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Chess Pieces

Chess pieces are the figurines used to represent different units in the game of chess. The sixteen pieces each player starts with include: eight pawns, two bishops, two knights, two rooks, one king, and one queen.  The pieces are typically either black or white and one player will play all the pieces of one color.

Here is a summary of the movement abilities of all the chess pieces: The king piece can move one space in any direction on the board. A rook may move as many spaces as he wishes to the left or right or forward or back. The bishop may move as many spaces as he wishes in any diagonal direction. A knight may move any three spaces in any direction so long as those movements create an L-shape (I.E. two spaces forward and one move left-or right.) On a pawn’s first turn he may move either one or two spaces forward but can only move forward one space at a time thereafter. Finally the queen, chess’s most important piece, has the ability to move as many spaces as she wishes in any direction backwards, forwards, left, right, or any diagonal direction.

Chess pieces can be ornate constructions or very minimalist ones. The Bauhaus Chess set featured simple geometric pieces whose design was mean to mirror the pieces movement abilities. So the knight became a simple wooden L, the rook became a plus sign, and the bishop became a cross. Other chess pieces are themed to represent a certain historical time period or fantasy theme. Some of these pieces can be very expensive and often incorporate precious gems and metals in their constructions.

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