user-1: I'm looking for an opening I saw in a book (not a chess book). The opening was about 10 moves long, and the author stated that the evaluation after the last move shown had been considered for many years in many chess books as "black has a slight advantage", but later it had been shown that white could checkmate in 1 move.
Additional information: the book I read was written by Martin Gardner. It was not a chess book, but possibly a collection of his Scientific American columns, published in the 60s - 80s. This chess opening was (if I remember correctly) an example in a chapter devoted to puzzles and problems, unrelated to chess, that had been published with a wrong solution, or with a solution that later had been improved.

user2299: Maybe Martin Gardner was writing about this story. I'm quoting from p. 95 of Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld, The Fireside Book of Chess, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1949. (Of course they gave the moves in descriptive notation.)

In the eighth edition of a popular manual by Dufresne and Mieses, the following line of play is given:

[FEN ""]

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 c5 4.Nf3 cxd4 5.Nxd4 e5 6.Ndb5 d4 7.Nd5 Na6 8.Qa4 Bd7 9.e3 Ne7


In this situation, the authors' comment is, "Black has the superior position." What the analysts seem to have overlooked is that White can mate on the move!

I'm guessing Kt-B3 was somehow typoed into Kt-K2.

-1: <p>I'm looking for an opening I saw in a book (<strong>not a chess book</strong>). The opening was about 10 moves long, and the author stated that the evaluation after the last move shown had been considered for many years in many chess books as "black has a slight advantage", but later it had been shown that white could checkmate in 1 move.</p>

<p>Additional information: the book I read was written by Martin Gardner. It was not a chess book, but possibly a collection of his <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Gardner_bibliography#%22Mathematical_Games%22:_The_Scientific_American_columns" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Scientific American columns</a>, published in the 60s - 80s. This chess opening was (if I remember correctly) an example in a chapter devoted to puzzles and problems, <strong>unrelated to chess</strong>, that had been published with a wrong solution, or with a solution that later had been improved.</p>
 2299: <p>Maybe Martin Gardner was writing about this story. I'm quoting from p. 95 of Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld, <em>The Fireside Book of Chess</em>, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1949. (Of course they gave the moves in descriptive notation.)</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>In the eighth edition of a popular manual by Dufresne and Mieses, the following line of play is given:</p>
</blockquote>

<pre><code>[FEN ""]

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 c5 4.Nf3 cxd4 5.Nxd4 e5 6.Ndb5 d4 7.Nd5 Na6 8.Qa4 Bd7 9.e3 Ne7
</code></pre>

<blockquote>
  <p>In this situation, the authors' comment is, "Black has the superior position." What the analysts seem to have overlooked is that White can mate on the move!</p>
</blockquote>

<p>I'm guessing Kt-B3 was somehow typoed into Kt-K2.</p>
