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Knighted chess is a family of over twenty Western Chess variant which incorporate two new pieces. The family includes Capablanca chess (usually played on a 10×8 board), Seirawan chess (on a 8x8 board), Embassy chess, Grand Chess (10x10 board), and Ed Trice chess. The two new pieces combine the powers of knight with that of bishop or rook, hence the term "knighted chess" as used by Cazaux & Knowlton.Cazaux & Knowlton (2017), pp. 251-274.The term is also used in Variant Chess magazine article, see: Variant Chess, Volume 1, Issue 6, April June 1991, pp 67-73.Pritchard, D. B. (2007), p. 181. Some authors also use the term "Capablanca chess" to refer to the whole family of variants that add these two new pieces.Gollon, John (1985). Chess variations Ancient, Regional, and Modern, p. 219. Tuttle Publishing.
The new compound pieces are the archbishop or princess which combines moves of a bishop and a knight, and the chancellor or empress which combines moves of a rook and a knight. These new pieces (which go by various other names depending on the variant) allow new strategies and possibilities that provide an interesting change to game of chess while also retaining the original style and aesthetic. For example, the archbishop by itself can checkmate a lone king in a corner (when placed diagonally with one square in between). A few variants also add another compound piece, the amazon (queen+knight).
The first knighted chess variant was introduced by Italian chess player Pietro Carrera in his 1617 book Il Gioco de gli Scacchi ( The Game of Chess).Foster, Ben. Chancellor Chess, or The New Game of Chess (1889), p. 5. Various similar games appears throughout the 18th and 19th centuries with the new knighted pieces. In the 20th century, World Chess Champion José Raúl Capablanca (1888–1942) also promoted a knighted chess variant now called Capablanca chess. Capablanca was concerned with how high level chess was overly reliant on extensive memorization and study of Chess opening and their variations. He feared that eventually most high level games would end in draws because of this. This threat of "draw death" for chess was his main motivation for developing and promoting a new chess variant.Cazaux & Knowlton (2017), p. 258. Later board game designers like Christian Freeling also attempted to promote different knighted chess variants.
Several chess grandmasters played and commented on knighted chess variants throughout the 20th century. Alexander Alekhine is reported to have played Neo-chess. The American grandmaster Yasser Seirawan designed his own variant to be played on a standard chessboard (Seraiwan chess). The Soviet grandmaster Viktor Korchnoi is known to have enjoyed playing Janus Chess, and is quoted as having said "I like playing Janus Chess because one can show more creativity than in normal chess."Pritchard (2007), p. 124.
The centaur was placed on the and champion on the , these being pieces which he appears to have invented for the purpose of the book, as he mentions previously odds where the weaker player’s king or queen has the knight’s move.“Del vantaggio del Recavallo”, “Del vantaggio della Donnacavallo” (Book 4, ch 12-13; “Of the odds of the King-Knight”, “Of the odds of the Queen-Knight”)
”del gioco nuovo, nel quale entrano due nuovi Pezzi ritrovati dall’Autore” (Tortelli, Mario; p.514; “of the new game into which enter two new Pieces recovered by the Author”)
His likely primary motivation for the design was either the limitations of Chess theory in this time or that he was just following the logic of Pedro Damiano and Ruy López de Segura that already assumed the logic of chess playing out to the game being about the second player’s response to the King’s or queen’s pawn opening, and even deeper, the first player’s response to the second’s immediate defense against them establishing the ideal pawn center, to its inevitable conclusion or that he considered it improper to play with a fairy piece, specifically a royal crowned Knight, merely by way of handicap and he was not as concerned with avoiding structural weaknesses in the new game’s starting position created by a potential new piece standing on a given file, as with the archbishop between the knight and the rook leaving its own pawn unprotected.
Carrera used the names Centauro (centaur) instead of archbishop, and Campione (champion) instead of chancellor. H.J.R. Murray incorrectly described the moves of the Centauro (actually, bishop + knight) and Campione (rook + knight). Coincidentally, he could have placed the doubleton of Italian draughts or Spanish Draughts, games which he even mentioned in passing in course of discussing the origin of chess“quel gioco, che i siciliani chiamano marella, e gli spagnuoli el juego de las damas” (p.35, The game that the Sicilians call marella and the Spaniards el juego de las damas), between the knight and the rook and left the new piece’s pawn unprotected from anything but itself, thus improving marginally upon placing the archbishop there. Though he was a good chess theoretician, he appears strangely unconcerned about the theoretical benefits and detriments of each possible setup, and the major theoretical detriment of the setup he chose is that the archbishop is thus mainly important to the opening theory of the game in the negative sense that it is necessary to get it out of the way of queenside castling, that is, when playing his variant adapted to modern rules.
