Smothered mate
A knight checkmates a king that is boxed in by its own pieces, often after a stunning queen sacrifice.
Buried by its own army
Black's king in the corner is surrounded by its own rook and pawns. It has no free square at all. A knight check cannot be blocked, so if the knight can check the king and nothing can capture it, it is checkmate. That is a smothered mate.
One hop
Your turn
Checkmate in one move.
Show the answer
Knight to f7 is mate. The king's own rook and pawns take every square away, and no black piece can capture the knight.
Chase it back to the corner
Your turn
Check with the knight, then check again so the king has to go back to the corner.
Show the answer
Knight to f7 check sends the king to g8, and knight to h6 is a double check from the knight and the queen. The king must run back to h8 (going to f8 allows queen to f7 mate).
The queen sacrifice
Your turn
Sacrifice your queen to block the last free square, then mate with the knight.
Show the answer
Queen to g8 check forces rook takes g8, because the knight guards g8. Now the rook blocks its own king, and knight to f7 is smothered mate.
Why the sacrifice?
Question
In the last puzzle, why did White give up the queen on g8?
Show the answer
To force a black piece onto g8, so the king has no free square left
Once the rook takes on g8, every square around the king is filled by its own pieces, and the knight check is mate.
More in Checkmates
Scholar's Mate
The four-move checkmate every beginner meets, how it works, and the simple moves that stop it cold.
Back-rank mate
A castled king behind three unmoved pawns can be mated by a single rook. Learn to deliver it, and to avoid it.
The Arabian mate
A rook and knight team up to trap a king in the corner. One of the oldest mating patterns there is.