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. It is an abstract strategy game that involves no hidden information and no elements of chance. It is 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 type of piece 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 goes back to at least the emergence of chaturanga—also thought to be an ancestor to similar games like xiangqi and shogi—in seventh-century India. After its introduction in 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, with standardization and 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. Chess competition today is governed internationally by FIDE (Fédération Internationale des Échecs), the International Chess Federation. 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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Fischer in 1972

Robert James Fischer (March 9, 1943 – January 17, 2008) was an American chess grandmaster and the eleventh World Chess Champion. A chess prodigy, he won his first of a record eight US Championships at the age of 14. In 1964, he won with an 11–0 score, the only perfect score in the history of the tournament. Qualifying for the 1972 World Championship, Fischer swept matches with Mark Taimanov and Bent Larsen by 6–0 scores. After winning another qualifying match against Tigran Petrosian, Fischer won the title match against Boris Spassky of the USSR, in Reykjavík, Iceland. Publicized as a Cold War confrontation between the US and USSR, the match attracted more worldwide interest than any chess championship before or since.

In 1975, Fischer refused to defend his title when an agreement could not be reached with FIDE, chess's international governing body, over the match conditions. Consequently, the Soviet challenger Anatoly Karpov was named World Champion by default. Fischer subsequently disappeared from the public eye, though occasional reports of erratic behavior emerged. In 1992, he reemerged to win an unofficial rematch against Spassky. It was held in Yugoslavia, which at the time was under an embargo of the United Nations. His participation led to a conflict with the US federal government, which warned Fischer that his participation in the match would violate an executive order imposing US sanctions on Yugoslavia. The US government ultimately issued a warrant for his arrest; subsequently, Fischer lived as an émigré. In 2004, he was arrested in Japan and held for several months for using a passport that the US government had revoked. Eventually, he was granted Icelandic citizenship by a special act of the Althing, allowing him to live there until his death in 2008. (Full article...)

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General images

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

Image 1Bobby Fischer vs. Mikhail Tal (from History of chess)
Image 2Wilhelm Steinitz, the first official World Chess Champion (from History of chess)
Image 3An 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)
Image 4Richard Creifelds, c. 1886, The Veterans, Brooklyn Museum (from Chess in the arts)
Image 5RZA at a Hip Hop Chess Federation Tournament (from Chess in the arts)
Image 6A Chess Dispute (1903) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 7Lucas van Leyden, c. 1508, The Game of Chess, oil on oak, 27 x 35 cm, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin (from Chess in the arts)
Image 8In 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 9John Lavery, 1929, The Chess Players (from Chess in the arts)
Image 10Shams-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 11Moors from Andalusia playing chess, Book of Games by King Alfonso X, 1283 (from History of chess)
Image 12Karel van Mander, 1600 (attributed to), Les joueurs d'échecs (from Chess in the arts)
Image 13Iranian courtiers of the Qajar dynasty playing chess in Mazandaran (from History of chess)
Image 14Final match of the 1575 tournament in El Escorial. Painting by Luigi Mussini. (from History of chess)
Image 15Liberale da Verona, The Chess Players, c. 1475 (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 16Stamp of the USSR devoted to the accomplished Estonian player and analyst Paul Keres, 1991 (from History of chess)
Image 17Honoré Daumier, 1863, The Chess Players (from Chess in the arts)
Image 18World Champions José Raúl Capablanca (left) and Emanuel Lasker in 1925 (from History of chess)
Image 19Two Georgian writers, Ilia Chavchavadze and Ivane Machabeli, playing chess in Saint Petersburg, 1873 (from Chess in the arts)
Image 20The 12th-century Lewis chessmen in the collection of the National Museum of Scotland (from History of chess)
Image 21Niccolò di Pietro, 1413–15, The Conversion of Saint Augustin, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon (from Chess in the arts)
Image 22Cocowood chess set (Philippines craft) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 23Some 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 24Bauhaus chess set by Josef Hartwig (from Chess in the arts)
Image 25Book of the customs of men and the duties of nobles or the Book of Chess (1473) (from Chess in the arts)
Image 26The Chess Players by Henry Fox Talbot, 1847 (from History of chess)
Image 27Hans Muelich, 1552, Duke Albrecht V. of Bavaria and his wife Anna of Austria playing chess (from Chess in the arts)
Image 28Paris Bordone, c. 1545, Chess players, oil on canvas, Mailand, Wohnhaus (from Chess in the arts)
Image 29Antonis Mor, 1549, Von Sachsen vs. a Spaniard (from Chess in the arts)
Image 30Moors from Andalusia playing chess, Book of Games by King Alfonso X, 1283 (from Chess in the arts)
Image 31Thomas Eakins, 1876, The Chess Players (from Chess in the arts)
Image 32Iranian shatranj set, glazed fritware, 12th century, New York Metropolitan Museum of Art (from History of chess)
Image 33These 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 34Sofonisba Anguissola, The Chess Game, 1555, National Museum, Poznań, Poland (from Chess in the arts)
Image 35Persian manuscript from the 14th century describing how an ambassador from India brought chess to the Persian court (from History of chess)
Image 36Krishna and Radha playing chaturanga on an 8×8 ashtāpada (from History of chess)
Image 37Gustaf Lundberg, 1775, Portrait of Gustav Badin, pastel, 74 x 57 cm, Nationalmuseum, Sweden (from Chess in the arts)
Image 38Chess Set by Man Ray (from Chess in the arts)
Image 39Chess game between Tha'ālibī and Bākhazarī, 1896 painting by Ludwig Deutsch (from History of chess)
Image 40Edward Harrison May, 1867, Lady Howe mating Benjamin Franklin (from Chess in the arts)
Image 41Current world champion Gukesh Dommaraju (from History of chess)
Image 42Animation of the Immortal Game, in which Adolf Anderssen, playing White, beat Lionel Kieseritzky in June 1851 (from History of chess)

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FIDE world ranking

Rank	Player	Rating
1	Magnus Carlsen	2837
2	Hikaru Nakamura	2804
3	Gukesh Dommaraju	2787
4	Arjun Erigaisi	2782
5	Fabiano Caruana	2776
6	Nodirbek Abdusattorov	2771
7	R Praggnanandhaa	2758
8	Wei Yi	2758
9	Alireza Firouzja	2757
10	Ian Nepomniachtchi	2757
11	Wesley So	2751
12	Aravindh Chithambaram	2749
13	Levon Aronian	2747
14	Shakhriyar Mamedyarov	2746
15	Viswanathan Anand	2743
16	Jan-Krzysztof Duda	2739
17	Vladimir Fedoseev	2739
18	Anish Giri	2738
19	Leinier Domínguez Pérez	2738
20	Hans Niemann	2736

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