One of the most common ways for chess historians to trace when the board game chess entered a country is to look at the literature of that country. Although due to the names associated with chess sometimes being used for more then one game (for instance Xiang-qi in China and Tables in England), the only certain reference to chess is often several hundred years later than uncertain earlier references.

The earliest dates for strong references include,

Byzantium

a. 923 AD - at-Tabari's Kitab akhbar ar-rusul wal-muluk (note the work is an arabic work, no early greek works are known)

China

c. 900 AD - Huan Kwai Lu ('Book of Marvels')

England

c. 1180 AD - Alexander Neckam's De Natura Rerum (note that it is thought that Neckam may have learnt of chess in Italy, not in England)

France

a. 1127 AD - A song of Guilhem IX Count of Poitiers and Duke of Aquitaine.

Germany

c. 1030 AD - Ruodlieb

India

1148 AD - Kalhana's Rajatarangini (translated by MA Stein, 1900)

The King, though he had taken two kings (Lothana and Vigraharaja) was helpless and perplexed about the attack on the remaining one, just as a player of chess (who has taken two Kings and is perplexed about taking a third).

(note this refers to the old four-handed chess sometime known as chaturagi).

Italy

c. 1062 AD - Letter from Petrus Damiani (Cardinal Bishop of Ostia) to the Pope-elect Alexander II and the Archdeacon Hildebrand.

Persia

c. 600 AD - Karnamak-i-Artakhshatr-i-Papakan

Artakhshir did this, and by God's help he became doughtier and more skilled than them all in ball-play, in horsemanship, in chess, in hunting and in all other accomplishments.

(It is fairly certain chess is meant due to the word chatrang being used).

Spain

c. 1009 AD - castrensian will of Ermengaud I (Count of Urgel)

I order you, my executors, to give . . . these my chessmen to the convent of St. Giles, for the work of the church.

Sumatra

c. 1620 AD - Sejarah Malayu

Now this Tan Bahra was a very skillful chessplayer, and one that was unequalled at the game in that age, and he played at chess with the men of Malacca.

Switzerland

c. 1000 AD - Manuscript 319 at Stiftsbibliothek Einsiedeln.

References

• HJR Murray, A History of Chess, (Oxford University Press)

• Helena M. Gamer, The Earliest Evidence of Chess in Western Literature: The Einsiedeln Verses, Speculum, Vol. 29, No. 4. (October 1954), pp. 734-750.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

The exact location, time and method of the entry of chess into western Europe is unknown, however linguistic evidence suggest that it was almost certainly obtained from the Arabs.

However the earliest western evidence of chess is dated to the eleventh century at the very earliest, still a signifcant time after the arabs themselves had discovered chess. Given that prior to eleventh century the arabs had substantial settlements in Spain, France and Italy knowing that our version of chess came from the arabs has not helped in identifying the entry point.

Philogical evidence points to an earlier date than archeological and literary evidence currently suggests, indicating that the game entered Europe perhaps as early as 900 AD.

References

• HJR Murray, A History of Chess, (Oxford University Press)

• Helena M. Gamer, The Earliest Evidence of Chess in Western Literature: The Einsiedeln Verses, Speculum, Vol. 29, No. 4. (October 1954), pp. 734-750.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

* In 1976 the USSR and other communist coutries did not compete for political reasons.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

The Cox-Forbes theory is a theory on the evolution of chess put forward by Captain Hiram Cox and extended by Professor Duncan Forbes.

The theory states that a four-handed dice-chess game was played in India in approximately 3000 BC; due to the results of certain rules or the difficulty in getting enough players the game evolved into a two-handed game. Due to religious and legal objections to gambling the dice were dropped from the game, making it a game purely of skill.

The theory was mostly based on evidence in the Indian text Purana, but more recent study of the work has shown the evidence to be weaker than previously thought. Also the work is now assigned a more conservative date of 500 BC rather than the earlier 3000 BC. As a result the theory is now rejected by most chess historians.

Introduction

The immortal game is a famous chess game played in 1851 by Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritzsky. It is one of the most famous chess games of all time.

Adolf Anderssen was one of the strongest players of his time, and was considered by many to be the world champion after winning the 1851 London tournament. Lionel Kieseritzky lived in France much of his life, where he gave chess lessons or played games for 5 francs an hour at the Cafe de la Regence, Paris, France. Kieseritzky was well-known for being able to beat lesser players in spite of great odds.

This was an informal game played between these two great players at the Simpon's on the Strand Divan in London. Kieseritsky was very impressed when the game was over, and telegraphed the game moves to his Parisian chess club. The French chess magazine "La Regence" published the game in July 1851. This game was later nicknamed "The Immortal Game" in 1855 by the Australian Ernst Falkbeer.

The immortal game has resurfaced in many unusual guises. The town of Marostica, Italy has replayed the immortal game with living persons every year, beginning on September 2, 1923. The position after the 20th move is on a 1984 stamp from Surinam. The final part of the game was used as an inspiration for the chess game in the movie Blade Runner in 1982, though the chessboards are not arranged exactly the same (in fact, in the movie Sebastian's and Tyrell's board do not even match each other).

This game is an excellent demonstration of the style of chess play in the 1800s, where rapid development and attack were considered the most effective way to win, where many gambits and counter-gambits were offered (and not accepting them would be considered slightly ungentlemanly), and where material was often held in contempt. These games, with their rapid attacks and counter-attacks, are quite fun to review, even if the some of the moves would no longer be considered the best ones by today's standards.

In this game, Anderssen demonstrates amazing cleverness - he sacrifices a bishop on move 11, then sacrifices both rooks starting on move 18, and wraps it up with a queen sacrifice on move 22 to produce checkmate. Anderssen later demonstrated the same kind of extraordinary cleverness in the evergreen game.

The game is given below in algebraic chess notation. Note that some published versions of the game have errors, as described in the annotations.

Annotated moves of the game

1. e4 e5 2. f4

This is the King's Gambit: Anderssen offers his pawn in exchange for faster development.

2...exf4

Kieseritsky accepts the gambit; this variant is thus called the King's Gambit Accepted. This was a common opening in the 1800s; it's less common today, as black is often able to eventually equalize development, so white will be down in material.

3. Bc4 Qh4+

Kieseritsky's move will force Anderssen to move his king and Anderssen will not be able to castle, but this move also places Kieseritsky's queen in peril, and Kieseritsky will have to waste time to protect it.

John Savard's commentary claims that the moves were actually: 3.... b5 4. Bxb5 Qh4+ 5. Kg1 with the moves afterwards the same. These are transposed positions, with the final resulting position the same. However, no other work claims this is correct, so this is unlikely to be correct.

4. Kf1 b5?

This is the Bryan gambit, named after Thomas Jefferson Bryan. It's not considered a sound move by most players today.

Position after 4. ... b5?

5. Bxb5 Nf6 6. Nf3

This is a common developing move, but the knight now attacks black's queen, forcing black to protect it instead of developing his own side.

6...Qh6 7. d3

With this move, white now has solidified control over the critical center of the board. German grandmaster Robert Huebner recommends 7. Nc3 instead.

