World chess champion

Above: Logo of the World Chess Federation FIDE
Middle: World champions Michail Botwinnik and Wilhelm Steinitz Below: World Chess Championship 2008
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The title of world chess champion is the highest honor in the game of chess , which - as a rule - is awarded after previous qualifying tournaments and finally through a duel for the world chess championship. The Austrian Wilhelm Steinitz is considered the first official world chess champion after his competitive victory against Johannes Hermann Zukertort in 1886. The reigning world champion has been the Norwegian Magnus Carlsen since 2013 , who won the title at the 2013 World Chess Championship from Viswanathan Anand and last defended it in 2018 against Fabiano Caruana .

The competitions to obtain the title of "World Chess Champion" were historically referred to as the "Men's World Chess Championship" as a distinction to the separate World Chess Championship for women . Since a corresponding clarification in the late 1980s, however, the title has generally been open to men and women. There are limited age groups for the Junior World Championship (U20), the Youth World Championship in the age groups U8 – U18 and the Senior World Championship - all also open to both genders, but also with their own competitions for female players. There are also world championships in blitz chess , rapid chess and correspondence chess .

World championships are played as a duel over several games between the world champion and a challenger. In 1948 and 2007, however, the world champion was determined through a round-robin tournament with several participants. The challenger must usually qualify for the World Cup duel by winning the Candidates Tournament.

A temporary separation of the world championship from the world federation FIDE since 1993 was reversed by the 2006 World Chess Championship . During this time, the FIDE world championships held , the winners of which were not considered generally recognized world champions.

The world's best players before the official world championship fights begin

First international chess tournament at the court of King Philip II of Spain in 1575, painting by Luigi Mussini (1886)

Modern chess probably originated around 1475 in Valencia, Spain, when the bishop and queen changed pace . The writers Francesc de Castellví i de Vic , Narcís Vinyoles , Bernat Fenollar and Francesc Vicent were significantly involved in this process . These are probably the best players of their time. The Catalan chess poem Scachs d'amor is evidence of this earliest development phase . This was followed by printed chess treatises by Francesc Vicent (1495), Luis Ramírez Lucena (1497) and Pedro Damiano (1512), which continued this tradition. Around the middle of the 16th century, the Spaniard Ruy López de Segura was considered the best player in the world. He was beaten 2: 3 by the Sicilian Giovanni Leonardo da Cutri in the first international chess tournament in history in 1575 at the court of the Spanish King Philip II in Madrid . Then Leonardo da Cutri also defeated the best Portuguese player El Morro "in many games" and, back in Madrid, his Italian compatriot Paolo Boi 2-1.

Giulio Cesare Polerio was one of the best chess players of her time . These personalities established the golden age of Italian chess. This tradition was continued by Alessandro Salvio around 1600 and by Gioacchino Greco from around 1620 to 1634 .

Around 1700, the Scot Alexander Cunningham was considered the best player in Europe.

From around 1730 the Italians flourished again with their theorists Domenico Lorenzo Ponziani , Ercole del Rio and Giambattista Lolli . At the same time, a lively chess scene developed in the Café de la Régence in Paris , which gradually overtook and replaced the Italian supremacy in European chess. The French François Antoine Legall de Kermeur (1730–1745), François-André Danican Philidor (1745–1795), Verdoni (1795–1804), Alexandre Deschapelles (1804–1820) and Louis-Charles Mahé de La Bourdonnais (1820–1840) ) replaced each other as the world's best players. La Bourdonnais achieved fame through six consecutive matches (a total of 85 games) against the Irishman Alexander MacDonnell in London in 1834, which the French won.

Image of the duel between Howard Staunton (left) and Pierre Saint-Amant (1843)

After the competition victory of the Englishman Howard Staunton over the Frenchman Pierre Saint-Amant in Paris in 1843, England was now considered the leading chess nation. It was Staunton who was instrumental in the implementation of one of the first international chess tournaments. This tournament took place on the occasion of the World Exhibition in London in 1851 . Surprisingly, it was not the English pioneer who won, but the hitherto completely unknown German Adolf Anderssen from Breslau , who also won the direct comparison against Staunton with 4: 1 in the semifinals.

