Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

actually.. if you are a real fan of bobby fischer, you would have heard how
the real set up goes..

all pawns are in the exact same spots

king is placed in same position..
all other pieces in back row are shuffled but there must be at least 1
piece of 1 kind on each side and on the opposite side like a mirror

same goes for black.. mirror of whites side

Fischerandom association:
http://www.Fischerandom.narod.ru
Welcome!

I found a simpler procedure to set up Fischer Random Chess.
It doesn't require computers, dice, or lookup tables:

(1)  Put the eight white pieces in a bag.  Draw them one by one
and place them on squares a1, b1, ... h1.

(2)  If the bishops are on the same color, look at the following
pairs:  a1-b1, c1-d1, and e1-f1.  Swap the leftmost pair that
contains a bishop.

(3)  If the king is not between his rooks, swap the king with
the closer rook.

     All 960 legal positions are equally likely to result from
this method.

Oops, my bad.  There are 28 ways for the bishops to fall into the home row:
 16 ways are Fischer-legal and 12 aren't.  So there is no possible
one-to-one mapping of illegal positions to legal ones.  To be totally
unbiased, my Step #2 would have to say, 'If the bishops occupy the same
color, start over.'

My Step #3 is OK, though.  For every legal arrangement of king and rooks,
there are exactly two illegal ones.

By the rules you have here, white can castle a-side.  Can he legally?

8/8/8/8/8/8/8/4NRKR w - - 0 1

white can castle h-side in this next position, yes?

8/8/8/8/8/8/8/5KR1 w - - 0 1

If the answer to the first question was yes, how about this position?

8/8/8/8/8/8/8/4nRKR w - - 0 1

does a piece occupying a square constitute that piece checking the
square?

Thanks,

Landon

a
very nice item. I just want to make a comment. I think Fischers chess is
realy good, but would have one thing different: as there is no kingside or
queenside as such (the k and q being setup randomly ) it would be better
if you cuold castle the same on both sides.....ie the king ends up on g1
or on b1. In standard chess castling q side has the disadvantage that king
is nearer the centre and has tl be moved to protect the a pawn. 
Leettting him castle deep int the corner would encoutrage opposite side
castling which leads to lively game sswithbsimultaneous attacks on bith
wings in my experience.
A very nice article thank you very much

Beware: The castling rules for FullChess are _NOT_ the same as
the rules for Fischer Random Chess.  This is clear from the
Spanish ruleset.  I'm sure both games are enjoyable - it's just
important to note that they are different.  If you happen to get the
orthodox initial position, it doesn't matter, but in other positions
the difference could make a difference.

Fischerandom Chess email Club
http://frcec.tripod.com/

FRCEC rated games via Game Courier!

To play your rated FRCEC via Game Courier, advise your Chess Variant ID
when you setup your FRCEC match. You will be assigned an FRCEC Match
Number, and a the FRCEC moderator will setup the match at Game Courier for
you. You will receive an email from Chess Variants confirming the match
details, and you can now start your game with Game Courier. 
 
To join FRCEC, send an email to:
[email protected]

The following e-mail was received by the editors: 

Great website! You write:
 

	'Fischer Random Chess has 960 legal arrays. This number is determined as
follows: 

	First, place the two Bishops. There are 16 different ways for one bishop
to be on a white square and the other Bishop to be on a black square. 

	That leaves six empty squares. Now, place the King somewhere between the
two Rooks. There are 20 different ways for a King and two Rooks to occupy
six squares with the King in between. 

	That leaves three squares for the two Knights and the Queen. There are
three possible ways to place these pieces. 

	Thus, there are 16 x 20 x 3 (960) legal arrays in Fischer Random
Chess.'

	 

	The most complex step is that 20 in the middle. It can be removed like
this:

		Fischer Random Chess has 960 legal arrays. This number is determined as
follows: 

		First, place the two Bishops. There are 16 (4 x 4) different ways for
one bishop to be on a white square and the other Bishop to be on a black
square. 

		That leaves six empty squares. Now, place the Queen. There are 6
different ways to do this. 

		That leaves five empty squares. Now, place the two Knights. There are 10
different ways to do this. 

		That leaves three empty squares. Lastly, place the two Rooks and the
King. There is only one legal way to do this. 

		Thus, there are 16 x 6 x 10 x 1 (960) legal arrays in Fischer Random
Chess. 

		Regards 

		Peter Ridges

I have expanded Fischer's mathematics system to cater for Capablanca's
chess variations.

Capablanca84000 is a variant of Fischer Random Chess (Chess960), based
on the Capablanca (10x8) variation.
The light (for white. dark squared for black) squared bishop may start
on one of 5 files (b,d,f,h,j). the dark (light for black) squared
bishop may similarly begin on one of 5 files (a,c,e,g,i).
The archbishop may then be placed on any of the remaining 8 files.
The chancellor may then be placed on any of the remaining 7 files.
The queen may then be placed on any of the remaining 6 files.
The two knights may be placed within the remaining 5 files in 10 ways:
1+2, 1+3, 1+4, 1+5, 2+3, 2+4, 2+5, 3+4, 3+5, 4+5.
The remaining 3 files are filled in the order of rook-king-rook to
allow for castling on both sides of the king.
Multiplying the quotients gives the number of combinations: 5 x 5 x 8
x 7 x 6 x 10 = 84,000

By taking the random number, 12345, we can calculate the combination
for white (black is mirrored from white through 4th/5th rank).
Placement of light squared bishop: 12345/5 = 2469 with no remainder.
the light squared bishop goes in it's first possible file, b.
Placement of the dark squared bishop: 2469/5 = 493 with remainder of
4. The dark squared bishop goes in it's last possible file, j.
Placement of the archbishop: 493/8 = 61 with remainder 5. The
archbishop goes into its 6th (note, lowest remainder is 0, not 1)
possible file. b and j are already taken, so the archbishop goes into
file g.
Position of the chancellor: 61/7 = 8 with remainder 5. The chancellor
goes into the 6th available file. b, g and j are taken, so the
chancellor goes into file h.
Placement of the queen: 8/6 = 1 with remainder 2. The queen goes into
the 3rd possible file. b, g, h and j are taken so the queen goes into
file d.
Placement of the two knights: The last integer result, 1, indicates
that the two knights occupy the 2nd possible combination of files,
1+3. b, d, g, h and j are taken, so the knights occupy files a and e.
The remaining three files (c, f and i) are filled by the two rooks and
the king, with the king inbetween the two rooks. Thus, the rooks go
into files c and i. The king goes into file f.
The set up for combination 12345 is:
knight-bishop-rook-queen-knight-king-archbishop-chancellor-rook-bishop.

One of the current most popular chess variants on the market today is
Gothic Chess, 'designed' by Edward Trice. The pieces row in Gothic chess
is as follows (from left(a-file) to right(j-file)):
rook-knight-bishop-queen-chancellor-king-archbishop-bishop-knight-rook on
a 10x8 board.
How to calculate the equivalent Capablanca84000 combination: The light
squared bishop is in the 4th possible file. We use the quotient 3.
The dark squared bishop is in the second possible file. For this we
use the quotient 1.
The archbishop is in the 6th possible file, quotient = 5.
The chancellor is in the 4th available file, quotient = 3.
The queen is in the 3rd available file, quotient = 2.
The knights are in the 6th possible orientation, quotient = 5.
Using these numbers we calculate backwards. The last quotient is 5.
The number 5 is achieved after dividing 30 by 6. 30 + 2 is the
previous number. 32 is achieved After dividing 224 by 7. 224 + 3
should be the previous number. 227 is achieved After dividing 1816 by
8. 1816 + 5 should be the previous number. 1821 is achieved After
dividing 9105 by 5. 9105 +1 should be the previous number. 9106 is
achieved by dividing 45530 by 5. The final calculation is to add the
first quotient, 3, to 45530 to give 45533.

The first Capablanca84000 combination is 00000. The last combination is
83999.

Capablanca84000 and its calculating system are intended to be made the
property of the public domain and may be used or improved by any entity,
or hosted for free on any internet website. The reason for designing
Capablanca84000 was to give something to the world of chess. It took under
an hour to design and I would not feel comfortable for receiving anything
more than acknowledgemnt of contribution, since no novel idea was
employed. I wish that no third party may charge or be charged for using
Capablanca84000. I wish for it to be public domain. I wish that the design
ownership belong to José Raúl Capablanca and Robert James Fischer.
I have 'designed' my own personal combination which I believe is unique
and the best set-up. Currently, I choose to keep this combination secret,
until I am the recognised 'designer' of it.