7...Nh5

This move does threaten Ng3+, and it protects the pawn at f4, but it also sidelines the knight to a poor position at the edge of the board - where knights are the least powerful.

8. Nh4 Qg5

John Savard claims this is 8.... c6, but this is an error in Savard's documentation.

9. Nf5 c6

This simultaneously unpins the queen pawn and attacks the bishop. However, some have suggested 9.... g6 would be better, to deal with a very troublesome knight.

10. g4 Nf6 11. Rg1!

This is a clever piece sacrifice. If black accepts, his queen will be moved away from the action, giving white a lead in development.

Position after 11. Rg1!

11.... cxb5?

Huebner believes this was the critical mistake; this gains material, but loses in development, at a point where white's strong development is able to quickly mount an offensive. Huebner recommends 11. ...h5 instead.

12. h4!

A clever move. White's knight at f5 protects the pawn, which is attacking black's queen.

12...Qg6 13. h5 Qg5 14. Qf3

Anderssen now has two threats:

• Bxf4, which will snatch black's queen (the queen has no safe place to go),

• e5, which would attack black's knight at f6 while simultaneously exposing an attack by white's queen on the unprotected black rook at a8.

14...Ng8

This deals with the threats, but undevelops black even further - now the only black piece not on its starting square is the queen, which is about to be put on the run, while white has control over an immense amount of the board.

15. Bxf4 Qf6 16. Nc3 Bc5

An ordinary developing move by black, which also attacks the rook at g1.

17. Nd5

Anderssen responds to the attack with a counter-attack. This move threatens Nc7, which would fork the king and rook. Richard Reti recommends 17. d4 ... 18. Nd5, which results in an advantage for white.

17...Qxb2

Black gains a pawn, and threatens to gain the rook at a1 with check.

Position after 17... Qxb2

18. Bd6!!

This is an amazingly clever sacrifice - white offers to sacrifice both his rooks! However, there is controversy about this move. Huebner comments that, from this position, there are actually many ways to win, and he believes there are at least 3 better moves than Bd6: d4, Be3, or Re1, which lead to strong positions or checkmate without needing to sacrifice so much material. However, Grandmaster Garry Kasparov has pointed out that the world of chess would have lost one of its "crown jewels" if the game had continued in such an unspectacular fashion. This particular move is quite striking because white is willing to give up so much material.

18... Bxg1?

This is a mistake, resulting in the loss of the game as the next moves show. Steinitz suggested in 1879 that a better move would be 18... Qxa1+; likely moves to follow are 19. Ke2 Qb2 20. Kd2 Bxg1.

Note that "The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games" has a mistake at this point; move 18 black through move 20 black inclusive are different. "Mammoth" records the moves as: 18... Qxa1+ 19. Ke2 Bxg1 20. e5 Na6 21. Nxg7+ Kd8 22. Qf6+!! Nxf6 Be7# 1-0 However, it seems to be quite alone in this claim; other resources including Eade's book and the Chesslive Online Database give the moves listed here. Nor does "Mammoth" explain why it has a different move sequence than other works. The commentary here presumes that "Mammoth" is in error at this point. Note that this is a reordering of the moves, and the positions become the same again at the end of move 20.

19. e5!

This sacrifices yet another white rook. More importantly, this move prevents the black queen from protecting black's g7 pawn - in fact, the black queen won't be able to easily return to defend black's king at all. It sets up a dangerous possible attack, 20. Nxg7+ Kd8 21. Bc7#.

19...Qxa1+ 20. Ke2

At this point, black's attack has run out of power; black has a queen and bishop on the back row, but can't effectively mount an immediate attack on white, while white can storm forward. According to Bill Wall, Kieseritzky resigned at this point. Huebner notes that an article by Friedrich Amelung in the journal Baltische Schachblaetter, 1893, reported that Kiesertizky probably played 20... Na6, but Anderssen then announced the mating moves. In any case, it's suspected that the last few moves were not actually played on the board in the original game.

20...Na6

This move was probably made to counter 21. Nc7, which would fork the black king and rook, and it prevents the bishop from occupying c7 as part of a mating attack, but white has another dangerous attack available.

21. Nxg7+ Kd8 22. Qf6+

This is a queen sacrifice, on top of the earlier sacrifices of a bishop and both rooks, and black cannot avoid taking the queen.

Position after 22. Qf6+

22...Nxf6 23. Be7# 1-0

At the end, black is way ahead in material: a queen and two rooks ahead, plus the advantage of having both bishops, while having only one less pawn. But the material doesn't matter. White has been able to use his remaining pieces (just 2 knights and a bishop!) together to force mate.

References

• Burgess, Graham, John Nunn, and John Emms. The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games. 1998. New York: Carroll and Graf Publishers, Inc. ISBN 0-7867-0587-6. This detailed summary unfortunately has an error starting in move 18.

• Chernev, Irving. The Chess Companion. 1968. ISBN 0-671-20104-2.

• Eade, James. Chess for Dummies. 1996. Foster City, CA: IDG Books Worldwide, Inc. ISBN 0-7645-5003-9.

• Kavalek, Lubomir. Chess (newspaper column). Washington Post. July 2003.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

The evergreen game is the name of a famous chess game was played in 1852 by Adolf Anderssen and Jean Dufresne.

Adolf Anderssen was one of the stongest players of his time, and was considered by many to be the world champion after winning the 1851 London tournament. Jean Dufresne was popular author of chess books, and did manage to win a few games against masters.

This was an informal game, like the "immortal game". Grandmaster Wilhelm Steinitz later identified the game as being the "evergreen in Anderssen's laurel wr[e]ath", giving this game its name.

The game is recorded below in algebraic notation. It can also be downloaded in PGN format.

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. b4

This is the "Evans Gambit", a favorite opening in the 1800s and still used today. White gives up material to gain an advantage in development.

4...Bxb4 5. c3 Ba5 6. d4 exd4 7. O-O d3?!

This isn't considered by many to be a good response; alternatives include dxc3 or d6.

8. Qb3!?

This immediately attacks, in particular the f7 pawn, but Burgess suggests Re1 instead.

8.... Qf6 9. e5 Qg6

The e5 pawn can't be captured right now; if 9... Nxe5, then 10. Re1 d6 11. Qb5+ at which point black has lost a piece.

10. Re1! Nge7 11. Ba3 b5?!

Instead of defending, this is a counter-sacrifice. This is a bad idea, since white has a better strategic position. Burgess suggests instead ...a6, to allow the b-pawn to advance later.

12. Qxb5 Rb8 13. Qa4 Bb6

Black cannot play O-O here, because 14. Bxe7 would overwhelm the knight on c6.}

14. Nbd2 Bb7 15. Ne4 Qf5? 16. Bxd3 Qh5 17. Nf6+!?

This is a beautiful sacrifice. Burgess notes that 17. Ng3 Qh6 18. Bc1 Qe6 19. Bc4 wins material in a much simpler way.

