Schaken zonder koning ? door Rob de Vries
Dat de rubriek "An Arbiter’s Notebook" van Geurt Gijssen niet alleen bloedserieuze zaken behandelt moge blijken uit de volgende (door uw redactie enigszins ingekorte) discussie (sorry, geen tijd om te vertalen, maar naar inschatting van de redactie moet het merendeel van onze lezers in staat worden geacht deze Engelse tekst te kunnen volgen).
Dear Mr. Gijssen, I’d like to comment on the suggestion that no game of chess was played in the following Q&A in your February 2009 column:
Question: I laughed loudly upon reading the case of a missing king in a rapid game. I can imagine such a situation; for example, if a player accidently starts the game with two queens. However, I see a solution. Since the object of a chess game is to checkmate the opponent’s king, the players playing without one or both kings must be playing something else, not chess. Therefore, you may state that since the game is not chess, there is no such thing as “a game of chess with at least three moves completed,” and thus start the game from the beginning. Best regards, Wojciech Pietrzak (Poland).
Answer: An excellent idea. I think you are right. Mr. Siegfried Hornecker from Germany also wrote about this subject. He mentioned that the player with king can never win the game, even when the kingless player oversteps the time – because the player with the king can never checkmate an absent king. Therefore, the game is draw after the kingless player has overstepped the time. But, as a matter of fact, I prefer your solution.
I’d like to object from a philosophical point of view that has very practical implications. The philosophical point: as is known from blindfold games, no pieces are needed at all to play a game of chess. If chess is played with real persons on the market square, there is hardly ever a true king or queen available, neither black nor white. So the “pieces” just denote kings and queens in the same way as drawing a digit on a sheet of paper denotes the digit rather than that the drawing is the digit. That means a game starting with a queen piece on d1 and another on e1 is actually a game of chess. The piece on e1 simply denotes the king, and even though it looks like a queen, strong players would not find it difficult to play. The practical implications: It’s hard to imagine that you reach a promising position after which your opponent chooses to inform you that we are not playing chess because your king looks odd.
The Laws of Chess don’t mention size, shape and color (except for light vs. dark). The FIDE standards state in Article 1
The chess equipment offered by the organizers (hosts) of a FIDE or Continental Championship, Olympiad and other FIDE registered tournaments shall conform with the standards mentioned below, and shall be approved by the Chief Arbiter.
I didn’t find a rule for a situation in which the chief arbiter failed to do so and opponents refused to remedy the situation amicably. Can you help with any advice? This also relates to the widespread practice of using an upside down rook when a second queen is not immediately available. Does the game stop being a game of chess then? I think not. Sincerely, Stephan Busemann (Germany).