chess

English

Wikibooks

A chess game
A chessboard in initial configuration

Pronunciation

  • enPR: chĕs, IPA(key): /tʃɛs/
  • Audio (US)(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɛs

Etymology 1

From Old French eschés, plural of eschec, from Vulgar Latin *scaccus, from Arabic شَاه‎ (šāh, “king in chess”), from Persian شاه‎ (šāh, “shah, king”), from Middle Persian 𐭬𐭫𐭪𐭠‎ (šāh), from Old Persian 𐏋 (XŠ /xšāyaθiya/). See check.

Noun

chess (usually uncountable, plural chesses)

  1. A board game for two players with each beginning with sixteen chess pieces moving according to fixed rules across a chessboard with the objective to checkmate the opposing king.
Translations
See also
Chess pieces in English · chess pieces, chessmen (see also: chess) (layout · text)
♚ ♛ ♜ ♝ ♞ ♟
king queen castle, rook bishop knight pawn

Etymology 2

Origin uncertain; perhaps linked to Etymology 1, above, from the sense of being arranged in rows or lines.

Noun

chess (plural chesses)

  1. (now chiefly US) Any of several species of grass in the genus Bromus, generally considered weeds.
    • 2007, Michael Chabon, Gentlemen of the Road, Sceptre 2008, p. 59:
      Hobbled, loudly gourmandizing the dry chess grass, they were guarded by a pair of dismounted soldiers in long, dusty coats [...].

Etymology 3

Compare French chassis (“a framework of carpentry”).

Noun

chess (plural chesses)

  1. (military, chiefly in the plural) One of the platforms, consisting of two or more planks dowelled together, for the flooring of a temporary military bridge.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of Wilhelm to this entry?)
    • Farrow
      Each chess consists of three planks.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for chess in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.)

Anagrams

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