17.... gxf6 18. exf6 Rg8 19. Rad1! 19.... Qxf3

The black queen can just dangle on f3, because the rook on g8 pins the white pawn on g2.

20. Rxe7+! 20.... Nxe7? 21. Qxd7+!! Kxd7 22. Bf5+

A double-check, which is almost always dangerous. It's certainly dangerous in this case.

22.... Ke8 23. Bd7+ Kf8 24. Bxe7# 1-0

References

• Burgess, Graham, John Nunn, and John Emms. The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games. 1998. New York: Carroll and Graf Publishers, Inc. ISBN 0-7867-0587-6.

• Eade, James. Chess for Dummies. 1996. Foster City, CA: IDG Books Worldwide, Inc. ISBN 0-7645-5003-9.

• Wheeler, David A.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

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The Opera Game is a famous chess game played in 1858 between an American Paul Morphy and a German and French aristocrat (Karl, Duke of Brunswick and Count Isouard), playing together.

The Frenchmen invited Morphy to the Paris Opera, then asking him to join them in a chess game. The Duke and the Count (playing black) were allowed to consult each other during play.

The game has been much reproduced in the years since it was played and is often used by chess teachers to demonstrate the importance of rapidly developing one's pieces. It is given here in algebraic notation.

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6

This is Philidor's Defense.

3. d4 Bg4

3...exd4 is more normal. 3...f5 is a more aggressive alternative.

4. dxe5 Bxf3

If ... dxe5, then 5. Qxd8 Kxd8 and Black has lost the right to castle.

5. Qxf3 dxe5 6. Bc4 Nf6 7. Qb3 Qe7 8. Nc3

White prefers fast development to material.

8. ... c6 9. Bg5 b5 10. Nxb5!

Morphy chooses not to retreat the bishop, which would allow Black to gain time for development.

10. ... cxb5 11. Bxb5+ Nbd7 12. 0-0-0

The combination of the bishop's pin on the knight and the open file for the rook will lead to Black's defeat.

12. ... Rd8 13. Rxd7 Rxd7 14. Rd1 Qe6

Compare the activity of the White pieces with the idleness of the Black pieces.

15. Bxd7+ Nxd7

If ... Qxd7, then 16. Qb8+ Ke7 17. Qxe5+ Kd8 18. Bxf6+ gxf6 19. Qxf6+ Kc8 20. Rxd7 Kxd7 21. Qxh8 and White is clearly winning.

16. Qb8+! Nxb8 17. Rd8#

The game in PGN format

[Event "Informal Game"]
[Site "Paris, France FRA"]
[Date "1858.??.??"]
[Round "-"]
[White "Morphy, Paul"]
[Black "Duke of Brunswick and Count Isouard"]
[Result "1-0"]

1. e4 e5
2. Nf3 d6
{This is Philidor's Defense.}

3. d4 Bg4
4. dxe5 Bxf3
{If ... dxe5, then 5. Qxd8 Kxd8 and Black has lost the castling privilege.}

5. Qxf3 dxe5
6. Bc4 Nf6
7. Qb3 Qe7
8. Nc3
{White prefers fast development to material.}

8. ... c6
9. Bg5 b5
10. Nxb5!
{Morphy chooses not to retreat the bishop, which would allow Black to gain time for development.}
 
10. ... cxb5
11. Bxb5+ Nbd7
12. 0-0-0
{The combination of the bishop's pin on the knight and the open file for the rook will lead to Black's defeat.}

12. ... Rd8
13. Rxd7 Rxd7
14. Rd1 Qe6
{Compare the activity of the White pieces with the idleness of the Black pieces.}

15. Bxd7+ Nxd7
{If ... Qxd7, then 16. Qb8+ Ke7 17. Qxe5+ Kd8 18. Bxf6+ gxf6 19. Qxf6+ Kc8 20. Rxd7 Kxd7 21. Qxh8 and White is clearly winning.}

16. Qb8+! Nxb8
17. Rd8#

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Siegbert Tarrasch

The title International Grandmaster is awarded to superb chess players by the world chess organization FIDE. It is a lifetime title, in chess literature usually abbreviated as GM or IGM (this is in contrast to WGM for Woman Grandmaster and IM for International Master).

Normally three favorable results (or norms) in tournaments involving other Grandmasters are required before FIDE will confer the title on a player. There are other milestones a player can achieve to get the title, such as qualifying for the Candidates tournament. The Candidates Tournaments, now defunct, were a series of tournaments whose winner earned the right to challenge the reigning world champion. Bobby Fischer got his Grandmaster title by qualifying for the 1959 Candidates Tournament, at the ripe old age of 15. In 2002, twelve year old Ukrainian Sergey Karjakin became the youngest Grandmaster ever.

Grandmasters normally have an Elo chess rating of over 2500. Players from 2400-2500 normally have acquired the International Master (IM) title.

The title "Grandmaster" was created by Russian Tsar Nicholas II who first awarded it in 1914 to five players (Lasker, Capablanca, Alekhine, Tarrasch and Marshall) after a tournament in Saint Petersburg which he had funded.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Video: Letsplaychess.com: R.J Fischer vs Hector D. Rossetto

Wilhelm Steinitz

The following is a list of world chess championship matches. The winner of each match is listed first.

Unofficial events

• 1834 La Bourdonnais-McDonnell
  • Match 1: June-July (+16 -5 =4)
  • Match 2: July (+4 -5 =0)
  • Match 3: July-August (+6 -5 =1)
  • Match 4: August-September (+8 -3 =7)
  • Match 5: September (+7 -4 =1)
  • Match 6: September-October (+4 -5 =0)
• 1843 Saint-Amant-Staunton (3½ - 2½)
• 1843 Staunton-Saint-Amant (+11 -6 =4)
• 1846 Staunton-Horwitz (+14 -7 =3)
• 1858 Morphy-Anderssen (+7 -2 =2)
• 1866 Steinitz-Anderssen (+8 -6 =0)

Later matches

• 1928 (FIDE) Efim Bogoljubov-Max Euwe (5½-4½) (one-time FIDE championship, before 1948 system)
• 1992 (Independent) Fischer-Spassky (+10 -5 =15) (unofficial rematch of the 1972 match)

Official events

• 1886 Match Steinitz-Zukertort (+10 -5 =5)
• 1889 Steinitz-Chigorin (+10 -6 =1)
• 1890/91 Steinitz-Gunsberg (+6 -4 =9)
• 1892 Steinitz-Chigorin (+10 -8 =5)
• 1894 Lasker-Steinitz (+10 -5 =4)
• 1896/97 Lasker-Steinitz (+10 -2 =5)
• 1907 Lasker-Marshall (+8 -0 =7)
• 1908 Lasker-Tarrasch (+8 -3 =5)
• 1910 Lasker-Schlechter (+1 -1 =8)
• 1910 Lasker-Janowski (+8 -0 =3)
• 1921 Capablanca-Lasker (+4 -0 =10)
• 1927 Alekhine-Capablanca (+6 -3 =25)
• 1929 Alekhine-Bogoljubow (+11 -5 =9)
• 1934 Alekhine-Bogoljubow (+8 -3 =15)
• 1935 Euwe-Alekhine (+9 -8 =13)
• 1937 Alekhine-Euwe (+10 -4 =11)

