A brief history of chess – Alex Gendler

Trace the storied history of the game of chess, from its origins in 7th century India to the computer software we use today.

The attacking infantry advances, their elephants already having broken the defensive line. The king tries to retreat, but the enemy flanks him from the rear. Escape is impossible. This isn’t a real war— nor is it just a game. Over the 1,500 years of its existence, chess has been known as a military strategy tool, a metaphor for human affairs and a measure of genius. Alex Gendler shares its history.

Lesson by Alex Gendler, directed by Remus & Kiki.

Sign up for our newsletter:
Support us on Patreon:
Follow us on Facebook:
Find us on Twitter:
Peep us on Instagram:
View full lesson:

Thank you so much to our patrons for your support! Without you this video would not be possible! zjweele13, Anna-Pitschna Kunz, Edla Paniguel, Elena Crescia, Thomas Mungavan, Alejandro Cachoua, Jaron Blackburn, Yoga Trapeze Wanderlust, Sandy Nasser, Venkat Venkatakrishnan, Nicolle Fieldsend-Roxborough, John Saveland, Jason Garcia, Robson Martinho, Martin Lau, Senjo Limbu, Joe Huang, SungGyeong Bae, Christian Kurch, Begum Tutuncu, David Matthew Ezroj, Sweetmilkcoco, Raphaël LAURENT, Joe Meyers, Farah Abdelwahab, Brian Richards, Divina Grace Dar Santos, Jessie McGuire, Abdullah Altuwaijri, Sarah Burns, Clement, Hadi Salahshour, FAWWAZ GHUWAIDI, Dino Biancolini, Reagen O’Connor, Nicu Boanda, Cindy O., Karla Brilman, Jørgen Østerpart, Sergi Páez, rakesh Katragadda, Carolyn Corwin, Charlene You, Boris Langvand, Exal Enrique Cisneros Tuch, Carsten Tobehn, Kin Lon Ma, Katie Dean, Ezgi Yersu and Eunsun Kim.

%1$ Comments860

    A history of chess without naming Spain, is indeed an extremely BRIEF history…

    Who else is disappointed this had NOTHING to do with putting milk into a sheep's stomach and finding out active enzymes then made a delicious product called 'chess?' Or is my spelling off?

    Thousands of years before Christ Shakuni played this game in Mahabharata

    In India, We still call it the gojo (war elephant) instead of Bishop. Also, it is rook (war ship) instead of a castle.

    I thought chess was made in China in 200 b.c?

    Many believe that the IBM Deep Blue win over Garry Kasparov was a hallow victory and that IBM cheated.

    Nonsense, chess was invented by a Persian matheatician. In other to explain mathematical concepts so the king could understand. H. R. JACOB, MATHEMATICS , A Human Endear 2nd ed. 1970 , W.H. Freeman and Company

    He skipped the part about how the inventor, for his reward, asked for one grain of rice for the first, two for the second, four fur the third and so on
    The king thought this sounded reasonable until an advisor pointed out that 2^n per square would end up being more rice than has ever been grown
    The inventor was beheaded
    (I had heard this story on npr)

    i´d learn something new today, desde Colombia , gracias

    These visualizations and animations are out of this world.

    How about Arabic, "sheikh" for tribal leader (king), and "sheikh mat" for the king is dead

    Imagine all that work to create this video and the board is incorrectly oriented. WTF.

    If chess was released in 2021:
    Nerf the queen she's OP
    Change the map it's boring…

    what is wrong with the media and video games?

    our first open world sandbox boardgame

    In Armenia we still use "Shahmat" as a name for this game
    Great animation and explanation!

    The Queen was the first strong independent female character.

    “Once I make my move then you’re free to check the king” “No! Ron No!”

    In the picture at 2:28 is “Xiangqi aka Chinese Chess” not “Go aka Weiqi” .

    It's always the Arabs who learn diffrent things from Indians and give it their own names to spread it to Europe

    "It is unlikely that this game was devised by a single person, but probably many minds over several years." In that case, I find this brief history to be lacking from the very start.

    “The player who upset Russian dominance was not a citizen of another country…”
    Bobby Fischer: “Am I a joke to you?”
    This script for this video must have been written by a Russian.

    The art for this one was nothing less than amazing. Who are the illustrators?

    Who animated this and using which software, this is brilliant!

    When I win, I like chess. When I lose, I like Clue.

    I love this animation. so cool. @ puppetmake

    4:35 Feels very much like they were gearing up to introduce the 1972 Fischer v Spassky, then did a 180 towards Deep Blue.

    If chess pieces were an allegory of the different classes performing their roles, then I’d be a tiddlywink.

    U r wrong chess was first invented by mandodari wife of ravana

    Why is the western version called the "modern" version inthe video? I've seen people in china and japan playing thier versions now. Isn't that modern enough?

    Yeah, I hate playing against computers at chess. They're like the Agent P to my Dr. Doofenshmirtz – always knowing exactly what I'm planning and how to thwart me.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *