Richard Réti

Richard Réti (28 May 1889 – 6 June 1929) was an Austro-Hungarian-born (later Czechoslovak) chess grandmaster, author, and composer renowned for his pioneering contributions to hypermodern chess theory, including the development of the Réti Opening (1. Nf3) and influential endgame studies.

Born in Pezinok (then Bösing, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, now Slovakia) to a Jewish family, Réti grew up in Vienna, where he learned chess at age six by observing his parents play. He studied mathematics and physics at the University of Vienna and achieved his first major tournament success in 1910 by winning the Vienna championship.

Richard Réti was born on 28 May 1889 in Pezinok, then part of Austria-Hungary (now Slovakia), into a Jewish family.

As part of the Jewish community in the multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Réti family was immersed in the cultural richness of Jewish heritage in the region during the fin de siècle era.

In 1891, when Richard Réti was two years old, his family relocated from Bösing (now Pezinok, Slovakia) to Vienna, where his father, the physician Samuel Réti, established a medical practice to provide better educational opportunities for his sons. The family, of Jewish background, spent summers at the Bösing sanatorium but primarily resided in Vienna thereafter.