Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 2.djvu/350

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OF THE GAME OF SCHACI.

wives, and the rest of their family, to live in the camp. And though they do not use a bow, and encumber men more by their whims than they destroy by their valour, yet the queen is intended for the king's help. Therefore, that she may evince her affection, she accompanies him to battle. (95)

The sixth kind of pieces used in this game are the kings. The king shews above all the rest what is the nature of motion and progression. For since he may reside in the fourth square with the white, though he himself be black, he hath the knight Alphinus on the right hand in a white space, but a Rochus in the black. In the left he holds opposite places. But though the king has more power and dignity than all the other pieces, it does not become him to move far from his throne; and, therefore, he begins his move from his own white square, like the Rochi, from right and left. Yet he cannot be placed on the left in the black space, near the situation of the Rochus on the white; but he may go into the white space near the aforesaid Rochus in the corner square, where the guards of the city