Anderssen's victory now made him the world's best player in the chess world. In 1858 Anderssen played a match against the American Paul Morphy in Paris . Morphy achieved a brilliant victory, but the American ended his chess career soon after, so that Anderssen was once again considered the world's leading champion.

After the Austrian Wilhelm Steinitz had defeated Anderssen in a competition played in London in 1866, he was considered the undisputed best player in the world.

History of the World Championships

After his overwhelming victory at the big international tournament in London in 1883 (before Steinitz) is considered Johannes Zukertort as Champion of the World and called Steinitz's leadership out. The chess world expected a duel between these rivals and got it: With his 12.5: 7.5 victory (+10 = 5 −5) over Zukertort in the competition from January 11th to March 29th, 1886 , Wilhelm Steinitz is generally regarded as the one 1st world chess champion.

After Steinitz 'competition victory, there were a number of challengers who wanted to play with him for the world championship. Until 1948, the world champion alone decided whose challenge he accepted and whom to refuse a world championship fight. The title holder determined the conditions and the prize money almost at will.

This was often criticized, especially during Emanuel Lasker's time on the world championship throne, because worthy opponents did not get a chance or only after long negotiations.

In 1922, José Raúl Capablanca tried to introduce clear rules that were accepted by his potential challengers ( Alexander Alekhine , Efim Bogoljubow , Géza Maróczy , Richard Réti , Akiba Rubinstein , Savielly Tartakower and Milan Vidmar ). They consisted of 21 paragraphs that were printed in the American Chess Bulletin in December 1923 . The main points were:

The title holder has his title within a year to defend if he is challenged by a recognized master, provided that a prize fund of at least 10,000 dollars guaranteed and $ 500 in advance as collateral. However, the world champion has the right to set the exact date for the start of the competition.
20 percent of the prize money goes to the titleholder, the rest is distributed in a ratio of 60:40 between the winner and loser of the competition.
The competition goes to six winning games, draws do not count. The cooling-off time is 150 minutes for 40 moves. After five hours of play there is a hanging game .

Capablanca's successor as world champion, Alexander Alekhine, adhered to these rules formally, but avoided a rematch with Capablanca by always giving preference to the challenges of other players.

From 1948 to 1993 the world championship was organized by the World Chess Federation FIDE . The respective challenger of the world champion was determined by a multi-level qualification system (regional zone tournaments, interzonal tournaments and candidates ' tournament ).

Because Kasparov was no longer willing to defend his title under the aegis of FIDE in 1993, the situation that had prevailed before 1948 returned. Kasparov defended his title on his own terms. In 2000 he lost it to Vladimir Kramnik . In parallel, FIDE organized "official" world championships, the winners of which were not generally recognized as the world's best players. In 2006 there was an unification competition that ended the division of the world title.

