- 4.1 20 basic mates
- 4.1.1 Material advantage
- 1+2. Mating the lone king at the edge of the board with the queen
- 3 +4. Mating the lone king at the edge of the board with the rook
- 5+6. Mating the lone king at the edge of the board with other pieces
- 7+8. Mating the lone 3/4 in the middle of the board with various pieces
- 9+10. Mating the uncastled king
- 4.1.2 Mating the castled king:
- 4.1.3 Vukovic's mates [Separate document]
- 4.1.1 Material advantage
4.1 20 basic mates
BCF Certificate of MeritClass 1 (Elementary)
"The game is won by the player who has mated the opponent's king. This immediately ends the game" - Article 10.1 of the official laws of chess, FIDE.
4.1.1 Material advantage
1+2. Mating the lone king at the edge of the board with the queen
You can't mate a K with K and Q in the middle of the board, but you can at the edge where there's less room for him to wriggle out. The Black Kings in the first diagram are all in checkmate.
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1. Centralise your own K
2. Drive the king to the edge of the board using the Q, stepping in with your Q or K every time the K gives way
3. Bring up your own K, and arrange the K and Q to mate the K
N.B. Don't allow stalemate!
In practice from the diagram below, you might play:
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| Training exercise for one person Try doing this sort of mate as quickly as you can from different starting positions - count how many moves you make as the attacker, and see if you can get it as low as possible. Have another go tomorrow, and next week, to see if you improve. |
3 +4. Mating the lone king at the edge of the board with the rook
Same again: you can't mate a K with K and R either in the middle of the board, but you can at the edge. The diagram shows more or less the only mate with the rook (others are possible if there are other pieces on the board).
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2. Arrange the K and R to mate the K
So, we can go 1. Ke2, Ke4; 2 Rh4+ Kd5; 3 Ke3, Ke5; 4 Rh5+ Ke6; 5 Ke4, Kd6; 6 Re5, Kc6; 7 Kd4, Kc7; 8 Kc5, Kb7; 9 Rd7+ Kc8 (or 9...Ka6; 10 Rc7!); 10 Kc6, Kb8; 11 Rg7! Ka8; 12 Kb6, Kb8; 13 Rg8#
The variation at move 9 is interesting. Black's K might be better off where it is, but does have to move even if it means walking into a mate. This unpleasant obligation is called zugzwang. Did you get this? In the next diagram we see a similar position where White could mate in 2.
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5+6. Mating the lone king at the edge of the board with other pieces
With some combinations of pieces you can mate in the middle of the board, but it's usually easier and sometimes necessary to do it at the edge. For some piece combinations, you need to get the king into the corner! You can do this with K+BB vs. K. You can arrange a mate in a corner with K+NN vs. K, but this cannot be forced. You can also mate in a corner with K+NB vs. K, but this is very tricky to force. You can try it against yourself if you like!
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BCF Certificate of Merit
Class 2 (Intermediate)
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Capablanca recommended the study of this mate, not because it comes up very often, but to show the power of the two Bishops in combination. You try with two Knights, but don't hold your breath... ;-) You should see the differences in the nature of the pieces straight away.
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COOL TIP: That probably isn't the most efficient but is easy to understand. And that's the secret of good chess - understanding. I hope you can see this pattern of driving the king back, cutting off squares, pushing it back to the edge of the board, in all these examples. Do try to repeat all these on a board yourself. |
![[cool blue cat says:]](/chessx/cool_cat.gif)
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Training exercise
for two people Try doing various mates as quickly as you can from different starting positions - count how many moves one of you makes as the attacker, and see if the other can get it lower. Have another go tomorrow, and next week, to see if you both improve. |
7+8. Mating the lone K in the middle of the board
with various pieces
Just to show it can be done.
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9+10. Mating the uncastled king
You must know the mate with 1 e4, e5; 2 Bc4, Nc6; 3 Qh5, Nf6; 4 Qxf7#, and there are several others like it. These are important formations, and most amusing if you can pull it off is the epaulette (shoulder-pad?) mate, in the second diagram below.
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4.1.2 Mating the castled king:
11,12. mates on the back rank
This is a very common mate, and easy to overlook if you have been sensible enough to leave your K behind a nice safe wall of pawns!
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13,14. mates on the second rank
These are very common and important mates; in the first diagram it is a luxury to have both Bishop and Rook supporting the Queen!
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15-20. other mates
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COOL TIP: Obviously, there are loads of mates. You must develop a feel for the sorts of ways pieces work together to create checkmates. |
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Training exercise
for one person One way to do this is to set up one corner of a
board with a castled king's position and try and mate the king
using different combinations of pieces - Q+B, Q+N, Q+R, R+B, and so
on. |