In the game of chess, perpetual check is a situation in which one player can force a draw by an unending series of checks. Such a situation typically arises when the player who is checking cannot deliver checkmate; while failing to continue the series of checks gives the opponent at least a chance to win. A draw by perpetual check is no longer one of the rules of chess. However, such a situation will eventually result in a draw by either threefold repetition or the fifty-move rule, but usually players agree to a draw (Burgess 2000:478).
Perpetual check can also occur in other chess variants, although the rules relating to it may be different. For example, giving perpetual check is not allowed (an automatic loss for the giver) in both shogi and xiangqi.
Famous quotes containing the words perpetual and/or check:
“Television knows no night. It is perpetual day. TV embodies our fear of the dark, of night, of the other side of things.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)
“Is there no hope for me? Is there no way
That I may sight and check that speeding bark
Which out of sight and sound is passing, passing?”
—Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872–1906)