There is aready my proposal for Capablanca Random Chess. I repeat it here:

CAPABLANCA RANDOM CHESS (2004-Nov-26) Proposal 

This definition of CRC should cover the following goals:

a) creating an interesting drosophila for chess programmers 
b) using Capablancas 10x8 Chess board geometry 
c) using Capablancas piece set (incl. archbishop and chancellor) 
d) applying rules aligned to Fischer Random Chess 
e) avoiding conflicts to any claimed patents 

The CRC rules are: 

a) creating a starting position (one of 48.000): 
 1) the bishops have to be placed upon different colored
  squares; same rule applies to the implicite bishop pieces:
  queen and archbishop (aligned to FRC)
 2) the king always has to be placed somewhere between the 
  rooks to enable castlings (aligned to FRC)
 3) use only such positions without unprotected pawns (Chess)

b) describing a method of generating starting positions on 
   free squares by using a dice or random number generator: 
 1) select queen or the archbishop to be placed first (2x)
 2) place the selected 1st piece upon a bright square (5x)
 3) place the selected 2nd piece upon a dark square (5x)
 4) one bishop has to be placed upon a bright square (4x) 
 5) one bishop has to be placed upon a dark square (4x) 
 6) one chancellor has to be placed upon a free square (6x) 
 7) one knight has to be placed upon a free square (5x) 
 8) one knight has to be placed upon a free square (4x)/2 
 9) set the king upon the center of three free squares left
11) set the rooks upon the both last free squares left 
12) this establishes White's first row, the Black side 
    has to be built up symmetrically to this 
13) place ten pawns similar to traditional chess in a row 
14) skip this position if it has unprotected pawns or not
    at least three positions in line 1 differently filled
    compared to Gothic Chess (patented), this finally gives
    about 21.259 distinct starting arrays.
   
c) nature of (asymmetric Fischer-) castlings:
 1) castlings are (like in traditional chess) only valid
  if neither the affected king or rook has been moved, or
  there would be a need to jump over any third piece, or
  the king would be in chess somewhere from his starting
  position to his target field (both included). Therefore
  all squares between king and its target square (included) 
  have to be free from third pieces, same applies to the
  way the rook has to go to its target square.
 2) the alpha-castling (O-O-O, White's left side):
  like in FRC the king will be placed two rows distant
  from the border (here c-file) and the rook at the next 
  inner neighboured square.
 3) the omega-castling (O-O, White's right side):
  like in FRC the king will be placed one row distant
  from the border (here i-file) and the rook at the next 
  inner neighboured square.

d) performing castlings:
 within a GUI try to move the king upon the related rook
 or at least two squares into that direction; manually:
 1) move the king outside of the board
 2) move the rook to its end position (if need to)
 3) move the king to his end position

e) extended FEN encoding:
 1) the extended FRC-FEN could be used as a base
 2) 'a'/'A' are used to identify archbishops
 3) 'c'/'C' are used to identify chancellors
 4) '9' is used to mark nine empty squares
 5) '10' is used to encode ten empty squares
 6) if a castling enabled rook is not the most outer one
  at that side, the letter of his file has to be placed
  immediately following his castling marker symbol, where
  'q'/'Q' are used for the alpha-, 'k'/'K' for omega-side.
 
f) engine notation rules for castling moves:
 According to UCI convention the castling moves should be
 written by using both coordinates (source and target field)
 of the involved king. But there are castlings, where the 
 king does only one or none simple step. In that cases the 
 castling should be distinguishable by appending a 'k', like
 already practized in promotion moves to make them unique.
 Overmore an engine should accept O-O or O-O-O (no zeroes),
 but only use them, when the GUI would demand for such a
 less precise notation.

Capablanca Random Chess (CRC) and Capablanca84000 were hybridised from
previously existing ideas (by Robert James Fischer and Jose Raul
Capablanca) independantly by their respective authors. Capablanca84000 is
the property of the public domain. I request confirmation as to whether
CRC is also the property of the public domain. The author of
Capablanca84000 supports and acknowledges the work of the author of CRC.
CRC and Capablanca84000 are the fruit of the same idea by two independant
authors. CRC and Capablanca84000 are significantly different to allow the
employment of either mathematical system.
Capablanca84000 is a more direct hybrid of Capablanca Chess using the
Fischer Random Chess (FRC) system. CRC is a modified hybrid of Capablanca
Chess and the FRC system.

As for catering for the possible system result which gives a position
similar or identical to a previously existing 'patented' 'invention',
I would state that generating a random number does not breach any patent.
Further, applying this random number to mathematical system which is the
property of the public domain does not breach any patent. Coincidence does
not breach any patent.

