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Isle of Lewis Chess Men. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Why queen have this aspect? My opinion about rook: even in some modern sets pieces' size is determined not by it's power, but by proximity to king (that is, queen is tallest, bishop is shorter, kniht is middle, rook is short).
I made a slight mistake. The set with square towers as rooks and the footsoldiers reduced by about a quarter to serve as pawns is at http://www.chessbaron.co.uk/chess-TH2003.htm . That company carries four sets based on the Lewis chessmen; the other three all have runestone pawns.
It seems to me that the armed footsoldiers, four of them berserkers, must be rooks. They appear to be about the same size as the other pieces, just a little shorter, as the end pieces usually are, in modern chess sets and in other connections (even the Rockettes in Radio City are arranged with the tallest in the center and the shortest at the ends). In order to make them pawns in reproduction sets they have to be scaled down. Rooks are depicted as warders, castle guards, or captains afoot in German and Scandinavian sets down into the nineteenth century.
Joe Joyce wrote on Thu, Jul 15, 2010 06:22 PM UTC:John, thanks for the information. I like the 'tower rook' set better than the 'stylized shield pawn' set, but you are obviously right about the rooks/warders. And using them as rooks completes the full-human-figure theme of the Isle of Lewis chess sets. I still think the rune stones Mats identified make lousy pawns. Maybe a set with one [style of] warder as the rooks and the other [say the berserker type chewing on the shield, because like pawns, they go out to charge and die] shrunk down to make pawns. Where are JKS or GKG when you need them to make pieces?
Nifty idea! Now, which of us will write to Chessbaron? After that, I give up: who are those TLAs?
Joe Joyce wrote on Fri, Jul 16, 2010 01:20 PM UTC:Hey, John. I would actually display the set with the warder-rook and the little berserker pawns, and might even try to play a game with it. The 2 gentlemen are a couple of our site artists. Gary makes chesspieces from Sculpy, a clay-like sculpting material, as well as more common materials; and James does statues as well as some excellent artwork. They've both added some fine pieces to the site's piece sets.
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