FACTS
ON THE ORIGIN OF CHINESE CHESS (XIANGQI 象棋)
In
this article (which is based on a paper delivered to the 1997 symposion of the
IGK) I will give an overview on early Chinese hypotheses on the origins of
Chinese Chess; we will then inspect references to Xiangqi in earlier Chinese texts, and refer to
other evidence to decide whether or not these hypotheses hold good.
As I regard chess in East Asia a fascinating field in itself, my paramount interest is to delve into the origins, the history, and the development of chess and chess-like games. Although I will refrain from speculations on the connections between Chinese Chess and the Indian and Persian chess-games, the reader is invited to draw whatever conclusions himself.
However, I hope I will succeed in making obvious that Chinese Chess and its forerunners have a sound claim to necessarily be allowed for by anyone dealing with the history of chess.
As
it seems to be a time-honoured custom to explain the meaning of the word
"Xiangqi" when dealing with Chinese Chess, I will say a few words on
the subject as well. Throughout the history of the Chinese writing system, many
of the characters were assigned new meanings, lost old meanings or gained
additional meanings, and suffered shifts in the semantic contents of words
written with that character. These changes may even have taken place in
specific areas only, or only for a certain time, or with considerable lags in
larger portions of the country. In certain professions such as the military
words and characters were given highly specialized meanings. Thus it has become
quite difficult to determine what a certain, especially a rare, character might
have meant in a given text. It is important to know the background of a given
writer to decide whether a specialized meaning of a word or character could
have been intended. The Chinese
word "Xiangqi" is written with two characters of whom the first,
xìang 象, nowadays denotes 'elephant; portrait;
phenomenon; ivory; stellar configuration, omen; acting, playing; official
interpreter', the second, qí 棋, denotes 'chessman; chess
or similar games; foundation'. Qí usually refers to the game as a whole (board
and pieces), and is often used to write words denoting board-games, as Weiqi 圍棋,
Tanqi 彈棋 &c.
To
further complicate matters, Xiangqi is not the only possible word to label a
chess-game. Just to mention a few possibilities: to signify board-games as a
whole or certain board-games the words qí 棋,
棊, 碁, yì 弈, 奕, bó 博, 簙, xì 戲, dû 賭, alone or in combination,
with perhaps a supplementary dà 大 or xîao 小 (great rsp. small) were all in use. Since
tracking all these references down is near impossible or has failed to provide
any satisfying result until now, I will concentrate on occurrences of the
Chinese words Xiangqi 象棋 and Xiangxi 象戲.
By
the way, as I think that almost all the translations for "Xiangqi"
that have been proposed up to now (e.g., Elephant Chess, Ivory Chess, Symbol
Chess) are not unreasonable, but the explanations given aren’t really
satisfying. So I’d rather stick to Xiangqi or "Chinese Chess".
One
might ask whether the xìang 象 in Xiangqi has anything to do with the game-piece of that
name. It has often been found strange that a relatively unimportant piece might
have lent its name to the game. I propose that the name of the game
derives from older sources we are going to deal with in a few moments, but that
actually something different was intended. In most of the Xiangqi sets we find
the "elephants" either marked xìang 象 or xìang 相. The second character signifies amongst
other meanings ‘chancellor, minister, great councilor’, the word was used from
earliest times on as the title of a high-ranking official. The two words are
homophones from about 600 AD and near homophones from about 1000 BC. Perhaps
the Xìang 象 in the name of the game
refers to the symbolic pieces moving around the board, while the piece Xìang 象 / 相 originally was a Grand
Minister. So maybe this was forgotten in later times, and the Xìang 相 survived only as a
variant writing to make it easier to distinguish the pieces in well-used sets
of pieces. This is nothing more than an idea yet - but who knows?
In
the elder Chinese literature five hypotheses on the origins of Chinese Chess
feature prominently The list follows Zhou Jiasen 周家森 and Li Songfu 李松福 . Ordered according to
the antiquity they ascribe to Chinese Chess these hypotheses are :
1.
An origin in the age of the legendary Shennong 神農 (trad. reigned 2737-2697
BC), as proposed by the Yuan 元 (1206- 1368) monk Nianchang 念常 (1282-1342?) in his "Fozu
lidai tongzai 佛租歷代通載 (‘Buddha in passing
generations and all the years’)", xí
Shénnóng yî rì yuè xing chén wèi xìang Táng xìanggúo Níu Sengrú yòng ju mâ shì
zú jia pào dài zhi wèi ji yî(.) 昔神農以日月星辰為象唐相國牛僧孺用車馬士卒加砲代之為(。)
"In
olden times Shennong used the sun (ri 日), the moon (yue 月), the stars (xing 星), and the planets (chen 辰) as symbols (xiang 象); the Tang 唐- Minister of State
(xiangguo 相國) Niu Sengru 牛僧孺 used chariots (che 車), horses (ma 馬), scholars (shi 士), soldiers (zu 卒), and catapults (pao 砲) to replace these as
utensils in the game."
2.
An origin in the age of the legendary Huangdi 黃帝 (trad. reigned 2697-2597
BC), the Yellow emperor, as proposed by Zhao Buzhi 晁補之 (1053-1110) of the
Beisong 北宋 (Northern Song, 960-1126)
in his "Guang Xiangxi ge xu 廣象戲格 序 (‘Rules for wide Xiangqi:
Foreword’)" ,
Xìangxì
bingxì yê Huángdì zhi zhàn qu mêngshòu yîwèi zhèn xìang shòu zhi xíong yê gù xì
bing eryî xìangxì míng zhi (.) 象戲兵戲也黃帝之戰驅猛獸以為陣象獸之雄也故戲兵而以象戲名之(。)
"Xiangxi
象戲 is a game of strategy;
Huangdi in his wars used fierce animals in his battle array; as Elephants
(xiang 象) are the strongest of
wild animals, the game is called Xiangxi after this strategy."
Shennong
and Huangdi are two of the Chinese cultural heroes who taught the Chinese,
Xiangqi were thus ascribed an origin in the third millennium BC, if we placed
these cultural heroes before the first dynasty.
3.
An origin in the age of Zhou 周 (1122-249 BC) Wuwang 武王 (reigned1122-1115 BC), in
the time of this last campaigns against the tyrant Shang 商 Zhou 紂 (reigned 1154-1122 BC),
as proposed by Ming 明- (1368-1644) time Xie
Zaihang 謝在杭 (=Xie Zhaozhe 謝肇淛, 1567-1624) in his
"Wuzazu 五雜俎 (‘Investigations on the
five categories of things’)" , thus ascribing Chinese Chess an origin in
the late 12th century BC.
Xìangqì
xiangchuán wèi Wûwáng fá Zhòu shí zùo jí bùrán yì zhàngúo bingjiazhê líu gài
shí yóu zhòng chezhàn yê 象棋相傳為武王伐紂時作即不然亦戰國兵家者流蓋時猶重車戰也
"Xiangqi,
according to tradition made by King Wu of Zhou in the time of his final
campaigns against Shang; if that is not so, at least it became popular among
military personnel in the time of the contending realms, as in this time
chariot warfare was still important."
4.
An origin in the time of the contending realms (475-221 BC). This was proposed
in Hu Yinglins 胡應麟 (1551-1602) Bicong 筆叢 (‘Brush notes’, a kind of
essays) , and the "Qianqueju leishu 潛確居類書 (‘Encyclopaedia of hidden
and real conditions’)" , which was compiled by Chen Renxi 陳仁錫 (1581-1636), thus
ascribing Xiangqi an origin in the third century BC,
Yong
Mènzhou wei Mèngchángjun zúxìa yàn ju zé dòu Xìangqí yì Zhàn'gúo zhi shì yê gài
Zhàn'gúo yòng bing gù shí rén yòng zhànzheng zhi xìang wèi qíshì yê 雍門周謂孟嘗君足下燕居則鬥象棋亦戰國之事也蓋戰國用兵故時人用戰爭之象為棋勢也
"Yong
Menzhou 雍門周 said to Mengchangjun 孟嘗君: Mylord, if you are at
leisure, play Xiangqi; thus it was a thing from the time of the contending
realms. Because in the strategy of the contending realms the people of this
time used elephants just as in the board game strategy (qishi 棋勢)."
The
prince Mengchang mentioned here was a well-known man who lived during the times
of the last Zhou-king; thus the admonition quoted here would point to a date in
the late third century BC.
