Chessboard

The word is a transparent English compound, but each half carries a long history. “Board” is Old English bord, “a plank, flat surface,” with the sense “table upon which a game is played” recorded from the late 14th century. “Chess” entered English in the 13th century through Old French esches, the plural of eschec “game of chess, chessboard; checkmate,” itself descending from a chain running Sanskrit chaturanga “four members of an army” through Persian chatrang to Arabic (al) shatranj. The object predates the English word: the 8×8 uncheckered ashtapada of 6th-century India is the board's ancestor, the checkered light/dark pattern was acquired in 10th-century Europe, and the 1283 Libro de los juegos described the 8×8 board as the ideal one. The convention of orienting the board with a light square at each player's right was endorsed by Pedro Damiano at the end of the 15th century.

First documented: a1451 — Will of York, printed in Surtees Society vol. 45 — the Middle English Dictionary's earliest quotation under “ches,” sense 2(a): “Item, j cheseborde.” The two-word form “chesse bordes” appears in 1467.