H. G. Muller wrote on Thu, Dec 23, 2010 06:41 PM UTC:
The similarity with your design is that I also use a ridge on the helmet of some of the Spartan pieces. The design philosophy is based on universality of pieces amongst variants, however. So the King, being a orthodox FIDE King, is represented by an ordinary Staunton King. Similaly, the Warlord, having the same moves as the Archbishop of Capablanca Chess, uses the Staunton representation for this piece that has become more or less standard.
Arcbishops and Kings crowned with a cross might not fit very well with the context of Sparta, but neither do Bishops or crosses fit with the Persians. And I certainly did not want to make new representations for familiar pieces. So I decided to ignore such historic friction. Naming the pieces different is OK, but i want them tolook as famliar as possible.
For this reason I represented the General as a Rook with a King's cross, as it is, after all, a 'Crowned Rook'. The Lieutenants move Bishop-like (mostly diagonally), and the Captains Rook-like (orthogonally), so I have given them representations in which the Rook and Bishop are still recognozable. The rook has acquired a roof (for which I used the top of a Staunton Bishop) to distingush Captain from orthodox Rook, and the clipped bishop was 'Spartanized' by putting a ridge on its head, like was done to convert Pawns to Hoplites.
A photograph of the set (which has king height 64 mm):
(not yet finshed; I stil have to paint some of the pieces, and not all Pawns are converted toHoplites yet.)
The similarity with your design is that I also use a ridge on the helmet of some of the Spartan pieces. The design philosophy is based on universality of pieces amongst variants, however. So the King, being a orthodox FIDE King, is represented by an ordinary Staunton King. Similaly, the Warlord, having the same moves as the Archbishop of Capablanca Chess, uses the Staunton representation for this piece that has become more or less standard.
Arcbishops and Kings crowned with a cross might not fit very well with the context of Sparta, but neither do Bishops or crosses fit with the Persians. And I certainly did not want to make new representations for familiar pieces. So I decided to ignore such historic friction. Naming the pieces different is OK, but i want them tolook as famliar as possible.
For this reason I represented the General as a Rook with a King's cross, as it is, after all, a 'Crowned Rook'. The Lieutenants move Bishop-like (mostly diagonally), and the Captains Rook-like (orthogonally), so I have given them representations in which the Rook and Bishop are still recognozable. The rook has acquired a roof (for which I used the top of a Staunton Bishop) to distingush Captain from orthodox Rook, and the clipped bishop was 'Spartanized' by putting a ridge on its head, like was done to convert Pawns to Hoplites.
A photograph of the set (which has king height 64 mm):
(not yet finshed; I stil have to paint some of the pieces, and not all Pawns are converted toHoplites yet.)