Horatio Caro

Horatio Caro ( born July 5, 1862 in Newcastle upon Tyne, † December 15, 1920 in London ) was an English chess player and chess theorist.

He lived in Berlin and was a member of the Berlin Chess Club. In 1890 he drew attention to himself when he won a tournament game against eventual champion Emanuel Lasker in just 14 moves.

Even before the turn of the century Caro appeared on the international tournament arena in appearance: He was at the international tournament in Berlin 1897 9, a year later he participated in the great Austrian Emperor 's Jubilee tournament in Vienna in part (17th place).

In 1904 he was 1st Berlin champion. In the same year he participated in the 14th Congress of the German Chess Federation in Coburg, finished there, however, only the 11th Place. With a masters tournament in Barmen 1905 he came in 7th place and after all, was able to Rudolf Spielmann and Aaron Nimzowitsch, which at that time were still early in their careers, leave behind.

Caro played matches against the best chess master of his time and proved to be surprisingly successful than in his tournaments he reached twice (1892 and 1903) a draw against Curt von Bardeleben. The first competition ended 3:3 ( 2, -2, = 2 ), the second 4:4 ( 4, -4, = 0) and lost narrowly to the Polish world class player Szymon Winawer with 2,5:3,5 ( 2, -3, = 1 ), and against Jacques Lousy with 4.5:5.5 ( 3, -4, = 5 ), each in Berlin 1897. 1905 He won a match against the German champions Moritz Lewitt with 6,5:5,5 ( 4, -3, = 5), also held in Berlin.

But he is known today primarily for his analysis of what became known as the Caro- Kann Defence ( 1.e2 -e4 c7 - c6 ), which he had published in 1886 in the chess column in the Daily Review. Although it was the Pole Szymon Winawer, who introduced this train was the first in the tournament practice, namely in 1883, but only introduced the theoretical basis by Caro and Can to establish this now so popular defense (it was the highest skill level level last Péter Lékó used in the 12th and 14th game of his world Championship fight against Vladimir Kramnik ).

Also named after Caro Kann is a variant in the English Opening, namely the construction of 1 c2 - c4 Ng8 - f6 c7 - c6 c3 2.Sb1 - 3.e2 -e4 d7 -d5.