I want to make clear, that I do not intent to patent the idea of CRC.
Everybody who like it, may use it freely. Nevertheless it is not public
domain concerning the idea, because I want to be asked when changes or
improvements should become necessary. In so far I claim my copyright on
that idea. 

As an example currently there is a discussion, how the new pieces should
be represented. Indeed it seems neither being simple nor to be skipped
finding appropriate icons DISTINCT to existing and RELATED to the GAITS of
the represented pieces. The solution Smirf (my program being able to play
FRC and CRC, see: [http://www.chessbox.de/_tmp/SmirfPrototyp.png]) provides
for that problem thus avoids the usage of horse heads or bishop hats. And
for newcomers additionally to those pictures it might be helpful also to
use new and better names, where some already have been introduced here: 

CROSSED SWORDS: A=ARCHANGEL (ger. E=Erzengel, protecting the paradise with
swords) instead of Archbishop or Janus 
ROOK on a HORSESHOE: C=CENTAUR (ger. Z=Zentaur, because of its double
nature, horse part below) instead of Chancellor

See for that at: [http://www.chessbox.de/Compu/schachveri1_e.html]

To Greg Strong: I still want to avoid unnecessary conflicts with Ed Trice.
Nevertheless I agree, that randomly produced starting arrays hardly could
be regarded as trial to break a patent, where chances are 1:21.000. May be
it would help to specify an ERC variant: EUROPEAN RANDOM CHESS without
that GC avoiding rule, because such patents seem not to be valid in Europe,
also reflecting the European history of that extended 10x8 variant.

Reinhard, may i suggest an improvement to CRC? it seems to me that you
wish
to limit the number of credible variations to 'as low a number as
possible', to increase the overall credibility of the system. in
Capablanca84000, i considered deleting 42,000 of the variations since
they
are mirror images of the other 42,000. however, the reason behind
Capablanca84000 was to expose a conman using the traditional Fischer
system and no new formulae of my own (except those required for
Capablanca's archbishop and chancellor). thus, i am happy with the
number
84,000. indeed, i could even introduce more than 84,000 if i wanted to by
not being strict about bishops or rooks.
by introducing my suggestion you can get CRC down to about 10,000
variations [edited]. especially since
Capablanca84000 belongs not to I, but to the public domain. [edited]
my suggestion comes in several forms:
A: king must be to the right of the queen. traditional, includes
'invented' position.
B: king must be to the left of the queen. untraditional, deletes need for
patent skirting.
C: king must be on the right side of the board. see A.
D: king must be on the left side of the board. see B.

What is your goal, taa? Supposing you are intelligent I prosume you could
imagine that I notice that you are anonymously spreading desinformation
and nonsense here. Because the castlings like in Chess960 are not
symmetric, there is no redundance of mirrored positions. And CRC of course
is not trying to get as few as possible starting arrays, but instead to
filter positions, which eventually could be used as polemic arguments
against CRC, and to secure a more harmonic impression of that approach.

you might be right, i based the castling assumption on something else.
something i assumed before i learnt about fischer castling.
take standard chess and its mirror as variations in chess960. castling
would be the only difference between the two, other than
left-hand/right-hand bias. that's a shame.
my goal, is to liberate capablanca chess from the slavery which that
person has put it under, with his incredible patent. (note, contrary to
popular opinion, incredible doesn't mean good, it means 'not credible')

ok, i didn't quite get the distinction, but here is my comment on
cappablanca chess in general: it gives rooks more power, and takes too
much power from the knights. the addition of the 16 extra squares reduces
the board mobility of the knights, a pivitol piece in Chess and Fischer
Random Chess. 

and i also find the two new peices to be just a tad extravagant. i think
if i want new peices, play 'chess with different armies', my new
favorite besides FRC. (my prefference now goes: FRC, CwDA, then chess,
then cappablanca chess.) 

anyway, FRC was invented because of how boring openings have gotten in
Chess, because there are millions of pages written about the openings
alone, and everyone is playing off of memory, not playing chess. 

CRC and Cappablanca 84000 are simply superfluous in this way, because
cappablanca chess itself doesn't yet (and perhaps never will) have the
problem of opening memorizations.  

anyway, this is what i think. mostly just taste, but a little informed
opinion as well.

Does anyone happen to know what year this game was invented?  Amazingly
enough, there is no mention of FRC in Pritchard's encyclopedia.  I would
like to supply such basic information as year of invention for all games
supported by ChessV, so any information would be helpful!

