This is a set of pieces for Courier Chess, a variety of chess that was
played in the Middle Ages, mainly in Germany. A board of size 8x12
squares is used and each player gets 24 pieces of 9 varieties: 12
Pawns, 2 Rooks, 2 Knights, 2 Elephants, 2 Couriers, 1 Man, 1 Fool, 1
Queen and, of course, 1 King.

The pieces here are modeled after Lucas van Leyden's painting "The
Chess players" from 1508. The volume of each piece roughly represents
its strength: the Rook, for instance, is worth 8.5 Pawns and has a
volume of roughly 8500 mm3. Because of this the Man in my set is
bigger than the Queen.

More information:
http://history.chess.free.fr/courier.htm
https://courierchess.com/