Checkmate (often shortened to mate ) is any game position in chess and other chess-like games in which a player's king is in check (threatened with capture ) and there is no possible escape. Checkmating the opponent wins the game.
71-517: Emory Andrew Tate Jr. (December 27, 1958 – October 17, 2015) was an American chess player who held the title of International Master . He was the father of the Internet personality Andrew Tate . Emory Andrew Tate Jr. was born in Chicago , Illinois , on December 27, 1958. He grew up in a family of nine children. His father, Emory Andrew Tate I, was an attorney, and his mother, Emma Cox Tate, ran
142-750: A community school board program. Tate's highest FIDE rating was 2413 on the October 2006 rating list, which made him the 72nd highest-rated player in the United States and among the top 2000 active players in the world. His peak USCF rating was 2508 on December 30, 1996. He received the International Master title in 2007, after earning his third norm at the 2006 World Open . His older son, Andrew , said: "I never saw him study chess books, ever. He also hated chess computers and never used them. He just sat down and played." Tate earned
213-425: A draw either by the fifty-move rule or stalemate . Opinions differ as to whether or not a player should learn this checkmate procedure. James Howell omits the checkmate with two bishops in his book because it rarely occurs but includes the bishop and knight checkmate. Howell says that he has had it three times (always on the defending side) and that it occurs more often than the checkmate with two bishops. On
284-408: A rook , which can occur on any edge of the board. The black king can be on any square on the edge of the board, the white king is in opposition to it, and the rook can check from any square on the rank or file (assuming that it cannot be captured). The second diagram shows a slightly different position where the kings are not in opposition but the defending king must be in a corner. With the side with
355-407: A corner). With the side with the bishops to move, checkmate can be forced in at most nineteen moves, except in some very rare positions (0.03% of the possible positions). The third checkmate position is possible but not forceable. It is not too difficult for two bishops to force checkmate, with the aid of their king. Two principles apply: In the position from Seirawan, White wins by first forcing
426-408: A dark square. This may be remembered by the phrases "light on the right" and "queen on her own color". In formal competition, the piece colors for every matchup are allocated to players by the organizers. In informal games, colors are decided either by mutual agreement, or randomly, for example by a coin toss, or by one player concealing a white pawn in one hand and a black pawn in the other and having
497-426: A game. Before about 1600, the game could also be won by capturing all of the opponent's pieces, leaving just a bare king . This style of play is now called annihilation or robado . In Medieval times , players began to consider it nobler to win by checkmate, so annihilation became a half-win for a while, until it was abandoned. Two major pieces ( queens or rooks ) can easily force checkmate on
568-532: A heart attack during a tournament in Milpitas, California on October 17, 2015. After his death, a number of grandmasters and international masters wrote tributes to him. In 2016, the Alabama Senate passed a resolution "celebrating [his] life and legacy". Grandmaster Maurice Ashley described Tate as "a trailblazer for African-American chess". Chess Chess is a board game for two players. It
639-800: A reputation as a creative and dangerous tactician on the U.S. chess circuit, where he won about 80 tournament games against grandmasters . Tate won the United States Armed Forces Chess Championship five times. He won the Indiana state championship six times (1995, 1996, 2000, 2005, 2006, 2007) and was inducted into the Indiana State Chess Hall of Fame in 2005. He also won the Alabama state championship in 2010. Fellow Air Force veteran and 2003 U.S. Armed Forces Chess Champion Leroy Hill said: "All
710-680: A role it assumed in 1948. The current World Champion is Ding Liren of China. The reigning Women's World Champion is Ju Wenjun from China. Other competitions for individuals include the World Junior Chess Championship , the European Individual Chess Championship , the tournaments for the World Championship qualification cycle , and the various national championships . Invitation-only tournaments regularly attract
781-443: A rook and a queen. There are four fundamental checkmates when one side has only their king and the other side has only the minimum material needed to force checkmate, i.e. (1) one queen , (2) one rook , (3) two bishops on opposite-colored squares, or (4) a bishop and a knight . The king must help in accomplishing all of these checkmates. If the winning side has more material, checkmates are easier. The checkmate with
