The fact
The Persians’ own books say chess came to them from India. The Indian game chaturanga, named for the four limbs of an army, reached the court of Khosrow I in the 6th century and became shatranj.
The proof
- The Middle Persian Chatrang-namag tells how an Indian king sent the game to Khosrow I Anushirvan (r. 531–579) as a challenge.
- Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh (completed 1010) repeats that chess came from Hind.
01Four limbs of an army
Chaturanga means four-limbed, the old name for an army of elephants, horses, chariots and foot soldiers. The board pieces follow it: the elephant became the bishop, the chariot the rook. The Persian word shatranj is simply chaturanga worn smooth in another tongue, and the Arabs took it from Persia. Persian authors kept the debt on record, so there is no need to argue it. The game went on to Europe and changed again, but the board of 64 squares, the ashtapada, was Indian first.
