, also known as Japanese chess, is a strategy board game for two players. It is one of the most popular board games in Japan and is in the same family of games as Western chess, chaturanga, Xiangqi, Indian chess, and janggi. Shōgi means general's (shō ) board game (gi ). Western chess is sometimes called (Seiyō Shōgi ) in Japan. Shogi was the earliest chess-related historical game to allow captured pieces to be returned to the board by the capturing player. This drop rule is speculated to have been invented in the 15th century and possibly connected to the practice of 15th century mercenaries switching loyalties when captured instead of being killed. The earliest predecessor of the game, chaturanga, originated in India in the sixth century, and the game was likely transmitted to Japan via China or Korea sometime after the Nara period. Shogi in its present form was played as early as the 16th century, while a direct ancestor without the drop rule was recorded from 1210 in a historical document Nichūreki, which is an edited copy of Shōchūreki and Kaichūreki from the late Heian period (c. 1120). Equipment Two players face each other across a board composed of rectangles in a grid of 9 ranks (rows, ) by 9 files (columns, ) yielding an 81 square board. In Japanese they are called Sente (first player) and Gote (second player), but in English are conventionally referred to as Black and White, with Black the first player. The board is nearly always rectangular, and the rectangles are undifferentiated by marking or color. Pairs of dots mark the players' promotion zones. Each player has a set of 20 flat wedge-shaped pentagonal pieces of slightly different sizes. Except for the kings, opposing pieces are undifferentiated by marking or color. Pieces face forward by having the pointed side of each piece oriented toward the opponent's side – this shows who controls the piece during play. The pieces from largest (most important) to smallest (least important) are: 1 king 1 rook 1 bishop 2 gold generals 2 silver generals 2 knights 2 lances 9 pawns Several of these names were chosen to correspond to their rough equivalents in international chess, and not as literal translations of the Japanese names. Each piece has its name written on its surface in the form of two kanji (Chinese characters used in Japanese), usually in black ink.