Five opening traps, and the habit that avoids each one
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An opening trap is a sequence in which a natural-looking move turns out to be a serious mistake, usually losing a piece or the game within a few moves. Traps are popular with new players because they promise quick wins. They are worth studying for the opposite reason: almost every famous trap works only because the victim broke one of the basic opening principles. If you know the trap, you will not fall into it. If you understand why it works, you will not fall into the thousand unnamed traps that look a little different.
Below are five well-known examples. Every move was checked with a chess rules library, and the final diagram of each one shows the position the trap leads to. A word of advice before you start: do not build your opening around setting traps. A trap that fails usually leaves the person who set it with a worse position. Learn them as warnings.
1. Scholar's Mate
This is the first trap most players meet. White brings the queen out early and aims queen and bishop together at f7, the weakest square in Black's camp because only the king defends it.
1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 Nc6 3.Qh5 Nf6 4.Qxf7#
The mistake is Black's third move, Nf6. It develops a piece and attacks the queen, which looks sensible, but it ignores the threat on f7. Black had several good defences instead, such as g6, which attacks the queen and blocks its diagonal, or Qe7, which protects f7 directly.
The habit: after every opponent move, ask what it threatens. The queen on h5 attacks two things, e5 and f7, and seeing the second one is enough to stop this trap.
2. Légal's Mate
Named after the eighteenth-century French player Légal de Kermeur, this trap lets the opponent win the queen and then mates with minor pieces.
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bc4 Bg4 4.Nc3 g6 5.Nxe5 Bxd1 6.Bxf7+ Ke7 7.Nd5#
On move 5 the white knight takes on e5, apparently leaving the queen hanging to the pinning bishop. Black grabs the queen with Bxd1, and the two knights and the bishop finish the game. The pin on the f3 knight was not a real pin: it was a pin against the queen, not against the king, so the knight was free to move if the result was worth more than a queen.
The habit: before taking a big prize, ask why your opponent is allowing it. Black's best is to take the knight with dxe5 instead and accept that, after Qxg4, White has won a pawn. Losing a pawn is a setback; losing the game in seven moves is not recoverable. Even a good capture deserves a quick check for the opponent's checks and captures in reply.
3. The Blackburne Shilling Gambit
This trap is played by Black. After 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4, Black plays the odd-looking 3...Nd4, leaving the e5 pawn without its defender. It is named after Joseph Henry Blackburne, the English master, who reportedly used it to win small stakes in casual games.
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nd4 4.Nxe5 Qg5 5.Nxf7 Qxg2 6.Rf1 Qxe4+ 7.Be2 Nf3#
White's Nxe5 grabs a pawn and Nxf7 forks queen and rook, both natural moves, but they leave g2 and the king's position undefended. The queen takes on g2, then on e4 with check, and the knight mates on f3, where the king is hemmed in by its own bishop, rook and pawns.
The habit: when your opponent offers material in the opening, look first at what is left undefended near your own king. White could avoid all of this simply by castling or by playing Nxd4, taking the knight that had wandered forward. The gambit is objectively poor for Black, which is exactly why it is a trap rather than an opening.
4. The Elephant Trap
This one comes from the Queen's Gambit Declined, a serious opening played at every level. It catches White players who think they have found a free pawn.
1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 Nbd7 5.cxd5 exd5 6.Nxd5 Nxd5 7.Bxd8 Bb4+ 8.Qd2 Bxd2+ 9.Kxd2 Kxd8
The knight on f6 looks pinned to the queen by the bishop on g5, so White takes the pawn on d5 with the knight, expecting Black to be unable to recapture. But Black does recapture, with Nxd5. If White now wins the queen with Bxd8, Black first gives check with Bb4. White must block with the queen, Black takes it, and only then does the black king recapture the bishop on d8.
The habit: a pin is a weakness only if the pinned piece really cannot move. Here Black was happy to give up the queen because a check was waiting. When you count material in a forcing sequence, count to the end, including the checks in between.
5. The Noah's Ark Trap
In the Ruy Lopez, the white bishop often retreats to b3, where it looks safe. If White carelessly exchanges in the centre, Black's queenside pawns can surround it.
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 d6 5.d4 b5 6.Bb3 Nxd4 7.Nxd4 exd4 8.Qxd4 c5 9.Qd5 Be6 10.Qc6+ Bd7 11.Qd5 c4
White's eighth move, Qxd4, is the error. It recaptures a pawn, which seems natural, but the queen is then attacked by c5, the bishop's escape squares disappear, and after c4 the bishop is trapped. The name refers to the trap's age: it is said to be as old as the Ark.
The habit: pieces on the edge or in a corner of the board need a route home. Every few moves, check whether each of your pieces could retreat if a pawn attacked it.
What the five traps have in common
Look back at the victims. In Scholar's Mate, Black missed a threat. In Légal's Mate and the Elephant Trap, the victim grabbed material without checking the opponent's forcing reply. In the Blackburne Shilling Gambit, White took two pawns and left the king exposed. In the Noah's Ark Trap, a piece wandered to a square with no retreat. None of these mistakes is about memorising openings. They are about two questions: what does my opponent threaten, and what happens after I take? Players who ask both questions every move rarely fall for traps, named or not.
The opening principles article covers the positive side of the same idea: develop pieces, control the centre and castle early, and most traps will never have a chance to happen.