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#1732797501248852-402: A rook or queen along a back rank (that is, the row on which the pieces [not pawns] stand at the start of the game) in which the mated king is unable to move up the board because the king is blocked by friendly pieces (usually pawns) on the second rank. An example of a back-rank checkmate is shown in the diagram. It is also known as the corridor mate . The scholar's mate (also known as
923-511: A series of games between two players, or a team competition in which each player of one team plays one game against a player of the other team. Chess's international governing body is usually known by its French acronym FIDE (pronounced FEE-day) ( French : Fédération internationale des échecs), or International Chess Federation. FIDE's membership consists of the national chess organizations of over 180 countries; there are also several associate members, including various supra-national organizations,
994-510: A simple trap known as the Scholar's mate (see animated diagram) can be recorded: Variants of algebraic notation include long algebraic , in which both the departure and destination square are indicated; abbreviated algebraic , in which capture signs, check signs, and ranks of pawn captures may be omitted; and Figurine Algebraic Notation, used in chess publications for universal readability regardless of language. Portable Game Notation (PGN)
1065-848: A truck-leasing business. Tate II learned to play chess as a child. He served in the United States Air Force as a sergeant, where he "excelled as a linguist." Tate learned Spanish through being an exchange student in Mexico. He was "chosen to participate in the Indiana University Honors Program in Foreign Language, Spanish Division during the summer of 1975" and spent two months living with a Mexican family. In 1993, Tate gave chess lessons to elementary school students in Goshen, Indiana , as part of
1136-476: A wide variety of styles. The Staunton pattern is the most common, and is usually required for competition. Chess pieces are divided into two sets, usually light and dark colored, referred to as white and black , regardless of the actual color or design. The players of the sets are referred to as White and Black , respectively. Each set consists of sixteen pieces: one king , one queen , two rooks , two bishops , two knights , and eight pawns . The game
1207-464: Is "surprised", in the military sense of "ambushed". "Shāh" ( شاه ) is the Persian word for the monarch. Players would announce "Shāh" when the king was in check. "Māt" ( مات ) is a Persian adjective for "at a loss", "helpless", or "defeated". So the king is in mate when he is ambushed, at a loss, helpless, defeated, or abandoned to his fate. In modern Persian, the word mate depicts a person who
1278-405: Is a checkmate by the bishop, with the black king in the corner. The bishop can be on other squares along the diagonal, the white king and knight have to be on squares that attack g8 and h7. The second position is a checkmate by the knight, with the black king on a side square next to the corner. The knight can be on other squares that check the black king. The white king must be on a square to protect
1349-399: Is a text-based file format for recording chess games, based on short form English algebraic notation with a small amount of markup . PGN files (suffix .pgn) can be processed by most chess software, as well as being easily readable by humans. Until about 1980, the majority of English language chess publications used descriptive notation , in which files are identified by the initial letter of
1420-415: Is an example of a stalemate, from the end of a 1966 endgame study by A. H. Branton. White has just moved 1.Na3+? If Black moves 1...Kc1!, then White must move his bishop to save it because if the bishop is captured , the position is a draw because of the insufficient material rule. But after any bishop move, the position is a stalemate. A back-rank checkmate is a checkmate delivered by
1491-415: Is compulsory; a player may not skip a turn, even when having to move is detrimental . Each piece has its own way of moving. In the diagrams, crosses mark the squares to which the piece can move if there are no intervening piece(s) of either color (except the knight, which leaps over any intervening pieces). All pieces except the pawn can capture an enemy piece if it is on a square to which they could move if
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#17327975012481562-423: Is controlled using a chess clock that has two displays, one for each player's remaining time. Analog chess clocks have been largely replaced by digital clocks, which allow for time controls with increments . Time controls are also enforced in correspondence chess competitions. A typical time control is 50 days for every 10 moves. Historically, many different notation systems have been used to record chess moves;
1633-569: Is dead", as chess reached Europe via the Arab world , and Arabic māta ( مَاتَ ) means "died" or "is dead". Moghadam traced the etymology of the word mate . It comes from a Persian verb mandan ( ماندن ), meaning "to remain", which is cognate with the Latin word maneō and the Greek menō ( μένω , which means "I remain"). It means "remained" in the sense of "abandoned" and the formal translation
