Reviews

This is a lovely 1860 book with a normal chess diagram on the back hard cover and the chaturanga 4 team diagram on the front.The coloured chaturanga layout next to the title page has a yellow set in the top LH, a black set in the top RH, a green set in the bottom LH and a red set on the bottom RH. If you buy a later edition it will not have the coloured diagram and it will be difficult to work out play from page 16 onwards.There is a good black & white chaturanga diagram on page 39 which will help.
The book has all the creation histories and p.15 where Forbes suggests the game was from India 3000 years before our era resulted in some contrary views. It has 60 pages of Appendices and covers all viewpoints to 1860 thoroughly. He believed India to be the birthplace of chess but gives much information on Chinese chess which became topical when David Li's book'The Genealogy of Chess' appeared in 1998. Most historians still think the game came from India but Mr. Li makes a strong case for China.
The 1860 copy has 18 chapters and 6 Appendices in its 372 pages and is on good paper, well printed with large lettering.Forbes (1798-1868) was a Scots Professor of Oriental Languages at Kings College London..Bob Meadley 

This is a very informative book and provides great insight into how chess came to be.