Emanuel (Emmanuel) Stepanovich Schiffers (; – ) was a Russian

chess Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...

player and chess writer. For many years he was the second leading Russian player after

Mikhail Chigorin Mikhail Ivanovich Chigorin (also ''Tchigorin''; ; – ) was a Russian chess player. He played two World Championship matches against Wilhelm Steinitz, losing both times. The last great player of the Romantic chess style, he also served as a ma ...

. Schiffers parents emigrated from Germany. He was born in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

and also died there. Schiffers held the title of Russian champion for 10 years before finally being defeated by his student, Mikhail Chigorin, in 1880. At their first meeting in 1873, Schiffers was able to offer Chigorin (also from St. Petersburg) knight

odds In probability theory, odds provide a measure of the probability of a particular outcome. Odds are commonly used in gambling and statistics. For example for an event that is 40% probable, one could say that the odds are or When gambling, o ...

. In 1878 they played on even terms, Schiffers losing the first of two matches 7–3, but winning the second 7½–6½, thus establishing himself as the second strongest player in Russia after Chigorin himself. They later played two more matches with Chigorin winning both. At Rostov on Don in 1896, he played a match against former

world chess champion The World Chess Championship is played to determine the world champion in chess. The current world champion is Gukesh Dommaraju, who defeated the previous champion Ding Liren in the World Chess Championship 2024, 2024 World Chess Championship. ...

Wilhelm Steinitz William Steinitz (born Wilhelm Steinitz; May 14, 1836 – August 12, 1900) was a Bohemian-Austrian, and later American, chess player. From 1886 to 1894, he was the first World Chess Champion. He was also a highly influential writer and c ...

, losing 6½–4½. Schiffers played eight major foreign tournaments from

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1887 to

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1898. His best tournament result was at Hastings 1895 where he finished sixth with 12/21 ( Harry Pillsbury won). In 1899 and 1900/01, he took second places, behind Chigorin, in All Russian Masters Tournament (1st and 2nd RUS-ch). Schiffers was known as "Russia's Chess Teacher". In 1889, he gave the first public lectures on

chess theory The game of chess is commonly divided into three phases: the chess opening, opening, Chess middlegame, middlegame, and Chess endgame, endgame. There is a large body of theory regarding how the game should be played in each of these phases, especi ...

in Russia, at the St. Petersburg Chess Association and in other cities. He wrote the chess textbook ''Samouchitel shakhmatnoi igry'' (''Chess Self Taught'', published 1906). In November 1899 it was reported that he became insane and was taken to an asylum.

Notable game

Schiffers–Harmonist, Frankfurt 1887, has been anthologized in many game collections and was dubbed "Schiffers' Immortal Game" by Irving Chernev.'' Chess Review'', January 1955, p 10 It features a spectacular rook

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followed by a long winning

combination In mathematics, a combination is a selection of items from a set that has distinct members, such that the order of selection does not matter (unlike permutations). For example, given three fruits, say an apple, an orange and a pear, there are ...

. :1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4 exd4 6.cxd4 Bb4+ 7.Bd2 Bxd2+ 8.Nbxd2 d5 9.exd5 Nxd5 10.Qb3 Nce7 11.0-0 0-0 12.Rfe1 c6 13.a4 Qc7 14.Rac1 Nf4? 15.Ng5 Neg6 (''diagram'') 16.Re8 Rxe8 17.Bxf7+ Kh8 18.Bxe8 Ne2+ 19.Kh1 Nxc1 20.Nf7+ Kg8 21.Nh6+ Kf8 22.Qg8+ Ke7 23.Bxg6 hxg6 24.Qxg7+ Kd8 25.Qf8+ Kd7 26.Ne4 Qd8 27.Qd6+ Ke8 28.Nf6+

References

* * (gives 1906 as year of death, evidently a typo)

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Schiffers, Emanuel 1850 births 1904 deaths Chess players from the Russian Empire Russian chess writers People from the Russian Empire of German descent Chess players from Saint Petersburg 19th-century Russian chess players Writers from the Russian Empire