where did chess orginate

Originally posted by Joe Fist
http://www.markalowery.net/Chess/Chess_origin.html

But I've heard it said the game originated in either Iraq or Iran with much fewer pieces, one of them being a "Shah". The game then migrated to Europe and the Shah was replaced by the Queen. I'm not sure on what century this all happened.

It's not clear, like a lot of history, there are a number of related games. Actually the Indian game mentionned above which is one of the fore-runners involved four people (according to what I read) and the two player version is what survives.
Modern European chess started in the 14th century when they introduced castling and made the queen much more powerful (she used to have only the same moves as the king), also they let you move the pawn two forward in the opening and - you can just imagine the arguments - the compromise that came out of that is the en passant rule.
The best answer to the question is: where the was civilization and from when there was civilization there were chess-like games.

It's all lies, chess was invented by me when I went back in time to remove all mention of the presence of dinosaurs from the bible during it's second edit. It seemed like a good idea at the time, you know, encourage debate that sort of thing. But I got bored and decided to take a side trip to India, saw some game they were playing and made a few improvements, they thanked me and I went on my way. However on the way back some members of the Chinese court whom I had intended just to pay a short visit to, complained when I mentioned the topic in passing. And since I had already spent the day seeding contorversy throughout the annals history, I decided it might be fun to add yet another curious twist of happenstance.

I only confess now because I shortly plan to journey back to 2000 and unrig the American election which I foolishly upset due to a night of debauchery and began attending to my duties with a hangover. Consequently you shall all be privy to this bit of information only for as long as it takes me to find th keys to my time machine.

As they say in the time trade: You will not have seen me, I will not have been here 🙂

Originally posted by Starrman
It's all lies, chess was invented by me when I went back in time to remove all mention of the presence of dinosaurs from the bible during it's second edit. It seemed like a good idea at the time, you know, encourage debate that sort of thing. But I got bored and decided to take a side trip to India, saw some game they were playing and made a few improve ...[text shortened]... ine.

As they say in the time trade: You will not have seen me, I will not have been here 🙂

I read somewhere (can't remember where) - that chess was invented / developed by the warriors besieging Troy...

This was one loooooong siege (years - not hours as suggested by Brad & his chums)