Standard chess rules apply, the board is not rotated (i.e. white pawns move upwards), no lateral thinking is needed. Simply find the one move for white which mates the black king.
This puzzle was created by Leonid Kubbel.
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1$\begingroup$ Are there two queens each(of black and white)? $\endgroup$– Mea Culpa NayNov 15, 2017 at 9:29
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1$\begingroup$ @MeaCulpaNay apparently so, it appears some pawns have promoted. $\endgroup$– boboquackNov 15, 2017 at 9:30
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1$\begingroup$ @MeaCulpaNay Yes, and 4 bishops, 3 rooks, ... $\endgroup$– SleafarNov 15, 2017 at 9:30
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3$\begingroup$ See about the 29 minute mark in youtube.com/watch?v=0saFg21rbY8, where grang master Ben Finegold "analyses" this exact puzzle (he talks about it for a few minutes, at least). $\endgroup$– ArthurNov 15, 2017 at 13:55
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1$\begingroup$ @M.M You could ask a similar question about any math puzzle here. Regarding chess puzzles at least the "funny" ones are considered on topic here. According to a meta post serious chess puzzles should be posted on chess.se, but I don't see any puzzles posted there regularly, which makes me doubt if they are welcome there at all. $\endgroup$– SleafarNov 17, 2017 at 5:17
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7 Answers
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It's simple:
Move the queen on e3 to a3
This gives the position:
which is clearly mate.
NB:
The black queen on e5 is pinned by the white rook on e1, so it can't intercept.
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2$\begingroup$ I was quite busy with the red herring on d7. $\endgroup$– SleafarNov 15, 2017 at 9:33
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5$\begingroup$ What is the problem with queening the pawn d7-d8? $\endgroup$– ChrisNov 15, 2017 at 11:41
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3$\begingroup$ Aha! Of course. I spent so long looking for how black could get out of it that I completely forgot to check if it was a legal move! :) $\endgroup$– ChrisNov 15, 2017 at 12:02
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@boboquack found the only solution. The following list shows suggestions from comments and other answers together with their refutation. You can click each link to show an image/animation.
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1$\begingroup$ What about moving d7 to d8 and promoting to queen? $\endgroup$– RickNov 16, 2017 at 9:38
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Knight to G6, right?
No capture No escape for King in any direction.
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White queen at e3 takes black queen at e5
This should mate the king
Edit: did not see that a bishop could block this. This is not a mate.
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$\begingroup$ @xQbert F8 is guarded by bishop at H6 $\endgroup$ Nov 15, 2017 at 17:35
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1$\begingroup$ How about: bishop at c4 moves to e6, blocking check? $\endgroup$– psmearsNov 15, 2017 at 17:45
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Knight, D4 to F5. I think this meets the criteria.
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What about moving the bishop from g3 to h4.
Seems like a winner to me.
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$\begingroup$ Ah didn't see that. I don't know what the chess abbreviations mean $\endgroup$ Nov 16, 2017 at 19:30
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$\begingroup$ Therefore I added animations to the list above. And there is only one solution. $\endgroup$– SleafarNov 16, 2017 at 19:31
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$\begingroup$ Right but I didn't want to click and wait for every animation to find the move I was thinking of. It would've been easier to just write the moves in plain English $\endgroup$ Nov 16, 2017 at 19:33
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$\begingroup$ I doubt it would be easier, it would be too long and nobody would read it. The chess notation isn't really that complicated. Usually it's the name of the piece + target square. $\endgroup$– SleafarNov 16, 2017 at 19:38
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I have a solution that can be given in just nine characters, but Stack Exchange demands that an answer be at least 30 characters long. So now that I've satisfied that restriction:
d7xc8 = N
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$\begingroup$ The king can't escape to e8 if the pawn is queened instead of knighted (or any other sufficiently mobile piece), and the knight isn't needed because of the rook on a7, but the bishop can block h1 to b7. $\endgroup$– JasonNov 15, 2017 at 18:58