1704-405: Is frozen, open-mouthed, staring, confused and unresponsive. The words "stupefied" or "stunned" bear close correlation. So a possible alternative would be to interpret mate as "unable to respond". A king being in mate (shah-mat) then means a king is unable to respond, which would correspond to there being no response that a player's king can make to the opponent's final move. This interpretation
1775-457: Is much closer to the original intent of the game being not to kill a king but to leave him with no viable response other than surrender, which better matches the origin story detailed in the Shahnameh . In modern parlance, the term checkmate is a metaphor for an irrefutable and strategic victory. In early Sanskrit chess ( c. 500–700), the king could be captured and this ended
1846-399: Is not a permissible response to a check. The object of the game is to checkmate the opponent; this occurs when the opponent's king is in check, and there is no legal way to get it out of check. It is never legal for a player to make a move that puts or leaves the player's own king in check. In casual games, it is common to announce "check" when putting the opponent's king in check, but this
1917-411: Is not required by the rules of chess and is usually not done in tournaments. Once per game, each king can make a move known as castling . Castling consists of moving the king two squares toward a rook of the same color on the same rank, and then placing the rook on the square that the king crossed. Castling is permissible if the following conditions are met: Castling is still permitted if
1988-422: Is played on a square board of eight rows (called ranks ) and eight columns (called files ). Although it does not affect game play, by convention the 64 squares alternate in color and are referred to as light and dark squares. Common colors for wooden chessboards are light and dark brown, while vinyl chessboards are commonly buff and green. To start the game, White's pieces are placed on
2059-491: Is recognized in FIDE-sanctioned events; game scores recorded in a different notation system may not be used as evidence in the event of a dispute. Chess is often played casually in public spaces such as parks and town squares. Contemporary chess is an organized sport with structured international and national leagues, tournaments, and congresses . Thousands of chess tournaments, matches, and festivals are held around
2130-606: Is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to distinguish it from related games such as xiangqi (Chinese chess) and shogi (Japanese chess). Chess is an abstract strategy game that involves no hidden information and no elements of chance . It is played on a chessboard with 64 squares arranged in an 8×8 grid. The players, referred to generically as "White" and "Black" , each control sixteen pieces : one king , one queen , two rooks , two bishops , two knights , and eight pawns . White moves first, followed by Black; then moves alternate. The object of
2201-408: Is the checkmate of a lone king by the opponent's two bishops and king. The superior side is able to drive the lone king into a corner and force mate using the two bishops and king collaboratively. The only stipulation is that the two bishops must move on opposite-colored squares. Accomplishing the mate requires a maximum of 19 moves. The king and bishops cooperate to drive
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2272-436: Is the current World Champion. A huge body of chess theory has developed since the game's inception. Aspects of art are found in chess composition , and chess in its turn influenced Western culture and the arts , and has connections with other fields such as mathematics , computer science , and psychology . One of the goals of early computer scientists was to create a chess-playing machine . In 1997, Deep Blue became
2343-526: Is usually calculated as 1 point for each game won and one-half point for each game drawn. Variations such as "football scoring" (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw) may be used by tournament organizers, but ratings are always calculated on the basis of standard scoring. A player's score may be reported as total score out of games played (e.g. 5½/8), points for versus points against (e.g. 5½–2½), or by number of wins, losses and draws (e.g. +4−1=3). The term "match" refers not to an individual game, but to either
2414-885: The International Braille Chess Association (IBCA), International Committee of Chess for the Deaf (ICCD), and the International Physically Disabled Chess Association (IPCA). FIDE is recognized as a sports governing body by the International Olympic Committee , but chess has never been part of the Olympic Games . FIDE's most visible activity is organizing the World Chess Championship ,
2485-655: The Barnhart Etymological Dictionary, an alteration of the Persian phrase "shāh māt" ( شاه مات ) which means "the King is helpless". Persian "māt" applies to the king but in Sanskrit "māta", also pronounced "māt", applied to his kingdom "traversed, measured across, and meted out" thoroughly by his opponent; "māta" is the past participle of "mā" verbal root. Others maintain that it means "the King
