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A chessboard is a game board used to play chess. It consists of 64 squares, 8 rows by 8 columns, on which the are placed. It is square in shape and uses two colors of squares, one light and one dark, in a checkered pattern. During play, the board is oriented such that each player's near-right corner square is a light square.
The columns of a chessboard are known as , the rows are known as , and the lines of adjoining same-colored squares (each running from one edge of the board to an adjacent edge) are known as . Each square of the board is named using algebraic, descriptive, or numeric chess notation; algebraic notation is the FIDE standard. In algebraic notation, using White's perspective, files are labeled a through h from left to right, and ranks are labeled 1 through 8 from bottom to top; each square is identified by the file and rank that it occupies. The a- through d-files constitute the , and the e- through h-files constitute the ; the 1st through 4th ranks constitute White's side, and the 5th through 8th ranks constitute Black's side.
The chessboard acquired its modern checkered pattern in the 10th century with the arrival of chess in Europe.Yalom 2004, p. 17. This pattern was based on that of the then-5×5 draughts board. As a result of this change, each diagonal was now highlighted by a continuous sequence of same-colored squares, which later facilitated the introduction of the modern bishop and queen movements in the 15th century.Hooper & Whyld 1996, p. 48.
The Libro de los juegos (1283) contains a description of the chessboard, describing eight rows and columns as the ideal number, deeming the practice of chess on the 10×10 board too tiresome and on the 6×6 board too quick.Yalom 2004, p. 62. In the 13th century, some players began using the convention that the first square of the far right column should be light-colored; this convention was endorsed by Pedro Damiano at the end of the 15th century.Hooper & Whyld 1996, p. 47.
In contemporary chess, a digital board is a chess board connected to a computer that is capable of transmitting the moves to the computer itself: the information about the moves can be used to play a game against a chess engine, or simply to record the moves of a game automatically. A digital board uses sensors to detect the position of the pieces, and each piece move can be recorded.
In 1998, the 33rd Chess Olympiad was held in Elista. The games were digitally broadcast over the internet thanks to the introduction of digital chess boards developed by Digital Game Technology: 328 boards were used for the event.
In 2003, ex-world champion Garry Kasparov faced chess engine X3D Fritz in a series of four matches in a Virtual reality, where the computer-generated board hovered in the air in front of Kasparov, who used special glasses. This was the first man–machine game of chess performed in a completely simulated environment.
High-level games generally use wooden boards, while vinyl, plastic, and cardboard are common for less important tournaments and matches, as well as for home use. Additionally, some very large chessboards are built into or drawn on the ground. Rarely, decorative glass and marble boards are permitted for games conducted by national or international chess federations.
Wooden boards are traditionally made of unstained woods that are light brown and dark brown in color. To reduce cost, some boards are made with veneers of more expensive woods glued to an inner piece of plywood or chipboard. A variety of color combinations are used for plastic, vinyl, and silicone boards. Common dark-light combinations are black and white, as well as brown, green or blue with buff or cream.
For international or continental championships, FIDE's regulations state that wooden boards should be used. For other FIDE tournaments, wood, plastic, or cardboard boards may be used, and the board should be rigid in all instances. The board may also be made of marble, as long as there is an appropriate contrast between the light and dark squares. The finishing should be neutral or frosted but never shiny. The squares should be from 5 to 6 Centimetre in length, at least twice the diameter of a pawn's base. If the Chess table and the board are two separate pieces, the latter must be fixed so it stays in place.
In the older descriptive notation, the files are labelled by the piece originally occupying its first rank (e.g. queen, , ), and ranks by the numbers 1 to 8 from each player's point of view. This method is no longer commonly used. FIDE stopped using descriptive notation in 1981.
ICCF numeric notation assigns numbers to both files and ranks, with rank 1 being the one closest to the player with the white pieces. The file leftmost to the White player ( a in algebraic notation and QR in descriptive notation) is file one and the rightmost to them ( h in algebraic notation and KR in descriptive notation) is file eight.
The board used for the Persian Tamerlane chess is one of the first recorded variant chessboards, with eleven columns by ten rows along with two citadels. Each player has a citadel to the right of their second rank, which may be occupied by the opponent's king, in which case that opponent may declare a draw. In 1617, Pietro Carrera proposed a variant that received his name, Carrera's Chess, with a 10×8 board, later used in other variants such as Capablanca chess and Gothic Chess. Other sizes, with ten rows by ten columns, are used in Omega Chess and Grand Chess; Omega Chess has four additional squares, one in each corner of the board. Los Alamos chess uses a smaller 6×6 board.
Japanese shogi uses a board with nine columns by nine rows. The board of Chinese xianqi consists of nine columns by ten rows; here, the pieces are placed on the intersections of the lines that divide the squares, rather than within the squares themselves.Hooper & Whyld 1996, p. 369. Each player has a 3×3 palace in the central three columns and the closest three rows, within which the player's general and advisors must stay. Between the central two rows is a river that the elephant cannot cross and past which the soldier increases in strength.Hooper & Whyld 1996, p. 78. A similar board without a river is used in Korean janggi.
Some chess variants use more than a single board per match. Bughouse chess, for example, involves four players playing two simultaneous matches on separate boards. Alice Chess is a popular variant which is usually played on two boards to facilitate the movement of pieces between the boards.Hooper & Whyld 1996, p. 11. Three-dimensional boards are often represented by multiple two-dimensional boards. Variants may use anywhere from two to eight boards. For example, Raumschach utilizes five boards of twenty-five squares each, totaling 125 squares. Another noteworthy variant, Star Trek Chess, utilizes a board of sixty-four squares with movable parts divided into seven levels. In the initial position, each player occupies two of the movable four-square attack boards. The white pieces start in the lower level, using attack boards connected to this level and the first two rows of the board, while the black pieces start at the top, using the attack boards and first two rows of the third level.
In 1250, a sermon called Quaedam moralitas de scaccario per Innocentium papum (The Innocent Morality) showed the world as being represented by a chessboard. The white and black squares represented the two conditions of life and death, or praise and censure; over these, the pieces, representing humanity, would confront each other in the adversities of the game, which symbolized life.
Due to its simple geometry, the chessboard is often used in mathematical puzzles or problems unrelated to chess, such as the wheat and chessboard problem and the mutilated chessboard problem. The term infinite chessboard is sometimes used to refer to a grid.
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