The Quiet Move: Origins

Quiet Move: A move which is not forcing, i.e. a move which does not directly attack or capture an enemy piece. In tactics problems, a quiet move is often used to control important squares or guard your own pieces from future capture, before launching a more direct attack in subsequent moves.
"Chess Tactical Motifs and Themes", Chess Tempo

The quiet move in chess first appeared in Medieval problems where checkmate must be accomplished in a set number of moves. These contrasted with older Arabic problems requiring a series of checks to achieve victory because the other side threatened mate on the move. In the Arabic problems, forces often were balanced. Not so in these early European compositions.

Consider this position that is said to have occurred in a game played sometime in the ninth century. An Arabic manuscript examined by H.J.R. Murray, author of A History of Chess (1913), asserts "this happened to Abū’n-Naʿām, and he used to boast of it" (309).

Black to move

Black must sacrifice the knight and one of the rooks in order to checkmate White with the other rook on the third move.

Contrast that problem with a composition appearing in a collection of manuscripts dating as early as the early fifteenth century. The problem specifies that each White piece moves once and mate must be delivered on the third move.

White to move

Medieval compositions were not considered "cooked" when there were multiple solutions, as this one. That standard is modern. Also violating modern standards, the mate can be accomplished in less than three moves.

According to Murray, the the pseudonym Bonus Socius was used by the compiler of an important manuscript of a group of several that all were copied from another work (618). This problem appears as no. 62 in the MS. The same arrangement of pieces shifted back one rank appears as no. 35 with the same instructions, but an altogether different set of solutions.

White to move

There are eight first moves where the solution meets the specified criteria and two more that do not, although mating on the third move.

Murray writes that this work represents an effort to organize existing material according to the number of moves in the solution. He credits these simpler problems with exploring "the powers of a single piece, or the combined powers of a few pieces" (649).

This one, for example, could serve to teach beginners the habit of cutting off the king from the center of the board. That rooks can checkmate a king in the middle of the board comes as a surprise to beginners. The restraining power of the king is an important element.

White to move

After the only move that leads to the required mate in four, White has several ways to proceed. Murray's solutions from the Bonus Socius MS is 1.Rg4 Ke3 2.Rc3+ Kf2 3.Rd3 (or a3, b3) Kf1 4.Rf3#.

Another set of manuscripts expand upon Bonus Socius. The most important of this second set is known as Civis Bononiae, also a pseudonym. There are 194 chess problems in the former and 288 in the latter. One from this group strikes me as particularly useful for teaching elementary skills in the use of the king. Although there is more than one way to achieve checkmate, achieving it according to the specified criteria requires opposition and outflanking--a standard technique in pawn endings, but in this case it is a mate with rook and king against a lone rook.

White may move the rook only once. Mate in 12 or less.

White to move

Playing against Stockfish 15, I delivered checkmate on the ninth move.