What does checkmate mean?

A chess game consists of controlling the movement of sixteen pieces each by the two players. These sixteen pieces consists of one king, one queen, two rooks, two knights, two bishops and eight pawns. The ultimate aim of the game is to checkmate the king of the opponent player.

The word checkmate comes from the Farsi language spoken Iran and Afghanistan. The phrase from the language goes as SHAH-K-MATE which means ‘the king is dead’. The word SHAH means ‘king’ and the word MATE has its root from English word ‘murder and Spanish word ‘matador’.

Check mate is a situation in which the king of a player is under attack by one or two pieces of opponent player. The game ends once the king is met with a check.

If the king is under attack but can escape the attack then it is said as check. When there are no moves to escape the attack and cannot avoid being captured then the situation is said as check mate. When any move taken may lead to a check for king this situation is known as stale mate and the game is a draw.

Checkmate can occur at any stage of the game, at the starting phase with few moves (it is known as fool’s mate), in the middle or at the end with only few pieces left on the board.
Two powerful pieces which can checkmate are the queen and the rook. Here one piece moves the king to the edge while the other piece checks the king.

Check mating with the queen is easiest and it takes at most ten steps to achieve. Checkmating with rook is another easiest method and occurs frequently. Checkmating with a bishop and knight is difficult to achieve and occurs less often. Checkmate with two bishops is common comparatively easier to that of a bishop and knights check mate.