5.
An origin in the time of Beizhou (Northern Zhou, 557-589) 北周 Wudi 武帝 (reigned 561-578), as
proposed in the "Taiping yulan 太平御覽 (‘Grand mirror of the
Taiping era’)" (completed in 982) under the heading ‘Xiangqi’ .
Zhou
Wûdì zào Xìangxì (.) 周武帝造象戲(。)
"Zhou
Wudi created Xiangxi",
the
"Wuyuan 物原 (‘Source of
Things’)" of Ming 明 Meng Qi 夢頎 explains:
Zhou
Wûdì zùo Xiangqi (.) 周武帝作象棋(。)
"Zhou
Wudi made Xiangqi".
We
should bear these five hypotheses -the Shennong hypothesis, the Huangdi
hypothesis, the Zhou Wuwang hypothesis, the contending realms hypothesis, and
the Beizhou Wudi hypothesis- in mind while we go on to inspect further textual
and additional evidence that might or might not support the hypotheses put
forth by these earlier Chinese scholars.
The
earliest still extant text in which we find the combination of the characters
xìang 象 and qì 棋 is the Chuci 楚辭 (‘Poems from Chu’) , a
corpus of poems purportively deriving from the third or second century BC, but
finally arranged (and edited?) only in the early second century AD. The poems
themselves might indeed have been composed during the later contending realms
period. The Zhaohun 招魂 (‘Calling back the soul’)
, a long poem by Song Yu 宋玉, contains the characters
xiang and qi. Chinese commentators do agree that a kind of game is referred to
but they usually assume that liubo 六博 is meant.
…
Bí bí Xíangqí yôu Lìubó xie (.) 篦蔽象棋有六簙些(。) …
The
castor shrubs hide the Xiangqi, but there still is the Liubo! (or: … there it
is, the Liubo! (?))
From
this sentence it cannot be decided for sure whether one game (Liubo alone) or
two games (Liubo and Xiangqi) are meant. If Xiangqi or one of its predecessors
were meant, this would point to an origin in the contending realms period.
A
somewhat later reference is found
in the Shuo yüan 說宛 ('Collection of
explanations', 'Collection of persuasions (shuì yuàn 說苑)', 'Garden of Happiness
(yuè yuàn 說苑)') that has been composed
in the first century BC. It was presented to the throne in 17 BC by Liu Xiang 劉向 (79-8 BC). Here as well
we cannot decide what game the text actually alludes to, as we do not have any
extra-textual reference. There remain some doubts about the actual translations
of this passage, as an inspection of a larger portion of the text makes other
meanings not impossible. The translation given here was chosen as it conveys a
hint on chess.
…ér
chân yú (.) yàn zé dòu Xiàngqì ér wû Zhèng nû (.) 而諂諛(。)燕則鬥象棋而舞鄭女(。) …and flatter (.) If you
have leisure, then fight at Xiangqi or dance with the women from Zheng(.)…
This
is in fact the passage quoted in the "Hu Yinglin bicong" and
"Qianqueju leishu", the date of origin of the "Shuo yuan"
thus backing the hypothesis that Xiangqi stems from the period of the
contending realms.
What
is noteworthy, anyway, is that the combination of the characters Xìang and Qí
is quite old. Without difficulty we can trace it back to at least the the late
century BC. A still earlier origin is not at all excluded definitely. However,
we do not know for sure what kind of game was referred to by this word. It
seems not improbable that anyone facing the task to name a new game in later
times might have been inspired by these passages.
A
game with a name similar to Xiangqi can be found in the 6th century AD. This is
the Xiangxi 象戲 (‘symbol game’ (?)), a
board game said to have been invented by emperor Wu 武 (r. 561-578) of the later
(Northern-) Zhou 後(北)周- dynasty (557-581). This
claim is usually backed by quotes from Linghu Defen 令狐德棻 (583- 661) who wrote the
(Hou) Zhoushu (後)周書 (‘Book of the (later)
Zhou Dynasty’), Wei Zheng 魏徵 (580-643), author of the Suishu 隋書 (580-617), and Li Yanshou
李延壽 (612?-678?) writer of the
Beishi 北史 (‘History of the Northern
Dynasties’, covering the time 386-618). All agree that in 569 Emperor Wu
composed the Xiangjing
象經 (‘Classic of the symbol
game’) to explain the game. The Zhoushu writes in the annals of the emperors :
wû
yùe dì zhì Xìangjing chéng jí bâi líao jîangshuo 五月帝制象經成集百僚講說 "[4th year of the
Tianhe 天和-period.] 5th month. The
emperor finishes the making of the Xiangjing and gathers his officials to
expound it."
