Adolf Albin (14 September 1848 – 22 March 1920) was a Romanian

chess player This list of chess players includes people who are primarily known as chess players and have an article on the English Wikipedia. A * Jacob Aagaard (Denmark, Scotland, born 1973) * Manuel Aaron (India, born 1935) * Nijat Abasov (Azerbaijan, bor ...

. He is best known for the countergambit that bears his name and for authoring the first chess book written in Romanian.

Life

He was born in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than north of ...

, Romania to a wealthy family. His forefathers, however, sprang from

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, Germany and settled in

Zhitomir Zhytomyr ( uk, Жито́мир, translit=Zhytomyr ; russian: Жито́мир, Zhitomir ; pl, Żytomierz ; yi, זשיטאָמיר, Zhitomir; german: Schytomyr ) is a city in the north of the western half of Ukraine. It is the administrative ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

in the 19th century, but later moved to Romania. After completing his studies in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

, he went back to Romania, where he ran the Frothier Printing House in Bucharest. Soon he became associated with Dr. Bethel Henry Baron von Stroussberg, working as a translator for the influential railroad tycoon who was nicknamed "The King of Railways". Stroussberg's financial bankruptcy in 1875 led to Albin's exile in Vienna once again, together with his wife and three children. He died at age 72 in a Vienna sanatorium.

Chess career

Albin came to

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...

relatively late: according to ''

The Oxford Companion to Chess ''The Oxford Companion to Chess'' is a reference book on the game of chess written by David Vincent Hooper and Kenneth Whyld. The book is written in an encyclopedia format. The book belongs to the Oxford Companions series. Details The first e ...

'' he learnt the game in his 20s and did not play in international events until his 40s. His best result came at

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

1893, where he finished second behind

Emanuel Lasker Emanuel Lasker (; December 24, 1868 – January 11, 1941) was a German chess player, mathematician, and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years, from 1894 to 1921, the longest reign of any officially recognised World Chess Champ ...

(who scored a perfect 13/13), ahead of

Jackson Showalter Jackson Whipps Showalter (February 5, 1859 in Minerva, Kentucky – February 5, 1935 in Lexington, Kentucky) was a five-time U.S. Chess Champion: 1890, 1892, 1892–1894, 1895–96 and 1906–1909. Chess career U.S. Championship matches Showal ...

Harry Nelson Pillsbury Harry Nelson Pillsbury (December 5, 1872 – June 17, 1906) was an American chess player. At the age of 22, he won one of the strongest tournaments of the time (winning the Hastings 1895 chess tournament), but his illness and early death prevent ...

and others. He played in the very strong tournaments at Hastings 1895 (scoring 8½/21) and

Nuremberg Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...

1896 (scoring 7/18). His tournament results on the whole were spotty, though he won individual games against several notable players, including

world champion A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

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

at New York 1894 and Nuremberg 1896. He authored the first chess book in Romanian, ''Amiculŭ Joculu de Scachu Teoreticu şi Practicu'' (published in Bucharest in 1872).

Death

As Michael Lorenz has noted in Chess Note 11752 (March 8, 2020), Albin died on 22 March 1920, and not on 1 February 1920 as previously believed."Chess Note 11752" at www.chesshistory.com
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Legacy

Albin is the

eponym An eponym is a person, a place, or a thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives which are derived from the word eponym include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Usage of the word The term ''epon ...

of several

chess opening A chess opening or simply an opening is the initial stage of a chess game. It usually consists of established theory; the other phases are the middlegame and the endgame. Many opening sequences have standard names such as the "Sicilian Defens ...

variations, notably the

Albin Countergambit The Albin Countergambit is a chess opening that begins with the moves: :1. d4 d5 :2. c4 e5 and the usual continuation is: :3. dxe5 d4 The opening is an uncommon defense to the Queen's Gambit. In exchange for the gambit pawn, Black has a ...

in the

Queen's Gambit The Queen's Gambit is the chess opening that starts with the moves: :1. d4 d5 :2. c4 It is one of the oldest openings and is still commonly played today. It is traditionally described as a ''gambit'' because White appears to sacrifice the c ...

(1.d4 d5 2.c4 e5) and the Albin Attack (also known as the Alekhine–Chatard Attack) in the

French Defence The French Defence is a chess opening characterised by the moves: :1. e4 e6 This is most commonly followed by 2.d4 d5, with Black intending ...c5 soon after, attacking White's and gaining on the . The French has a reputation for solidity ...

(1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 Be7 5.e5 Nfd7 6.h4).

References

Bibliography * *Urcan, Olimpiu G. (2008). ''Adolf Albin in America: A European Chess Master's Sojourn, 1893–1895''. (McFarland & Co. Inc. Publishers).

External links

* * (1999)
Adolf Albin: The Teacher of Nimzovich?
. chessarch.com. * Urcan, Olimpiu G. (2004)
Adolf Albin and the Genesis of the Albin Counter Gambit Part I
(

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

). Chesscafe.com. * Urcan, Olimpiu G. (2004)
Adolf Albin and the Genesis of the Albin Counter Gambit Part II
(

). Chesscafe.com. {{DEFAULTSORT:Albin, Adolf 1848 births 1920 deaths 19th-century chess players 19th-century Romanian people Chess theoreticians Romanian people of Austrian descent Chess players from Bucharest