Thanks,
Greg

it was invented in 1996 by Robert Fischer in Argentina.  

http://www.chessbox.de/Compu/fullchess1b_e.html

'Giving history lessons to the people on this web site is very low on my
list of priorities.'
_____________________

If your definitive history lessons must include condescending remarks
toward this entire group, then I am confident we can survive completely
without your input.

The CAPABLANCA-RANDOM-CHESS idea goes back to early 2004. One of the first
publishings of that idea has been made by me at July 1st, 2004 in 

http://www.bauer-schweitzer.de/forum/index.html

From Chessbase:
Breaking news: Fischer comeback?
27.05.2005 Bobby Fischer is considering returning to the arena of
competitive chess. Yesterday he met with his former adversary Boris
Spassky, who travelled to Iceland with the expressed purpose of 'drawing
Fischer back to the chessboard'. Fischer is agreeable to the notion, but
insists on a worthy opponent and Fischer Random rules.

Well, don't buy a non-refundable airline ticket to Iceland for this event
just yet.  Fischer is notoriously eccentric and difficult to negotiate
with.

The weird thing is that I suspect all of the publicity surrounding his
detention in Japan and fugitive status in US-America made this tentative
event hold stronger interest to the public and hence, more feasible as a
business venture.

Fischer is eccentric for sure, and I have no doubt that he knows how to
play his status to his advantage (monetary or otherwise.)  What gives me
hope is his requirement for 'fischer random' rules.  To me, this
suggests that his eccentricity is focused on the popularization of FRC and
not on direct income.  Given that this is his purpose (allegdly) the
question is whether other top-level players will agree.  His other
requirement was world-class competition, and I truely wonder how many
other grand-masters will be willing to play him at his own game (despite
the fact that 'his game' is designed to level the playing field by
removing opening book knowledge.)

Fischer vs. Topalov
Fischer Random Chess
http://www.novinite.com/view_news.php?id=53662

According to this news report, both are willing to play one another.
Will negotiations over money and the details of the competition hold-up,
though?

Yes, but was Fischer just being Fischer? The question has been asked
before. By the way, Karpov says he will play Fischer, even if it is FRC,
and there is an article out now showing Fischer meeting with Kasparov!!!!
Can this be true? http://www.GothicChess.com/news.html is the link.
Exciting stuff if it were so.

It is significant news for chess960 (a.k.a. Fischer Random Chess) when a
major new chess book is published that is largely devoted to chess960.

I therefore would like to encourage the editors to add mention of this
new
chess960 book to this web page.

The book info is:

Play Stronger Chess by Examining Chess960:
Usable Strategies of Fischer Random Chess Discovered
   by
Gene Milener

ISBN  0-9774521-0-7
Page count 252

More information, including an extended excerpt, is available at
http://CastleLong.com/.

Available at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk, BarnesAndNoble.com, and
elsewhere.

This chess book is about both chess960 and chess1, because it compares
and
contrasts them.  This teaches us things about both rule sets that are
harder to see when studying either in isolation.

Thank you.

Very good, I hope you can develop a chess game to download and promote de
fischerandom,

cheers from Argentina

Hi Gene, I mentioned your book near to mine at my SMIRF / ChessBox pages:
http://www.chessbox.de/Compu/schachbuch.html . Unfortunately my German
language book on Chess960 is sold only rarely about 10 pieces per quarter.
So I hope for you to have better success with yours ... ;-)

Your book is enlighting a lot of details also on 'fights' about right or
wrong extended FEN and move representation for engines playing Chess960.
Meanwhile the unnecessarily invented Fritz numbering scheme for Fischer
Random Chess luckily has been withdrawn by an update of that program.

Regards, Reinhard.

material values- all pieces
Fischer Random Chess
http://www.symmetryperfect.com/shots/values-chess.pdf

We have a [returning] Chess 960 World Champion:

Levon Aronian.

Anand fought back hard but Armenian Levon Aronian proved to be too good, beating the Indian Grandmaster in tiebreaker in a thrilling final to clinch the Chess 960 World Championships.

My suggestion for a way to randomize the starting positions (also works with all shuffles) and also record this position in a way that is self-explanatory for the nature of the positions.  Please feel free to comment. 

Need 8 cards or tiles numbered 1-8.
These cards or tiles represent columns on a chessboard.  Numbers are used instead of letters, for notation purposes (see below).  Numbers correspond to different columns. 1=A, 2=B, 3=C, 4=D, 5=E, 6=F, 7=G, 8=H .   The space the pieces would go in are in the row they would normally set up in.  In normal chess, white goes into row 1 and black in row 8.  

