a strategic board game for two players in which each side moves sixteen pieces on a chequered board, trying to put the opponent’s king in checkmate
Miranda enjoys spending her evenings playing chess with her grandfather.
The school started a chess club to help students practice critical thinking skills.
✦ Borrowed from Old French “esches”, plural of “eschec”, from Medieval Latin “scaccus”, from Arabic “shāh” meaning “king”, originally from Persian “shāh”.
a square board divided into sixty-four alternating light and dark squares, on which the game of chess is played
He carefully arranged the pieces on the wooden chessboard before the match began.
Tourists gathered around the giant outdoor chessboard in the park, eager to move the waist-high pieces.
✦ formed from chess + board in Middle English to denote the playing surface for the game of chess
any surface, pattern, or situation that looks like, or is compared to, the alternating squares of a chessboard, especially in descriptions of landscapes or complex strategies
From the airplane window, the farmland below appeared as a patchwork chessboard of green and gold.
Urban planners designed the new district like a huge chessboard, with straight roads crossing at perfect right angles.
✦ extension of the primary sense to figurative and descriptive uses, recorded in English from the 19th century
