[MR] BBC: Lewis Chessmen (and Chesswomen) on Display

[Vels inn Viggladi]

> Says somthing about the game and the culture, that the Queen is so much smaller than the King.
> 
> Donal


Not so much, really. Around the time the Lewis Chessmen were made that piece was still referred to as a "General", "Heir", or "Counselor". The renaming of the piece to "Queen" came out of Spain during the same century. It was still another couple hundred years after that when the piece began to move in the way we are familiar (15th Century).

Around that time, it was the battlefield aide to the King, moving one square diagonally. If anything, it may say more the other way: given the popular examples of Eleanor of Aquitaine and Blanche of Castile, replacing a general with a powerful woman would be a very large step culturally.




Vels