The world chess champions

**List of all world chess champions**
No.	Surname	country	undisputed world champion	controversial
01.	Wilhelm Steinitz	Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary / United States United States	1886-1894
02.	Emanuel Lasker	Germany Germany	1894-1921
03.	José Raúl Capablanca	Cuba Cuba	1921-1927
04th	Alexander Alekhine	Russia Russia / France France	1927-1935 1937-1946
05.	Max Euwe	Netherlands Netherlands	1935-1937
06th	Mikhail Botvinnik	Soviet Union 1955 Soviet Union	1948-1957 1958-1960 1961-1963
07th	Vasily Smyslow	Soviet Union 1955 Soviet Union	1957-1958
08th.	Mikhail Tal	Soviet Union 1955 Soviet Union	1960-1961
09.	Tigran Petrosian	Soviet Union 1955 Soviet Union	1963-1969
10.	Boris Spassky	Soviet Union 1955 Soviet Union	1969-1972
11.	Bobby Fischer	United States United States	1972-1975
12.	Anatoly Karpov	Soviet Union 1955 Soviet Union / Russia Russia	1975-1985	FIDE: 1993-1999
13.	Garry Kasparov	Soviet Union Soviet Union / Russia Russia	1985-1993	classic: 1993–2000
	Alexander Chalifman	Russia Russia		FIDE: 1999-2000
	Ruslan Ponomarev	Ukraine Ukraine		FIDE: 2002-2004
	Rustam Kasimjanov	Uzbekistan Uzbekistan		FIDE: 2004-2005
	Wesselin Topalow	Bulgaria Bulgaria		FIDE: 2005-2006
14th	Vladimir Kramnik	Russia Russia	2006-2007	classic: 2000–2006
15th	Viswanathan Anand	India India	2007-2013	FIDE: 2000-2002
16.	Magnus Carlsen	Norway Norway	2013–

World Champion Wilhelm Steinitz (1886-1894)

Steinitz was a fighter by nature and never shied away from arguments. As before the competition with Zukertort, he again chose the most successful and most likely to threaten his position in the chess world to fight for the world title. He defended his title in competitions in 1889 (against Tschigorin) , 1890 (against Gunsberg) and 1892 (again against Tschigorin) . In 1894 Steinitz had to admit defeat to the young German talent Emanuel Lasker . He only recognized the loss of his title after he had also lost a revenge match against Lasker in 1896 .

World champion Emanuel Lasker (1894–1921)

Lasker was world champion for a total of 27 years from 1894 to 1921. His dominant position in the chess world of that time is undisputed. However, his World Championship was also characterized by the fact that he knew how to avoid duels with an uncertain outcome by setting up conditions that were difficult to meet. So there was no competition with the Polish master Akiba Rubinstein, which the chess world wanted . The battle of strength with José Raúl Capablanca did not take place until 1921.

After his victory over Steinitz in 1894, Lasker played the following world championship fights : 1896 fight for revenge against Steinitz, 1907 against the American Frank Marshall , 1908 against his German rival Siegbert Tarrasch , 1910 against Carl Schlechter and also 1910 against Dawid Janowski . In 1921 Lasker was defeated by the Cuban master José Raúl Capablanca in Havana .

World champion José Raúl Capablanca (1921–1927)

Capablanca dominated chess tournaments in the 1920s and was best known for its deep positional understanding. On the initiative of Capablanca, rules ("The London Rules") for future world championship fights were drawn up for the first time in 1922 on the sidelines of the London tournament, which were accepted by the leading masters present. The clauses made it difficult for the challenger to raise the prize money. A World Cup match should also be scheduled for six winning games. The challenger Capablancas determined in 1927 a - according to the London rules originally not intended - Candidates tournament in New York, in which Capablanca took part. Behind the world champion, Alexander Alekhine took second place. After Alekhine had found sponsors for the competition in Argentina, the long-awaited competition for the world championship finally took place in Buenos Aires from September 16 to November 29, 1927 . Capablanca lost against Alekhine 3: 6 in 25 draws. In the following years he tried in vain to persuade his successor to fight for revenge. The London rules later did not apply again.

World champion Alexander Alekhine (1927-1935 and 1937-1946)

Alekhine ascended the chess throne in 1927 with his spectacular victory over Capablanca. Although he had promised his predecessor a revenge match, Alekhine evaded Capablanca over the next few years and a rematch did not take place. Instead, he played against Efim Bogolyubov in 1929 and 1934 .

In 1935 he lost his title in the longest world championship fight to date to the Dutchman Max Euwe , but brought him back in a rematch in 1937 . There were no further competitions during the Second World War . Alekhine died in Portugal in 1946, accused of collaborating with the Germans and of anti-Semitism .

