xiàngqí

Chinese xiàng (象) meant elephant — or, by extension, image or symbol (the elephant as representative animal in Chinese cosmology). Qí (棋) meant a board game. Xiangqi — elephant game — preserves the war elephant at the center of Chinese chess that western chess eliminated: European chess replaced the elephant (alfil in Arabic chess) with the bishop, which moves diagonally rather than in the elephant's L-shaped path.

Chinese chess derives from Indian chaturanga, transmitted via Central Asia by the 7th century CE. Xiangqi's board has a river (河, hé) dividing the two halves, and pieces are marked with characters rather than shaped as figures. The general (将/帅) is confined to a 'palace' of nine squares and cannot directly face the opposing general without pieces between them — the flying general rule that has no equivalent in Western chess.

Xiangqi has approximately 500 million players worldwide — more than any other board game including Go or Western chess. It is particularly popular in China, Vietnam, and overseas Chinese communities. The World Xiangqi Federation holds regular world championships; the strongest players are professionals in mainland China.

The river on the board is unique among chess variants. It is both cosmological (the Yellow River as China's civilizational boundary) and tactical (pieces are restricted in how they cross it). The game carries Chinese geography in its rules.