2556-406: The basic checkmate positions with a queen , which can occur on any edge of the board. Naturally, the exact position can vary from the diagram. In the first of the checkmate positions, the queen is directly in front of the opposing king and the white king is protecting its queen. In the second checkmate position, the kings are in opposition and the queen mates on the rank (or file ) of
2627-405: The bishop and cover a square not covered by the knight. With the side with the bishop and knight to move, checkmate can be forced in at most thirty-three moves from any starting position, except those in which the defending king is initially forking the bishop and knight and it is not possible to defend both. However, the mating process requires accurate play, since a few errors could result in
2698-440: The black king to the side of the board, then to a corner, and then checkmates. It can be any side of the board and any corner. The process is: This is not the shortest forced checkmate from this position. Müller and Lamprecht give a fifteen-move solution; however, it contains an inaccurate move by Black (according to endgame tablebases ). Avoid stalemate One example of a stalemate is this position, where 1.Kb6 (marked with
2769-513: The edge of the board using a technique known as the ladder checkmate . The process is to put the two pieces on adjacent ranks or files and force the king to the side of the board by using one piece to check the king and the other to cut it off from going up the board. In the illustration, White checkmates by forcing the Black king to the edge, one row at a time. The ladder checkmate can be used to checkmate with two rooks, two queens, or
2840-584: 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; Ding Liren
2911-404: The end of the game, " 1–0 " means White won, " 0–1 " means Black won, and " ½–½ " indicates a draw. Chess moves can be annotated with punctuation marks and other symbols . 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 not easily refuted. For example, one variation of
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2982-513: The enemy king to an edge of the board, and then into a corner to deliver the mate. "The process, though a bit lengthy, is fascinating because it gives us a glimpse of the power of the two bishops on the open board." Three basic checkmate positions are possible via the two bishops checkmate. The first is a checkmate in the corner. The second position is a checkmate on a side square next to the corner square (this position can theoretically occur anywhere along an edge, but can only be forced adjacent to
3053-448: The enemy pawn's two-square advance; otherwise, the right to do so is forfeited. For example, in the animated diagram, the black pawn advances two squares from g7 to g5, and the white pawn on f5 can take it en passant on g6 (but only immediately after the black pawn's advance). When a pawn advances to its eighth rank , as part of the move, it is promoted and must be exchanged for the player's choice of queen, rook, bishop, or knight of
3124-664: The first computer to beat a reigning World Champion in a match when it defeated Garry Kasparov . Today's chess engines are significantly stronger than the best human players and have deeply influenced the development of chess theory; however, chess is not a solved game . The rules of chess are published by FIDE (Fédération Internationale des Échecs; "International Chess Federation"), chess's world governing body, in its Handbook . Rules published by national governing bodies , or by unaffiliated chess organizations, commercial publishers, etc., may differ in some details. FIDE's rules were most recently revised in 2023. Chess sets come in
3195-423: The first rank in the following order, from left to right: rook, knight, bishop, queen, king, bishop, knight, rook. Pawns are placed on each square of the second rank. Black's position mirrors White's, with equivalent pieces on every file. The board is oriented so that the right-hand corner nearest each player is a light square; as a result the white queen always starts on a light square, while the black queen starts on
3266-407: The first rank moves to e2"). For pawns, no letter initial is used; so e4 means "pawn moves to the square e4". If the piece makes a capture, "x" is usually inserted before the destination square. Thus Bxf3 means "bishop captures on f3". When a pawn makes a capture, the file from which the pawn departed is used to identify the pawn making the capture, for example, exd5 (pawn on the e-file captures
3337-457: The four-move checkmate) is the checkmate achieved by the moves: The moves might be played in a different order or in slight variation, but the basic idea is the same: the queen and bishop combine in a simple mating attack on f7 (or f2 if Black is performing the mate). There are also other ways to checkmate in four moves. The fool's mate , also known as the two-move checkmate, is the quickest possible checkmate. A prime example consists of