World Champion Max Euwe (1935–1937)

The Dutchman Machgielis (Max) Euwe was able to claim the world championship title for two years by defeating Alekhine. He was the only amateur who held the title of world chess champion.

The 1948 world championship tournament

Play media file

Dutch cinema news about the World Cup in The Hague, 23 March 1948

The death of Alexander Alekhine paved the way for the World Chess Federation ( FIDE ) to host the world championship matches . The world champion chosen by FIDE and generally recognized as such (FIDE appointed Efim Bogolyubov as official FIDE champion in 1928 ) was determined in the 1948 world championship tournament , which Mikhail Botvinnik won.

The tournament, held from March 1 to May 18, 1948 in The Hague and Moscow, was attended by Michail Botwinnik, Paul Keres , Vasily Smyslow , Samuel Reshevsky and ex-world champion Max Euwe. The American grandmaster Reuben Fine , who was originally also planned as a participant, waived. The five participants each played five games against each other. Botvinnik won with 14 points from 20 games, clearly ahead of Smyslow (11), Keres and Reshewsky (both 10½) and Euwe (4).

World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik (1948–1957, 1958–1960, 1961–1963)

From this year on, FIDE took over the organization of the competitions. The new World Championship regulations stipulated that the world champion had to defend the title every three years. The respective challenger was determined through zone, interzone and candidate tournaments.

Botvinnik defended his title at the 1951 World Cup against David Bronstein and the 1954 World Cup against Vasily Smyslow each with a 12:12, which according to the regulations was enough to defend his title . In 1956, immediately after Smyslov's renewed victory in the Candidates' tournament, FIDE decided as an additional privilege of the world champion the right to a rematch in the event of a defeat.

At the 1957 World Chess Championship Botvinnik lost to Smyslow, but he was able to get the title back in the 1958 rematch. At the 1960 World Cup he was defeated by Mikhail Tal , but was able to use his revenge rights again in 1961 to regain the title. Thereafter, FIDE revoked the right to a rematch. At the 1963 World Cup , Botvinnik finally lost his title to the Armenian grandmaster Tigran Petrosyan .

World champion Vasily Smyslow (1957-1958)

The runner-up in the 1948 world championship tournament was able to defeat Botvinnik in the 1957 world championship fight, but was defeated by the old world champion a year later in the revenge fight provided for by the statutes.

World champion Michail Tal (1960–1961)

The young Michail Tal was regarded as the "fiery head" among the chess masters of his time. In 1960 he prevailed against world champion Botvinnik. To everyone's surprise, the much older Botvinnik managed to take revenge again thanks to his precise preparation for the competition.

World champion Tigran Petrosyan (1963–1969)

In 1963 Tigran Petrosyan , one of the best positional and defensive players in chess history, managed to beat Botvinnik. At the 1966 World Cup , he defended his title victoriously against Boris Spasski (+4 = 17 −3). It was the first time since 1934 that a reigning world chess champion really beat his challenger. At the 1969 World Cup , he lost the title to a Spasski who was much better prepared this time.

World champion Boris Spasski (1969–1972)

Spasski's world championship lasted three years until the highly regarded competition with the American chess genius Robert James “Bobby” Fischer . From July 11 to August 31, 1972, the world championship match between the Soviet citizen Spassky and the American Fischer took place in Reykjavík, which the mass media had hyped up to the battle of the systems and match of the century : Fischer won the competition with the final result 12.5: 8.5 (+7 = 11 −3), with Fischer losing the second game without a fight due to no-show.

World Champion Robert James (Bobby) Fischer (1972–1975)

The Fischer World Cup was highly acclaimed in the West. The fascination that the chess genius Fischer exuded was joined by the satisfaction that an American had succeeded in penetrating the domain of the Soviet chess school .

