Moving absolutely pinned piece to give checkmate: has this ever occured in a master game?

Question

We know that an absolutely pinned piece (a piece pinned against its own king) can move and give a check, and the check can even be a mate.

The following is an example of such a checkmate.

[FEN "8/8/2k5/8/4p2b/r7/3RKPBr/q7 w - - 0 1"]

1. f4 exf3#

Source: A. Skodras, Quora

I am interested in knowing whether this has ever occurred in a master game; say, both opponents are rated 2000+ and the game was competitive (e.g. in a tournament).

Note: To be clear, I would like to exclude the case of a pinned piece capturing the pinning piece and checkmating the opponent king at the same time (unless it is still in absolute pin). Thanks to Evargalo for pointing this out.

I suppose this happening in a game would be rare, let alone in a master game. But, the first impression (I had) that "moving a pinned piece and giving check cannont be a good move" is wrong.

[Title "Schatz vs. Giegold, Hof (1928)"]
[FEN "7k/pb5q/1p3p2/2p1p1p1/6P1/QP4KR/P4PP1/1B5r b - - 0 1"]

1... Qh4+

Source: Martin Weteschnik, Understanding Chess Tactics (btw, this is one of the best books on how tactics work).

Here, the move 1... Qh4+ is the best move (along with 1... Rxh3+ which is a slightly slower mate).

Addendum

CQL may be the best solution for questions of this type. One way I can think of to form a CQL query is the following (and its flipcolor variant):

1. white gives check (and mates black) in the current position,
2. the piece last moved is X,
3. if piece X is removed from the previous position, then white is in check.

I don't know how (or whether) step 3 can be expressed in CQL.

Answer 1

I used this CQL query to find such positions:

cql(input Mega_Database_2022.pgn)

flipcolor {
    pinningPieces = pin from A
    pinnedPieces = pin through a

    line --> pin from A
         --> {
                 wtm
                 mate
                 pin from A == pinningPieces
                 pin through a != pinnedPieces
             }
}

• flipcolor: check if a position meets the criteria for the given colours, then reverse them.
• pin from A: a white piece (A) pins the black king. from is the first argument, therefore the squares of the pinning pieces are returned. These shouldn't change - they aren't moved.
• pin through a: a black piece (a) is pinned against its own king. through is the first argument, therefore the squares of the pinned pieces are returned. These should change - one moved to mate the other side.
• wtm mate: white has been mated.
• line --> a --> b: the current position should match filter a and the position after the next move should math filter b.

Running the script against Mega Database 2022 only returns 9 (!) games. All follow the same pattern: a pawn is "pinned" by a major piece and moves to give checkmate.

Only 2 are master games:

1. Rocha, Wellington Carlos vs. Braga, Cicero Nogueira at the Paulisto Championship (1999):

   [FEN ""]
   [Event "Paulisto-ch final"]
   [Site "Americana"]
   [Date "1999"]
   [Round "5"]
   [White "Rocha, Wellington Carlos"]
   [Black "Braga, Cicero Nogueira"]
   [Result "1-0"]
   [ECO "B23"]
   [WhiteElo "2361"]
   [BlackElo "2405"]
   [PlyCount "81"]
   [StartPly "80"]
   
   1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Bc4 e6 6. O-O Nge7
   7. d3 d5 8. Bb3 O-O 9. Qe1 Na5 10. exd5 Nxb3 11. axb3 exd5 12. Qf2 d4
   13. Ne4 b6 14. Bd2 Nd5 15. Rfe1 h6 16. Ne5 Kh7 17. Qf3 f5 18. Nf2 Bb7
   19. c4 dxc3 20. bxc3 Qc7 21. Qg3 Ne7 22. h4 Bf6 23. Nh3 Rg8 24. Re2 Rg7
   25. Rae1 Rd8 26.Nf2 Ba8 27. Nf3 Nd5 28. Ng5+ hxg5 29. hxg5 Be7 30. c4 Nb4
   31. Bc3 Rd4 32. Bxd4 cxd4 33. Qh3+ Kg8 34. g4 Qb7 35. gxf5 gxf5 36. Ne4 Nxd3
   37. Nf6+ Bxf6 38. Re8+ Kf7 39. Qh5+ Rg6 40. Qh7+ Rg7 41. g6# 1-0
   

2. Petrosyan, Manuel vs. Vachier Lagrave, Maxime at a Titled Tuesday blitz on chess.com (2020)

   [FEN ""]
   [Event "Titled Tuesday intern op 9th June"]
   [Site "Chess.com INT"]
   [Date "2020.06.09"]
   [Round "4"]
   [White "Petrosyan, Manuel"]
   [Black "Vachier Lagrave, Maxime"]
   [Result "0-1"]
   [ECO "D12"]
   [WhiteElo "2607"]
   [BlackElo "2778"]
   [PlyCount "96"]
   [EventDate "2020.06.09"]
   [StartPly "95"]
   
   1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. e3 Bf5 5. Nc3 e6 6. Nh4 Be4
   7. f3 Bg6 8. Qb3 Qc7 9. Bd2 Be7 10. Rc1 Nbd7 11. g3 dxc4 12. Bxc4 a6 13. a4
   O-O 14. Nxg6 hxg6 15. O-O b5 16. Be2 Qb6 17. Ne4 Rfc8 18. Rc2 Nxe4 19. fxe4 b4
   20. Rfc1 Qb7 21. e5 c5 22. Kf2 Rab8 23. Bf3 Qa7 24. Qd3 Rd8 25. Qe4 Qb6 26. b3
   a5 27. h4 cxd4 28. exd4 Nf8 29. Be3 Rd7 30. d5 exd5 31. Qxd5 Qd8 32. Qc4 Ne6
   33. Bg4 Rd5 34. Bxe6 fxe6 35. Qg4 Rxe5 36. Bf4 Rf5 37. Qxg6 Qd5 38. Rc8+ Rxc8
   39. Rxc8+ Bf8 40. Kg1 Qxb3 41. Re8 Rf6 42. Qg4 Qb1+ 43. Kh2 Qe4 44. Qg5 b3 45.
   Bd6 Qe2+ 46. Kh3 Qf1+ 47. Kg4 Qf5+ 48. Kh5 g6# 0-1
   

Reference (from CQL documentation):

• flipcolor
• pin
• line
• Arrows: -->, <--
• wtm
• mate
• !=, ==
• Variables

Download CQL for Windows and Mac along with some examples from the official website. Email the authors for the Linux distribution.