The bishop in other languages

It is interesting that the piece bishop assumes a religious guise in English. In Hindi and Mongolian, it is a camel. Other variations: runner( German,Danish and Swedish ),hunter( Croatian),shooter( Czech). The French version is the fool ( a court jester).

Fil (elephant) in Turkish.

Aξιωματικός (officer) in Greek.

Lähetti (messenger or perhaps in this context runner) in Finnish

Alfil in Spanish which comes from Arabic meaning elephant.

კუ in Georgian. it means turrtle :D

it is interesting that in many langusges its elephant..in hindi rook is elephant.

In French its joker or juggler

Japanese - kakugyou. 角行。

It means "diagonal mover". Arguably the most literal of all shogi/chess piece names.

Haathi :D

Minor correction: it means "the elephant", Al-Fil. "Fil" comes from Persian "pil", elephant. This name is a clear reminiscence of the Asiatic origins of Chess, as war elephants were used in ancient times in India or Persia. While the "al-fil" was not part of the original game, as it was introduced in the XII century, there was a piece called "pil".

In places like England, the name was changed  due to the influence of the Church, as they were usually pictured in the company of the king. I'd rather have a war elephant with archers on top than a cleric in war, if you ask me, and it makes a lot more sense :)

It seems quite sensible to call the bishop Elephant in most languages because this is directly related to the history of chess, as the Alfil is the predecessor of the bishop:
http://www.chessvariants.org/piececlopedia.dir/alfil.html

This reminds me of a web comic on chess :)
http://buttersafe.com/2013/03/28/chess/

The French is similar to the English then.

 ...The French version is the fool ( a court jester).

.........................................................................................

Hey, I resent being called a fool.

In dutch we say: loper. Wich can be translated back to walker, but in this context runner would be better.

Edit: bisschop is also used in dutch. Thats exactly the same as the english bishop ;)

Sometimes people even say 'raadsheer' wich will be translated as councilman

In French we say "fool" because the word "fil" (elephant) sounds like "fol", which means "fool" or "jester" in old French.

Well, I certainly like this thread. 

So do I.

In Australian - that's me Bish, maaaaaaaate!

In my language we say Aana ( elephant) in Malayalam