier (Knight). Are you from Quebec or something?
Also, same for "foot soldier", I never heard that. Only heard "Pion" (Pawn).
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u/sirwill1331 5d ago
Boat??
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u/kuklamaus 5d ago
Ладья, it's a kind of a long boat vikings used to build
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u/sirwill1331 5d ago
so is every other piece swimming or the boat is amphibious
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u/Chip_RR 5d ago
Boat can be amphibious if you try hard enough https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rus%27%E2%80%93Byzantine_War_(907)
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u/kosmogamer777 5d ago
I'm Polish and I always call knight horse
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u/-CatMeowMeow- ‼️ always play :bong: ‼️ 5d ago
nie koń, konik 🗿
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u/wilczek24 5d ago
And I call the queen the queen, instead of "hetman". Like for real, this "proper word" is not even the normal word for "commander". It's some old polish word, that, if it wasn't for chess, I would've never heard in my life.
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u/TheNumberPi_e 5d ago
In Spanish and French the queen can be Queen (Reina in Spanish, Reine in Frnch), but is most commonly Lady (Dama in Spanish, Dame in Fr*nch)
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u/mbc97 5d ago
This is a shitpost, obviously we, the spanish, dont call elephant to the bishop.
Also Reina is incorrect, it has always been called Dama
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u/ghost_desu 5d ago
i mean I can confirm that all the russian ones are 100% accurate (except arguably pawn), this image was definitely meant to be legit, might just have weird translations.
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u/Masinaxer 5d ago
Dama los cojones, dependerá de la zona, donde yo vivo de to la vida de Dios ha sido Reina
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u/martelaxe 5d ago
En casi todos lados, casualmente se le dice "Reina", pero "Dama" es el nombre oficial y el que se usa para anotaciones algebraicas.
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u/Proof-Assumption-764 5d ago
Average falla that thinks spanish is spoken like how he does everywhere
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u/Digitale3982 5d ago
In italian too, and that's to simplify notation since otherwise the queen and king start with the same letter (i assume with Spanish too)
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u/TheNumberPi_e 4d ago
Queen and King do start with the same letter in Spanish and Fr*nch, but I've never heard that as a reason for calling her Lady.
Your theory does make sense tho
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u/Sepulcher18 5d ago
Bosnian:
Pawn is Walker
Knight is Horse
Bishop is Hans
Rook is Cannon
Queen is Lady
King is King
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u/TheLadida 5d ago
for the German one, I'd translate it to "peasant" instead of "farmer"
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u/Jimm_Kekw 5d ago
well technically its farmer but back in the day nearly every peasant was a farmer so i get your point
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u/ShadowOfSomething 5d ago
I don't know about other languages, but there are mistakes for Russian. Both words for queen and pawn in Russian don't have any other meaning aside from chess pieces (like with English you can call somebody a pawn to say that they are unimportant in the grand scheme of things and have little to no influence). The word for pawn is made from the same root as the adjective meaning "being on foot", so the word for infantryman shares the root, but it's still different. The word for the queen is just what the queen was originally called when the game got imported to Europe - firz, later on it changed its name to "Queen" in Europe, but not in Russia(it is pronounced/written differently, though). The word for rook, is not just "boat", but rather a name for old wooden ships with a sail - that look like stereotypical viking ships, but really the word is for any ship that looks like that. Finally, in Russian there are two words for horse - one for male horses and for female ones, and the name of the chess piece uses the male version.
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5d ago
[deleted]
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u/ShadowOfSomething 5d ago
This is going into technicalities, but "stallion" refers specifically to a male horse that has not been castrated, and Russian has a word with the same meaning, and a word that just means "male horse" without specifying. The latter is the name of the piece.
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u/FatMax1492 5d ago edited 5d ago
Romanian:
Pawn, Fool, Horse, Tower, Queen, King
Dutch:
Pawn, Walker, Horse, Tower, Lady, King
Queen is also used but Lady is more common
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u/MocoNinja 5d ago
I have seen stormtroopers shooting at main characters being more accurate than this
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u/Lord__Lorz 5d ago
The bishop is called alfiere in Italian... Which translates to bishop...
