Dawid Janowski

Chigorin – Janowski · 1895 · 0–1

Hastings 1895, Janowski's arrival on the international stage, and sixteen moves is all Mikhail Chigorin gets. With the white king on c1 Janowski tears the shelter down: 13...Bxa3 14.Nb1 Bxb2+ 15.Kxb2 Qa2+ 16.Kc1 Nd4, and there is no defence to the mate.

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Janowski – Steinitz · 1895 · 1–0

Hastings 1895 again, and this time the victim is Wilhelm Steinitz, the first World Champion. Janowski sacrifices the exchange with 17.Rxe6, drives the king out with 18.Bh6 and 19.Qxf7, and finishes 22.Bxf6 Bxf6 23.Qxf6+ Kc7 24.Qe5+.

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Janowski – Schallopp · 1896 · 1–0

Nuremberg 1896, seventeen moves, and one of the most abandoned queen raids in the archive. Janowski gives a bishop with 12.Bd5 exd5, then sends the queen on tour — 13.Qxc6+ Kd8 14.Qxa8+ Kd7 15.Qb7+ Ke6 16.Qc6+ — and closes with the quiet 17.Bf4.

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Janowski – Lasker · 1896 · 1–0

Nuremberg 1896: Janowski beats Emanuel Lasker while Lasker holds the world title. A seventy-one-move Berlin Defence that turns on the c- and d-pawns; Janowski shepherds them to c7 and d6 and the passed pawns settle it. He is the only master besides Tarrasch to have beaten the first four World Champions, and this is the first of them.

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Steinitz – Janowski · 1896 · 0–1

Four days later at the same tournament, Steinitz with White — and Janowski wins again, this time from the black side. He gives the exchange on b2 with 35...Rxb2+, keeps the initiative, and after 41...Bxe5 42.Rxh6+ Kg7 White has nothing left.

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Marshall – Janowski · 1899 · 0–1

From the 1899 match with Frank Marshall, and one of the few master games that ends in checkmate on the board. Janowski keeps feeding material into the attack — 41...Nxe3 42.Bxe3 Rxe3+ 43.Kd1 Rxb2 — and mates with 45...Ba4+ 46.Kc1 Rc2+ 47.Kd1 Ra2+ ... 47...Re1#.

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Janowski – Lee · 1899 · 1–0

London 1899, twenty-one moves in the McCutcheon French. Janowski opens the g-file with 16.fxg5 hxg5 17.Qxg5, ignores the knight eating his queenside, and delivers 19.Bxf7+ Kd7 20.Qg7 Qd8 21.Be8+.

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Marshall – Janowski · 1901 · 0–1

Monte Carlo 1901, an Evans Gambit Compromised Defence — Marshall throwing everything at him, and Janowski taking it all. He wins the a-pawn with 22...Qxa3, gives back the bishop for the attack, and after 26.Rxf7+ Kxf8 27.Qe6+ Kf8 28.Re3 Nf5 the white attack is out of ammunition.

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Janowski – Schlechter · 1906 · 1–0

Nuremberg 1906, eighteen moves against Carl Schlechter — the most solid defensive player of the era, who four years later would come within a single game of taking Lasker's title. The knight tour 13...Ndb4 14.a3 h6 15.Bh4 Nd3 runs out of squares, and 17.Bxc6 Qxc6 18.Be7 traps the rook.

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Janowski – Lasker · 1909 · 1–0

From the 1909 match against Emanuel Lasker in Paris. Janowski wins the h-file with 36.Rf5 gxh4 37.Nxh5 Qxh5 38.Rxh5+, forces the queens off with 43.Qxg7+, and converts a knight ending — a reminder that the man remembered for his bishops could grind too.

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Janowski – Capablanca · 1913 · 1–0

Havana 1913 against José Raúl Capablanca, on Capablanca's home ground and eight years before he took the world title. Janowski liquidates into a knight ending a pawn up, walks the king to g5, and pushes the f- and g-pawns through: 48.f5 Kd5 49.f6 Ne6+ 50.Kh6.

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Janowski – Alekhine · 1914 · 1–0

Mannheim 1914, the tournament cut short by the outbreak of war, against a twenty-one-year-old Alexander Alekhine. Janowski completes the set of the first four World Champions here: 38.Rxg7+ Kh8 39.exd5 e4 40.Rg8+ Rxg8 41.Qxd4+ strips the king and the d-pawn queens.

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Janowski – Bogoljubow · 1914 · 1–0

Two days later at the same tournament, nineteen moves against Efim Bogoljubow, a future challenger for the world title. Textbook build-up in the Orthodox Queen's Gambit — 14.Ne5, 15.Qf3, 17.Re3 — and then the oldest sacrifice in the book: 18.Bxf6 Bxf6 19.Bxh7+.

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