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Janggi is one of a family of strategic board games of which Western chess, Japanese Shogi, and the very similar Chinese Xiangqi are also members. Janggi is native to Korea and is therefore sometimes called Korean chess. Other romanizations of the game are changgi, jangki, and tjyangkeui. It is a game that is played on a board that is 9 lines wide by 10 lines long.
Janggi is sometimes fast-paced due to the jumping cannons and the long range elephants, but professional games most often last for over 100 moves and is thus most often slower than western chess. Also, while in Western chess battle is concentrated in the middle few rows for the bulk of the game, in janggi the battle seems to be fought simultaneously all over the board.
History
Janggi is closely related to Xiangqi ("Chinese chess", which it may be a direct descendent of), and more distantly related to Shogi and chess. Like all of these games, it derives from the 6th century Indian game of chaturanga, or a close relative thereof.
Rules
The board is composed of 90 intersections of 9 vertical files and 10 horizontal rows. The board is nearly the same layout as that used in Xiangqi, except that the janggi board has no "river" in the central row. The pieces consist of disks marked with an identifying character and are placed on the intersections of the lines (as in Xiangqi and go). Janggi pieces are sometimes shaped like octagons and differ in size. The sides are green (or blue), which moves first, and red. Each side also has a palace that is 3 lines by 3 lines (i.e. 9 positions) in the center of that side against the back edge of the board. The palace also has four diagonal lines that extend outwards from the center, which form an "X" shape.
Pieces
The pieces are labeled with Chinese characters. The labels on the green pieces are all written in the cursive "draft script", making some pieces barely recognisable. For instance, the green chariot or cha has a cursive version of 車, which looks something like 车 (the Simplified Chinese equivalent of the traditional character).General
The pieces that are equivalent to the kings in Western chess are actually referred to as military generals (janggun) in Korean. They are labelled with the Chinese character Han (in Chinese pinyin: Hàn; 漢) on the red side and Cho (Chǔ; 楚) on the green side. They represent the rival states of Han and Chu that fought for power in the post-Qin Dynasty interregnum period in China (see Chu-Han contention). In North Korea, the Chu-Han setup is not used; the red general is there called jang (chang; 將, "general") and the green general is called gwan (kwan; 官, "minister").Janggi differs from its Chinese counterpart in that the janggi general starts the game from the central intersection of the palace, rather than from the center intersection of the back edge. The general may move to any of the 9 positions within the palace, following the lines marked on the board. There are 4 diagonal lines in the palace connecting the center position to the corners. When the general is lost, the game is lost. The general cannot leave the palace under any circumstances. If the generals come to face each other across the board and the player to move does not move away this is bitjang, a draw. This rule is different to that of Chinese chess where it is illegal for the generals to face.
Guards
The pieces are labeled sa (士) are civilian government officials, i.e. the council members serving the commander in chief. One can call them guards, too, since they stay close to the general. They are also called assistants or mandarins.To both the left and right of the general are the guards. They move the same as general, along the marked lines in the palace. The guards are the weakest pieces because they may not leave the palace. They are invaluable for protecting the general, though.
Elephants
The elephants, sang (象), are located to both the left and the right of the guards. These pieces move one point horizontally or vertically, followed by two points diagonally away from their initial position, ending up on the opposite end of a 2 x 3 rectangle. Unlike Xiangqi, which assigns its elephants a purely defensive role by confining them to one side of the board, behind the "river", janggi does not limit the movement of its elephants to the other side of the board, as there is no river. The Korean elephant is, therefore, much more of an offensive piece than its Chinese counterpart. The elephant can be transposed with the adjacent horse in the setup.Horses
Called the horse or ma (馬), this piece is very similar to the knight in international chess, except that the intersection at the "angle" of the horse's move must not be occupied. The move of the Horse is like that of the elephant, ending its move at the opposite corner of a 1 x 2 rectangle. The horse can be transposed with the adjacent elephant in the setup.Chariots
These are labelled cha (車). Like the rook in European chess, the chariot moves and captures in a straight line either horizontally or vertically. The two chariots begin the game in the corners.Cannons
These are labelled po (包). Each player has two cannons. The cannons are placed on the row behind the pawns, directly in front of the knights. The cannon moves by jumping another piece horizontally or vertically. The jump can be performed over any distance provided that there is exactly one piece anywhere between the original position and the target. In order to capture a piece, there must be exactly one piece (friendly or otherwise) between the cannon and the piece to be captured. The cannon then moves to that point and captures the piece. They are powerful at the beginning of the game when "hurdles" are plentiful, but lose value rapidly with attrition. The other piece over which the cannon jumps may not be another cannon. A cannon may not capture another cannon. Unlike Xiangqi, Janggi requires Cannons to jump in order to move, as well as capture.Soldiers
They are labelled byeong (兵) (soldiers, general term for a soldier) for red and jol (卒) (also means soldiers, usually lowest ranking soldiers) for green respectively. Each side has 5 soldiers. They are placed on alternating points, one row back from the edge of the river. They move, and unlike Pawns in international chess also capture, by moving one space either straight ahead or to either side. Unlike Chinese chess, soldiers do not have to be promoted to move sideways.Ending the game
Stalemate is achieved when no legal moves are possible. A stalemate is a draw.Check is announced by declaring janggun, meaning "general". Getting out of janggun is called meonggun, and one may declare meonggun while escaping from janggun.
Miscellaneous rules
Unlike in western chess, there is no draw by perpetual check or repetition of position. If a position is being repeated, a referee is called to determine who is at fault. Usually the referee orders the player who is losing to make a different move, so the player who is winning can press for an advantage, but sometimes it is not technically clear who is to blame, and different referees may differ as to which player must deviate, or whether repetition is mutually forced.A player may decide to make a move so that his or her General faces the other player's General unobstructed. Such a move forfeits the first player's right to win the game; however, it may be very advantageous. For the rest of that game, the first player can use his or her General to give check to the other player's General. The decision to cause such a situation is driven by the player's desire to avoid either a stalemate or being checkmated.
See also
External links
"Janggi"