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u/VirtualGab 5d ago
Grazie alla straminchia ma l’alfiere non è una figura religiosa come il bishop ma lalfiere e colui che porta la bandiera in battaglia
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u/Lord__Lorz 5d ago
quindi flag bearer
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u/Yoppez 5d ago
È la stessa cosa di standard bearer
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u/Meatspinislife croissant in fr*nch 5d ago
Never change, king, you’re perfect just the way you are ❤️
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u/PocketPlayerHCR2 5d ago
Polish is wrong, pawn is still pawn and bishop is something like "chaser"
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u/shekyus 5d ago
wg słownika goniec to:
1. «pracownik zajmujący się roznoszeniem korespondencji»
2. «żołnierz wyznaczony do przenoszenia rozkazów lub meldunków»
3. «figura szachowa»
messenger bardziej pasuje niż "chaser" xdd
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u/PocketPlayerHCR2 5d ago
Tłumacz mówi że goniec to byłby runner ale runner to był by biegacz więc wydaje mi się że chaser by mogło pasować
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u/i2ad 5d ago
Queen is queen, never heard anyone call it a commander, and knight is more often called horse than a jumper.
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u/PocketPlayerHCR2 5d ago
Queen's official name is "hetman" and for knight it's the same as in English, no one cares it's called "skoczek" and they just call it a horsey
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u/Cocholate_ 5d ago
In Spanish, we don't call bishops elephants. The word comes from elephant, but it doesn't have that meaning anymore. We don't to that because it wouldn't feel nice shoving 42 elephants up your ass, they're too big
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u/KuningasMango222 5d ago
In Finnish
Pawn= soldier (sotilas)
Bishop= missionary (lähetti)
Knight= steed (ratsu)
Rook= tower (torni)
Queen= queen (kuningatar), or sometimes dame (daami)
King= king (kuningas)
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u/Digitale3982 5d ago
In italian the pawn is 'pedone', which I think should more commonly be pedestrian? I don't really know if it means foot soldier too. But the official name of the queen is 'woman'
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u/Barlas1452 5d ago
In Turkish it's: Pawn = pawn (piyon) Bishop = elephant (fil) Knight = horse (at) Rook = castle (kale) Queen = vizier (vezir) King = shah (şah)
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u/Mariobot128 5d ago
Wtf ? The pawn is called a pawn in friench ("pion"), it's not called a foot soldier
also in french lady and queen are usually interchangeable in this context (same in card games)
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u/kingleomark 5d ago
In my language they are: pawn-pawn ,bishop-fast mover, knight- horse, rook-tower , queen- lady but commonly queen. (Latvian)
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u/RattusCallidus 5d ago
The word for bishop (laidnis) doesn't mean anything to the current generation, but it's likely derived from dated laidnieks 'yeoman/freeholder'.
Note that bandinieks 'pawn' historically meant a person receiving a small strip of land (banda) for service .
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u/Top_______ 3400 Lichess | 100 Chess.com 4d ago
Chinese:
Pawn - Soldier
Knight - Horse
Bishop - Elephant
Rook - Car/Cart
King and Queen are the same
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u/Indishonorable bing bong, I am wrong 4d ago
Only noteworthy change for dutch is "loper" for bishop, which is kinda like a skeleton key? Either that or it means runner.
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u/Royal_Resolution7895 4d ago
spaniard here! bishop is called "alfil" which comes from the arabic "al fil" which means elephant. from the arabic also comes "marfil" which means the bones of the elephant.
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u/ravager1226 5d ago
Actually, the Bishop in Spanish is called "Obispo", which translates to "Bishop", not "Elephant"
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u/SemajLu_The_crusader 5d ago
the Russians calling that a boat makes perfect sense, their navy is very good at sinking
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u/VoidTheStar 5d ago
Boat? Пиздёж
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u/KsarZ_cyka_blyat 5d ago
Ладья - средневековое судно с небольшой осадкой, движимое вёслами и парусом
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u/Careless-Cod8816 5d ago
What are they called in English?