Chess

When a game begins, one player controls the sixteen white pieces while the other uses the sixteen black pieces. The colors are chosen either by a friendly agreement, by a game of chance such as pick-a-hand, or by a tournament director. The first player, referred to as White, always moves first and therefore has a slight advantage over the second player, referred to as Black. The chessboard is placed so that each player has a white square in the near right hand corner, and the pieces are set out as shown in the diagram, with each queen on a square that matches its color.

Each kind of chess piece moves a different way.

• The king can move only one square horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. The player can not make any move that would place his king in check. Once in the game, each king is allowed to make a special double move, to castle. Castling consists of moving the king two squares towards a rook, then moving the rook onto the square over which the king crossed. Castling is only permissible if all of the following conditions hold:

1. The player must never have moved the king;
2. The player must never have moved the rook involved in castling;
3. There must be no pieces between the king and the rook;
4. The king may not currently be in check, nor may the king pass through squares that are under attack by enemy pieces. As with any move, castling is illegal if it would place the king in check.
5. The king and the rook must be on the same rank (to exclude castling with a promoted pawn).

• The rook moves any number of vacant squares vertically or horizontally (it is also involved in the king's special move of castling);
• The bishop moves any number of vacant squares in any direction diagonally;
• The queen is a combination of the rook and bishop - it can move any number of vacant squares diagonally, horizontally, or vertically;
• The knight can jump over occupied squares and moves two spaces horizontally and one space vertically or vice versa, making an "L" shape. A knight in the middle of the board has eight squares to which it can move. Note that every time a knight moves, it changes square color.
• Pawns have the most complex rules of movement:

• A pawn can move forward one square, if that square is unoccupied. If it has not moved yet, the pawn has the option of moving two squares forward, if both squares in front of the pawn are unoccupied. A pawn cannot move backward.
• When such an initial two square advance is made that puts that pawn horizontally adjacent to an opponent's pawn, the opponent's pawn can capture that pawn "en passant" as if it moved forward only one square rather than two, but only on the immediately subsequent move.
• Pawns are the only pieces that capture differently than they move. They can capture an enemy piece on either of the two spaces adjacent to the space in front of them (i.e., the two squares diagonally in front of them), but cannot move to these spaces if they are vacant.
• If a pawn advances all the way to its eighth rank, it is then promoted (converted) to a queen, rook, bishop, or knight of the same color. In practice, the pawn is almost always promoted to a queen.

With the exception of the knight, pieces cannot jump over each other. One's own pieces ("friendly pieces") cannot be passed if they are in the line of movement, and a friendly piece can never replace another friendly piece. Enemy pieces cannot be passed, but they can be "captured". When a piece is captured (or taken), the attacking piece replaces the enemy piece on its square (en passant being the only exception). The captured piece is thus removed from the game and may not be returned to play for the remainder of the game.<ref>Note, however, that a captured piece is often used as a "new" piece, following the promotion of a pawn. The new piece is nevertheless regarded distinct from the original captured piece; it is simply used for convenience. Moreover, the player's choice by promotion is not restricted to pieces that have been captured previously. FIDE Laws of Chess, 3.7e</ref> The king cannot be captured, only put in check. If a player is unable to get the king out of check, checkmate results, with the loss of the game.

Chess games do not have to end in checkmate — either player may resign if the situation looks hopeless. Games also may end in a draw (tie). A draw can occur in several situations, including draw by agreement, stalemate, threefold repetition of a position, the fifty move rule, or a draw by impossibility of checkmate (usually because of insufficient material to checkmate).

The international rules of chess are described in more detail in the FIDE Handbook, section Laws of Chess.<ref>World Chess Federation. FIDE Laws of Chess. Retrieved 30 November 2006.</ref>

[edit] Time control

Main article: Time control

Besides the usual casual game without exact timing, there are other ways to play chess, used mostly by club and professional players. Today, the standard tournament or match games are always played with a chess clock and the timing ranges from long games played up to seven hours to shorter rapid chess games lasting usually 30 minutes or one hour per game. Even shorter is blitz chess with a time control of three to fifteen minutes for each player and bullet chess (under three minutes). If the player's time runs out, he loses.

[edit] Notation for recording moves

Main article: Chess notation

Chess games and positions are recorded using a chess notation, most often the algebraic chess notation. The abbreviated (or short) algebraic notation generally records moves in the format abbreviation of the piece moved - file where it moved - rank where it moved, e.g. Qg5 means "Queen moved to file g and rank 5 (that is, to the field g5). If there are two pieces of the same type, which can move to the same field, one more letter or number is added to indicate the file or rank from which the piece moved, e.g. Ngf3 means "Knight from the file g moved to the field f3". Letter P indicating pawns is usually dropped, so that e4 means "Pawn moved to the field e4".

