Lionel Kieseritzky

Lionel Adalbert Bagration Felix Kieseritzky ( born December 20 1805jul / January 1 1806greg in Tartu, Governorate of Livonia ( Russian empire ). . † May 18, 1853 in Paris) was a deutschbaltischer chess master. In 1839 he left Russia and worked in Paris since then as a professional chess player.

Biography

Kieseritzky was the youngest of fourteen children of a lawyer Otto Wilhelm Kieseritzky and his Wife Catharina Felicitas, born of Hoffmann. From 1825 to 1829 Kieseritzky studied at the Imperial University in his hometown of philology and law, but later turned to mathematics since early showed his talent there. He was a sought-after and popular teacher of mathematics at Dorpat.

As a chess player he soon outstripped his fellow Baltic, and Livonia offered him in this area no more development opportunities. The reason for his emigration took place in 1839 but was in another field. Kieseritzky led an unsettled in the details insult process. Although he won the lawsuit, he feared a resurgence of the operations and decided to leave his home. At the age of thirty years, he settled in Paris and lived there until his early death at the age of only 47 years.

Chess activity

In Paris he was known as a professional player who was regularly seen at the famous Café de la Regence. Soon Kieseritzky was a leading French masters. He finally took the 1851 international chess tournament in London in part, in which the best European chess players competed against each other for the first time.

Kieseritzky was an excellent combination of players and representatives of the so-called romantic chess era. According to him, a major variant of the King Knight Gambit is named that arises after the moves 1 е2 - е4 е7 - е5 2 f2 - f4 -f3 e5xf4 3 Sg1 g7- g5 4 h4 g5 - g4 h2 5 Nf3 - e5. But entered the chess history it is primarily through the " Immortal game ", a game that he played in London in 1851 against Adolf Anderssen. It lasted only an hour, and Kieseritzky she lost after 23 moves. But he added through his game to one of the most beautiful matte and sacrificial combinations ever come across in a game of chess. The " Immortal " sets standards for aesthetics and beauty in chess. The competition, in which this game was played, but could Kieseritzky with 9:6 ( 8 -5 = 2) decide for themselves.

Sometimes depicted as stubborn or cranky, he sat down temporarily for a three-dimensional chess variant. A system constructed by him "Space chess " met while students at masters and colleagues, as a report Anderssen suggests rejection.

Kieseritzkys best historical Elo rating was 2734, which he reached early in 1851.

Known games

• Anderssen - Kieseritzky, London in 1851, the " immortal game "