A Dozen Scoresheets from World Championship Matches

Scoresheets serve as the official record of a chess game and its results. At the end of a game, both players sign each other's scoresheet, indicating their agreement with the recorded moves and the result. This collection from the world championship can give you a taste of what a scoresheet is, as well as showcasing the handwriting and signatures of top chess players.

There are different ways to record a chess game, called notation. Each system has its unique history and use, with algebraic notation being the current standard for its clarity and simplicity. Algebraic notation uses letters for columns (a-h) and numbers for rows (1-8). Moves are recorded by noting the piece and its destination, such as Kd8 for a king move to d8 or Nf3 for a knight move to f3.

In older scoresheets, the starting and ending squares of a piece's move are often both written, like in the scoresheets of Alekhine, Botvinnik, Karpov, and Kasparov, shown below. For example, 'd2-d4' indicates a pawn move from d2 to d4.

Descriptive notation, an older method, describes moves from each player's perspective using the piece's starting file and rank, like N-KB3 for a knight to king's bishop 3. The scoresheet by Capablanca below is such an example.

Other notation methods exist as well. Numeric notation, for example, assigns numbers to both ranks and files. It is the official chess notation system of the International Correspondence Chess Federation to avoid potential confusion, as chess pieces have different abbreviations depending on language. Forsyth-Edwards Notation (FEN) is used to describe specific board positions rather than moves and is routinely used by chess programs and websites to copy and insert positions. 

Here are a few more scoresheets from recent World Championship matches. Which handwriting do you find most captivating?