FIDE-sanctioned events

• 1948 (FIDE) Botvinnik (14 points out of 20, five player, five cycle round-robin tournament)
• 1951 Botvinnik-Bronstein (+5 -5 =14)
• 1954 Botvinnik-Smyslov (+7 -7 =10)
• 1957 Smyslov-Botvinnik (+6 -3 =13)
• 1958 Botvinnik-Smyslov (+7 -5 =11)
• 1960 Tal-Botvinnik (+6 -2 =13)
• 1961 Botvinnik-Tal (+10 -5 =6)
• 1963 (FIDE) Petrosian-Botvinnik (+5 -2 =15)
• 1966 Petrosian-Spassky (+4 -3 =17)
• 1969 Spassky-Petrosian (+6 -4 =13)
• 1972 (FIDE) Fischer-Spassky (+7 -3 =11)
• 1975 Karpov-Fischer (by default)
• 1978 Karpov-Korchnoi (+6 -5 =21)
• 1981 Karpov-Korchnoi (+6 -2 =10)
• 1984 Karpov-Kasparov (+5 -3 =40) (aborted match)
• 1985 Kasparov-Karpov (+5 -3 =16)
• 1986 Kasparov-Karpov (+5 -4 =15)
• 1987 Kasparov-Karpov (+4 -4 =16)
• 1990 Kasparov-Karpov (+4 -3 =17)

Split title

• 1993 (FIDE) Karpov-Timman (+5 -2 =14)
• 1993 (PCA) Kasparov-Short (+6 -1 =13)
• 1995 (PCA) Kasparov-Anand (+4 -1 =13)
• 1996 (FIDE) Karpov-Kamsky (+6 -3 =9)
• 1998 (FIDE) Karpov-Anand (+2 -2 =2 and Karpov won on tiebreaks +2 -0 =0)
• 1999 (FIDE) Khalifman-Akopian (+2 -1 =3)
• 2000 (Braingames) Kramnik-Kasparov (+2 -0 =13)
• 2000 (FIDE) Anand-Shirov (+3 -0 =1)
• 2002 (FIDE) Ponomariov-Ivanchuk (+2 -0 =5)
• 2004 (FIDE) Kasimdzhanov-Adams (+3 -2 =3)
• 2004 (Classical) Kramnik-Lékó (+2 -2 =10)
• 2005 (FIDE) Topalov (10 points out of 14, double round robin tournament, eight participants)

Unified title (FIDE)

• 2006 Kramnik-Topalov (+3 -3 =6; Kramnik wins after tiebreaks, +2 -1 =1)
• 2007 Anand (9 points out of 14, double round robin tournament, eight participants)
• 2008 Anand-Kramnik (+3 -1 =7)
• 2010 Anand-Topalov

Notes

1858 Morphy-Anderssen: After demolishing Loewenthal (+8 -3 =2), Morphy crushed Anderssen (+7 -2 =2) who was reduced to playing the infamous "Anderson opening" in the later half of the match (1. a3?). Anderssen was considered the best player in the world prior to this encounter. However, the match was not declared as any kind of World Championship match, and Morphy declined to play in the World Championship matches that followed.

1927 Alekhine-Capablanca: After winning this match in great style, Alekhine hand picked his opponents for all his future matches, and refused to play a rematch with Capablanca.

1948 World Championship Tournament: The death of Alekhine in 1946 left the World Champion title vacant. FIDE organised a tournament to determine the new champion (the body went on to organise every subsequent match until the 1990s). Mikhail Botvinnik, Vassily Smyslov, Samuel Reshevsky, Paul Keres and Max Euwe took part, with Botvinnik triumphing.

1951 Botvinnik-Bronstein, 1987 Kasparov-Karpov: FIDE originally used rules that stated that upon a tie, the previous WCC, if he was a candidate would retain the title.

1975 Karpov-Fischer: Fischer refused to play, insisting on different match scoring rules (declaring Fischer the winner if he achieved 9 wins before Karpov reached 10 wins, draws not counting.) Fischer declined to participate in a match held under the same conditions as the previous Fischer-Spassky match, and thus foreited the title to Karpov. For the following matches from 1978 to 1984, FIDE adopted Fischer's rule of discounting draws, but simply required the winner to achieve 6 wins.

1984 Karpov-Kasparov: This match was abandonded (Karpov did not win it, but did retain the title.) Kasparov was quickly down 4-0 in the first dozen games, then down 5-0 before winning his first. Then he won two out of the last three games, and the FIDE president simply halted the match. The 1985 rematch went back to the previous rules (defending WC needs to reach 12 points before challenger reaches 12.5 points, where draws are worth half a point to both players.)

1992 Fischer-Spassky: Although recognized by very few as a legitimate World Championship, it was billed as a World Championship rematch by Fischer and his hand picked opponent, Spassky. This match took place in Yugoslavia, while under strict santions. The US governement forbid Fischer to play in this country, but Fischer ignored this. Because of this, Fischer cannot return to the US.

1993 Karpov-Timman, Kasparov-Short: Both Karpov and Timman were soundly defeated in the candidates pre-matches by Nigel Short, who went on to play Kasparov in a match, but not under the auspices of FIDE. As a result, FIDE chose the two highest finishing remaining candidates, but excluded Yusupov by virtue of having been defeated by Timman in the quarter final match that already occurred in the same cycle.

1998 Karpov-Anand: After a tied match, the FIDE WCC was decided by a couple of rapid play tie breakers both won by Karpov. The match conditions heavily favored the defending champion Karpov over Anand, who was exhausted from the qualifying rounds. Later FIDE knockouts were altered to seed the defending champion into earlier rounds.

2000 Kramnik-Kasparov: Although defeated by Shirov in a candidates match earlier under another World Chess Championship sponsoring organization, Kramnik was hand picked by Kasparov, and was most likely the strongest player besides himself. Of course Kramnik proved to be more than Kasparov's equal by defeating him.

2002: Ponomariov-Ivanchuk: The 2002 FIDE WCC pre-tournament and final match has moved to a much faster time control which by many accounts (comments by Kasparov, and Ivanchuk among others) has significantly and noticeably reduced the quality of the games.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Chess Equipment

One thing that applies both strategically and tactically is material advantage. If you command more pieces, or more powerful pieces, than your opponent, you will have greater opportunity.

A knight is about as valuable as a bishop (these two are called minor pieces), but less valuable than a rook, and less still than a queen (rooks and queens are called major pieces).

Three pawns are likely to be more useful than a knight in the endgame, but in the middlegame a knight is often more powerful. Two minor pieces are stronger than a single rook. Two rooks are stronger than a queen, but not by much.

