The ferz or fers is a

fairy chess piece A fairy chess piece, variant chess piece, unorthodox chess piece, or heterodox chess piece is a chess piece not used in conventional chess but incorporated into certain chess variants and some unorthodox chess problems, known as fairy chess. Compar ...

that may move one square diagonally. It was used in orthodox chess and in

Shatranj Shatranj (, ; from Middle Persian ) is an old form of chess, as played in the Sasanian Empire. Its origins lie in the South Asian game of chaturanga. Modern chess gradually developed from this game, as it was introduced to Europe by contacts in ...

form of chess before being replaced by the

queen Queen most commonly refers to: * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a kingdom * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen (band), a British rock band Queen or QUEEN may also refer to: Monarchy * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Q ...

History and nomenclature

The ferz is a very old piece, appearing in

chaturanga Chaturanga (, , ) is an Traditional games of India, ancient Indian Strategy game, strategy board game. It is first known from India around the seventh century AD. While there is some uncertainty, the prevailing view among chess historians is t ...

and

shatranj Shatranj (, ; from Middle Persian ) is an old form of chess, as played in the Sasanian Empire. Its origins lie in the South Asian game of chaturanga. Modern chess gradually developed from this game, as it was introduced to Europe by contacts in ...

, the ancestors of all

chess variant A chess variant is a game related to, derived from, or inspired by chess. Such variants can differ from chess in many different ways. "International" or "Western" chess itself is one of a family of games which have related origins and could be co ...

s; it also featured in games such as Tamerlane chess. The ferz was a standard chess piece until the modern moves of queen and

bishop A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of di ...

were developed around the 15th century, with the ferz being replaced by the former. The ferz also appears in some large historical

shogi variant A shogi variant is a game related to or derived from shogi (Japanese chess). Many shogi variants have been developed over the centuries, ranging from some of the largest chess-type games ever played to some of the smallest. A few of these variant ...

s, such as in

dai shogi or is a board game native to Japan. It derived from Heian era shogi, and is similar to standard shogi (sometimes called Japanese chess) in its rules and game play. Dai shogi is only one of several large board shogi variants. Its name means ''larg ...

under the name ''cat sword'' (). The Thai variant of chess,

makruk Makruk (; ; ), or Thai chess (; ; ), is a Strategy game, strategy board game that is descended from the 6th-century Indian game of chaturanga or a close relative thereof, and is therefore related to chess. It is part of the family of chess varian ...

, retains the ferz from shatranj as the "Met", both as a starting piece and as the only pawn promotion option. Thus, much of shatranj endgame theory is also valid for makruk. The piece was originally called the (

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

for "minister" or "counsellor"), which was translated by the

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

s to ''farzin'' or ''farzīn'' (), which means "counsellor" or "wise man". This was shortened to ''ferz'', and this became ''firz'' or ''fers'' in medieval Europe. Its name later changed to ''

'', but when that name started being used for the modern chess queen, its former name ''ferz'' or ''fers'' began to be used in

chess problem A chess problem, also called a chess composition, is a puzzle created by the composer using chess pieces on a chessboard, which presents the solver with a particular task. For instance, a position may be given with the instruction that White is t ...

s. In modern

Eastern Slavic languages The East Slavic languages constitute one of three regional subgroups of the Slavic languages, distinct from the West and South Slavic languages. East Slavic languages are currently spoken natively throughout Eastern Europe, and eastwards to Sibe ...

, however, ''ferz'' () is the current name for the chess queen.

Value

The ferz by itself is worth about half a

knight A knight is a person granted an honorary title of a knighthood by a head of state (including the pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church, or the country, especially in a military capacity. The concept of a knighthood ...

. A

king King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...

and three can force

checkmate Checkmate (often shortened to mate) is any game position in chess and other chess-like games in which a player's king is in check (threatened with ) and there is no possible escape. Checkmating the opponent wins the game. In chess, the king is ...

on a

bare king In chess and chess variants, a bare king (or lone king) is a king whose player has no other remaining pieces (i.e. all the player's other pieces have been ). Effect on the game Historical In some old versions of chess, such as "baring chess" and ...

if not all three are on the same square color; a king and two on opposite-colored squares can force

stalemate Stalemate is a situation in chess where the player whose turn it is to move is not in check and has no legal move. Stalemate results in a draw. During the endgame, stalemate is a resource that can enable the player with the inferior position ...

on a bare king,Variant Chess 60
pp. 92–94 but not easily, and they cannot force checkmate. The endgame of rook versus ferz is a win for the rook. Despite being colorbound, the ferz is the strongest of the basic leapers during the opening phase of the game, even stronger than the wazir, due to its larger mobility forward. A wazir and a ferz can force checkmate on a bare king only if the bare king is significantly close to a corner that is the same color square as that of the ferz. While a knight and wazir can usually force checkmate against a bare king, a knight and ferz can only do so if the bare king is significantly close to a corner that is the same color square as that of the ferz. The wazir is better than the ferz in most endgames because of the wazir's ability to restrict squares adjacent to the squares last restricted.

Symbol

Both white and black symbols for the ferz have been provisionally accepted for a future version of the

Unicode Unicode or ''The Unicode Standard'' or TUS is a character encoding standard maintained by the Unicode Consortium designed to support the use of text in all of the world's writing systems that can be digitized. Version 16.0 defines 154,998 Char ...

standard, in the Chess Symbols block:

References

Bibliography

External links

Endgame statistics with fantasy pieces
at ''

The Chess Variant Pages ''The Chess Variant Pages'' is a non-commercial website devoted to chess variants. It was created by Hans Bodlaender in 1995. The site is "run by hobbyists for hobbyists" and is "the most wide-ranging and authoritative web site on chess variants". ...

''
The Ferz
by

Ralph Betza Ralph Betza (born 1945) is a FIDE Master and inventor of chess variants such as chess with different armies, Avalanche chess, and Way of the Knight. Betza was a user of the website The Chess Variant Pages, on which several chess related works ...

, ''

'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Ferz (chess) Fairy chess pieces