Many beginners are concerned about various questions about how the pieces move - this is the basis of all movements and moves. This is where learning begins. It is worth dwelling on them in more detail.

There are 6 pawns, a rook (or tour), a bishop (also called an officer), a knight, a queen (otherwise known as a queen) and a king. They all walk differently. There are also subtleties in movement depending on the game situation. So, let's talk about each one separately.

Pawn

How do they walk from the second row? Pawns are the most numerous (there are 8 of them), but also the weakest characters. They can only go forward and only one cell. They can no longer go back. These figures hit a little differently - moving diagonally. The only case when a pawn can jump 2 squares forward is at the very beginning of the battle, making its first move.

On the other hand, a pawn that reaches the opposite edge of the board can be promoted to any other piece. Most often, chess players choose the queen because of its versatility, but if the game situation requires it, the “ordinary” can become an officer, a rook, and a knight.

Tura

Let's move on to the first row. How do chess pieces hidden behind pawns move? The tura walks in a straight line, both horizontally and vertically. The number of cells she can step over is unlimited. She is also capable of stopping at any point. Reversing is not prohibited. But the rook cannot jump over other pieces. She hits as she goes: she goes in a straight line, destroys her opponent and takes his place. All this without deviating from your line of movement.

There is a special move - castling. Only those who have not made a move can take part in it: the king and the tour. If one or both of them has already moved across the field, then castling cannot take place. The essence of this movement is that the king is moved 2 squares to the tour, and it is rearranged behind the king. This is the only case when 2 pieces are involved at once within one move.

Horse

Let's continue to study chess. How do pieces move that even people far from the game have heard of? The movement of the knight is similar to the letter "G". He jumps over 2 squares and stands on the third, perpendicular to the previous movement. The step can be made both vertically and horizontally. The horse is also capable of turning in any direction. Therefore, this figure standing in the center of the field has 8 options for movement. As a result of the move, the knight always ends up on the square of the opposite color.

Another advantage of the knight is that it can jump over other pieces, including enemy ones, without eating them. Without consequences for himself, he attacks the queen, rook or bishop, because they move completely differently and will not be able to overtake the cunning one. To hit, the knight must take the place of the attacked piece. Otherwise, he will simply jump over it.

Officer

How do chess pieces move if they are bishops? Along the diagonals. Each player has a “white” and a “black” bishop. This name is given because of the initial color of the field on which the piece stands. It is impossible to change it. The officer cannot jump over other pieces. Otherwise, his movements are not limited: in any diagonal direction for any number of cells. To eat an enemy piece standing in the officer's path, you need to put him in its place.

Queen

The most maneuverable and powerful figure. Moves the same way as a bishop and rook combined. That is, vertically, horizontally and diagonally to any number of cells and in all directions. It has only one limitation: you cannot jump over the pieces. In case of danger, the queen can hide in any direction. If necessary, attack from any point on the board. The queen is the most strong weapon in the hands of a chess player.

King

The most important figure that requires constant protection. With this we will complete the study of the question of how pieces move in chess. The king has practically no opportunity to hide, since he can only move 1 square. Of course, he can walk in any direction: diagonally, vertically or horizontally. But it is also quite easy to control it, provided that it is removed significantly. The king eats enemy pieces in the same way as he moves - moving 1 square. That's all that can be said about how the pieces move in chess.

The end of the game is connected with the king. They checkmate him. This means that the most important figure is under attack, and she has nowhere to hide: there are opponents all around. There are also no figures nearby to hide behind. If such a situation is created, the game ends. And the one who is checkmated is considered the loser.

Check is a position where the king is under attack, but he can escape or screen. It is also possible that the threatening figure can be eaten. The king cannot be left under attack. How do the chess pieces move in this case? All player actions must be aimed at protecting the king.

Pat is a very interesting situation in the game. In this case, the king himself is not under attack, he is not in check, but he has nowhere to move: all other cells are controlled by enemy pieces. The retinue cannot come to the rescue either. The stalemate is counted as a draw and the game ends.