The
Beishi reports the matter in
identical wording in the entries on the annals of the Zhou emperors. The Suishu
reports the matter in the biography section, in the biography of Lang Mao 郎茂 :
shí
Zhou Wûdì wèi Xìangjing (,) Gaozû cóng róng wèi Zheng yue (:) rén zhû zhi suô
wèi yê (,) gân tiandì (,) dòng guîshén (,) ér Xìangjing duo jiu fâ (,) jiang
héyî zhì zhì 時周武帝為象經高祖從容謂徵曰人主之所為也感天地動鬼神而象經多糾法將何以致治
"When
Zhou Wudi made the Xiangjing, the now deceased emperor casually asked Zheng:
'What is the place of the ruler of mankind, should he unify heaven and earth,
should he move the ghosts and spirits, like in the Xiangjing with many binding
rules, how shall I govern?'"
The
existence of this book is further corroborated by its mentioning in the
bibliographical chapters of the histories of later dynasties, namely the Sui 隋 (581-617) and the Tang 唐 (618-907) dynasties. It
is interesting to note that the first gives the title among the military works,
the second gives the title among the artistic works.
Although
the Xiangjing itself is not extant anymore, the preface written by Wang Bao 王褒 (flourished between
552-581) has been handed down to us . From this preface we know that this game
was thought to represent phenomena of heaven and earth, the principles of Yin 陰 and Yang 陽, the passing of seasons,
the eight trigrams, divination, music, filial piety and loyalty, proper rites,
the order of government, and orderly conduct. All this is linked in certain
schools of Chinese thought. But still it is difficult to perceive how all this
could have been represented in a board game. Nevertheless the preface states
that there were pieces that were moved on the board, and we are told that
military thinking and strategy played a role in the game. Thus we are entitled
to count Xiangxi amongst the forerunners of modern Xiangqi.
A
somewhat less tangible source on Xiangxi is a poem ("Xiangxifu 象戲賦, ‘A fu poem on
Xiangxi’") composed by the general Yu Xin 庾信 (513-581). In somewhat
obscure language he appraises how all and everything is displayed in this game
in its appropriate proportions. In the letter accompanying the presentation of
the poem to the throne he repeats his praise for the emperor who succeeded in
representing the order of the world in this game. From its content we can
deduce that it must been composed in or shortly after 569.
We
find further references to the Xiangjing and the game described therein in the
following years. In the Jiande 建德 -Era (572-577) of Zhou Wudis reign a certain Yang
Jian 楊堅 writes a book on history
and criticizes the game . In the biography section of the Jiu Tangshu 舊唐書 (‘Old Annals of the Tang
dynasty’) by Liu Xu 劉昫 (887-946) it is mentioned that the official Lu Cai
呂才 (biographical data not
available) is called in the year Zhenguan 貞觀 3 (629) of Tang Taizongs 唐太宗 reign to explain a quote
from a book whose title is given as "Zhou Wudi sanju xiangjing 周武帝三局象經
("Zhou
Wudis three games in the Xiangjing")", but is probably the selfsame
Xiangjing. This quote reads: Tàizi xî mâ 太子洗馬, literally "the
crown prince washes the horses", but in fact meaning "the crown
prince shuffles the pieces".
The
eldest extant reference to a game that more closely resembles modern Xiangqi can
be found in the "Xuanguai lu 玄怪錄 (‘Tales of the obscure
and peculiar’)" by the Tang
Minister of State Niu Sengru 牛僧孺 (779-847), a collection of tales of the
supernatural. He makes most of his stories appear as if they had previously
been orally transmitted.
The
content of the story "Cen Shun 岑順" in a nutshell is that the impoverished
scholar Cen Shun takes up to live in an old house that belongs to one of his
relatives. In a dream he is commissioned as military advisor by a messenger.
