kriegspiel

[ kreeg-speel, -shpeel, kreek- ]

noun

1. (sometimes initial capital letter) a game using small figures and counters that represent troops, ships, etc., played on a map or miniature battlefield, developed for teaching military tactics to officers.
2. a form of chess in which both players see only their own pieces on a board in front of them and must remember the opponent's moves as told to them by a referee who maintains a third board on which the play of both players is shown.

kriegspiel

/ ˈkriːɡˌspiːl /

noun

1. sometimes capital a form of war game in which symbols representing military formations are moved about on maps
2. a variation of chess in which each player has his own board and men and does not see his opponent's board and men. The moves are regulated by an umpire on a third board out of sight of both players

Word History and Origins

Origin of kriegspiel¹

1805–15; < German Kriegsspiel, equivalent to Krieg ( e ) s, genitive of Krieg war + Spiel game

Word History and Origins

Origin of kriegspiel¹

C19: from German Kriegsspiel war game

Example Sentences

And nowhere was that competitive spirit more apparent than at lunchtime, when the scientists began playing Kriegspiel, a chess variant once favored by the German military.

From Washington Post

This, perhaps, is why German military officers in the 19th Century devised a peculiar board game known as Kriegspiel - or "wargame" - as a training tool.

From BBC

The American newspapers were filled with long, though belated, accounts of the brilliant fighting at Ciudad Rodrigo, Almeida, and Badajoz; and these narratives fired the imagination of Prescott, whose eagerness his companion found infectious, so that the two began to play at battles; not after the usual fashion of boys, but in a manner recalling the Kriegspiel of the military schools of modern Germany.

From Project Gutenberg

A year or so later I read in some newspaper that a fortune awaited the man who could invent something that could be applied to ships as the land Kriegspiel to armies.

From Project Gutenberg

Kriegspiel, krēg′spēl, n. the 'war-game' played with metal blocks on a map, to train officers in military manœuvres.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• dress rehearsal
• tryout