That's it for the basic element when playing chess. It is known how the pieces move, you can start the game.

Hello again, dear friend!

Over the centuries-old history of chess, the queen has had a brilliant career. In ancient times, he was a big klutz, he walked diagonally and only one square. How does the queen move in chess today?

But first, a small digression. Since you’ve landed on this page, it means you’re a beginner, so we bring to your attention a cool educational video course “How to teach a child to play chess.” Thanks to him, you will learn and understand all the rules yourself, and you will also teach a child from 4 years old to play. You will not regret...

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In this article we will look at in pictures and examples of both the strength of the queen and methods of curbing his agility.

Queen moves

The queen can move both diagonally and straight (horizontally and vertically). If he is not interfered with by pieces that cannot be jumped over, he can make a move to any distance.

Of course, the queen can capture the opponent’s piece. In this case, a horse. His own bishop prevents the queen from advancing further.

In essence, the queen combines the functions of a rook and a bishop.

The queen must be protected

The queen is the most valuable piece. Trading it for a rook, bishop or knight is almost always unequal.


In this position, the white queen can capture any of the black pieces: the rook or the knight. However, they are protected by the elephant. The bishop will beat the white queen.This exchange is beneficial for Black.

The relative value of a queen is three minor pieces (or nine pawns). It can be exchanged equally only for the opponent’s queen or several pieces at once.

For example, two rooks. In terms of relative value, two rooks are slightly stronger than the queen (a rook is equal to five pawns), but in general, such a difference can be neglected by a beginning player. In addition, a lot depends on the specific position, you and I already know about this.

Queen's strength

The queen is the most dexterous, strong and most “emotional” piece.

After the world championship match with Max Euwe, journalists asked Alexander Alekhine:

“How would you briefly describe your opponent?”

Alekhine responded like this:

“He loves long queen moves!”

The answer of the first Russian world champion can be taken as a joke. However, we know that in every joke there is only part of the joke... and the rest is true.

It’s not easy for even experienced chess players to follow the rapid maneuvers of the queen in experienced hands, but what about beginners?

Example:


Despite the approximate material equality, White, due to the activity of the queen with the support of the bishop, can play for a win:

1.Be1-f2+


1...Kd4-e5 (not better than 1...Kd4-c4 due to 2.Qh7-d3+ Krs4-v4 3. Qd3-d4+ Kv4-v5 4. Krs2-v3! and mate on the next move)

2.Bf2-g3+!


3… Ke5-d4 4. Bg3-d6!!


4... Qd8:d6 (other moves are mate by moving the queen to d3) 5. Qh7-d3+


5...Kd4-e5 is followed by 6.Qd3-g3+, and 5...Kd4-c5 is followed by 6.Qd3-a3+

In both cases, the white queen's next move beats black queen and white wins the game:


In this example, the bishop made a lot of moves, but it is the white queen who plays the key role in surrounding the black king. It is his cunning threats that lead to victory.

I'm sure you noticed that the examples don't look like the simplest ones exercises for children . However, the author of these lines is convinced that You can learn to play well only by analyzing positions that force you to use your thinking to the fullest. .

Against the queen

The queen is so mobile and extraordinary that it is very difficult to develop typical fighting techniques against him.

Still we will try:

Abstraction. Feed the “glutton”!

Rules of the game provided the queen with rich opportunities. The queen's appetite is truly limitless. Possessing super functionality, he can take enemy pieces left and right. Experienced chess players often take advantage of this circumstance, offering the opponent’s queen to feast on Danaan gifts.

The main goal is to distract from the decisive area of ​​the struggle. Or catch it. More on this a little later, but now examples of distraction:


The white queen has just captured the pawn on b7. His position looks formidable. He attacks two black pieces at once - the rook and the knight.

1… Nc6:d4! 2. Fw7:a8+ White is blissfully unaware


2... Ke8-f7

and after 3.Qa8:h8 Qd7-b5!! - cold shower:


Checkmate with the queen on square e2 on the next move is inevitable.