One commonly used simple scoring system is 1 point for a pawn, 3 for a knight or bishop, 5 for a rook, and 9 for a queen. Under a system like this, giving up a knight or bishop in order to win a rook ("winning the exchange") is advantageous and is worth about two pawns. This of course ignores such complications as the current position and freedom of the pieces involved, but it is a good starting point.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Attacking and defending pieces

A piece is said to attack an opponent's piece if, in the next move, it could capture that piece. A piece is said to defend or to protect a piece of the defender's color if, in case the defended piece were taken by the opponent, the defender could recapture right away. Attacking a piece forces the opponent to respond only if the attacked piece is undefended, or if the attacking piece is of lower value than the attacked one.

Forks

A fork is a move that uses one piece to attack two of the opponent's pieces at the same time, hoping to achieve material advantage (because the opponent can only counter one of the two threats). Knights are often used for forks: they jump to a position from where they attack two pieces. A quite common situation is a white knight jumping to c7, thereby threatening both the rook at a8 and the king at e8. Such "king forks" are particularly effective, because the opponent is forced by the rules of the game to counter the threat to his king; he cannot choose to defend the other piece, and he cannot use a zwischenzug (see below) to complicate the situation. Pawns can also fork enemy pieces: by moving a pawn forward, it may attack two pieces: one diagonally to the left and one diagonally to the right. A common situation is the move Pawn d2-d4 forking a black bishop at c5 and a black knight at e5.

Kasparov vs. World Team 1999 Kasparov played 12.Nc7+	A variation of the Three Knights Opening 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 Bc5 4.Nxe5 Nxe5 5.d4

A queen move also often attacks two pieces at the same time, but this is only useful if both pieces are undefended (since the queen is more valuable than the pieces it is attacking, it is usually only profitable for it to capture undefended pieces).

Pins

"The defensive power of a pinned piece is only imaginary." - Nimzovich

A pin is a move which forces one of the opponent's pieces to stay put because moving it would expose a more valuable piece behind it. As they move in a straight line, bishops, rooks, and queens can pin other pieces.

In the diagram below left, black can't move his knight without losing his queen, and he can't move his rook at all. In the diagram below right, Kramnik pins black's bishop and soon wins it with a4-a5.

Morphy vs. Consultation Team 1858 after Morphy's 14th move	Kramnik vs. Morozevich 2002 Rapid Play Kramnik played 31.Rb1

Skewers

A skewer is a move which attacks two pieces in a line, similar to a pin, except that the enemy piece of greater value is in front of the enemy piece of lesser value. After the more valuable piece moves away, the lesser piece can be captured. Queens, rooks, and bishops can skewer.

Lasker vs. Bauer 1889 Lasker played 33.Qg7+	Tal vs. Botvinnik 1960 Tal played 30.Bc4

Because of possible pins and skewers, one should be extremely cautious if king and queen are located on the same vertical, horizontal or diagonal line.

Discovered attacks

A discovered attack is a move which unmasks an attack by another piece. A piece is moved away so as to unmask the attack of a friendly bishop, rook or queen on an enemy piece. If the attacked piece is the king, we speak of a discovered check. Discovered attacks are powerful, because if the moving piece manages to pose a second threat, the opponent is in trouble.

A special case of a discovered check is a double check, where both the piece being unmasked and the piece being moved attack the enemy king. A double check requires that your opponent move his/her king as the king is under attack from two directions and it is impossible to counter both at the same time in any other way.

Torre vs. Lasker 1925 Torre played 31.Rg5+	Byrne vs. Fischer 1957 Fischer played 22...Nc3+

Zwischenzug

The German zwischenzug means "intermediate move"; it is a common tactic that occurs in almost every game: instead of countering a direct threat, which the opponent expects, a move is played which poses an even more devastating threat, often an attack against the queen or the king. The opponent has to counter that threat first, and this will ideally change the situation to his disadvantage.

When you plan your tactics, you should always watch out for a zwischenzug. Don't assume that the opponent has to counter your threats immediately. It is good practice to always check whether your opponent has a check or a move threatening your queen. Conversely, anticipate your opponent's threats and plan a surprising zwischenzug.

Sacrifices

Often it is necessary to throw the opponent's position out of balance by first sacrificing some material, to be regained with interest a couple of moves later. Pawn sacrifices in the opening are known as gambits; they are usually not intended for material short-term gain but instead to achieve a more active position.

Direct attacks against the enemy king are often started by sacrifices; a common example is a bishop sacrificing itself on h7, checking the king on g8 who has to take the bishop, after which the white queen and knight develop a fulminant attack.

Attacks against the king

Colle vs. O'Hanlon, 1930 Colle played 12.Bxh7+

Attacks against the castled king are usually justified by some imbalance: you have more firepower on the king's side than your opponent, or the opponent weakened his king's position by moving one of the pawns in front of the king.

Many mating attacks are introduced by sacrifices: if mate is the goal, material doesn't matter anymore. The queen is almost always the most important piece in a mating attack, since she has various ways of mating a king. The most common of which is a direct "contact check" while being protected by one of her own pieces, for instance white knight g5, black king on g8 and the queen mates at h7, or white bishop at f6 or h6 and the white queen on g7 mates the black king on g8.

Don't assume that every move in a mating attack has to be a check. Often, a check just drives the king to a better position, or weakens your own setup. Try to find "quiet" moves which seal the deal.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

There are various different types of chess problem:

• Directmates - white to move first and checkmate black within a specified number of moves against any defence. These are often referred to as "mate in n", where n is the number of moves within which mate must be delivered. In composing and solving competitions, directmates are further broken down into three classes:

  • Two-movers - white to move and checkmate black in two moves against any defence

  • Three-movers - white to move and checkmate black in no more than three moves against any defence

  • More-movers - white to move and checkmate black in a given number of moves more than three against any defence

• Helpmates - black to move first cooperates with white to get his own king mated via legal moves

• Selfmates - white moves first and forces black to checkmate white's king against black's will

• Reflexmates - a selfmate in which each player must give mate if they are able to do so on their turn. When this stipulation applies only to black, it is a semi-reflexmate.

• Series-movers - one side makes a series of moves without reply to achieve a stipulated aim. Check may not be given except on the last move. A series-mover can be a:

  • Series-mate - a directmate with white playing a series of moves without reply to checkmate black

  • Series-helpmate - a helpmate in which black plays a series of moves without reply, and then white plays one move to checkmate black

  • Series-selfmate - a selfmate in which white plays a series of moves leading to a position in which black is forced to give mate

  • Series-reflexmate - a reflexmate in which white plays a series of moves leading to a position in which black can, and therefore must, give mate

All the above may also be found in forms of fairy chess - chess played with unorthodox rules, possibly using fairy pieces (unorthodox pieces).

In addition, there is the study, in which the stipulation is that white to play must win or draw. Almost all studies are endgame positions. Because the study is composed it is related to the problem, but because the stipulation is open-ended (the win or draw does not have to be achieved within any particular number of moves) it is usually thought of as separate from the problem. However, particularly long more-movers sometimes have the character of a study - there is no clear dividing line between the two.

In all the above types of problem, castling is assumed to be allowed unless it can be proved by retrograde analysis (see below) that the rook in question or king must have previously moved. En passant captures, on the other hand, are assumed not to be allowed, unless it can be proved that the pawn in question must have moved two squares on the previous move.