The following nights he helps in the defeat of attackers from a foreign
kingdom. When his relatives notice that he has changed they entice him to tell
what has happened. They dig up the floor of the room he was sleeping in and
find a set-up Xiangxi board in an old grave. These occurrences are dated to the
year Baoying 寶應 1, that is 762 AD.
Niu
Sengru explicitly lists units of cavalry (tianma 天馬), a general (jiang 將), chariots (ju 車), infantery (jia 甲), and gives clues to
catapults (pao 砲) and archers (gong 弓). The existence of these
last two types of pieces may be inferred from his mention of arrows and stones
flying hence and forth. He does neither elaborate on the number of pieces nor
the size of the board, with one exception: he states that the six soldiers (liu
jia 六甲) advance in proper array.
If we take this as a clue on the number of pawns in the game it becomes clear
that this game is not the same as present-day Xiangqi. Furthermore he gives
some hints at the move of certain pieces. It is stated that the General moves
horizontally into the four (cardinal) directions; the chariots can only advance
and do never retreat; the cavalry moves three measures aslant; the pawns move
one step ahead. To make it absolutely clear: these moves can be deduced from
the text, but not with certainty. The narration goes on to tell of heaps of
soldiers rushing east and west, north and south. Thus one could as well come to
think that most of the pieces could move into any direction. To distinguish the
game described by Niu Sengru from present-day Xiangqi on the one hand and
Beizhou Wudis Xiangxi on the other hand this older game is called 'Baoying
Xiangqi' in works on Chinese Chess history.
There
are a few more references to Xiangxi in the dynastic histories, in literary
sketches (bîjì 筆記), and in poems. From
these references we can conclude that Xiangxi was a game not unknown to at
least part of the Chinese populace, more specifically the formally educated
'literati'.
In
connection with Tang- and Song 宋-time (960-1280) Xiangxi we face a puzzling problem, whose
implications I have not yet uncovered fully. This problem involves the so-called Suzhou zhijîn
qínqíshuhuà tú 蘇州織錦琴棋書畫圖 ("Silk-brocade
picture of qin-lute, game-board, books, and painting-scroll from Suzhou")
, which is in unison dated to the period between the late Tang and early Song
time, that would be the time of approximately the 10th century. This piece of
silk-brocade of whom I have only seen small-size drawings shows a set of the
four treasures of the scholar or symbols for the four lesser arts. Playing the
qin, playing Weiqi or Xiangqi, the ability to do calligraphy, and the ability
to paint are the four arts an allround scholar had to master in addition to his
knowledge of the four classics (i.e. the Great Learning (Daxue 大學), the Doctrine of the
Mean (Zhongyong 中庸), the Analects of
Confucius (Lunyu 論語), and the Book of Mencius
(Mengzi 孟子)). There are other sets
of four that group together things, books, or modes of behaviour that literati
had to master. All the items shown are given in good detail: a five-stringed
qin, a tidily rolled painting, a neat stack of books in which the bindings can
be seen, and a 8 by 8 black-and-white squares game-board. The qi-games meant
are in all instances I know of either Weiqi or Xiangqi. We can definitely
exclude Weiqi on the simple reason that the game-board shown simply is not a
Weiqi-board. So it ought to have been a Xiangqi- or Xiangxi-board. Naturally
this board features none of the hallmarks of present-day Xiangqi: no river, no
nine-castle (jiugong 九宮), no symmetrical set-up
of pieces on the board. My first idea was that this might be a fake made up in
later times, but from the drawings alone I could not disprove anything. The
other items shown definitely fit the time to which this piece of silk-brocade
is ascribed, ie. the number of strings on the lute, the method in which the
books appear to be bound, and the way in which the painted hand-scroll is
rolled. Usually in this kind of pictures originality is neither required nor
expected, so one could reasonably suppose that quite a usual kind of game-board
was shown on that piece of brocade. A somewhat more determined evaluation will
have to wait until I know more about this piece of silk-brocade.