Whites were ruined by greed... no one canceled the sense of proportion. And Black skillfully lured the white queen at the cost of sacrificing two rooks and with the remaining forces attacked the forgotten white king.

Catching the queen

If you manage to catch the queen, that is, force him to exchange it for a less valuable piece, this is a great achievement, almost always deciding the outcome of the game. To be fair, I will say that often this is not so much the merit of the “catcher” as the mistake of the “game”.

It is interesting to observe when, due to the queen’s self-confidence or “gluttony,” he finds himself in a delicate situation. Example:


Black has declared check and intends to win back the material with interest - White's rook is under attack. However... 1. Qd1-d2!!


1... Qc3:a1 (on 1...Qc3:d4 - 2.Cd3-b5+ with the loss of the queen) 2. c2-c3!!


That's all. The black queen “jumped.” After White's next move Nd4-b3, he is caught. Black will have to give up his queen for a minor piece.

Finally: According to tradition, about the correct names of the figures.

Even literary classics call the queen “ queen " This is understandable, the queen sounds proud and euphonious not only to the ears of representatives of the literary fraternity.

Simpler people sometimes call the queen a queen. Personally, I, a chess player with half a century of experience, have no questions about what to call a queen. I guess you do too.

Thank you for your interest in the article.

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The game of chess is inexhaustible, the number of moves in one game can be quite large, but not everyone knows how the pieces move in chess. For this reason, many amateur level players play chess every day. own rules, without even realizing that they are doing it wrong.

In this case, you should figure out where chess came from, the name of the pieces, and how they move in this or that case. The huge number of moves tends to scare off newbies, although in reality there is absolutely nothing to be afraid of. Having delved into the game, all difficulties will instantly disappear, because all the variety of positions and all kinds of chess combinations are based on elementary movements of the pieces.

A Brief History of Chess

To date, the exact origin of chess is still unknown, although there are several good versions. One of them claims that the game originated in India more than two millennia ago. Historians who adhere to this version say that chess is the result of the development of other games that are similar to them. The game that many people use now became known only in the 15th century, and it also gained popularity in Europe.

Even though no one knows where this game came to us, we know the rules of chess, how the pieces move and how you can win by deception.

Purpose of the game

Surely many people know that the game requires a board with exactly 64 squares marked (alternating dark and light), and the players must take places opposite each other. The game of chess seems to us incomprehensible, but at the same time extremely simple. How the pieces move will be described below, but for now you need to familiarize yourself with the purpose of the game.

Each player has exactly 16 pieces:

  • king;
  • queen;
  • 2 rooks;
  • 2 elephants;
  • 2 horses;
  • 8 pawns.

The goal of chess is to checkmate the opponent's king. Checkmate is a situation when one of the kings is threatened in the form of an opponent's piece, that is, the king is already in check and cannot escape this position in any way.

Start

Before starting the game, you should set up the board so that both opponents have a light square in the lower right corner. Next, the figures are arranged in rows:

  1. Rooks in the corners, knights nearby, then bishops. In the center there is a queen (on a cell of the same color as the figure itself) and a king is placed next to it on an empty cell.
  2. The next row consists entirely of pawns.

The player who chose the light-colored pieces must go first. If a dispute arises over who will play what chess, you can toss a coin (“heads or tails”) or blindly choose one or another piece (what color it turns out to be, that’s what all the others will be).

Now we need to understand how the pieces move in chess. For beginners, this may seem difficult at first, although in fact there is nothing special about it.

How pieces move in chess

Each figure has its own trajectory of movement. To understand how pieces move in chess, you don’t need to rack your brains, since these rules are extremely simple and can be memorized very quickly.

You just need to understand the main points:

  1. When making a move, some pieces do not pass through others.
  2. You cannot go to a square occupied by your own piece.
  3. Before making a move, you need to think about how and which piece to position in such a way that it defends its territory and can capture the opponent’s piece in this or the next move.