There are several other types of chess problem which do not follow the usual chess pattern of two sides playing moves towards checkmate. Some of these, like the knight's tour are essentially one-offs, but other types have been revisited many times, with magazines, books and prizes being dedicated to them:

• Retrograde analysis - this is the act of working out from a given position, what previous move or moves have been played. A problem employing retrograde analysis may, for example, present a position and carry the stipulation "Find white's last move" or "Has the bishop on c1 moved?". Problems such as these in which retrograde analysis is the main point are commonly called retros. Retrograde analysis may also have to be employed in more conventional problems (directmates and so on) to determine, for example, whether an en passant pawn capture or castling is possible. The most important sub-set of retro problems are:

• Shortest proof games - the solver must construct a game, starting from the normal initial position in chess, which ends with the position in a given diagram. The two sides cooperate to reach the position, but all moves must be legal. Usually the number of moves required to reach the position is given, though sometimes the task is simply to reach the given position in the shortest possible number of moves.

• Construction task - no diagram is given in construction tasks; instead the aim is to construct a game or position with certain features. For example, Sam Loyd devised the problem: "Construct a game which ends with black delivering discovered checkmate on move four" (published in Le Sphinx, 1866; the solution is 1.f3 e5 2.Kf2 h5 3.Kg3 h4+ 4.Kg4 d5#). Some construction tasks ask for a maximum or minimum number of something to be arranged, for example a game with the maximum possible number of consecutive discovered checks, or a position in which all sixteen pieces control the minimum number of squares.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

There are no official standards by which to distinguish a beautiful problem from a poor one, and judgement varies from individual to individual as well as from generation to generation, but modern taste generally recognizes the following elements as being important if a problem is to be regarded as beautiful:

• The problem position must be legal. That is to say, the diagram must be reachable via a legal chess game which begins from the standard opening position. It is not considered a defect if the diagram can only be reached via a game containing gross blunders. Chess problems, on the whole, are not created for the purpose of practical chess training.

• The first move of the problem's solution (the key move or key) must be unique. A problem which has two keys is said to be cooked, and would not be published in any magazine. An exception is problems which intentionally have more than one solution, which compliment or contrast each other in some way - this type of problem is particularly common in helpmates.

• Some would say that, ideally, there should only be one possible white move after every black move, although this is not nearly so important. A choice of white moves other than the first move is a dual. Duals are often excusable if the problem is strong in other regards.

• The solution should be explicable in terms of a theme or themes, rather than emerging from disjointed calculation. Many of the more common themes have been given names by problemists.

• The key move of the solution should be unobvious. Obvious moves such as checks, captures, and (in directmates) moves which restrict the movement of the black king, make for bad keys. Keys which deprive the black king of some squares it could move to (flight squares) but at the same time surrender an equal or greater number of flights are acceptable. Key moves which prevent the enemy from playing a checking move are also undesirable, particularly in cases where there is no mate provided after the checking move.

• Every piece on the board should serve a purpose, either to enable the actual solution, or to exclude alternative solutions. Extra units should not be added to create "red herrings" (this is called dressing the board), except in rare cases where this is part of the theme. If the theme can be shown with fewer total units, it should be.

• The problem should exhibit economy of moves. If the theme can be shown in fewer moves, it should be.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

In the early days of computer chess, there were two general schools of thought. The first camp took a "strategic AI" approach, estimating that examining all possible sequences of moves to any reasonable depth would be impractical due to the astronomical number of possibilities and nominal processing power. Instead of wasting processing power examining bad or trivial moves (and their extensions), they tried to make their programs discriminate between bad, trivial and good moves, recognize patterns or formulate and execute plans, much as humans do.

The second camp took a "brute force search" approach, examining as many positions as possible using the minimax algorithm with only the most basic evaluation function. A program might, for example, pay attention only to checkmate, which side has more pieces, and which side has more possible moves, without any attempt at more complicated positional judgement. In compensation, the program would be fast enough to look exhaustively at all positions to a certain depth within its allotted time.

Use of alpha-beta pruning combined with a number of search heuristics dramatically improved the performance of brute-force search algorithms. In modern times, the general consensus is that chess is theoretically a nearly-understood paradigm as an AI design goal and the Chinese game of go is now at the forefront of challenges to AI designers.

Ultimately, the brute force camp won out, in the sense that their programs simply played better chess. The game of chess is not conducive to inerrantly discriminating between obviously bad, trivial and good moves using a rigid set of rules. Traps are set and sprung by expert players who understand and master the many levels of depth and irony inherent to the game. Furthermore, technological advances by orders of magnitude in processing power have made the brute force approach far more incisive in recent years than was the case in the early years. The result is that a very solid, tactical AI player has been built which is errorless to the limits of its search depth and time. This has left the strategic AI approach universally recognized as obsolete. It turned out to produce better results, at least in the field of chess, to let computers do what they do best (i.e., calculate) rather than coax them into imitating human thought processes and knowledge.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Chessmaster 10th edition running on Windows XP

It remained an open question whether any amount of brute force computation would ever be adequate to defeat the expertise of top humans. In 1968, IM David Levy made a famous bet that no chess computer would be able to beat him within ten years. He won his bet in 1978 by beating Chess 4.7 (the strongest computer at the time), but acknowledged then that it would not be long before he would be surpassed. It is well that Levy didn't renew his bet for another ten years, because in 1989 he was crushed by the computer Deep Thought in an exhibition match, and would probably have lost even to earlier, lesser computers.

Deep Thought, however, was still considerably below World Championship Level, as the then reigning world champion Gary Kasparov demonstrated in two sterling wins in 1989. It wasn't until a 1996 match with IBM's Deep Blue that Kasparov lost his first game to a computer at tournament time controls in Deep Blue - Kasparov, 1996, Game 1. This game was, in fact, the first time a reigning world champion had lost to a computer using regular time controls. However, Kasparov regrouped to win three and draw two of the remaining five games of the match, for a convincing victory.

In May 1997, an updated version of Deep Blue defeated Kasparov 3.5-2.5 in a return match. While not an official world championship, the outcome of the match is often taken to mean that the strongest player in the world is a computer. Such a claim is open to strong debate, as a truly fair human-machine match is difficult to arrange.

Firstly, in one of the games, Kasparov was not defeated over the board. He resigned in a technically drawn position, perhaps distraught that Deep Blue was playing such human-like moves. He angrily accused the Deep Blue team of feeding human input to the computer as the game was in progress. Thus this defeat should be reckoned more as a psychological loss than an indication of inferior chess ability.

Secondly, there are other players whose playing style is recognised as more effective against computer opponents. Kasparov's strength lies in overwhelming opponents tactically and psychologically, both of which play to the strength of computers, whereas Vladimir Kraminik, who recently defeated Kasparov in a World Championship match, is more content to defend a tenable position, probe for weaknesses, and accumulate small advantages.

