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 66.65, Richard Réti is the most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 36 different languages on wikipedia.

Richard Réti (28 May 1889 – 6 June 1929) was an Austro-Hungarian and 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 58.22, Ignatz Kolisch is the 2nd most famous Slovak Chess Player.  His biography has been translated into 18 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.

3. Adolf Schwarz (1836 - 1910)

With an HPI of 53.77, 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. Max Weiss (1857 - 1927)

With an HPI of 53.37, Max Weiss is the 4th 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 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, Schachmeister-Streiche (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.

5. Herman Steiner (1905 - 1955)

With an HPI of 52.58, Herman Steiner is the 5th 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.

6. Ľubomír Ftáčnik (b. 1957)

With an HPI of 52.41, 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.