MARK RUBERY CHESS
Here follows some interesting trivia on the Royal Game:
The longest game of chess that is theoretically possible is 5,949 moves.
According to the America’s Foundation for Chess, there are 169,518,829,100 ,544,000,000,00 0,000,000 (approximately 1.70x10 29) ways to play the first 10 moves of a game of chess.
There are 400 different possible positions after one move each. There are 72,084 different possible positions after two moves each. There are over 9 million different possible positions after three moves each. There are over 318 billion different possible positions after four moves each. The number of distinct 40move games in chess is far greater than the number of electrons in the observable universe. The number of electrons is approximately 10^79 , while the number of unique chess games is 10^120 .
The first chessboard with alternating light and dark squares (as it appears today) was made in Europe in 1090.
The new pawn move, where pawns were allowed to advance two squares on its first move instead of one, was first introduced in Spain in 1280.
The first chess game played between space and earth was on June 9, 1970 by the Soyez-9 crew. The game ended in a draw.
As late as 1561, Castling was two moves. In order to castle kingside you had to first play Rf1 and Kg1 on the next move.
The word “Checkmate” in Chess comes from the Persian phrase “Shah Mat,” which means “the King is dead.”
The number of possibilities of a Knight’s tour (the journey of a knight over an otherwise empty board where it visits each square once only) is 13,267,364,410,532
From the starting position, there are eight different ways to Mate in two moves and 355 different ways to Mate in three moves.
The names of the pieces-- the queen, king, knight, rook and bishop came about during the Middle Ages, when society was extremely oriented towards war and rigidly stratified. During the Renaissance period, society became more dynamic and rules were added to enable rapid attack techniques. These include making the queen more powerful, and permitting pawns to move two squares on the first move.
WHITE TO PLAY AND DRAW ‘Ks rf aa mK na ik+ sm ag tu cn rt uN m- pc l3 ee d+ aa log n- g0 s! i+ dt ef h+ i2 sw gg an mi es wu ic th1 Navara. His head hung down against his chest, below the board. He could have been sleep except his eyes were clenched shut rather than closed. The facial muscles flickered and he lurched up into something like a normal position, planting his elbows. A few seconds later his head slumped again, this time on to the table itself. Was here tired? In pain? Bored to death? It was hard to say but shortly after this piece of theatre the game was drawn.’ (Graham Hillyard-observing at the 2010 Olympiad)