[blind-chess] Chess Article #50 Descriptive Chess Notation
- From: Roderick Macdonald <rmacd@xxxxxxxx>
- To: Blind Chess Mailing List <blind-chess@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 12 Jun 2010 20:32:01 -1000 (HST)
Chess Article #50
Descriptive chess notation
Adapted and Condensed from
Wikipedia the Free encyclopedia
Descriptive chess notation, or just descriptive notation is a
notation for recording chess games, and at one time was the most
popular notation in Britain and America for doing so. It has been
superseded by abbreviated algebraic notation, as the latter is more
concise and requires less effort to avoid ambiguity. However chess
players may find older chess books using this notation. Descriptive
notation exists in many language-based variants, the most prevalent
being English descriptive notation and Spanish descriptive
notation.
Howard Staunton, in The Chess-Player's Handbook, (1847) uses a
cumbersome early version, viz., P. to K's 4th (later written P-K4).
It is noteworthy that in the back of the book, he offers brief
descriptions of long algebraic chess notation, which he calls that
adopted by German writers, and of ICCF numeric notation, which he
calls "Koch's Notation."
Naming the pieces
Each piece is abbreviated to the first letter of its name: K for
king, Q for queen, R for rook, B for bishop, P for pawn. Knight
begins with the same letter as king, so to get around this it is
abbreviated to either Kt or N. "Kt" was used in older chess
literature. "N" is used in the examples in this article. In 1944
Chess Review received many letters debating the change from Kt to
N (Lawrence 2009:10).
Naming squares on the board
Names of the chessboard squares in descriptive notation.
In descriptive chess notation each square has two names, depending
on black's or white's viewpoint. Each file is given a name
corresponding with the piece that occupies the first rank at the
start of the game.
Thus the queen's file is named 'Q' and the king's file is named
'K'. Since there are two each of the remaining pieces on the first
rank, it is necessary to distinguish between them. The pieces on
the queen's side of the board (left for white, right for black) are
named with respect to the queen i.e. 'queen's rook', 'queen's
knight' and 'queen's bishop' and have the shortened names 'QR',
'QN' and 'QB' respectively. Similarly, the pieces on the king's
side (right for white, left for black) are named with respect to
the king i.e. 'king's rook', 'king's knight' and 'king's bishop'
and have the shortened names 'KR', 'KN' and 'KB' respectively. The
rank is given a number, ranging from 1 to 8, with rank 1 being
closest to the player. This method of naming the squares means that
each square has one name from white's point of view and another
from black's. For instance, the bottom left square ('a1' in
algebraic chess notation) is called "queen's rook 1" (QR1) by white
and "queen's rook 8" (QR8) by black.
Notation for moves
Each move of a piece is indicated by a sequence of characters.
Castling has its own sequence of characters and special indicators
are added to the end of the sequence if relevant.
* Move that is not a capture: A move without capture is
represented by the piece's name, a hyphen and the square at
the end of the move e.g. N-QB3 (knight to queen's bishop 3),
P-QN4 (pawn to queen's knight 4). In some literature, if the
move is to the first rank, the "1" is omitted.
* Capture: A move with capture is represented by the piece's
name, a cross (x) and the destination square is identified by
the name of the piece captured e.g. QxN (queen captures
knight).
* Castling: The notation 0-0 is used for castling kingside and
0-0-0 for castling queenside. The word "Castles" is sometimes
used instead, particularly in older literature.
* Promotion: Parentheses are used to indicate promotion, with
the piece resulting from the promotion in parentheses:
P-R8(Q). Sometimes an equal sign is used instead, as in
P-R8=Q.
* Special terms: Special indicators that are appended to the
move include e.p. (en passant), ch or + (check), mate or ++
(checkmate), resigns, and draw.
Typically, the move will record only enough information to make the
move unambiguous. For example, after 1. P-K4 P-K4, the move 2.
B-QB4 would be written 2. B-B4, since White cannot legally move
either bishop to KB4. A pawn capturing a pawn may be shown as PxP
if it is the only one possible, or as BPxP if only one of the
player's Bishop's Pawns can capture another pawn, or as QBPxP, or
PxQBP, or other such variations.
Disambiguation of pieces using notations like QBP and KR becomes
awkward once they have moved away from their starting positions (or
starting files, for pawns) and is impossible for pieces created by
promotion (such as a second queen). So as an alternative, moves may
also be disambiguated by giving the starting position or the
location of a capture, delimited with parentheses or a slash, as
BxN/QB6, or R(QR3)-Q3. Sometimes only the rank or file is
indicated, as R(6)xN.
When listing the moves of a game, first the move number is written,
then the move by White followed by the move by Black. If there's no
appropriate White move to use (e.g., if the moves are interrupted
by commentary) then an ellipsis ... is used in its place.
In Spanish descriptive notation the hyphen is not needed, as the
rank serves as separator. So the Sicilian opening (1. P-K4 P-QB4 in
English) would be written 1. P4R P4AD.
Advantages
By identifying each square with reference to the player on move,
descriptive notation better reflects the symmetry of the game's
starting position ("both players opened with P-K4 and planned to
play B-KN2 as soon as possible"), and because the pieces captured
are named, it is easy to skim over a game record and see which ones
have been taken at any particular point.
The maxim that "a pawn on the seventh is worth two on the fifth"
makes sense from both Black's perspective as well as White's
perspective.
English descriptive notation is also particular to chess, not to
any other game.
Disadvantages
Confusion can arise because the squares are named differently.
Errors may be made when not realizing that a move is ambiguous. In
comparison, abbreviated algebraic notation represents the same
moves with fewer characters, on average, and can avoid confusion
since it always represents the same square in the same way.
Example
The Evergreen game (Adolf Anderssen, Jean Dufresne, 1852) in
English descriptive chess notation.
White: G. A. Anderssen
Black: J. Dufresne
Opening: Evans Gambit
Location: Berlin, 1854
1. P-K4 P-K4
2. Kt-KB3 Kt-QB3
3. B-B4 B-B4
4. P-QKt4 BxKtP
5. P-B3 B-R4
6. P-Q4 PxP
7. O-O P-Q6
8. Q-Kt3 Q-B3
9. P-K5 Q-Kt3
10. R-K1 KKt-K2
11. B-R3 P-Kt4
12. QxP R-QKt1
13. Q-R4 B-Kt3
14. QKt-Q2 B-Kt2?
15. Kt-K4 Q-B4?
16. BxQP Q-R4
17. Kt-B6 ch! PxKt
18. PxP R-Kt1
19. QR-Q1! QxKt
20. RxKt ch KtxR
21. QxP ch! KxQ
22. B-B5 dbl ch K-K1
23. B-Q7 ch K-B1
24. BxKt mate
Other examples occur in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass.
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