Fischer's conquest of the chess throne surprisingly turned out to be the end of his career: The American withdrew from chess and did not defend the title in 1975 against the challenger Anatoly Karpov identified by FIDE . Fischer's resignation was preceded by long negotiations about the modalities in the competition regulations. FIDE was not prepared to host the competition on Fischer's terms (game to win 10, draws do not count, if the score is 9: 9 the match is canceled as a draw).

World champion Anatoli Karpov (1975–1985)

After Fischer failed to compete in the 1975 World Championship match, the challenger Karpow was proclaimed world champion by FIDE President Euwe. At the 1978 World Cup and the 1981 World Cup , Karpov defended his title against Viktor Korchnoi, who was 20 years his senior . Korchnoi had already been his final opponent for the Fischer challenge in 1975.

FIDE had meanwhile changed the regulations - no longer 24 games were played, but one match on six wins, draws did not count.

A 1984 world championship fight Karpows against challenger Garry Kasparov was canceled after 48 games. As in 1978 and 1981, they played for six wins. The intermediate result at the time of the cancellation was 5: 3 (+5 = 40 −3) for Karpow. The competition had started on September 10, 1984 and was canceled on February 15, 1985 by FIDE President Florencio Campomanes , although the FIDE regulations did not provide for this. At the time of the demolition, Karpov was in the lead, but was visibly battered, so that the demolition was generally viewed as a favor of the world champion over his younger challenger. Campomanes argued that such a situation with dozens of draw games was simply not dealt with in the statutes and that with now 48 games, twice the number of games planned under the old regulations had been played. It is also not possible to simply continue playing until a player is physically damaged. This is not the essence of chess.

In autumn 1985 the competition was repeated with changed rules (limitation to 24 games). Karpov had to admit defeat to Kasparov.

World champion Garry Kasparov (1985–1993 / 2000)

Since FIDE had reintroduced the right of revenge with the rule change, Kasparov had to defend his title against Karpov in 1986 , which he succeeded. Karpov was his opponent in the following World Cup in 1987 and World Cup in 1990 , but Kasparov was able to defend his title.

In 1993 there was a break between Kasparov and the world chess organization FIDE. Kasparov refused to play for the world championship again under the financial conditions of FIDE and was then disqualified from FIDE along with Nigel Short , his challenger for 1993. The two players were then instrumental in founding their own chess association, the Professional Chess Association (PCA). According to this, rival world champions were determined in both associations.

Kasparov defended his title in 1993 in a competition organized by the PCA against Nigel Short . In 1995 the next PCA-supported competition took place: Kasparov defeated the Indian Viswanathan Anand . Only in 2000 did Kasparov defend his title again. The decline of the PCA meant that no challenger was identified for the world champion. Kasparov's opponent Vladimir Kramnik was the first challenger the world champion chose since Alekhine's day . That and how - namely without achieving a single victory - Kasparov lost his title to Kramnik was generally considered sensational. They played in London from October 8th to November 2nd. Final result: 6.5: 8.5 (+0 = 13 −2).

In 1996, the Deep Blue chess computer became the first computer to beat the then reigning world chess champion Garry Kasparov in a game with regular time controls.

The FIDE World Championships

→ Main article: FIDE World Chess Championships 1993-2005

**FIDE world champion 1993-2006**
Surname	Period	country
Anatoly Karpov	1993-1999	Russia Russia
Alexander Chalifman	1999-2000	Russia Russia
Viswanathan Anand	2000-2002	India India
Ruslan Ponomarev	2002-2004	Ukraine Ukraine
Rustam Kasimjanov	2004-2005	Uzbekistan Uzbekistan
Wesselin Topalow	2005-2006	Bulgaria Bulgaria

After FIDE had disqualified the reigning world champion Kasparow and his identified challenger Short, a FIDE world championship was held parallel to the PCA world championship fight. This was the beginning of a split in the world championship that lasted until 2006. In 1996, 1997–1998, 1999, 2000, 2001–2002, 2004 and 2005, FIDE hosted other tournaments with the title World Cup. The knockout mode introduced in 1998 did not meet with unanimous approval from many players and in the chess world and was last used in 2004.

