The Piececlopedia: The Rook-Knight Compound

Empress, Marshall, Chancellor

Historical remarks

This piece has a long history and has been called by many names. Some of the earliest names for this piece are Champion from Carrera's Chess (1617), Concubine from The Duke of Rutland's Chess (1747), Dabbabah from Great Chess - Indian / Turkish variant, and Guard from Bird's Chess (1874). Three of these have become more commonly used for other pieces. The Champion is a piece in the commercial variant Omega Chess, the Dabbabah is a historical piece that leaps two spaces orthgonally, and Guard is commonly used for the Man, which moves one space in any direction. The rationale for calling it a Concubine is that it is like a Queen but not as powerful. But the name has never proven popular, as it is not a pretigious name, and polygamy is no longer popular. The three most widely used names for this piece are Empress, Chancellor, and Marshall.

Empress is the standard name for the piece among fairy problemists. This name is used as the favored name in both Dickin's Guide to Fairy Chess and The Oxford Companion to Chess. Frank Maus used the name in Empress Chess (1924), Union Chess (1924), Confederate Chess (1924), and Empire Chess (1925). It is also the name it is known by in the Wikipedia article Empress (chess). The rationale behind this name is an analogy with the Queen. Like the Queen, this piece and the Bishop/Knight compound are each a compound of two of the three simple pieces in Chess, the Rook, Bishop, and Knight. The idea is that, like the Queen, all three of these compounds should be named after female royalty. Since the Rook is stronger than the Bishop, this piece was considered the stronger of the two compounds besides the Queen. So it got the name Empress, while the name Princess went to the Bishop/Knight compound. One difficulty with the name Empress is that it suggests that the piece is more powerful than the Queen, whereas it seems likely that the Queen is the more powerful of these two pieces. For this reason, others have used it for the Queen-Knight compound more commonly known as an Amazon. Thomas Long called Amazon Chess by the name of Empress Chess (1890), John William Brown called the Amazon an Empress in Millenial Chess (1999), and Sergey Sirotkin called it that in Beau Monde Chess (2000).

The name Marshall, or Marshal, dates back to 1840, when L. Tressan used it in The Sultan's Game. Capablanca briefly used this name in Capablanca's Chess, and Christian Freeling used it in Grand Chess. In recent times, this has been one of the most popular names used for this piece. Fergus Duniho used it in several variants, including Cavalier Chess (1998), Fusion Chess (1999), and Gross Chess (2009). Jean-Louis Cazaux has used it in large variants, such as Gigachess (2001), Heavy Chess (2020), and Bigorra (2023), among others. Charles Gilman called it a Marshal in Man and Beast 08: Diverse Directions.

The name Chancellor dates back to 1887, when Ben Foster used it in Chancellor Chess. In the 20th century, Jose Capablanca seems to have favored this name over Marshall, though he did use both. Ed Trice used the name Chancellor in his commercial variant Gothic Chess. David Paulowich used it in New Chancellor Chess (1997), and Unicorn Chess (2000), and TenCubed Chess, among others. Kevin Pacey used the name in Sac Chess (2014). Zied Haddad used it in Musketeer Chess (2014), for which he manufactured and sold commercial piece sets.

Although both names have enjoyed popularity during the last century, there seem to be a few reasons for favoring the name Marshall. First, the name Marshall has more consistently been used for this piece, whereas the name Chancellor has more frequently been used for other pieces. Capablanca used it for the Knight-Bishop compound, and Sidney LeVasseur has used it for another piece in Kings Court. Second, the letter C is commonly used for other popular pieces, such as the Camel, the Cannon, and the Champion, not to mention the Cardinal, the variant piece most frequently paired with this piece. Given the popularity of this piece, it would confuse things to use the letter C for this piece too. Etymologically, the name Marshall fits a piece with Knight moves better than Chancellor does. Marshall literally means horse-servant, being related to the English word mare, meaning a female horse. One especially relevant definition of Marshall is cavalry commander. In contrast, the name Chancellor has nothing to do with horses. It comes from a Latin word literally meaning doorkeeper, and it generally refers to a head of state or to a college president. It also has some ecclesiastical definitions, which Capablanca may have had in mind when he gave the name to the piece he also called the Archbishop. Finally, for whatever it's worth, Marshall is the older name.

This table gives an overview of the history of this piece.

Movement rules

The Marshall may move like a orthodox chess Rook, or like a orthodox chess Knight.

Movement diagram

The blue circles indicate the leaping moves of a Knight, while the green circles indicate the Rook move.

Alternate Images

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