noun, masculine/esˈkake/plural: escaques
a tile of a board to play chess or checkers; chess
Borrowed from Medieval Latin scaccum or a corresponding Romance word, e.g. Catalan escac (“check!; chess piece”) and escacs (“chess”), from Arabic شَاه (šāh, “shah; king in chess”) or شَاهُك (šāhuk, “your king”); see related jaque. Cognate with Italian scacco, French échec, Old Occitan escac (“chess”), Portuguese escaque. Alternatively, Coromines & Pascual suspect it may instead descend from ultimately a Germanic borrowing, as in Frankish *skāk (“robbery”) and Lombardic *skāk, cognate with Galli