ChessWorld Hitchhiker's Guide to ChessScope: This glossary does not intend to cover player names, opening names, or Composition terms. The Glossary aims to relate the terms to ChessWorld where possible when giving examples.If you have contributions, corrections or questions, please post them to the Chess Forum for discussion. There is a dedicated Chess Openings Glossary |
Glossary Course Modules with Game ExamplesGlossary Course Modules with Tactical Puzzle ExamplesA | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | [S] | T | U | V | W | X | Y | ZSA move which gives up material in order to gain some positional or tactical advantage. See the diagram below which occurred in the club game Bob Eames (ECF 199) vs T.C.Gavriel (ECF 183) 20/11/2000.  Black played Qxg2+ because after Rxg2, Re1 is mating White. View Tip as Course Module | ||||||
Scholar's mate
View Tip as Course Module | ||||||
Schools of Chess  Philidor The earliest school of chess pioneered by Philidor with his published work entitled "Analyse du jeu des echecs" highlighted the interrelationship between pieces and pawns. Philidor's quotation "The pawns are the soul of chess" is still widely known and talked about today. Philidor recognised the profound importance of pawn structure on the whole conduct of the game. Philidor discussed isolated, doubled pawns, backward pawns and pawn islands. He also discussed Holes, Blockades, Prophylaxis and even positional sacrifices - many of these concepts were later re-emphasised by Nimzovich in the Hyper-modern school. Verdict: Level of influence today: Modern Chess writers such as GM Andrew Soltis have since scientifically broken down particular pawn structure configurations showing the associated plans for both sides. The book "Pawn Structure Chess" classified the major pawn structure formations. Books such as Soltis's are highly ranked on Amazon sales, and have a big influence, echoing Philidor's fundamental notion that the "Pawns are the soul of chess". Nimzovich has essentially re-emphasised many of Philidor's concepts. Pros and cons: Emphasises the strategic elements of the position - the pawns are one of the most abstract features of a position. The Modernese School - The ideas of this school are shown in the writings of Rio, Lolli and Ponziani. The idea basically was to play for direct attack on the enemy king. Therefore omitting the emphasis Philidor placed on control of the center and pawn structure. This school had a big influence on the "Romantic era" of chess - an era where many beautiful attacking games. Verdict: Level of influence today: Occasionally top GM's venture into the old Gambits. Spassky for example was a major exponent of the Kings Gambit. Today emphasis is placed much more on sounder openings, and opening research. Pros and Cons: Makes for exciting creative games. However it might encourage unsound attacking play which could be easily refuted. The English School - Founded by Staunton in 1840 - play in the opening was characterised by central control and key square domination. Then, and only then, to seek direct attacks on the opponent's king. Verdict: Level of influence today: Massive - the principles of Staunton are the fundamental principles of the classical school. Pros and cons: Emphasises central square control and positional play The Classical School (began 1872-3)  Steinitz This School effectively ended the Romantic era of chess as more cynicism was placed on unsound attacks. Attacks should only be successful if the player attacking had an advantage. Steinitz rejected notions of the Romantic school such as the attack was more "honorable" than defence. Steinitz developed the Accumulation theory - the gathering of small advantages until they became decisive. Steinitz's ideas were later evolved and followed on by Chigorin and Lasker. Lasker, like Steinitz, also became a great defensive player and understood the amount of defensive resources available within a defensive looking position. Later Steinitz ideas were evolved by Tarrasch. Tarrasch believed that Steinitz may have overestimated the importance of pawn structure weaknesses, and that mobility was the more dominant strategic factor. This view was reflected in openings such as the Tarrasch defence where black willingly accepts an isolated pawn but has a lot of piece pressure compensation and mobility, often exposing White pawn weaknesses such as f2 and other sensitive squares around the opponent's king. Players like Tarrasch qualified many of Steinitz's concepts, such as emphasising that the side with greater mobility has weaknesses which are less exploitable than the opponent. The side with the initiative and mobility has greater opportunities to exploit weaknesses. The Classical school also had a champion in the form of Capablanca, who played very classical openings, and would often grind opponents down with his positional understanding and brilliant endgame technique. The personal relationship between Tarrasch and Nimzovich of the Hypermodern school is symbolically dramatic - they apparently could not tolerate each other very much, as well as having conflicting ideas of the game. Verdict: Level of influence today: Massive - Capablanca, Karpov, Fischer could all grind opponents down and were all very good at endgames. These past world champions are highly acclaimed and respected. Pros and cons: Emphasises positional play and avoiding playing unsound attacks not based on having an advantage of position The Hypermodern school  Aron Nimzovich This school was largely formed as a result of a backlash towards the apparent dogmatism of Tarrasch. Nimzovich aimed to disprove many of Tarrasch's ideas and theories. However many of this theories can be dated back to Philidor's school of chess. Players such as Breyer, Nimzovich and Reti were the leading exponents of this school of thought. In this school, the central concepts layed down by Tarrasch were challenged. For example the concept of "occupation of the center" vs control of the center. Nimozvich wrote the massively influencial book called "My system" which encapsulated many concepts such as blockade and restraint, the 7th rank, prophylaxis, overprotection, etc. Verdict: Level of influence today: Massive - Nimzovichian and hypermodern concepts have had a fundamental impact of many players in future generations, and Nimzovich's work is still held in high esteem today. Pros and cons: Emphasises systematic positional play and element management - in particular control of the center as being just as effective as occupation of the center. Introduces high level strategic tools into a players armoury such as pawn chain management, blockade and restraint, overprotection. The Soviet School  The Soviet machine had churned out many World Champions. In the top row of the above picture, Petrosian sits with his hands clasped, followed by Mikhail Tal, Boris Spassky, Mikhail Botvinnik, and Vassily Smyslov. The Soviets dominated chess from the 1940's. Botvinnik can be argued to be the father of the Soviet school of chess, which put chess more as a science with great research now being conducted in the Opening phase of the game, and the middlegame being played scientifically and more objectively on the merits of the position. This School represents the pre-computer analytical school, with a learning towards much greater objectivity and concrete analysis.  