3408-436: The g-file, 5th rank" (that is, to the square g5). Different initials may be used for other languages. In chess literature, figurine algebraic notation (FAN) is frequently used to aid understanding independent of language. To resolve ambiguities, an additional letter or number is added to indicate the file or rank from which the piece moved (e.g. Ngf3 means "knight from the g-file moves to the square f3"; R1e2 means "rook on
3479-567: 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 at least to the emergence of a similar game, chaturanga , in seventh-century India . After its introduction in Persia , it spread to the Arab world and then to Europe. The rules of chess as they are known today emerged in Europe at
3550-465: The game. The Persians (c. 700–800) introduced the idea of warning that the king was under attack (announcing check in modern terminology). This was done to avoid the early and accidental end of a game. Later, the Persians added the additional rule that a king could not be moved into check or left in check. As a result, the king could not be captured, and checkmate was the only decisive way of ending
3621-561: The hash symbol "#", for example: 34.Qg3#. A checkmate may occur in as few as two moves on one side with all of the pieces still on the board (as in fool's mate , in the opening phase of the game), in a middlegame position (as in the 1956 game called the Game of the Century between Donald Byrne and Bobby Fischer ), or after many moves with as few as three pieces in an endgame position. The term checkmate is, according to
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#17327975012483692-400: The king is never actually captured—the player loses as soon as the player's king is checkmated. In formal games, it is usually considered good etiquette to resign an inevitably lost game before being checkmated. If a player is not in check but has no legal moves, then it is stalemate , and the game immediately ends in a draw . A checkmating move is recorded in algebraic notation using
3763-411: The king. With the side with the queen to move, checkmate can be forced in at most ten moves from any starting position, with optimal play by both sides, but usually fewer moves are required. In positions in which a pawn has just promoted to a queen, at most nine moves are required. In the position diagrammed, White checkmates easily by confining the black king to a rectangle and shrinking
3834-414: The opponent choose. White moves first, after which players alternate turns, moving one piece per turn (except for castling , when two pieces are moved). A piece is moved to either an unoccupied square or one occupied by an opponent's piece, which is captured and removed from play. With the sole exception of en passant , all pieces capture by moving to the square that the opponent's piece occupies. Moving
3905-442: The opponent has enough pieces left to deliver checkmate). The duration of a game ranges from long (or "classical") games, which can take up to seven hours (even longer if adjournments are permitted), to bullet chess (under 3 minutes per player for the entire game). Intermediate between these are rapid chess games, lasting between one and two hours per game, a popular time control in amateur weekend tournaments. Time
3976-478: The other hand, Jeremy Silman includes the checkmate with two bishops but not the bishop plus knight checkmate because he has had it only once and his friend John Watson has never had it. Silman says: "... mastering it would take a significant chunk of time. Should the chess hopeful really spend many of his precious hours he's put aside for chess study learning an endgame he will achieve (at most) only once or twice in his lifetime?" Avoid stalemate This position
4047-427: The piece chosen is indicated after the move (for example, e1=Q or e1Q ). Castling is indicated by the special notations 0-0 (or O-O ) for kingside castling and 0-0-0 (or O-O-O ) for queenside castling. A move that places the opponent's king in check usually has the notation " + " added. There are no specific notations for discovered check or double check . Checkmate can be indicated by " # ". At
4118-443: The piece on d5). Ranks may be omitted if unambiguous, for example, exd (pawn on the e-file captures a piece somewhere on the d-file). A minority of publications use " : " to indicate a capture, and some omit the capture symbol altogether. In its most abbreviated form, exd5 may be rendered simply as ed . An en passant capture may optionally be marked with the notation " e.p. " If a pawn moves to its last rank, achieving promotion,
4189-555: The piece that occupies the first rank at the beginning of the game. In descriptive notation, the common opening move 1.e4 is rendered as "1.P-K4" ("pawn to king four"). Another system is ICCF numeric notation , recognized by the International Correspondence Chess Federation though its use is in decline. In tournament games, players are normally required to keep a score (record of the game). For this purpose, only algebraic notation