King

Now we should consider each of the figures separately. For a successful game, it is not enough just to know the basic points about how pieces move in chess. For children and adults, the most interesting figure is the king. He is at the same time the most important, but also the weakest. He has the ability to move exclusively one cell, but in absolutely any direction, including diagonally. In addition, he cannot stand on a square that is already in check, that is, where he will immediately be captured by an opponent’s piece.

Queen

People of any age can be interested in chess. Not everyone knows what the pieces are called and how they walk. It is worth noting that only those people who have experience playing chess are familiar with the name of this figure. The rest call the queen queen.

The queen is the strongest and most powerful piece. He, like the king, can move in any direction. Unlike the previous piece, it has the ability to move any number of cells, but without jumping over other pieces.

Rook

The question of how pieces move in chess, and especially the strongest ones, is quite popular not only among beginners, but also among amateurs. The rook is a unique piece that combines the capabilities of both the king and the queen. That is, she can move any number of cells, but only vertically or horizontally. In addition, the rook can easily take part in castling along with the king.

Elephant

The bishop belongs to the category of light pieces and can move any number of cells, but only diagonally. It is worth noting that at the very beginning of the game, one elephant occupies a dark square, and the second - a light one. During the entire game, they cannot change the original color in any way, so each player has two pieces that can go diagonally and capture the opponent’s piece on both a dark and light square. Both bishops must always work together and cover weak sides each other.

Horse

The only, and therefore unique, combat unit of chess is the knight. Only he has the ability to jump over the other pieces. He walks exclusively in the letter "G". That is, first it moves two cells horizontally or vertically, and then one cell, which is perpendicular to the original direction. Due to the fact that the knight has the ability to jump over other pieces, it can make a check to the king, from which he is not able to defend himself.

Pawn

Many people probably know which pieces go first in chess. But how exactly they walk is a more complicated question. A rather unusual piece - a pawn - can only move forward one square and only diagonally. On the very first move, the pawn can move a couple of squares forward. Under no circumstances can she go backwards. If any piece is located directly in front of it, then the pawn has no opportunity to either capture it or make a move until the space in front becomes free.

Transformation

At first glance, the pawn seems to be an unnecessary piece, since it is too weak. But she has one interesting feature, which only experienced players know about. It lies in the fact that if a pawn goes all the way to the opposite side, it becomes any other piece (this phenomenon is called “pawn promotion”). Only this piece can do this and, as a rule, it is turned into a queen. There is also a misconception that it can only transform into one of the previously taken figures, but in reality this is not the case.

Taking on the pass

Another rule that concerns only pawns is called “en passant capture.” It lies in the fact that if a pawn made the first move two squares and stood side by side with the opponent’s pawn, then the second has the opportunity to “eat” the first, that is, to take on the pass, which is where the name comes from. This situation can only be used during the next move, that is, immediately after the pawn moves two squares. If the opportunity was missed, then in subsequent moves it will be impossible to capture the piece.

Castling

No less important rule, called “castling,” consists of performing two important actions in one move. The first is to secure the king, and the second is to remove the rook from the corner, thereby launching it into the game. When castling, a player has the opportunity to move his own king a couple of squares to the right or left side, and also move the rook from the corner to the square next to the king (on the opposite side). But there are several conditions under which castling is permitted:

  • Before this, the king had not made a single move;
  • the corresponding rook also never moved;
  • there are no other pieces between the king and the rook;
  • the king is not in check at this time.

In the direction of the king's side, the king himself is located closer to the edge of the chessboard, which is called "short castling", and the opposite ("long castling") will be the same action, but across the entire field to the place where the queen was previously located. But with any of these options, the king can only move a couple of squares.

Checkmate

As already mentioned, the main task of the players is to checkmate the opponent’s king. This will be the end of the game when the main piece is under threat of check and has no way to escape it. But there are still several methods by which you can escape the check:

  • move to another square (except for the castling method);
  • close with another figure;
  • capture the piece that put the check.

If there are no such possibilities, then the king is checkmated and the game ends. As a rule, the king is not removed from the board, as is done with captured pieces, but the game is simply declared over.

