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Gold General. (Updated!) Shogi piece that moves one square but not diagonally backwards.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
Anonymous wrote on Wed, Apr 28, 2010 01:13 PM UTC:
This move have interesting history.
In some Chaturanga (ancient Indian chess) variants elephant (bishop) had
these moves: one step diagonaly in any direction or on step straight
forward. Diagonal moves meant 4 leags and orthogonal move meant trunk. When
chess came to Siam with this piece. There it was renamed into 'nobleman'.
From Siam, it came to Japan. Meaning of these moves was lost, and Japanese
explained this move in this way: 'One step diagonaly in any direction and
orthogonaly forward', and they replaced ferz (wich was at modern queen's
square, weak piece) with 'opposite' piecee, wich moves one step
orthogonaly in any direction and diagonaly forward. First piece was renamed
to 'silver general', and second to 'gold general'.