Ancient Chess Sets

[TonyW]

Some help please. I was looking through one of my woodturning books - "Fun at the Lathe" by Bell - in which he describes what he calls a 'Muslim' chess set, even though it was discovered near Hyderabad in India and dates from the early 11th Century.

Unfortunately, although there is a photograph of his set, all that there is in the way of dimensions is a copy of a rough sketch he made when he saw the originals in a museum. Does anyone have dimensions for anything similar please as they would be ideal for turning on the lathe - no horses's heads to carve for instance!

TIA,

Tony Wells.

 

[KenV]

Tony -- not where I can lay hands on them, but memory is that one of the Mike Darrow books on Chess will help you.

 

[magpens]

Possibly useful for you ... I just googled 11th century Muslim chess set

The Game of Kings | Muslim Heritage

http://history.chess.free.fr/first-european.htm

 

[Ed McDonnell]

Tony - If you look for "Islamic Chess Sets", you can find lots of examples. Many with dimensions specified for the king. It would be easy to extrapolate sizes from there.

Here's a link that may help.

Islamic chess sets

Alternatively, search for "Modern Chess Sets". Plenty of examples out there that wouldn't require carving.

Sample link:

Chess sets from The Chess Piece chess set store: Copper/Steel Contemporary chessmen, Stylish Metal Chess Sets

Or, get really creative and just do your own thing. Maybe introduce casting / segmenting as a way of differentiating pieces.

Ed

 

[TonyW]

My thanks for these replies and the links in them. Whilst I couldn't find any similar to the set
I was looking for, I did find a set that resembled highly decorated mushrooms of different sizes instead, and that I actually prefer, so I'm going with that instead. It's strange how the things work out! That's the good news, with the bad being that my wife got carried away with the pens that I was turning for Christmas presents, so I have to turn another batch first, before the chess set ...... <sigh>

Tony.