Mikhail Botvinnik The leading Soviets literally did join the "Botvinnik school" which was like a correspondence course where Botvinnik would help his students study the game professionally and eradicating their weaknesses and building on their strengths. The students of Botvinnik's school, include Karpov and Kasparov. The Soviet school's reign was unexpectedly brought crashing down by the American genius Robert J Fischer. Despite Spassky having the support framework of a large number of past Soviet World champions, Fischer was able to win the 1972 match against him. Fischer's playing syle is like a combination of Capablanca and Alekhine. Verdict: Level of influence today: Massive - The Soviet school has produced the vast majority of past World chess champions. Recent books by Dvoretsky attempt to highlight some of the secrets of the Soviet training system. Pros and cons: The Soviet chess school has resulted in absolutely brilliant world class players and world champions. The Computer/Analytical School of chess - Modern players rely on technology such as Chessbase and other databases to assist in very concrete preparation for their openings and against particular opponents. Not only have databases made an impact on player's style and games, also engine analysis has helped discover the immense resources in chess. The effect of the "computer school" is to help show the true level of dynamism that exists in chess, and remove any arrogance with intuitive shaky conclusions on either opening variations or particular types of position. But one has to be careful that sterile brute-force generated computer analysis of games does not obscure our understanding of the broader strategic themes of the games. In over-the-board chess, one is without a brute-force approach, so mastering strategy is very important. Verdict: Level of influence today: Massive - Technology is increasing each year, so the capacity for players to have massive databases and be able to quickly analyse using an engine all the key tactical variations is now becoming very common. Pros and cons: Chess is being made more scientific. Possible disadvantage: Chess being made too clinical and too much about preparation and analysis of variations as opposed to positional judgement and creative play. The Silman School of chess - Silman's "Reassess your Chess" was a huge best seller, and essentially re-emphasised a number of concepts about the middlegame, and particular the concept of imbalancing the position in order to be able to win. Verdict: Level of influence today: Massive - Silman's books have received a very wide audience. Pros and cons: Greater fighting chess as players strive more to create imbalances in the position which could result in more exciting fighting games Other miscellaneous "schools" and recent influences : The Petrosian/Defensive school of chess  Tigran Petrosian Emphasis placed on the importance of defence, and encouraging the opponent to overreach themselves. Pros and cons: Can achieve good results by playing solidly and accurately. Possible cons: Can result in dull openings and a dull way of playing waiting for the opponent to attack you. May help popularise the London system opening. The Bangiev School of chess - emphasis on square strategies. Pros and cons: Square control understanding increased. May however be at the expense of studying other aspects of positional play. The Creative school of chess  Mikhail Tal Players such as Bronstein, Keres, Tal, Nezhmetinzanov, Velimirovich, Spassky, Shirov, Morozevich, Larsen. These players sometimes play off-the-rail openings and wild games. They have a mass appeal generated from the excitement of their games and some have also reached the 2700 heights. The tactical training exercise school of chess - Popularised by Michael de Mazzo. The emphasis is more on specific tactics as opposed to strategy and positional play. By doing an enormous amount of tactical training puzzles and exercises and using a specific system of visualisation, Michael de Mazzo claims players can rapidly increase their rating. A possible weaknesses of this school of chess, is that players will be lacking in terms of positional understanding of the game. Summary and Conclusions Perhaps with hindsite of all the schools of chess throughout history, the answer to the question of the best way to play the game is simply: "It all depends on the position " :) An emphasis on "rule independence" as opposed to any rigid rules implied by any school of chess is likely to be the objective and correct way to play chess. However understanding of the various schools of chess contributes to our understanding of the game even before we play the first move of our next game and lets us often play good moves quickly :) View Tip as Course Module | ||||||
Score sheet | ||||||
Semi-closed game | ||||||
Semi-Open Game | ||||||
Seventh Rank | ||||||
Simplification | ||||||
Simultaneous display | ||||||
Skewer
The Black queen has been lost because of the skewer by White. It is as if the Black Queen and King are on an analogous barbecue skewer. View Tip as Course Module | ||||||
Skittles | ||||||
Smothered mate
The King goes to h8 because of it goes to f8, then Qf7 is mate. Then White plays Nf7 check:-
The King goes back to g8, and now White plays a double-check with Nh6 check
White sacrifices the Queen, to lure the Rook to g8
Nf7 is now checkmate - a smothered mate
See also the definition of Trap for another example of a smothered mate. View Tip as Course Module | ||||||
Space | ||||||
Stalemate
Black has no legal moves whatsoever, and Black is not in check. The game is declared drawn under these circumstances. It is important when heavily ahead on material to be careful to always give the opponent's king some moves available. One easy way to reduce stalemate risk is to continue putting the opponent's king in check until it is checkmate. This is an especially useful bit of advice for blitz chess games. View Tip as Course Module | ||||||
Strategy | ||||||
Swindle | ||||||
