In both cases, a piece that normally moves one space at a time is given the privilege of making an initial move that spans two spaces. To close off this possibility, en passant capture was introduced as an exception to the usual manner of capture by displacement.Īnother change made to speed up the game was to introduce castling, and one of the conditions on castling was that a king may not castle through check. This introduced the possibility of a pawn escaping capture by moving past the space another pawn could capture it on. In Europe, some people made changes that sped up the game, and one of these changes was allowing a pawn to move two spaces on its first move. So, these pieces never moved more than one space at a time. In these earlier games, pawns did not make double moves, and kings did not castle. This is when a piece captures another by moving to its space. Why are actual en passant captures limited to pawns?Ĭhess is descended from the earlier games Chaturanga and Shatranj, in which all capture was by displacement. But since it is illegal for a king to move into check, and Chess ends with the checkmate of the king, not with its capture, this potential en passant capture of the king never actually happens in Chess. Yes, a king may not move through check when castling, the idea being that when it moves two spaces toward the rook, it is subject to capture even on a space it is passing over. Does the concept of en passant capture have any other application in Chess?
The only time when en passant capture ever happens in Chess is when one pawn captures another that has just made a double move, as illustrated above. Is any other kind of en passant capture allowed in Chess? If you want to capture by en passant, it must be done on the next move. Must en passant capture be done immediately, or can I wait some turns before doing it? White can now capture the g pawn by en passant, as it has done here.