Anastasia's mate is a classic pattern of knight and rook pinning the king to the edge of the board. The knight takes a square from which it controls the king's escape routes, and the rook mates along the outermost file. The name comes from Johann Jakob Wilhelm Heinse's novel «Anastasia und das Schachspiel».
Here the black king on h7 is pressed against the edge. The knight on e7 covers g8 and g6, the pawn on g7 blocks the retreat, and the white rook mates down the h-file: the king can go neither along the h-file (the rook controls it) nor to the g-squares (the knight holds them).
The idea of Anastasia's mate is to place the knight so that it takes away the king's squares near the edge, then check with the rook along the rim. The pattern often appears when attacking a king that has taken shelter on the flank.
This page is a handy place to go over the set-up on the board and work through it square by square. An overview of all the named mates is collected in a separate article.
Drag a piece onto the board, or click a piece and then click the squares. The cross beside the pieces sweeps every piece of that colour off the board, and a single piece can be dragged off the edge.
The pieces will be arranged into the chosen pattern.
It is the mating side to move. Find mate in one.
Openings, endgame positions and breakthrough studies - the set-up appears on the board.
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