Thirdly, it was impossible for Kasparov to prepare to play the machine as he would against a human opponent, as the computer's programming was adjusted between prior matches and the Kasparov match. That incarnation of Deep Blue had no tournament record before the match, whereas the Deep Blue team was able to study and prepare against hundreds of Kasparov's public games.

Finally, a six-game match was too short for Kasparov to adjust to any potential weaknesses of Deep Blue. One great advantage of humans over computers is adaptability. In all his previous encounters with computers Kasparov had finished more strongly than he began, and it is reasonable to suppose that he would have fared better in a twenty-four game match, the traditional length of World Championship matches.

IBM retired Deep Blue after the match and it has not played since. However, other "Man vs. Machine" matches continue to be played. In October 2002, Vladimir Kramnik and Deep Fritz competed in the eight-game Brains in Bahrain match, which ended in a draw. Kramnik won games 2 and 3 by "conventional" anti-computer tactics - play conservatively for a long-term advantage the computer is not able to see in its game tree search. Fritz, however, won game 5 after a severe blunder by Kramnik. Game 6 was described by the tournament commentators as "spectacular". Kramnik, in a better position in the early midgame, tried a spectacular piece sacrifice to achieve a strong tactical attack, a strategy known to be highly risky against computers who are at their strongest defending such attacks. True to form, Fritz found a watertight defence and Kramnik's attack petered out leaving him in a bad position. Kramnik resigned the game, believing the position lost. However, post-game human and computer analysis has shown that the Fritz program was unlikely to have been able to force a win and Kramnik effectively sacrificed a drawn position. The final two games were draws. Given the circumstances, most commentators still rate Kramnik the stronger player in the match.

In January 2003, Kasparov played Deep Junior, another chess computer program, in New York. The match ended 3-3.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Fischer Random Chess (also called Chess 960, Fischerandom chess, FR chess, or FullChess) is a chess variant created by Grandmaster Bobby Fischer (who was world chess champion from 1972 until 1975). It was originally announced on June 19, 1996, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Fischer's goal was to create a chess variant in which chess creativity and talent would be more important than memorization and analysis of opening moves. His approach was to create a randomized initial chess position, which would thus make memorizing chess opening move sequences far less helpful.

Playing Fischer Random Chess

Examining openings for Fischer Random Chess is in its infancy, but opening fundamentals still apply. These include: protect the King, control the center squares (directly or indirectly), and develop your pieces rapidly starting with the less valuable pieces. Some starting positions have unprotected pawns that may need to be dealt with quickly.

Some have argued that two games should be played with each initial position, with players alternating as white and black, since some initial positions may turn out to give white a much bigger advantage than standard chess. However, there is no evidence that any position gives either side a significant advantage.

Recording Games

Since the initial position is usually not the orthodox chess initial position, recorded games must also record the initial position. Games recorded using the Portable Game Notation (PGN) can record the initial position using Forsyth-Edwards Notation (FEN), as the value of the "FEN" tag. Castling is marked as O-O or O-O-O, just as in standard chess. Note that not all chess programs can handle castling correctly in Fischer Random Chess games (except if the initial position is the standard chess initial position). To correctly record a Fischer Random Chess game in PGN, an additional "Variant" tag must be used to identify the rules; the rule named "Fischerandom" is accepted by many chess programs as identifying Fischer Random Chess. Be careful to use "Variant" and not "Variation", which has a different meaning. This means that in a PGN-recorded game, one of the PGN tags (after the initial 7 tags) would look like this:

 [Variant "Fischerandom"]

FEN is capable of expressing all possible starting positions of Fischer Random Chess. However, unmodified FEN cannot express all possible positions of a Fischer Random Chess game. In a game, a rook may move into the back row on the same side of the king as the other rook, or pawn(s) may be underpromoted into rook(s) and moved into the back row. If a rook is unmoved and can still castle, yet there is more than one rook on that side, FEN notation as traditionally interpreted is ambiguous. This is because FEN records that castling is possible on that side, but not which rook is still allowed to castle.

A modification of FEN, FRC-FEN, has been devised by R. Scharnagl to remove this ambiguity. In FRC-FEN, the castling markings "KQkq" have their expected meanings: "Q" and "q" means a-side castling is still legal (for white and black respectively), and "K" and "k" means h-side castling is still legal (for white and black respectively). However, if there is more than one rook on the baseline on the same side of the king, and the rook that can castle is not the outermost rook on that side, then the column letter of the rook that can castle is appended right after the related "K", "k", "Q", or "q". In other words, in FRC-FEN notation, castling potentials belong to the outermost rooks by default. This means that the maximum length of the castling value is 8 characters instead of 4 (KkQq plus 4 disambiguation characters), though positions needing that many characters are extremely improbable. Note that FRC-FEN is upwardly compatible, that is, a program supporting FRC-FEN will automatically use the normal FEN codes for a traditional chess starting position without requiring any special programming.

History

The first Fischer Random Chess tourney was held in Yugoslavia in the spring of 1996, and was won by Grandmaster Peter Leko.

In 2001, Leko became the first Fischer Random Chess world champion, defeating Grandmaster Michael Adams in an eight game match played as part of the Mainz Chess Classic. There were no qualifying matches (also true of the first orthodox world chess champion titleholders), but both players were in the top five in the January 2001 world rankings for orthodox chess. Leko was chosen because of the many novelties he has introduced to known chess theories, as well as his previous tourney win; in addition, Leko has played Fischer Random Chess games with Fischer himself. Adams was chosen because he was the world number one in blitz (rapid) chess and is regarded as an extremely strong player in unfamiliar positions. The match was won by a narrow margin, 4.5 to 3.5.

In 2002 at Mainz, an open Fischer Random tournament was held which attracted 131 players. Peter Svidler won the event. Other interesting events happened in 2002. The website ChessVariants.com selected Fischer Random chess as its "Recognized Variant of the Month" for April 2002. Yugoslavian Grandmaster Svetozar Gligoric published in 2002 the book Shall We Play Fischerandom Chess?, popularizing this variation further.

At the 2003 Mainz Chess Classic, Svidler beat Leko in an eight game match for the World Championship title by a score of 4.5 - 3.5.

Naming

This particular chess variant has a number of different names. The first names applied to it include "Fischer Random Chess" and "Fischerandom Chess".

Hans-Walter Schmitt (chairman of the Frankfurt Chess Tigers e.V.) is an advocate of this chess variant, and he started a brainstorming process to choose a new name for it. The new name had to obey the following requirements on the parts of some leading grandmasters:

1. It should not use parts of the name of any Grandmaster colleague

2. It should not include negatively biased or "spongy" elements like "random" or "freestyle"

3. It should be understood worldwide.

This effort culminated in the name "Chess960", deriving from the number of different initial positions.

R. Scharnagl, another proponant of this variant, has consistently used the term FullChess. He believes "FullChess" to also satisfy these premises, and that it also emphasizes the compatible embedding of the traditional game of chess.

At this time the terms "Fischer Random Chess" or "Fischerandom chess" are more common. It is not yet clear if these other, newer terms, or yet another one will replace it.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

The earliest known chess column appeared in the Lancet in 1823, but due to lack of popularity disappeared after less than a year.