According
to Li Songfu 李松福 two phrases from Wang Baos preface to the Xiangjing, the
phrases
…san
yue yinyáng… qi yue ba guà yî ding ji wèi 三曰陰陽…七曰八卦以定其位 "… the third is: Yin
and Yang, …the seventh is: the eight trigrams arranged in their proper position
…"
and
a phrase in Yu Xins Xiangxifu as well possibly point to an 8 by 8,
black-and-white Xiangxi-board.
From
Song times on textual evidence on a Chinese Chess similar or equal to
present-day Xiangqi abound. We do not have only texts but numerous
archaeological finds of game-boards and pieces. From all we know the game might
already have had its present form. There have even been some variant forms of
what became later the main line of Chinese Chess who gained a short-time
popularity and then disappeared. These were Sima Guangs 司馬光 (1019-1086) Qiguo Xiangxi
七國象戲 (Seven States Chess),
Zhao Buzhis 晁補之 Guangxiangxi 廣象戲, and perhaps the
Daixiangqi 大象棋 (Greater Xiangxi).
When
we set out, we undertook to inspect five early Chinese hypotheses on the origin
of Chinese Chess. These were 1.
the Shennong hypothesis, 2. the Huangdi hypothesis, 3. the Zhou Wuwang
hypothesis, 4. the contending realms hypothesis, and 5. the Beizhou Wudi
hypothesis.
From
lack of textual and archaeological evidence we can exclude the first and second
hypotheses, that is, the Shennong and Huangdi hypotheses. These are clearly
later-time inventions of the 11th and 12th centuries AD to introduce Xiangqi as
an eon-old and time-honoured game, invented by two of the Chinese cultural
heroes. The explanations and reasons offered are of such secondary nature that
they bear no real value.
In
the third hypothesis there seems to be a simple confusion of the well-known
Zhou Wuwang, whose ascension to the throne marked the beginning of a new epoch
in Chinese history, and the less-known Beizhou Wudi, whose reign brought no
real change in Chinese History. It is quite possible that these two were
confused, especially if it were true that oral tradition had it that Zhou
Wuwang invented Xiangqi. It would have seemed only natural to call someone as
important as Zhou Wu an emperor, dì 帝, instead of king, wáng 王.
The
fourth hypothesis, ascribing Xiangqi an origin in the time of the contending
realms, in fact quoting from the Shuo yuan, is backed by the textual evidence
from the Chuci, but we still lack extra-textual evidence. Nevertheless, the
word Xiangqi is there, and we can assume with some certainty that a kind of
game was referred to. Thus we cannot simply discard this hypothesis, even if we
still do not know what kind of game was really meant. But since Chinese
archaeology is still making progress, and finds of recognizable game-boards and
pieces may come our way in the near future, we can hope that there will be
undisputable hard facts on early Chinese Chess soon.
The
fifth hypothesis as well possibly bears some truth. Even if not a single
dynastic history does in fact report that Beizhou Wudi actually made Xiangxi or
Xiangqi, it is at least stated that he made the Xiangjing. We could suppose
that this Xiangjing was in fact a game and not a book, but there is no need to
think so. There are quite a number of additional references to the game and the
book, eg. Wang Baos preface, Yu Xins poem &c. Niu Sengru in Tang times can
safely describe the Xiangxi-board allegedly found in the grave as
"old". If the Beizhou-Xiangxi and the Baoying-Xiangxi were not
identical, his description would still point to the fact that Baoying-Xiangxi
was not regarded as anything recent.
The
question arises whether one of these two games can be reconstructed. At the
moment I do not think so, as too many factors are still unknown. While we have
source material to enough to speculate on the moves of pieces in the
Baoying-Xiangqi, we cannot do so in the case of the Beizhou-Xiangqi. It is
still too early to judge on the size and appearance of the boards as we lack
data. All reconstructions up to now should be regarded with utter caution. Not
a single one of them takes all the evidence known until now into account.
Another
unanswered question is which Chinese games might be connected to the early
forms of Chinese Chess. We still have to connect Xiangqi and Xiangxi to Liubo 六簙, to Bolúosaixì 波羅塞戲, and Bosaixì 波塞戲 (possibly both
Backgammon-type games, but imported from India), to Tanqi 彈棋, and to Lingqi 靈棋. The sources for these
games are still not fully analyzed, so preliminary reports, not to mention
full-scale histories of Chinese board-games yet remain to be written.