The 19th century saw further similar variants with extra pieces developed. Das Schachspiel, seine Gattungen und Abarten ( The Game of Chess, its Types and Varieties, 1840) by Ludwig Tressau of Leipzig, the first modern book on chess variants, discusses two similar chess variants with knighted pieces: Kaiserspiel and Sultanspiel. Kaiserspiel was played on a 10x10 board with two additional pieces, one commander (queen+knight) and one adjutant” (bishop+knight). Sultanspiel meanwhile expanded the board to 11x11 and added the marshal (rook+knight).Cazaux & Knowlton (2017), p. 256.
In 1874, the English chess player Henry Bird (known as the inventor of the f4 Bird's Opening) proposed a further variant on Carrera's game in an issue of the City of London Chess Magazine. The only significant difference was the opening setup. The new pieces were now between the bishops and the royal pair, the archbishop close to the king, the chancellor close to the queen. The queen's bishop's pawn is not protected in the initial setup. Bird used the names equerry instead of archbishop, and guard instead of chancellor. The theoretical benefit of this setup is that the new pieces’ pawns are thus very important to the opening theory of the game, equally to the king’s and queen's pawns. This makes the chancellor‘s pawn a pair for the queen's pawn as leading to a more strategically oriented game from the nature of the chancellor.
There were also various other lesser known European chess variants that also slightly enlarged the board and introduced knighted pieces. One of these was a chess variant introduced by John Manners, 3rd Duke of Rutland (1696–1779), which used a 10x14 squares board with the following extra pieces: the concubine (combines rook and knight), two crowned rooks (rooks with the added power of taking a diagonal step), two extra bishops, an extra knight, and six extra pawns. This game became popular among several leading players of the time like André Danican Philidor and Abraham Janssen.Cazaux & Knowlton (2017), p. 253
The chancellor piece also appeared in Benjamin R. Foster's chancellor chess variant played on a 9x9 board. First publicized in the St Louis Globe-Democrat (12 February 1887), which states that the invention "created a furore in the chess world heretofore unknown." Foster published a booklet promoting and explaining the game in 1889.Pritchard (2007), pp. 121-122.
The main impulse behind Capablanca promotion of this variant was his belief that high level chess was becoming too reliant on memorization and "encyclopedic knowledge" of chess openings and positions. Capablanca feared that this would eventually lead to most high level games ending in forced draws or at least becoming too reliant on following prepared opening variations learned by rote. This concern was also shared by his friend Emmanuel Lasker according to Lasker's own Mein Wettkampf mit Capablanca.
Capablanca proposed two opening setups for Capablanca chess. His final revision placed the archbishop between the and ; the chancellor between the and .
In Capablanca chess, the king moves three squares when castling instead of moving two squares as in standard chess. A pawn can promote to archbishop or chancellor in addition to the regular promotion options in standard chess. Unlike orthodox chess, each king, instead of each queen, starts on a square of its own color (the white king on a light square; the black king on a dark square).
Capablanca initially experimented with a 10×10 board size with a different initial setup and where pawns could advance up to three squares on their first move. After some later Playtest however, he also promoted a variant on a 10x8 board. Edward Lasker wrote:
... I played many test games with Capablanca, and they rarely lasted more than twenty or twenty-five moves. We tried boards of 10×10 squares and 10×8 squares, and we concluded that the latter was preferable because hand-to-hand fights start earlier on it.
Lasker was one of the few supporters of this new variant and he helped play-test the game with Capablanca. Hungarian grandmaster Géza Maróczy also played some games with Capablanca (who got the better of him). British champion William Winter thought that there were too many strong pieces, making the less relevant. Capablanca's proposition was also criticized by other contemporary chess players in print, including Max Euwe and Siegbert Tarrasch . The debate was carried out in newspapers like the Manchester Guardian.
The new piece names archbishop (Spanish: arzobispo, originally named chancellor) and chancellor (Spanish: canciller, originally named marshall, followed by marshal) were introduced by Capablanca himself. These names are still used in most modern variants of Capablanca Chess.
There have been numerous attempts to modify and improve on Capablanca chess. Most of these add relatively minor changes, such as changing the starting positions. Various game designers and chess players have commented on how the starting position of Capablanca's original variant leave the pawns on the i file undefended, creating a significant weakness that can be exploited. Because of this, several chess variants postdating Capablanca chess were designed with initial arrangements where all pawns are protected by at least one piece; these include Universal chess, Grand Chess, Embassy chess, Trice's chess, Grotesque chess, Ladorean chess, Schoolbook chess, and Univers chess. The creators of these variants felt that leaving any pawn undefended in the initial setup created an easily exploitable weakness that needed to be resolved.
Some variants of knighted chess only adopt one knighted piece, not both. One example of this is Chancellor chess Chancellor chess, which only uses knighted rook (chancellor) and is played on a 9x9 board. Another example is Puerto Rican chess player Gabriel Vicente Maura's modern chess (c. 1968) which only uses the prime minister (bishop+knight).Pritchard (2007), pp. 121-123.