Draw

Very often the game ends in a draw. There are five reasons for this:

  • lack of pieces on the board for checkmate;
  • 50 moves have already been made, and during this time none of the opponents moved a pawn or was able to capture a single piece;
  • the usual agreement of both players to a draw;
  • the occurrence of a stalemate, that is, some player does not have the opportunity to make a move;
  • if the same position is observed on the board for the third time (not in a row).

In most cases, when a draw is declared, the players by common consent begin the game again.

There are only 64 squares on the chessboard, but real chess battles can take place on them. One half of the cells is black, the other is white - 32 former and 32 black. According to chess rules, a cell is called a field.

Black and white are conventional colors. In the photo, some of the figures and the board are made using malachite. However, green figures and fields are conditionally black

Before arranging chess pieces, you need to position the chessboard correctly.

On the left side the board is installed correctly, on the right - incorrectly

There is a funny incident connected with an incorrectly placed chessboard that happened in ancient times somewhere on the border. It was on the border that two gentlemen periodically met and played chess with each other. One fine day, a customs officer became interested in the game and noticed that the board was positioned incorrectly. Those. The “chess players” didn’t even know the rules of chess, but simply pretended to play the game. As it turned out later, the imaginary chess players were smugglers - they hid contraband goods (gold, diamonds :) in chess pieces).

Naming chess fields (cells)

If there are fans of the game among our readers " Sea battle", then they probably drew an analogy with chess - each field has its own address. For example, a1, b7, e4, etc.

Each chess field has its own unique address. It is highly advisable that you visually remember where each field is located. In the future, this will be useful when studying the recording of chess moves. Please note that squares d4,e4,d5,e5 form the so-called center of the board. It is for the cent that the fight is waged at the beginning of a chess game (opening).

To quickly remember the names (addresses) of the chess fields, it makes sense to print out the drawing (A4 format) and hang it on the wall.

Names and designations of chess pieces

There are 6 types of figures in the opponents' arsenal:

  • The pawn is His Majesty's soldier.
  • Knight - the value of a knight is equivalent to 3 pawns;
  • Bishop - its cost, like that of a knight, is 3 pawns;
  • Rook - heavy artillery (5 pawns);
  • Queen - 9 pawns;
  • The king is priceless, because without him the game is impossible.

From left to right: king, queen, bishop, knight, rook, pawn

It is advisable for any beginning chess player to learn how to write down chess moves as early as possible; for this you need to know chess notation. Chess notation is a system of symbols used to record a chess game or the position of pieces on a chessboard. Already now you can familiarize yourself with the designations of chess pieces.

FigureAppearanceRussian abbreviationEnglish abbreviation
King♔ or ♚KrK (king)
Queen♕ or ♛FQ (queen)
Rook♖ or ♜LR (rook)
Elephant♗ or ♝WITHB (bishop)
Horse♘ or ♞TON(kNight)
Pawn♙ or ♟n or nothingp (pawn) or nothing

When studying chess notation, we will return to this table, and now we will figure out how to arrange the pieces.

Arrangement of chess pieces

Now let's see what the initial arrangement of chess pieces on the board looks like.

rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1

You must enable JavaScript to display charts.

This is exactly how the pieces should be arranged if we're talking about about chess in the classical sense. However, other variants of pieces are also possible when it comes to Fischer chess - otherwise called “random chess”. For now we are interested in the classic arrangement, so we need to remember it. Otherwise, confusion may arise, like in a chess game for children.

To make it easier for you to remember the arrangement of the figures, you can arrange them in a certain sequence. Watch the video for one of the options.


At the beginning of a chess game, there are 32 pieces on the board - 16 white and 16 black. At the end of the game, minimal amount There can be two figures - a white and a black king. Kings are the two most important pieces on the chessboard. The time has come to figure out what they can do - the whole truth about the chess king.

Chess is very old game. Chess is believed to have originated in India in the fourth or fifth century, but it is not known who invented it. Chess is an intellectual competition between two players. This is very logic game, where luck plays a small role.

