CHESS PLAYERS from Slovakia

Top 6

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary Slovak Chess Players of all time. This list of famous Slovak Chess Players is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.

1. Richard Réti (1889 - 1929)

With an HPI of 60.31, Richard Réti is the most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 35 different languages on wikipedia.

Richard Selig Réti (28 May 1889 – 6 June 1929) was an Austro-Hungarian, later Czechoslovak, chess player, chess author, and composer of endgame studies. He was one of the principal proponents of hypermodernism in chess. With the exception of Nimzowitsch's book My System, he is considered to be the movement's foremost literary contributor.

2. Ignatz Kolisch (1837 - 1889)

With an HPI of 51.06, Ignatz Kolisch is the 2nd most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 17 different languages.

Baron Ignatz von Kolisch (6 April 1837 – 30 April 1889), also Baron Ignaz von Kolisch (German) or báró Kolisch Ignác (Hungarian), was a merchant, journalist and chess master with Jewish roots. Kolisch was born into a Jewish family in Pressburg (known today as Bratislava). Both in business and as a chess player he was eminently successful. In his early years he moved to Vienna, then spent a year in Italy. In 1859 he arrived in Paris and in 1860–62 mostly sojourned in London, where he edited the Chess Player's Chronicle with Adolf Zytogorski and Josef Kling. In summer 1862 he accompanied the Russian Count Kushelev-Bezborodko to St. Petersburg, where he won a match against Ilya Shumov. Later he moved to Paris and in 1869 to Vienna. He became involved in banking and became a millionaire and chess patron, organizing and sponsoring important chess tournaments in the 1870s and 1880s. He founded the Wiener Börse-Syndikatskasse in 1869, and in 1873 established a commission house in Paris; and by prudent management he acquired considerable wealth. In 1881 he received the title of baron from Georg II, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen. As a chess player, Kolisch soon became known for his brilliant and aggressive style, but he was not a frequent participant in tournaments. In 1860 he won the first prize at the international tournament held at Cambridge, England. In 1861 he lost a match to Adolf Anderssen, the strongest player of the day, by a score of 5–4. The same year, he drew a match with Louis Paulsen. In 1867 at the Paris tournament he secured first place, defeating both Szymon Winawer and Wilhelm Steinitz. Kolisch was the founder and editor-in-chief of the Wiener Allgemeine Zeitung, to which, under the pseudonym "Ideka", he contributed many feuilletons. The protagonist in the short story "The chessbaron" (A sakkbáró) by Ferenc Móra is based on him. He died of kidney failure in 1889.

3. Adolf Schwarz (1836 - 1910)

With an HPI of 45.00, Adolf Schwarz is the 3rd most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 15 different languages.

Adolf Schwarz (31 October 1836, Gálszécs, Hungary, now Sečovce, Slovakia – 25 October 1910, Vienna) was an Austro-Hungarian chess master. He took 10th in the Vienna 1873 chess tournament (Wilhelm Steinitz and Joseph Henry Blackburne won). In 1878, he took 2nd, behind Louis Paulsen, in Frankfurt. In 1879, he took 3rd in Leipzig (1st DSB-Congress, Berthold Englisch won). In 1880, he tied for 1st–3rd with Blackburne and Englisch in Wiesbaden. In 1880, he tied for 1st–3rd with Max Weiss and Johannes Minckwitz in Graz. In 1880, he tied for 3rd–5th in Braunschweig. In 1882, he took 3rd in Vienna (Vincenz Hruby won), and tied for 12–13th in the Vienna 1882 chess tournament (Wilhelm Steinitz and Szymon Winawer won). Adolf Schwarz won matches against Minkwitz (+3 -2 =4) in 1878, and against Winawer (+3 -1 =0) in 1880.

4. Herman Steiner (1905 - 1955)

With an HPI of 44.85, Herman Steiner is the 4th most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 16 different languages.

Herman Steiner (April 15, 1905 – November 25, 1955) was an American chess player, organizer, and columnist. He won the U.S. Chess Championship in 1948 and became International Master in 1950. Even more important than his playing career were his efforts promoting chess in the U.S., particularly on the West Coast. An exemplar of the Romantic School of chess, Steiner was a successor to the American chess tradition of Paul Morphy, Harry Nelson Pillsbury, and Frank Marshall.

5. Max Weiss (1857 - 1927)

With an HPI of 44.66, Max Weiss is the 5th most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 15 different languages.

Miksa (Max) Weisz (21 July 1857 – 14 March 1927) was an Austrian chess player born in the Kingdom of Hungary. Weiss was born in Sereď. Moving to Vienna, he studied mathematics and physics at the university, and later taught those subjects. Weiss learned to play chess at age 12, and his strength increased steadily throughout the 1880s. 1880, Graz, tied with Adolf Schwarz and Johannes von Minckwitz for first prize. 1882, Vienna, tenth, won two games from Johann Zukertort, and drew with Wilhelm Steinitz. 1883, Nuremberg, tenth. 1885, Hamburg, tied with Berthold Englisch and Siegbert Tarrasch for second prize. 1887, Frankfort-on-the-Main, divided second and third prizes with Joseph Henry Blackburne. 1888, Bradford, tied with Blackburne for sixth prize. 1889, New York, (the sixth American Chess Congress), scored +24−4=10 to tie with Mikhail Chigorin for first prize, ahead of Isidor Gunsberg and Blackburne. 1889, Breslau, third prize. 1890, Vienna, first prize, ahead of Johann Bauer and Englisch. The New York 1889 tournament was organized to find a challenger for the World Chess Championship, but neither Chigorin (who had already lost a championship match) nor Weiss pursued a title match with Steinitz. In fact, having become one of the top players in the world, Weiss quit international chess after this tournament, though he did play a few Viennese events. In 1895 he defeated Georg Marco in a match, +5 −1 =1, and he tied for first in the 1895–6 winter tournament with Carl Schlechter. Around this time, Weiss began working to create a Viennese school of chess players. In 1905 Weiss was employed by S M von Rothschild bank in Vienna. His chess writings, Schach-Meistersteich (Mühlhausen 1918), Kleines Schachlehrbuch (Mühlhausen 1920), and the earlier problem collection Caissa Bambergensis (Bamberg 1902), are little remembered today. In 1927 Weiss died in Vienna, Austria.

6. Ľubomír Ftáčnik (b. 1957)

With an HPI of 42.63, Ľubomír Ftáčnik is the 6th most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 17 different languages.

Ľubomír Ftáčnik (born October 30, 1957, in Bratislava) is a Slovak chess grandmaster and a former European Junior Champion.