From: utzoo!decvax!duke!bcw
Newsgroups: net.chess
Title: Re: Vietnamese Chess
Article-I.D.: duke.2816
Posted: Tue Dec  7 20:22:50 1982
Received: Wed Dec  8 05:05:52 1982

From:	Bruce C. Wright
Re:	Vietnamese Chess

The rule about two Kings not being able to face each other across an
open board comes, I believe, from a Chinese version of Chess originally.
There are a lot of other strange rules in that version (including a piece
which moves by jumping over other pieces ... no I don't mean a Knight ...
it's related to the Grasshopper for those of you who know Fairy Chess -
it moves to the square(s) beyond those occupied by other pieces and cannot
move unless it jumps over pieces, like the jump in checkers.  Captures in
the normal way, i. e., the jumped piece is not captured).  The Chinese
version of the game also has a small "fortress" which the King is
not allowed to leave.  If this rule was brought up during the standard
Western game, it was probably being imported from the Chinese/Vietnamese
version of chess.

There are many versions of the game in the Orient;  the Japanese
version is also quite interesting:  the pieces are totally mercenary,
and when captured can be entered (with certain restrictions) on any
vacant square of the board instead of making a normal move.

			Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University