One attempt to reunite the two world championship titles was the Prague Agreement, initiated by the US Grandmaster Yasser Seirawan and titled "A fresh start", which was signed on May 6, 2002 by Garry Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik and Kirsan Ilyumschinow . the President of FIDE. This failed, however, because the planned qualification competitions did not materialize. Only after Kasparov's surprising resignation from tournament chess did the efforts to unite the competing titles lead to success in 2006.

World champion Wladimir Kramnik (2000 / 2006-2007)

In 2004 Kramnik defended his title against Hungary's Péter Lékó, who was determined in the Braingames Candidates Tournament, with a 7-7 draw (+2 = 10 −2).

The split in the world chess championship ended in 2006 with the competition between the “classic” world champion Kramnik and the FIDE world champion Wesselin Topalow . For the first time in a classic world chess championship, the tiebreaker decided the winner. Kramnik won and was now the sole world champion.

Kramnik had - as stipulated by the FIDE regulations - to defend the now sole world title in a round-robin tournament with eight participants. The winner of this tournament in 2007 was Viswanathan Anand, who was unbeaten and was the new world champion one point ahead of Kramnik.

World champion Viswanathan Anand (2007-2013)

Anand defended his 2008 world title in a match against Kramnik. Before the 2007 World Cup, Kramnik had been assured that if he lost his World Cup title he would have the chance of a revenge match the following year. In 2010 Anand defended his world title against Wesselin Topalow , in 2012 he won against Boris Gelfand in a tie-break. At the 2013 World Chess Championship he lost his title to Magnus Carlsen .

World Champion Magnus Carlsen (since 2013)

At the 2014 World Chess Championship there was a new edition of the duel Carlsen – Anand, in which Carlsen won again. At the 2016 World Cup , Carlsen defended his title in the tiebreaker against Sergei Karjakin and also at the 2018 World Cup against Fabiano Caruana after a tough fight in the tiebreaker.

Different entitlement to the world title

Even apart from the division of the title from 1993 to 2006, there were cases in which it was disputed who should be considered the world champion. But these are no longer relevant today:

Lasker returned his title in June 1920. According to an agreement between the two in January of the same year, the title was transferred to Capablanca. Capablanca attached great importance to a match with Lasker, but at least after an agreement about the hosting of the match in August 1920 he accepted his handover of the title. There were heated discussions in the chess world about the legitimacy of this transfer, with negative results. In the end, Capablanca was officially referred to as "the new world champion" only after winning the match in 1921.
In 1928 FIDE organized its first "official" championship : a competition between Efim Bogoljubow and Max Euwe , and in 1929 again between the same opponents. Bogoljubow won both times with a score of 5.5: 4.5. At the 5th FIDE Congress in Amsterdam in 1928, in which the world champion Alexander Alekhine also took part, Bogolyubov was awarded the title of FIDE Champion . In contrast to the FIDE World Championships 1993-2006, the tournament actually only served to determine the challenger of world champion Alekhine.
The view that Max Euwe was world champion again from August 1, 1947 by a FIDE decision at the Congress in The Hague for either two hours or one day was refuted by FIDE records. An application for a world championship title for Euwe had been submitted for discussion, but this was postponed until the arrival of the Soviet delegation. In some sources it was incorrectly stated that the application had initially been accepted and then revoked when the Soviets arrived.
Some believe that with Fischer's refusal to defend his title, Karpov became world champion as early as 1974. When Karpov was formally declared world champion in 1975, Fischer, in contrast, was still viewed by some as the "real" world champion. However, as the latter withdrew completely and Karpov underpinned his status as clearly the strongest player in the world with numerous tournament victories, the debate soon fell silent.

literature

Gedeon Barcza , László Alföldy, Jenő Kapu: The world champions of chess. Rattmann, Hamburg 1975.
André Schulz : The big book of the World Chess Championships. 46 title fights - from Steinitz to Carlsen . New in Chess, Alkmaar 2015. ISBN 978-9056916374 .
Raymund Stolze : Contested crown. The duels of the world chess champions from Steinitz to Kasparow. 3. Edition. Sportverlag, Berlin 1992, ISBN 3-328-00526-9 .
Edward G. Winter : World chess champions. Pergamon Press, Oxford 1981, ISBN 0-08-024094-1 .

