Szachista Magazine - November 2025

History of Chess Olympiads

The Publishing Future of Chess Olympiads

The November issue of Andrzej Filipowicz's Szachista magazine featured a commentary on the current vision for the development of The Great Book of Chess Olympiads.

Source: article "History of Chess Olympiads" from SZACHISTA magazine, November 2025, p. 17.

Article Content

Several years ago, Krzysztof Puszczewicz undertook the extraordinary and labor-intensive task of publishing the history of Chess Olympiads, of which 45 were organized between 1927 and 2024. Each study contains a complete set of results, a complete or near-complete collection of games played, and magnificent photographs.

To date, publications have been released covering the following Olympiads: 1927 London, 1928 The Hague, 1930 Hamburg, 1980 Malta, 1982 Lucerne, 1984 Thessaloniki, 1986 Dubai, 1988 Thessaloniki, 1992 Manila, 1994 Moscow, 1996 Yerevan, 1998 Elista, 2018 Batumi, 2022 Chennai, and 2024 Budapest, as well as separate Women's Olympiads: 1980 La Valletta; 1982 Lucerne; 1984 Thessaloniki; 1986 Dubai; 1988 Thessaloniki; 1992 Manila.

The largest collection can be found on the website http://szachy-kwi.eu/, where on the left side there are links to many bookstores: Empik, naukowo.pl, Virtualo, and others. To streamline this, the website https://olympchess.com was created in 2025, and here it will be possible to purchase any Olympiad directly. Currently, Budapest is available, and the publisher is already preparing the latest editions of the first three Olympiads, namely London 1927, The Hague 1928, and Hamburg 1930. These are editions based on press reports, mainly from "Swiat Szachowy" (The Chess World).

We will discover perhaps the largest historical collection of games, many annotated by the players themselves. Hamburg 1930 contains as many as 38 games, including Makarczyk - Rasmussen, in which a draw secured Poland the gold medal. The games of such luminaries as Rubinstein and Eliskases are included in their entirety (!).

For our part, we confirm that on the official website of The Great Book of Chess Olympiads, olympchess.com, you will find the authorized and most up-to-date compilation of Chess Olympiads. The ebooks published there are continuously updated with the latest knowledge that the author acquires on an ongoing basis. The website is ultimately intended to be the sole and complete source of chess chronicles by Krzysztof Puszczewicz.