1st Brilliancy Prize

The very first Brilliancy Prize was awarded to Henry Bird in 1876. This game was included and anotated in Reuben Fine's The World's Great Chess Games.

In this game which won the 1st Brilliancy Prize in Paris 1900, White leaves his Queen en pris for a half-dozen surprising moves -

White won the 1st Brilliancy Prize in Frankfurt 1887 possible partly based on the deflection on move 16, followed up with impeccable technique. -

This pretty Queen sac let Janowski share the 1st Brilliancy Prize at Ostende 1906-

Blackburne also shared the 1st Brilliancy Prize at Ostende 1906 with this win over Walter John. - 

Oldrich Duras also shared the Ostende 1906 1st Brilliancy Prize for his win over Teichmann.

The fourth shared 1st Brilliancy Prize at Ostende 1906 went to Frank Marshall, playing Black. -

And Finally . . . Although the New York 1924 was won by Em. Lasker and although Reti ended Capablanca's 8 yr. 1 mo. non-losing streak (63 games : 40 wins, 23 draws) in that same tournament, it was the following game against Bogoljubov that won Reti the 1st Brilliancy Prize.

The committee was torn in the decision, but as Alekhine himself noted in the annotations: "Rightfully, this game was awarded the first brilliancy prize."