Maia Chiburdanidze is a Georgian chess grandmaster. She is the sixth Women’s World Chess Champion, a title she held from 1978 to 1991, and was the youngest one until 2010, when this record was broken by Hou Yifan. Chiburdanidze is the second woman to be awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE, which took place in 1984. She has played on nine gold-medal-winning teams in the Women’s Chess Olympiad.
Chiburdanidze was born in Kutaisi, Georgia, in 1961. She began playing chess at the age of 5 and quickly showed a natural talent for the game. She won the Georgian Women’s Chess Championship at the age of 12, and the Soviet Women’s Chess Championship at the age of 14.