If the piece captures, "x" is inserted behind the abbreviation of the piece, e.g. Bxf3 means "Bishop captured on f3". When a pawn makes a capture, the file from which the pawn departed is used in place of a piece initial. For example, exd5 (pawn on the e-file captures the piece on d5). If a pawn moves to its last rank, achieving promotion, the piece chosen is indicated after the move, for example e1Q. Castling is indicated by the special notations 0-0 for kingside castling and 0-0-0 for queenside. A move which places the opponent's king in check usually has the notation "+" added. Checkmate can be indicated "#" (some use "++"). At the end of the game, "1-0" means "White won", "0-1" means "Black won" and "½-½" indicates draw.

Chess moves can be commented by punctuation. For example ! indicates a good move, !! an excellent move, ? a mistake, ?? a blunder, !? an interesting move that may not be best or ?! a dubious move, but not easily refuted.

For example, one variant of a simple trap known as the Scholar's mate, animated in the picture rights, can be recorded:
1. e4 e5
2. Qh5?! Nc6
3. Bc4 Nf6??
4. Qxf7# 1-0

[edit] History

[edit] Predecessors

Main article: Origins of chess

Image:Youth at chess with suitors - Haft Awrang.jpg

Many countries claim to have invented chess in some incipient form. The most commonly held view is that chess originated in India,<ref>H.J.R. Murray (1913). A History of Chess. Benjamin Press (originally published by Oxford University Press). ISBN 0-936-317-01-9.</ref> since the Arabic, Persian, Greek, Portuguese and Spanish words for chess are all derived from the Sanskrit game Chaturanga. In addition, in the past only India had all three animals, horse, camel and elephant, in its cavalry, which represent knight, bishop and rook in chess. The present version of chess played throughout the world ultimately derives from a version of Chaturanga that was played in India around the 6th century. It is believed that the Persians subsequently created a more recognizable version of the game called Shatranj.

Another theory exists that chess arose from the similar game of Xiangqi (Chinese chess), or at least a predecessor thereof, existing in China since the 2nd century BC.<ref>David H. Li (1998). The Genealogy of Chess. Premier Pub. Co. ISBN 0-963-785-22-2.</ref> Scholars who have favored this theory include Joseph Needham and David H. Li.

Chess eventually spread westward to Europe and eastward as far as Japan, spawning variants as it went. The game spread throughout the Muslim world after the Islamic conquest of Persia. When it entered the Muslim world, the names of its pieces largely retained their Persian forms but its name became shatranj, which continued in Spanish as ajedrez and in Greek as zatrikion, but in most of Europe it was replaced by versions of the Persian word shāh = "king".

Chess eventually reached Russia via Mongolia, where it was played at the beginning of the 7th century. It was introduced into the Iberian Peninsula by the Moors in the 10th century, and described in a famous 13th century manuscript covering chess, backgammon, and dice named the Libro de los juegos.

[edit] Origins of the modern game (1450—1850)

Early on, the pieces in shatranj - the predecessor of the European chess - had limited movement; elephants (bishops) could only move by jumping exactly two spaces diagonally, the counsellor (queen) could move only one space diagonally, pawns could not move two spaces on their first move, and there was no castling.

Image:André Philidor.jpg

By the end of the 15th century, the modern rules for the basic moves had been adopted in Italy: pawns gained the option of moving two squares on their first move and the en passant capture therewith, bishops acquired their modern move, and the queen was made the most powerful piece; consequently modern chess was referred to as "Queen's Chess" or "Mad Queen Chess".<ref>Raymond A Collett. Early Chess. Retrieved 30 November 2006.</ref> The game in Europe since that time has been almost the same as is played today.<ref>The current rules were finalized in the early 19th century, except for the exact conditions for a draw. See Stalemate#History of the stalemate rule.</ref>

Chess, with its new rules, started to develop a theory. Early masters of the 16th and 17th century like Portuguese Pedro Damiano, Italians Giovanni Leonardo Di Bona, Giulio Cesare Polerio and Gioacchino Greco or Spanish priest Ruy López de Segura developed elements of some chess openings, e.g. Italian Game, King's Gambit or Ruy Lopez, and started to analyze simple endgames.