Will place pieces in following order: Bishops, King, Rooks, Queen, Knights.  Pawns remain where they normally should be.  Whenever a card has been picked, then that card is separated from remaining cards to be used to determine placement of pieces.

To place Bishops: Separate cards into odd and even piles.  Shuffle and deal out one from each.  First place odd, then even numbers.  Record these two numbers. Example: Card 5 and card 6 came up.  Bishops are put in columns E (card 5) and F (card 6).  Record first two digits as 56

To place King: Gather together all cards that were not selected. Separate 1 and 8 cards from these cards. If the 1 card was already selected, then separate out the 2 card.  If the 8 card has already been selected, then separate out the 7 card.  These cards will be added back in to select placement of Rooks and Queen.  Shuffle together these remaining cards, and select 1.  Record this number.  Example: Card 3 came up.  Rook is put in column C (card 3).  Next digit is recorded as a 3.  The current record of pieces placed is 563.

To place Rooks: Look at position of King.  Gather together all remaining cards in a lower position than position of King in one pile (following with example here, cards 1 and 2) and all remaining cards in a higher position than King (following the ongoing examples, this would be cards 4, 7, 8).  Random select from first pile one card (or if there is only one card, then that is the position), and from second pile one card.  Record these numbers (lower then higher), and place rooks in these columns.  In this ongoing set of examples, let's say 2 and 8 were selected.  The numbers two and 8 would be recorded with the other numbers, and Rooks placed in the B (card 2) column and H (card 8) column.  The current record of pieces would be 56328

To place Queen: Take remaining cards together shuffle, and select one.  Queen would go in that column.  In this ongoing example, the remaining cards would be 1, 4, 7.  For this example, say the 1 card was picked.  Queen would be placed in the A column (card 1).  The current record would be 563281.  This is the final recorded position.

To place the Knights:  Place them in the two remaining empty positions.  In the ongoing example here, the remaining cards would be 4 and 7.  The Knights are placed in columns D (card 4) and column G (card 7).

To sum up, the position generated by this is: 564281 (b56 k3 r28 q1).  This is also the notation name for the position. 

Board set up would look like this:
qrknbbnr
pppppppp

[Empty spaces between pieces]

PPPPPPPP
QRKNBBNR

-------------------------------------
For a more random shuffle, in games without castling, the order of the pieces is done the same, but with less restrictions.  For color balance of Bishops, the same idea of sorting the cards by odd or even would apply.  Bishops would be then put on appropriate spaces.  Say 1 and 8 were picked.  The notation would be: 18 for Bishops.

Then the King would placed.  Say 2 was picked.  Notation would be 182

Then the Rooks would be placed.  Say 5, 7 were picked.  Notation would be so far 18257

Then the Queen would be placed.  Say position 3 was picked.  Notation would be 182573

Knights would be placed in empty spaces.

Pieces would be in following configuration:
BKQNRNRB

Final notation for this position is: 182573

The new world champion Hikaru Nakamura!  
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5626
Randomized 8x8 came and went already many times. Researchers could write books on CVs randomizing pieces. Next to Carrera (RN) and (BN), shuffling is the most popular type of CV in all time for designers cooking something up.  Pritchard 'ECV' under Baseline Chess records year 1851 at Baden Baden score between van der Hoeven and von der Lasa starting BKRRBNNQ. Pritchard's source is 'Dizionario Enciclopedico degli Scacchi'. It's what we call FRC or Chess960 now for purely political reasons. The variables in the theme for these 200 years, since Alexandre's invention, chiefly include: (1) whether non-mirrors allowed (2) players select or not (3) how much free placement. Also included (4) what CV to start with, since it doesn't have to be really 8x8 RNBQKBNR, but instead such as Capablanca 8x10. 
http://www.chessvariants.org/large.dir/bbchess/bbchess.html Before is a plenteous one by Professor Shoenfelder on 10x10 more liberally predisposed than even Benko's Pre-Chess.
At that time of Capablanca Chess inception, around 1921 Erich Brunner began popularizing 8x8 Random as Free Chess. FC tourneys in 1920s happened at Switzerland and England, like Mainz 2006-2009 repeats now. The difference between Free and FRC is mostly respecting #(2) above; for Free the answer is Yes, and for Fischer the answer is No.