Chess, often 1 to as the Royal Game, is the oldest of all board games which do not contain an element of chance. The origins of chess are uncertain, 2 there are a number of legends regarding its invention. One story 3 that it was King Solomon who invented chess, another that it was the Greek god Hermes, and yet another that the Chinese mandarin Han-Sing was 4 for its creation. In fact, chess almost certainly 5 in India in the 6th or 7th century AD. The game’s 6 then spread quickly through Persia (now 7 as Iran) and from there came to Europe. The first documented reference to chess in literature is in a Persian romance which was written about 600 AD. It is 8 the word ‘chess’ comes from ‘shah’, the Persian word for ‘king’ and that ‘checkmate’, the game’s winning move, comes from the phrase ‘shah mat’, meaning ‘the king is dead’.