Hungarian-American grandmaster Susan Polgar played some Trice chess matches, and in 2006 there was an attempt to arrange a match between Bobby Fischer and Anatoly Karpov in this variant, but this never took place. Fischer was reportedly interested in the game according to Ed Trice.
A few other variants have also seen some wider play. For example, Christian Freeling's Grand Chess was played in a 1996 tournament in Armenia. It was also a common feature of American magazine Abstract Games in the early 2000s. Grand chess is also discussed in Schmittberger's New Rules for Classic Games (1992) , and in Pritchard's Encyclopedia of Chess Variants.
An organization for the game was also founded, the Federación Mundial de Ajedrez Moderno (FEMDAM), which had delegates from 16 countries. Tournaments were held throughout the 70s, but events ceased in 1983 and FEMDAM was eventually dissolved when Maura fell ill.Cazaux & Knowlton (2017), p. 260
When notating games in algebraic notation, the letter E is used for the elephant and H for the hawk. If the player places one of the two pieces on the board, it is written after a slash. For example, 1. Nc3/E means that the player moved his knight from b1 to c3 and placed the elephant on b1. The elephant and the hawk are introduced to the game in the following way: whenever the player moves a Chess piece (king, queen, knight, bishop or rook) from its starting position (that hasn't already been moved), one of the pieces in hand may be placed immediately on the square just vacated. One cannot use the placing of an elephant or hawk to block check. If the player moves all his pieces from the first without placing one or both in hand pieces, he forfeits the right to do so. After castling, the player may put one of the pieces in hand on either the king's or the rook's square, but he may not place both pieces in hand in the same turn. Pawns may promote to a hawk or an elephant in this game (in addition to the normal chess pieces).
In total, there are 12,118 starting positions in Capablanca random chess.
"Capahouse" similarly applies the drop rule from crazyhouse to Capablanca chess. The rules are as in Capablanca chess except the following new rules:
the placement of the pieces on squares vacated by the existing pieces changes the game and creates innumerable possibilities which render all existing opening theory open to reexamination and opens up many new possibilities as well. Players who understand the principles of opening play will do well, while players who rely primarily on memorizing variations will find themselves in trouble.Ed Thrice and his colleagues in the Gothic chess community pioneered various theories and openings for this Capablanca variant in the 2000s. According to Thrice,
Initially, we played many games by opening with 1. f4 which is the functional equivalent of 1. e4 in older 8x8 chess. Later, 1. d4 become more fashionable, but not for the corresponding reason to the liaison opening in regular chess. It is more flexible, tends not to "hem in" either Bishop, and allows White the opportunity to initiate the first real threat in the game. Lately, National Master John Vehre and Ed Trice pioneered the 1. g4 line, referred to as The Spike opening. That opening is the most aggressive, offers the greatest scope for original play, and is one of the most complicated ways to create middlegame tactical shootouts.
| pawn | 1 |
| knight | 3 |
| bishop | 3.5 (+0.5 for the ) |
| rook | 5 |
| archbishop | 8.75 |
| chancellor | 9 |
| queen | 9.5 |
Edward Trice meanwhile gives the following values for the pieces in his Trice's chess:
| pawn | 1.00 |
| knight | 2.50 |
| bishop | 3.00 |
| rook | 4.75 |
| archbishop | 6.75 |
| chancellor | 8.25 |
| queen | 8.75 |
These values would be different in variants with different board sizes and configurations however. On larger boards, bishops gain in value, because both of its forward moves become likely to attack the enemy camp. Thus in Capablanca chess, two bishops are clearly superior to two knights, and closer in value to two knights plus pawn.
There is in addition a strong "leveling effect": the strong pieces (archbishop, chancellor, and queen) cannot display their superiority against a large number of weaker pieces, because the weaker pieces can restrict them. For example, a queen attacked by a knight must usually move to avoid capture, and cannot rely on being defended; but a knight attacked by a queen need not fear. Thus sacrificing a strong piece for rook and minor, or three minor pieces, can give significant compensation (greater than a pawn) because it increases the value of one's remaining strong pieces relative to the opponent's.
As such, most hobbyists make their own custom sets. One can also alter, customize or paint regular chess pieces to make them appear distinctive. Another option would be to use specific chessmen from Chess set made in a very different style than the standard Staunton chess set, like the English Barleycorn, Lund pattern or Selenus styles. Other options include using RPG figurines and 3D printed pieces.
The knighted variants which make use of standard 8x8 Chessboard like Seirawan chess and Neo-chess pose no problem for players seeking to try these variants on their common chess boards. Other variants require customized boards which are not easily available (such as 10x8). For 10x10 board variants, an international draughts board can be used as a stand in, while for 9x9 variants, a Shogi board can be used. One can also buy inexpensive chess boards made of card stock, vinyl or mousepad material and cut them into pieces which can then be reassembled to accommodate different board sizes.
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