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Introduction

Part of a Staunton chess set
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 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 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. The game is typically won by checkmating the opponent's king, i.e. threatening it with inescapable capture. There are 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 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 and is played by millions of people worldwide. (Full article...)

In chess, two squares are corresponding squares (also known as relative squares, sister squares, or coordinate squares) if the occupation of one of these squares by a king requires the enemy king to move to the other square in order to hold the position. Corresponding squares exist in some chess endgames, usually ones that are mostly blocked. Usually, there are several groups of corresponding squares. In some cases, they indicate which square the defending king must move to in order to keep the opposing king away. In other cases, a maneuver by one king puts the other player in a situation where he cannot move to the corresponding square, so the first king is able to penetrate the position. The theory of corresponding squares is more general than opposition and is more useful in cluttered positions.

In this article, all members of a pair of corresponding squares are labeled with the same number, i.e. 1, 2, etc.

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Chess from A to Z

Index: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z (0–9)
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