The first column to establish itself was that of George Walker in Bells Life in 1834 which survived until 1873. From February 15, 1845 onwards it faced competition from Howard Staunton's column in the Illustrated London News, a column which outsurvived Walker's, but only by 5 years. During this time a chess column also appeared in the Pictorial Times lasting from February 1845 to June 1848.

In 1882 H. E. Bird in his Chess History and Reminiscences estimated that there were 150 chess columns. Less than thirty years later in 1913 Harold Murray in his History of Chess estimated there existed at least 1,000 chess columns worldwide.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Video: Schools Recognize Benefits of Chess

Due to mergers and acqusitions in recent years there are only two chess libraries of major signicance and only a few other specialist collections. They are,

• The John G. White Chess and Checkers Collection at Cleveland Public Library.

  • Largest chess and draughts library in the world.

  • Built on the donation of quarter of a million dollars and 11,000 books from John G. White's private library upon his death.

• The Chess & Draughts collection at the Bibliotheca Van der Linde-Niemeijeriana (part of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, the National Library of the Netherlands).

  • Second largest chess and draughts library in the world.

  • Built on the donations of from the private chess libraries of Antonius van der Linde, Meindert Niemeijer and G.L. Gortmans.

  • Contain 40,000 works.

• Chess collection at the Templeman Library, University of Kent at Canterbury.

  • Built on donation of archive material of the British Chess Federation.

  • Contains a number of unique items relating to British chess clubs.

The most significant publicly acknowledged private chess library is currently that of Paolo Ciancarini. However, Mr. Ciancarini states that several people own larger libraries, including Lothar Schmidt in Germany and Mr. DeLucia in New York. Also, the former World Champion Anatoly Karpov is told to own a large chess library. Mr. Ciancarini's is the only one which has a catalog publicly available on the Web, and periodically updated.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

35th Chess Olympiad, Bled 2002

The Chess Olympiad is a chess event which has been organized by FIDE every second year since 1927.

Men's Olympiads

Year
Event
Location
Gold

1924
1st unofficial Chess Olympiad
The Chess Olympiad (individual)
Paris, France
Czechoslovakia 31

1926
2nd unofficial Chess Olympiad
The Team Tournament
(part of FIDE summit)
Budapest, Hungary
Hungary 9

1927
1st Chess Olympiad
London, United Kingdom
Hungary 40

1928
2nd Chess Olympiad
The Hague, Netherlands
Hungary 44

1930
3rd Chess Olympiad
Hamburg, Germany
Poland 48.5

1931
4th Chess Olympiad
Prague, Czechoslovakia
USA 48

1933
5th Chess Olympiad
Folkestone, United Kingdom
USA 39

1935
6th Chess Olympiad
Warsaw, Poland
USA 54

1936
3rd unofficial Chess Olympiad
non-FIDE unofficial Chess Olympiad
Munich, Germany
Hungary 110.5

1937
7th Chess Olympiad
Stockholm, Sweden
USA 54.5

1939
8th Chess Olympiad
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Germany 36

1950
9th Chess Olympiad
Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia 45.5

1952
10th Chess Olympiad
Helsinki, Finland
USSR 21

1954
11th Chess Olympiad
Amsterdam, Netherlands
USSR 34

1956
12th Chess Olympiad
Moscow, Soviet Union
USSR 31

1958
13th Chess Olympiad
Munich, West Germany
USSR 34.5

1960
14th Chess Olympiad
Leipzig, East Germany
USSR 34

1962
15th Chess Olympiad
Varna, Bulgaria
USSR 31.5

1964
16th Chess Olympiad
Tel Aviv, Israel
USSR 36.5

1966
17th Chess Olympiad
La Habana, Cuba
USSR 39.5

1968
18th Chess Olympiad
Lugano, Switzerland
USSR 39.5

1970
19th Chess Olympiad
Siegen, West Germany
USSR 27.5

1972
20th Chess Olympiad
Skopje, Yugoslavia
USSR 42

1974
21st Chess Olympiad
Nice, France
USSR 46

1976
22nd Chess Olympiad *
Haifa, Israel
USA 37

1978
23rd Chess Olympiad
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Hungary 37

1980
24th Chess Olympiad
Valletta, Malta
USSR 39

1982
25th Chess Olympiad
Lucerne, Switzerland
USSR 42.5

1984
26th Chess Olympiad
Thessaloniki, Greece
USSR 41

1986
27th Chess Olympiad
Dubai, UAE
USSR 40

1988
28th Chess Olympiad
Thessaloniki, Greece
USSR 40.5

1990
29th Chess Olympiad
Novi Sad, Yugoslavia
USSR 39

1992
30th Chess Olympiad
Manila, Philippines
Russia 39

1994
31st Chess Olympiad
Moscow, Russia
Russia 37.5

1996
32nd Chess Olympiad
Yerevan, Armenia
Russia 38.5

1998
33rd Chess Olympiad
Elista, Russia
Russia 35.5

2000
34th Chess Olympiad
Istanbul, Turkey
Russia 38

2002
35th Chess Olympiad
Bled, Slovenia
Russia 38.5

2004
36th Chess Olympiad
Calviá, Spain
Ukraine 39.5

2006
37th Chess Olympiad
Turin, Italy
Armenia 36

2008
38th Chess Olympiad
Dresden, Germany
Armenia 19

2010
39th Chess Olympiad
Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia

* In 1976 the USSR and other communist countries did not compete for political reasons.

Best individual results in men's Olympiads

N O T E S:

The 2004 Olympiad was originally planned to take place at Cala Galdana on Menorca, but in October 2003, a change of venue to Calviá on Mallorca was announced. This change was apparently motivated by funding difficulties. The 2006 Olympiad is due to be held in Turin in Italy.

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Video: Chess Olympiad 38th

Teaching and playing the game of chess has often been advocated as a form of mental training.

Benjamin Franklin, in his article The Morals of Chess (1750), advocated such a view:

"The Game of Chess is not merely an idle amusement; several very valuable qualities of the mind, useful in the course of human life, are to be acquired and strengthened by it, so as to become habits ready on all occasions; for life is a kind of Chess, in which we have often points to gain, and competitors or adversaries to contend with, and in which there is a vast variety of good and ill events, that are, in some degree, the effect of prudence, or the want of it. By playing at Chess then, we may learn: 1st, Foresight, which looks a little into futurity, and considers the consequences that may attend an action ... 2nd, Circumspection, which surveys the whole Chess-board, or scene of action: - the relation of the several Pieces, and their situations; ... 3rd, Caution, not to make our moves too hastily...."

The U.S. Chess Center in Washington, D.C., teaches chess to children, especially those in the inner city, "as a means of improving their academic and social skills."

There are a number of experiments that suggest that learning and playing chess does, indeed, aid the mind in certain ways. The U.S. Chess Federation (USCF) chess research bibliography contains a collection of many such experimental results.

Sources

• Benjamin Franklin: The Morals of Chess

• U.S. Chess Center

• USCF Chess Research Bibliography