I borrowed and read this book around the time the 2023 World Chess Championships were held and felt quite proud to be such a topical reader for once! Even though I’ve never heard of the Lewis chessmen before this book, I was intrigued by the subtitle: “The mystery of the most famous chessmen in the world and the woman who made them.”

Split into five rather long chapters, Ivory Vikings looks at the history of the Lewis chessman and talks about who might have made them. The beginning of the book, to be honest, felt a bit like a digression as we go into detail about Berserks and hunting Walruses for their teeth in the first chapter. The second chapter talked a bit about the history in the Britain and Iceland. It was a chapter that reminded me of what I read in Millennium and How Iceland Changed the World – always nice to see books linking to one another!

In fact, I suspect these long digressions are part of the style of the book, because even when we get into the history of the Lewis chessmen and who might have made them, we get a lot of other historical information as well. I would say that the last chapter was probably the most topical one, as it went into how the pieces were found, what the disputes about their origins are about and why. It’s a bit of a pity that this is the last chapter, because it makes the fourth chapter feel very misleading. The fourth chapter is the one that talks about Margaret the Adroit, who is also “the woman who made them” as mentioned in the subtitle and I had the impression that it was an accepted fact that she made the chess pieces until I read the last chapter! As a reader who knew nothing about the history of the Lewis chessmen, this made for a rather muddling introduction to its disputed history.

Additionally, given this is a book about a particular set of chess pieces, I had hoped there would be more photos of them in it. We get one photo of the piece in the chapter title per chapter, and that’s about it. I’m not sure if this is because I’m reading the ebook version, but if you’re looking for close-up pictures of the Lewis chessman to go with the book, you’ll have to search for it elsewhere.

Overall, though, this is a fascinating book that takes uses chess to take the reader on a journey through history. My favourite sections were the ones that were on topic – either about the history and development of chess or about the Lewis chessmen in particular, but readers who are keen to explore Icelandic and the history of the British Isles will enjoy all that the book has to offer.

Featured Image: Photo by ᴊᴀᴄʜʏᴍ ᴍɪᴄʜᴀʟ on Unsplash