Chess Word of the Week

The act of developing or disclosing that which is unknown.
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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Thu Sep 02, 2010 1:45 am

Gavin Strachan wrote:This weeks word of the week is:

Fork

When two or more of the opponents pieces are being attacked at the same time by one piece.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fork_(chess) for diagrams.
I couldn't think of anything sensible to say about Baden Baden last week (is that really a word?) but this one got me thinking of linguistic stuff again. Does anyone know what the words in other languages are for some common chess terms such as "fork", "pin", "skewer", "discovered check", "check" (this is given at the earlier link), "checkmate", "draw", "stalemate" and so on? There was a webpage of foreign-language terms for chess pieces that was pointed to last time, but what about other chess terms? I guess ones like "zugzwang" are universal, but even then I suppose some languages might have their own equivalent term rather than borrowing the German or French (e.g. en passant).

Oops. Am I using up future word of the week possibilities? :o

Alexander Hardwick
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by Alexander Hardwick » Thu Sep 02, 2010 6:47 am

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:
Gavin Strachan wrote:This weeks word of the week is:

Fork

When two or more of the opponents pieces are being attacked at the same time by one piece.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fork_(chess) for diagrams.
I couldn't think of anything sensible to say about Baden Baden last week (is that really a word?) but this one got me thinking of linguistic stuff again. Does anyone know what the words in other languages are for some common chess terms such as "fork", "pin", "skewer", "discovered check", "check" (this is given at the earlier link), "checkmate", "draw", "stalemate" and so on? There was a webpage of foreign-language terms for chess pieces that was pointed to last time, but what about other chess terms? I guess ones like "zugzwang" are universal, but even then I suppose some languages might have their own equivalent term rather than borrowing the German or French (e.g. en passant).

Oops. Am I using up future word of the week possibilities? :o
I think there may be issues with using a proper noun (e.g. Baden Baden) as Word of the Week. There should be more than enough common nouns in the game! Sorry to bring in the grammar. :oops:

I remember playing in an adult rapidplay, back in summer 2008, when I was drawn against a French opponent in one of the rounds. For some reason, it popped into my head that I didn't know how to "castle" in French. I never had the courage to ask him (might have appeared rude) and I have been wondering ever since. Can anyone help? I have scanned through the thread to see if this has already been mentioned, so forgive me if I am inadvertently repeating.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by Roger de Coverly » Thu Sep 02, 2010 9:22 am

Alexander Hardwick wrote:I remember playing in an adult rapidplay, back in summer 2008, when I was drawn against a French opponent in one of the rounds. For some reason, it popped into my head that I didn't know how to "castle" in French.
Here's a list of chess terms in multiple languages.

http://chess.granz.de/ch_vocab.html

It's a translation from German, so Zeitnot which is almost an English loan word comes out as "lack of time" instead of "time trouble". Also "the exchange" is referred to as optionally "quality" which is only ever an expression used by non-native English speakers.

Castling is Rochade in German and roque in French. Many languages use a variation on the German word and it's widely known. Remis (draw) similarly.

Twenty years ago or more, FIDE did a phrase book and dictionary. This contained things like "When is the Adjournment session" and "The Soviet Union are leading the Olympiad", so some of it is a bit obsolete. I did have need to wonder once whether I could do "I am claiming a draw under 10.2" in French or German with any hope of being understood, luckily I was able to draw on the board before my time ran out.

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Gavin Strachan
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by Gavin Strachan » Tue Sep 07, 2010 9:29 am

The word of the week this week is:

En Passant which is French for In Passing. A rule that was added in the 15th century after pawns were allowed to move 2 squares from their starting position in a bid to speed the game up; originally pawns only moved one square forwards.

It is a special move which is where if a pawn moves 2 squares forward from the starting position and avoids potential capture from an opposing pawn by moving passing it one extra square, the opposing pawn can recapture it as it if the pawn had only moved one square.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/En_passant
for diagrams.

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Gavin Strachan
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by Gavin Strachan » Fri Sep 17, 2010 2:19 pm

well it has been busy busy busy so a belated word of the week this week.

After much consideration the word of the week is:

Sacrifice.

A Sacrifice or sac for short, is when a player intentionally gives up a piece to improve their position. There are two main types of sacrifice, speculative and true. A true sacrifice is when a piece is sacrificed and the rewards are obvious through careful analysis. A speculative sacrifice is a one where the player is gambling that it will work but has not fully considered all of the options/the options are too complicated to work out but it looks good.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacrifice_(chess)

For further information on sacrifices.

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David Brock
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by David Brock » Fri Sep 17, 2010 4:27 pm

Word of the week should be Waffle as thats all that this subject is about either that or TWINS
Think,check and then Move !!

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Gavin Strachan
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Re: Chess Word of the Week

Post by Gavin Strachan » Tue Oct 05, 2010 11:00 am

True. This is why I thought I would let u take over from here on in Dave! I'm too busy travelling between 2 hospitals and looking after the 1st one.

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