CHESSMAN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does chessman mean? 

• CHESSMAN (noun)
  The noun CHESSMAN has 1 sense:

1. any of 16 white and 16 black pieces used in playing the game of chess

  Familiarity information: CHESSMAN used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CHESSMAN (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Any of 16 white and 16 black pieces used in playing the game of chess

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

chess piece; chessman

Hypernyms ("chessman" is a kind of...):

man; piece (game equipment consisting of an object used in playing certain board games)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "chessman"):

bishop ((chess) a piece that can be moved diagonally over unoccupied squares of the same color)

castle; rook ((chess) the piece that can move any number of unoccupied squares in a direction parallel to the sides of the chessboard)

king ((chess) the weakest but the most important piece)

horse; knight (a chessman shaped to resemble the head of a horse; can move two squares horizontally and one vertically (or vice versa))

pawn ((chess) the least powerful piece; moves only forward and captures only to the side; it can be promoted to a more powerful piece if it reaches the 8th rank)

queen ((chess) the most powerful piece)

Holonyms ("chessman" is a part of...):

chess set (checkerboard and a set of 32 pieces used to play chess)

 Context examples 

The famous Lewis chessmen are made of walrus tusk.

(Over-hunting walruses contributed to the collapse of Norse Greenland, University of Cambridge)

Aghast, he dropped the manuscript among the chessmen and stared in bewilderment round the room.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He could turn cramp-bones into chessmen; fashion Roman chariots from old court cards; make spoked wheels out of cotton reels, and bird-cages of old wire.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

All this Alleyne examined with curious eyes; but most interesting of all to him was a small ebony table at his very side, on which, by the side of a chess-board and the scattered chessmen, there lay an open manuscript written in a right clerkly hand, and set forth with brave flourishes and devices along the margins.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)