In the 18th century the centre of European chess life moved from South-European countries to France. The two most important French masters were François-André Danican Philidor, a musician by profession, who discovered the importance of pawns for chess strategy, and later Louis-Charles Mahé de La Bourdonnais who won a famous series of matches with the strongest British master of the time, Alexander McDonnell from Ireland, in 1834.<ref>Louis Charles Mahe De La Bourdonnai. Chessgames.com. Retrieved 30 November 2006.</ref>

Image:JaquesCookStaunton.jpg

During the 19th century, chess organization developed quickly. Many chess clubs, chess books and chess journals appeared. There were correspondence matches between cities, for example London Chess Club vs Edinburgh Chess Club in 1824.<ref>London Chess Club. Chessgames.com. Retrieved 30 November 2006.</ref> Chess problems, at the top level composed for example by Bernhard Horwitz, Josef Kling or Samuel Loyd, became regular part of 19th century newspapers. In the mid of the century, the first comprehensive manual of chess theory appeared, Handbuch des Schachspiels (Handbook of Chess) written by German masters Paul Rudolf von Bilguer and Tassilo von Heydebrand und der Lasa and first published in 1843.

[edit] Birth of a sport (1850—1945)

Image:AnimECHECS-Gambit-du-Roi1.gif
The "Immortal game" Anderssen-Kieseritzky 1851

The first modern chess tournament was held in London in 1851 and was surprisingly won by German Adolf Anderssen, relatively unknown by the time. Anderssen was hailed as the leading chess master and his brilliant, energetic — but from today's viewpoint strategically shallow — attacking style became typical for the time.<ref>Chess history. worldchessnetwork.com. Retrieved 30 November 2006.</ref> Sparkling games like Anderssen's Immortal game or Morphy's Opera game — both short casual games with many sacrifices — were regarded as the highest possible summon of the chess art.

Deeper insight into the nature of chess battle came with two younger players. American Paul Morphy, an extraordinary chess prodigy, won over all important competitors including Anderssen during his short chess career between 1857 and 1863. Morphy won not only because he was able to attack brilliantly, but also because of the strategical soundness of his moves — he intuitively knew how to prepare the attack in advance. This secret was later re-invented and described by another strong master and theoretician, Prague-born Wilhelm Steinitz, who later settled in Vienna, in London and died in the USA.

Image:Wilhelm Steinitz2.jpg

Besides his theoretical successes, Steinitz founded another important tradition: His won match against the leading German master Johannes Zukertort in 1886 is regarded as the first official World Chess Championship, and Steinitz the first champion. He lost his crown in 1894 to much younger German mathematician Emanuel Lasker, who maintained this title for 27 years, the longest tenure of all World Champions.

The prodigy from Cuba José Raúl Capablanca (World champion 1921—1927), who ended the German-speaking dominance in chess, loved simple positions and endgames and was very hard to beat — he lost no single tournament game during eight years around 1920. His follower was Russian-French Alexander Alekhine, a strong attacking player, who died as the World champion in 1946, having lost the title for a short time to Dutch player Max Euwe, but regaining it again.

Image:Capablanca-Lasker 1925.jpg

Between the two World wars, chess was revolutionized by the new theoretical school of so-called hypermodernists like Aron Nimzowitsch or Richard Réti. They denied simple principles of older positional school of Steinitz and Tarrasch and advocated controlling the centre of the board with distant pieces rather than with pawns, thus inviting the opponent to occupy the centre with pawns which can then become objects of attack.

Since the end of 19th century, the number of annually held master tournaments and matches quickly grew. In 1914, the title of chess grandmaster was first formally conferred by Russian Tsar Nicholas II, who awarded it to five finalists of a tournament in Saint Petersburg (Lasker, Capablanca, Alekhine, Tarrasch and Marshall). This tradition was later continued by FIDE, The Fédération Internationale des Échecs or World Chess Federation, founded in 1924 in Paris. In 1927, a World Champion title for women was established, whose first bearer was Czech-English master Vera Menchik.

[edit] Post-war era (1945 and later)

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After the death of Alekhine, a new World champion was sought in a tournament of elite players ruled by FIDE, who since then controlled the title for decades. The winner of the 1948 tournament, Russian Mikhail Botvinnik, started an era of Soviet dominance in the chess world — since then until the end of Soviet Union, there was only one champion other than Soviet, American Robert James Fischer (champion 1972-1975). All others — Mikhail Botvinnik, Vasily Smyslov, Mikhail Tal, Tigran Petrosian, Boris Spassky, Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov — were Soviet citizens.

In 1993, Garry Kasparov and Nigel Short broke with FIDE to organize their own match for the title. They complained of corruption and a lack of professionalism within FIDE, and formed a competing Professional Chess Association (PCA). Since then there have been two simultaneous World Champions and World Championships: the PCA champion extending the Steinitzian tradition in which the current champion plays a challenger in match format (a series of many games); the other following FIDE's new format of a tournament with many players competing. Reunification of the two lineages happened in 2006 in the FIDE World Chess Championship 2006 when PCA World Champion Vladimir Kramnik won over the FIDE World Chess Champion Veselin Topalov and become the undisputed World Chess Champion.

[edit] Strategy and tactics

Main article: Chess strategy and tactics

[edit] Fundamentals of strategy