4260-405: The players had street names. Emory's was 'Extraterrestrial' because we thought his play was out of this world." Tate married Eileen Ashleigh, an English woman, in 1985. Together, they had three children, the oldest of whom is controversial social media personality Andrew Tate . The couple divorced in 1997, and his ex-wife returned to Luton , England with their children. Tate died after suffering
4331-402: The queen is the most common, and easiest to achieve. It often occurs after a pawn has queened . A checkmate with the rook is also common, but a checkmate with two bishops or with a bishop and knight occurs infrequently. The two-bishop checkmate is fairly easy to accomplish, but the bishop and knight checkmate is difficult and requires precision. The first two diagrams show representatives of
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#17327975012484402-429: The rectangle to force the king to the edge of the board: Avoid stalemate The winning side must be careful to not stalemate the opposing king, whereas the defender would like to get into such a position. There are five general types of stalemate positions that can occur, which the stronger side must avoid. The first two are more common. The first diagram shows the basic checkmate position with
4473-429: The required piece is not available (e.g. a second queen) an inverted rook is sometimes used as a substitute, but this is not recognized in FIDE-sanctioned games. A game can be won in the following ways: There are several ways a game can end in a draw : In competition, chess games are played with a time control . If a player's time runs out before the game is completed, the game is automatically lost (provided
4544-402: The rook is under attack, or if the rook crosses an attacked square. When a pawn makes a two-step advance from its starting position and there is an opponent's pawn on a square next to the destination square on an adjacent file, then the opponent's pawn can capture it en passant ("in passing"), moving to the square the pawn passed over. This can be done only on the turn immediately following
4615-473: The rook to move, checkmate can be forced in at most sixteen moves from any starting position. Again, see Wikibooks – Chess/The Endgame for a demonstration of how the king and rook versus king mate is achieved. In the third diagram position, White checkmates by confining the black king to a rectangle and shrinking the rectangle to force the king to the edge of the board: Avoid stalemate There are two stalemate patterns: The two bishops checkmate
4686-407: The same color. Usually, the pawn is chosen to be promoted to a queen, but in some cases, another piece is chosen; this is called underpromotion . In the animated diagram , the pawn on c7 can be advanced to the eighth rank and be promoted. There is no restriction on the piece promoted to, so it is possible to have more pieces of the same type than at the start of the game (e.g., two or more queens). If
4757-415: The square were unoccupied. Pieces are generally not permitted to move through squares occupied by pieces of either color, except for the knight and during castling. When a king is under immediate attack, it is said to be in check . A move in response to a check is legal only if it results in a position where the king is no longer in check. There are three ways to counter a check: Castling
4828-452: The standard system today is short-form algebraic notation . In this system, each square is uniquely identified by a set of coordinates, a – h for the files followed by 1 – 8 for the ranks. The usual format is The pieces are identified by their initials. In English, these are K (king), Q (queen), R (rook), B (bishop), and N (knight; N is used to avoid confusion with king). For example, Qg5 means "queen moves to
4899-463: The world every year catering to players of all levels. Tournaments with a small number of players may use the round-robin format, in which every player plays one game against every other player. For a large number of players, the Swiss system may be used, in which each player is paired against an opponent who has the same (or as similar as possible) score in each round. In either case, a player's score
4970-736: The world's strongest players. Examples include Spain's Linares event, Monte Carlo's Melody Amber tournament, the Dortmund Sparkassen meeting, Sofia's M-tel Masters , and Wijk aan Zee's Tata Steel tournament. Regular team chess events include the Chess Olympiad and the European Team Chess Championship . The World Chess Solving Championship and World Correspondence Chess Championships include both team and individual events; these are held independently of FIDE. Checkmate In chess,
5041-411: The x) would be stalemate. Of the basic checkmates, this is the most difficult one to force , because these two pieces cannot form a linear barrier to the enemy king from a distance. Also, the checkmate can be forced only in a corner that the bishop controls. Two basic checkmate positions are shown with a bishop and a knight , or the bishop and knight checkmate . The first position
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