The Chessboard

The chessboard is made up of 64 alternating light and dark colored squares laid out in 8 rows (horizontal) and 8 columns (vertical).

On the chessboard there are straight lines of squares which are called “files”, “ranks” and “diagonals”.

 

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A straight vertical line of squares on a chessboard is called a “file”.

There are 8 files on a chessboard and each file has its own name.

 

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A straight horizontal line of squares on a chessboard is called a “rank”.

There are 8 ranks on a chessboard and each rank has its own name.

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A straight vertical line of squares from the top or bottom edge of the board to one of the side edges, is called a “diagonal”.

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