Portal:Chess

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Introduction

Left to right: white king, black rook, black queen, white pawn, black knight, white bishop

Chess is a board game for two players, played on a square board consisting of 64 squares arranged in an 8×8 grid. The players, referred to as "White" and "Black", each control sixteen pieces: one king, one queen, two rooks, two bishops, two knights, and eight pawns, with each piece type having a different pattern of movement. An enemy piece may be captured (removed from the board) by moving one's own piece onto the square it occupies. The object of the game is to "checkmate" (threaten with inescapable capture) the enemy king. There are also several ways a game can end in a draw.

The recorded history of chess dates back to the emergence of chaturanga in 7th-century India. Chaturanga is also thought to be an ancestor of similar games like janggi, xiangqi, and shogi. After its introduction to Persia, it spread to the Arab world and then to Europe. The modern rules of chess emerged in Europe at the end of the 15th century, becoming standardized and gaining universal acceptance by the end of the 19th century. Today, chess is one of the world's most popular games, with millions of players worldwide.

Organized chess arose in the 19th century. International chess competitions today are governed by the International Chess Federation FIDE (Fédération Internationale des Échecs). The first universally recognized World Chess Champion, Wilhelm Steinitz, claimed his title in 1886; Gukesh Dommaraju is the current World Champion, having won the title in 2024. (Full article...)

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The rook and pawn versus rook endgame is a fundamentally important, widely studied chess endgame. Precise play is usually required in these positions. With optimal play, some complicated wins require sixty moves to either checkmate, capture the defending rook, or successfully promote the pawn. In some cases, thirty-five moves are required to advance the pawn once.

The play of this type of ending revolves around whether or not the pawn can be promoted, or if the defending rook must be sacrificed to prevent promotion. If the pawn promotes, that side will have an overwhelming material advantage. If the pawn is about to promote, the defending side may give up their rook for the pawn, resulting in an easily won endgame for the superior side (a basic checkmate). In a few cases, the superior side gives up their rook in order to promote the pawn, resulting in a winning queen versus rook position (see Pawnless chess endgame § Queen versus rook). (Full article...)

