Shatranj

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A board game, an ancestor of modern chess. uncountable

    "Engrossed in the study of a small ivory shatranj board with pieces of ebony and horn, […] the African held the place nearest the fire […]"

Example

More examples

"Engrossed in the study of a small ivory shatranj board with pieces of ebony and horn, […] the African held the place nearest the fire […]"

Etymology

From Arabic شَطْرَنْج (šaṭranj), from Early Classical Persian چَتْرَنْگ (čatrang), from Middle Persian 𐭰𐭠𐭲𐭫𐭠𐭭𐭢 (ctlng /⁠čatrang⁠/), from Sanskrit चतुरङ्ग (caturaṅga).

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.