Lesson 05

Initial position

              In the initial position each side has eight pawns, two rooks, two knights, two bishops, a queen and a king arranged as shown in the diagram below. Note that the only pieces on either side which can initially move are the pawns and knights.

Beginners usually set up the board incorrectly; it is a complex position to remember. The following anectotes may help you remember where the pieces go.

• White on the Right It is important that the bottom-right-hand square is light-colored.

• Knights live in castles One knight is placed next to each rook (rooks look like the towers of a castle.)


• Queens on their color The White Queen goes on a White Square, Black Queen goes on a Black Square


• Bishops are advisers to the Royalty Bishops surround the King and Queen.


• White King on the Right From the White Player's perspective, both Kings are on the right, and from the Black Player's perspective, the Kings are on the left.

Lesson 04

Knight

The knight has a unique L-shaped move; two squares in one direction either horizontally or vertically, and one square in another direction perpendicular to the first. The knight is the only piece that may jump over other pieces.The knight captures any opponent's piece that it lands on during its L-shaped move.

Pawn

Pawns can move one square straight forward, or optionally and on their first move only, two squares straight forward. The pawn can move one square diagonally forward to capture a piece, but cannot capture a piece by moving straight forward. For this reason, two opposing pawns on a file may become blocked by each other.

                                   

                                                                        

Lesson 03

Queen

The queen is the most powerful piece, being able to move any number of squares in any lateral or diagonal direction. It is best described as the combination of a rook's and bishop's movement capabilities.

KING 

The king can move one square at a time in any direction, with certain restrictions.

The king is the most important piece belonging to each player, though not the most powerful. If a player moves a piece such that it threatens to capture his opponent's king, that king is said to be in check. If a player's king is in check, he must immediately remove the check by moving the king, blocking the check with another piece, or capturing the checking piece. As mentioned above, players may not place their own king in check; however, they may check their opponent's king. Two kings may never occupy adjacent squares, since they would have put themselves in check by moving there.

If the king is placed in check and cannot escape, it is said to have been checkmated (or "mated" for short). The first player to checkmate the opponent's king wins the game. Note that the king is never actually captured, since it is obliged to move out of check whenever possible (and the game ends when it is impossible).

                     The king may capture any opponent's piece adjacent to it, as long as doing so does not place himself in check.

Lesson 02

Rook

The rook can be moved any number of squares horizontally or vertically, but not diagonally.

Bishop

The bishop can move any number of squares diagonally. Each side starts the game with one light-squared bishop and one dark-squared bishop. Note that the bishop is restricted to the color of squares on which it began.

The bishop may not jump over any piece of either color. It captures any opponent's piece that it encounters during the movement described above, and then occupies the captured piece's square.

Lesson 01

The board

Traditionally, the game is played on a board of 64 alternating black and white squares turned with a white square to each player's far right. "White on right" is a helpful saying to remember this convention. The light and dark squares on the chessboard and the light and dark chess pieces are traditionally referred to as "white" and "black" respectively, although in modern chess sets almost any colors may be used. The horizontal rows of squares are called ranks and are numbered 1-8; the vertical rows of squares are called files and given the letters a-h.