Chess Piece

This chess piece would have been part of a chess set owned by a upper-class family in 13th century London. There are several aspects of this particular chess piece that signal the transformation of ideas from the East to the West. First, the major material used in this piece is walrus ivory, which came to replace elephant ivory after the trade of that material substantially reduced from the East (Seaver 2009,  276). This signals that trade between the East and West influenced the materials used to create this object. 

Furthermore, the actual form of this object shows a transformation of ideas. Scholars consider the game of chess to have originated in India. This game was carried west through the Islamic World, particularly the current Middle East, to Western Europe (Forbes 1868, 2). As the game came to the West, it underwent several transformations. For one, this particular piece shows a knight, which is a particularly strong symbol of European nobility and aristocracy. This shows that Europeans intended to adapt the game to fit their culture, using shapes that matched their values. This is also consistent with the fact that people in Europe played chess as a way to hone in their strategic thinking, and thus having symbols that represent nobility and strength are consistent with that.