The Language Of Chess

Following is a selection of the more common chess-related terms.

Blunder: To totally miss something obvious, giving the benefit to the opponent.

Patzer: A player who cannot seem to improve his game, though he has played for years. A patzer is blundering all the time.

Trap: A move that attempts to induce a mistake by the opponent.

Opening: The first 10 to 15 moves of the game. This is the first phase of the game.

Middlegame: The second phase of the game, where most of the action takes place.

Endgame or Ending: The last of the 3 phases of the game, when only a few pieces are left on the board.

File: a column in the chessboard.

Rank: a row in the chessboard.

Wing or Side: The board can be divided into 2 vertical halves: the queen's wing or queenside (including files a-d) and the king's wing or kingside (including files e-h).

Light Piece: A bishop or a knight.

Heavy Piece: A queen or a rook.

Light-Squared Bishop: A bishop, either white or black, that moves on the white squares.

Dark-Squared Bishop: A bishop, either white or black, that moves on the black squares.

Check: To threaten the opponent's king.

Checkmate or Mate: To threaten the opponent's king, so that it has no escape. This ends the game.

Stalemate: A player is stalemated if he has no valid moves at his disposal, but he is not in check. The game is drawn in the case of stalemate.

Material: 1 or more pieces, not including the king.

Development: The procedure of moving the pieces from their initial positions into more active squares. It is very important to develop one's pieces in the opening.

Tempo: The time to play a move. To 'win a tempo' means to proceed in such a way as to appear to be making 2 moves instead of one. This may happen, for example, when threatening the enemy Queen while proceeding in development; the opponent will have to move the Queen and delay his own development by 1 tempo.

Pin: to make a move that prevents an enemy piece from moving, or if it does, another enemy piece behind it (lying in the same rank, file or diagonal) can be captured. The pin is an 'absolute pin' if the second piece is the King; in this case the pinned piece cannot move at all.

Exchange: To capture an enemy piece and let the opponent capture a piece of the same value.

Simplification: 1 or more exchanges lead to simplification of the position.

Sacrifice: A purposeful loss of material in order to bring in (usually after a combination) a bigger advantage.

Gambit: A pawn sacrifice in order to achieve something, usually a valuable tempo or the opening of files, diagonals, etc.

Variation: A possible sequence of moves that arises from a position.

Combination: A sequence of moves that results in an advantage, either material or positional.

Plan: The result of a mental process concerning how one should proceed in a position. It consists of sequences of moves, intended piece locations and other observations. A plan often uses general concepts.

Strategy: The methods 1 player uses to accomplish a plan. Must be based on the strategic factors that are present.

Tactics: When several captures, threats, pawn thrusts, etc. take place, a position is said to have tactical possibilities. To play correctly, the players need to examine the tactics (calculate or 'count' the variations).

Positional: Anything relevant to the piece's positioning and to how it affects the evaluation of a certain position.

Maneuver: A sequence of moves that places a piece on a target square.

Analysis: A complete examination of tactical and positional possibilities, usually containing explanatory comments.

Pawn Majority: To have more pawns in a wing than the opponent has.

Blocked Pawn: A pawn that cannot advance because an enemy pawn blocks its way.

Free Pawn: A pawn that may advance easily, for there are no enemy pawns in front of it on its own file or on nearby files.

Isolated Pawn: A pawn is isolated when no pawns of the same color are in the nearby files.

Backward Pawn: A pawn that is weakened because it has not advanced as much as the pawns on the nearby files.

Doubled Pawns: 2 or more pawns of the same color residing on the same file.

Center Pawns: The pawns d2, e2 and d7, e7 in the initial position.

Compensation: Return to a previous position to compensate for a material loss.

Initiative: The privilege to be a little more active than the opponent. It is considered to be a slight advantage, but if not exploited it may vanish.

Opposition: In an endgame a player has the opposition if his King is placed opposite the enemy King in the same file, rank (or diagonal, in the case of the diagonal opposition) with 1, 3 or 5 squares in between.

Forced Move: A move that one is obliged to make, because it is the only valid move in the position. Sometimes used to describe a move that, if one does not make, he will lose for sure.

Zugzwang: A move that leads to defeat and is such that, if one could avoid making (say if he could 'pass'), he would not lose.

Waiting Move: A move that leads to zugzwang.

Swindle: A ruse by which a player in a losing position tricks his opponent, and thereby achieves a win or draw instead of the expected loss.

Time Trouble: The situation where a player must make a number of moves in a short time.

Bad Bishop: A bishop which is hemmed in by pawns of its own color.

Blindfold Chess: A form of chess in which one or both players is not allowed to see the board.

Blitz Chess: A form of chess with a very small time limit, usually 3 or 5 minutes per player for the entire game. With the advent of electronic chess clocks, it is often the case that the time remaining is incremented by 1 or 2 seconds per move.

Fool’s Mate: The shortest possible chess game ending in mate: 1. f3 e5 2. g4 Qh4# (or minor variations on this).