I recently saw a chess match being played. After a few moves, Black was to move, and the board was exactly as at the beginning, except that the white king rook (at h1) was missing. How did Black capture it -- specifically, what was the actual move?

At first glance I would have to say a Black Knight took the White Rook. They are the only piece that could jump over the row of pons to do it.  Both players must have been using only knights, except they could have moved their rooks back and forth one space once the knight next to it was moved out of the way.

In 8 moves, black knight can move down, take the white rook and move back to his orginal square. If it is Black's turn, then White has moved 9 times, since White goes first. You need an even number of turns to move a piece away and back to it's original position, so White must have used one (or an odd number of turns) to move a rook.

I haven't traced through all the possible moves to see if there is only one way this can happen. It looks like there could be many ways it could have happened.???

Posted by bob909 on 2004-10-18 17:20:51