Web links

Wiktionary: Chess world champion - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Commons : World Chess Champions - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Chronicle of the World Chess Championships ( Memento from June 7, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) on schachchronik.de
Complete collection of games from all world championships in pgn format
chessgraphs.com - compare FIDE rating histories of chess World Champions

Individual evidence

^ Ricardo Calvo: Valencia Spain. The Cradle of European Chess (English)
↑ Romeo, MC: Lucena - A mystery after 500 years ( Memento of October 12, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) (English)
↑ Alessandro Salvio: Trattato dell'Inventione et Arte Liberale del Gioco Degli Scacci (1604), in: George Walker: The Light and Luster of Chess , p. 351.
↑ George Walker: The Light and Luster of Chess , in: Chess & Chess-Players: Consisting of Original Stories and Sketches, London 1850, (English).
^ Robert Wodrow: Life of James Wodrow , Edinburgh / London 1828, p. 174.
↑ 1851 London Tournament , accessed October 12, 2010
↑ Edward Winter: The London Rules , 2008 (English)
↑ Johannes Fischer: Mikhail Botwinnik: The stubborn patriarch. 2005, accessed October 28, 2019 .
↑ A FRESH START (English)
^ Agreement of Prague ( Memento of March 11, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
↑ Edward Winter: How Capablanca Became World Champion
↑ Isaak and Wladimir Linder: Das Schachgenie Aljechin , Berlin 1992, p. 197.
↑ Chess: The History of FIDE , Section 5. Retrieved September 4, 2012.
↑ Sports Illustrated: A King Takes Himself Off The Board - maybe ( Memento from March 9, 2013 in the Internet Archive ). July 15, 1974. Accessed online September 4, 2012.
↑ Aleksandar Matanović : Chess is chess. Verlag Jugoslavijapublik, Belgard 1990, ISBN 8672970209 , p. 78.

[1] Ricardo Calvo: Valencia Spain. The Cradle of European Chess (English)

[2] Romeo, MC: Lucena - A mystery after 500 years ( Memento of October 12, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) (English)

[3] Alessandro Salvio: Trattato dell'Inventione et Arte Liberale del Gioco Degli Scacci (1604), in: George Walker: The Light and Luster of Chess , p. 351.

[4] George Walker: The Light and Luster of Chess , in: Chess & Chess-Players: Consisting of Original Stories and Sketches, London 1850, (English).

[5] Robert Wodrow: Life of James Wodrow , Edinburgh / London 1828, p. 174.

[6] 1851 London Tournament , accessed October 12, 2010

[7] Edward Winter: The London Rules , 2008 (English)

[8] Johannes Fischer: Mikhail Botwinnik: The stubborn patriarch. 2005, accessed October 28, 2019 .

[9] A FRESH START (English)

[10] Agreement of Prague ( Memento of March 11, 2016 in the Internet Archive )

[WinterCapa-11] Edward Winter: How Capablanca Became World Champion

[12] Isaak and Wladimir Linder: Das Schachgenie Aljechin , Berlin 1992, p. 197.

[13] Chess: The History of FIDE , Section 5. Retrieved September 4, 2012.

[SIFischer-14] Sports Illustrated: A King Takes Himself Off The Board - maybe ( Memento from March 9, 2013 in the Internet Archive ). July 15, 1974. Accessed online September 4, 2012.

[15] Aleksandar Matanović : Chess is chess. Verlag Jugoslavijapublik, Belgard 1990, ISBN 8672970209 , p. 78.