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General images

The following are images from various chess-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Hans Muelich, 1552, Duke Albrecht V. of Bavaria and his wife Anna of Austria playing chess (from Chess in the arts)
Image 2Lucas van Leyden, c. 1508, The Game of Chess, oil on oak, 27 x 35 cm, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin (from Chess in the arts)
Image 3Antonis Mor, 1549, Von Sachsen vs. a Spaniard (from Chess in the arts)
Image 4These seven ivory chess pieces are the oldest known, dating to about 700 CE. The ivory came from India. They were excavated in 1977 by archaeologist Yuriy Buryakov, at Afrasiyab in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. They are housed today at the Samarkand State Museum. Photographed during a loan of the pieces to the Silk Roads Exhibition at the British Museum. (from History of chess)
Image 5Final match of the 1575 tournament in El Escorial. Painting by Luigi Mussini. (from History of chess)
Image 6Moors from Andalusia playing chess, Book of Games by King Alfonso X, 1283 (from Chess in the arts)
Image 7Iranian shatranj set, glazed fritware, 12th century, New York Metropolitan Museum of Art (from History of chess)
Image 8Niccolò di Pietro, 1413–15, The Conversion of Saint Augustin, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon (from Chess in the arts)
Image 9Book of the customs of men and the duties of nobles or the Book of Chess (1473) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 10Animation of the Immortal Game, in which Adolf Anderssen, playing White, beat Lionel Kieseritzky in June 1851 (from History of chess)
Image 11Two Georgian writers, Ilia Chavchavadze and Ivane Machabeli, playing chess in Saint Petersburg, 1873 (from Chess in the arts)
Image 12Stamp of the USSR devoted to the accomplished Estonian player and analyst Paul Keres, 1991 (from History of chess)
Image 13Paris Bordone, c. 1545, Chess players, oil on canvas, Mailand, Wohnhaus (from Chess in the arts)
Image 14Shams-i Tabrīzī as portrayed in a 1500 painting in a page of a copy of Rumi's poem dedicated to Shams (from History of chess)
Image 15Edward Harrison May, 1867, Lady Howe mating Benjamin Franklin (from Chess in the arts)
Image 16Bauhaus chess set by Josef Hartwig (from Chess in the arts)
Image 17The Chess Players by Henry Fox Talbot, 1847 (from History of chess)
Image 18Karel van Mander, 1600 (attributed to), Les joueurs d'échecs (from Chess in the arts)
Image 19Chess game between Tha'ālibī and Bākhazarī, 1896 painting by Ludwig Deutsch (from History of chess)
Image 20The 12th-century Lewis chessmen in the collection of the National Museum of Scotland (from History of chess)
Image 21Iranian courtiers of the Qajar dynasty playing chess in Mazandaran (from History of chess)
Image 22Honoré Daumier, 1863, The Chess Players (from Chess in the arts)
Image 23Moors from Andalusia playing chess, Book of Games by King Alfonso X, 1283 (from History of chess)
Image 24Wilhelm Steinitz, the first official World Chess Champion (from History of chess)
Image 25Richard Creifelds, c. 1886, The Veterans, Brooklyn Museum (from Chess in the arts)
Image 26Gustaf Lundberg, 1775, Portrait of Gustav Badin, pastel, 74 x 57 cm, Nationalmuseum, Sweden (from Chess in the arts)
Image 27Current world champion Gukesh Dommaraju (from History of chess)
Image 28Persian manuscript from the 14th century describing how an ambassador from India brought chess to the Persian court (from History of chess)
Image 29Krishna and Radha playing chaturanga on an 8×8 ashtāpada (from History of chess)
Image 30RZA at a Hip Hop Chess Federation Tournament (from Chess in the arts)
Image 31Liberale da Verona, The Chess Players, c. 1475 (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 32Cocowood chess set (Philippines craft) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 33Thomas Eakins, 1876, The Chess Players (from Chess in the arts)
Image 34Some of the earliest examples of chess-related art are medieval illustrations accompanying books or manuscripts, such as this chess problem from the 1283 Libro de los juegos. (from Chess in the arts)
Image 35In 1975, former President of Pakistan Zulfi Bhutto gifted a carved ivory set of chess to the former United States President Gerald Ford. (from Chess in the arts)
Image 36Sofonisba Anguissola, The Chess Game, 1555, National Museum, Poznań, Poland (from Chess in the arts)
Image 37World Champions José Raúl Capablanca (left) and Emanuel Lasker in 1925 (from History of chess)
Image 38A Chess Dispute (1903) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 39John Lavery, 1929, The Chess Players (from Chess in the arts)
Image 40Chess Set by Man Ray (from Chess in the arts)
Image 41Bobby Fischer vs. Mikhail Tal (from History of chess)
Image 42An illustration from a Persian manuscript "A treatise on chess". The Ambassadors from India present the Chatrang to Khosrow I Anushirwan, "Immortal Soul", King of Persia. (from History of chess)

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FIDE world ranking

Rank	Player	Rating
1	Magnus Carlsen	2840
2	Hikaru Nakamura	2810
3	Fabiano Caruana	2795
4	Vincent Keymer	2776
5	Nodirbek Abdusattorov	2771
6	Alireza Firouzja	2759
7	Wei Yi	2754
8	Anish Giri	2753
9	Wesley So	2753
10	Gukesh Dommaraju	2748
11	Arjun Erigaisi	2745
12	Javokhir Sindarov	2745
13	R Praggnanandhaa	2741
14	Jan-Krzysztof Duda	2739
15	Leinier Domínguez	2738
16	Richárd Rapport	2738
17	Hans Moke Niemann	2735
18	Lê Quang Liêm	2731
19	Jorden Van Foreest	2729
20	Levon Aronian	2729

Did you know...

... that there have been attempts to make chess an Olympic sport since at least 1924?

Reviewed articles

Featured articles	Good articles
First-move advantage in chess	42nd Chess Olympiad	Goryachkina, Aleksandra
Gossip, George H. D.	43rd Chess Olympiad	Guramishvili, Sopiko
List of female chess grandmasters	Abdumalik, Zhansaya	Kazarian, Anna-Maja
Mechanical Turk	Alekhine, Alexander	Kristjánsson, Stefán
44th Chess Olympiad	Anderssen, Adolf	Lasker, Emanuel
	Belenkaya, Dina	Mammadzada, Gunay
	Bindrich, Falko	Milner-Barry, Stuart
	Blübaum, Matthias	Modern Benoni
	Budapest Gambit	Muzychuk, Anna
	Bughouse chess	Nadanian, Ashot
	Carlsen, Magnus	Rudolf, Anna
	Chess in Armenia	Rules of chess
	Cramling, Anna	Staunton, Howard
	Deep Blue (Chess computer)	Steinitz, Wilhelm
	En passant	Turochamp
	Endgame tablebase	World Chess Championship 1972
	Fischer, Bobby	Zhou, Qiyu

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Chess from A to Z

Index:	A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z (0–9)
Glossary:	A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

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