The game of chess involves two sides, black and white, each with one player. Chess board consists of 64 cells, light and dark, alternating in color. The board is divided into eight columns and eight rows. Columns are designated by letters (from left to right: a, b, c, d, e, f, g and h), rows are designated by numbers (from top to bottom: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8). Thus, each cell has a designation based on which column and row it is in. First in the cell entry there is a column, then a row, for example, the cell in the lower left corner is designated a1 (column a, row 1).

The board is always placed in such a way that the nearest corner square to the right of the player is light. Each cell can either be empty or be occupied by a piece. The initial chess position consists of 16 white pieces and 16 black pieces arranged as shown below.

General rules of chess

Players take turns. White always goes first. White chooses a piece to move and places it on another square, based on the rules for moving this piece. They always move with one piece at a time, the exception to this rule is castling, when two pieces are involved at once (king and rook). The square on which a piece steps can either be empty, or it can be occupied by a piece from the opposite side. In the latter case, the enemy piece captured. Otherwise they say what's going on take figures. The captured piece is removed from the board and no longer takes part in the game. (Taking is not a mandatory action.)

Capturing and castling are discussed in more detail in the following sections:

Chess pieces

On the bottom row in the figure above, where the white pieces are located, are (from left to right): rook(also called tour or tower), horse, elephant, queen(also called queen), king, another bishop, another knight, and another rook. In the second row of white figures there are eight pawns. Please note that the queen in its initial position always occupies a square of the same color as the queen itself (i.e., the white queen is placed on a light-colored square, and the black queen is placed on a dark-colored square).

Each chess piece has a certain value (usually they are measured in pawns, i.e. each piece replaces a certain number of pawns). A queen is worth 9 points, so it is much more valuable than a pawn, whose value is only 1 point.

The table below lists all the chess pieces with their pictures, names, symbols, and values. The king is not valued in chess, because it is the most important piece, and if he is checkmated (see below), the game is lost. Although some sources give him 200 points.

Each piece in chess moves differently. All chess pieces are described in more detail in the following sections:

The purpose of the game of chess

The goal of the game is to put mat to the enemy king. Checkmate precedes check. If playing as White, then Black's king is put in check if White can capture it (in other words, if it is under attack by White's piece). To prevent White from capturing the black king on the next move, black must make a move that removes the king from check.

If Black cannot escape from check, then the Black king is declared checkmated and White wins the game. One way to describe checkmate is: checkmate is a position in which the king is in check and the player cannot make a single move to escape check. Another option for the development of events is when Black is NOT in check, but he cannot make a single move (due to the threat of being in check and/or due to inaccessible squares). This situation is called stalemate. When a stalemate occurs, the game ends in a draw.

The options for ending a chess game are described in more detail in the following sections:

Other rules of chess

  • A pawn, having reached the last square, can be promoted to a queen, rook, bishop or knight in the same move - this process is called pawn promotion. The result of the transformation occurs immediately. Therefore, if a pawn is promoted to a queen, the queen, if the situation allows, immediately puts check or even checkmate to the enemy king.
  • Each move must be made with one hand.
  • A piece that a player has already taken must be moved only if its movement does not put his king in check. This rule is called “take it - go.”
  • If an enemy piece is touched, it must be captured if possible. If this is not possible, then the game continues as if the piece had not been touched.
  • A player can correct a piece on the board during his turn by saying “I’m correcting.”
  • During castling, the king moves first and then the rook.
  • When a clock is used, the button on it must be pressed by the same hand that moved the piece during the move.
  • The game must be played with respect for the opponent. A player must not distract or interfere with his opponent.
  • The player can voluntarily surrender, in which case he loses and his opponent wins. A player can also offer a draw - if the opponent accepts the offer, it is declared a draw, otherwise the game continues.
  • 50-move rule: If there have been 50 consecutive moves by both white and black, without a single capture or pawn move, a draw can be claimed.

There are also some other rules of chess. Full list look at the rules