Nikolai Spiridonovich Rossolimo was born into an upper-middle-class Russian-Greek family in Kiev, then part of the Russian Empire.

His father was Spiridon Rossolimo, a Russian painter and portraitist of Greek ancestry, while his mother née Xenia Nikolaevna Skugarevskaya was an aristocratic writer and war correspondent.

In 1955, he won the U.S. Open Championship held in Long Beach, California, on tiebreaks ahead of Samuel Reshevsky.

Rossolimo died of head injuries following a fall down a flight of stairs, just after finishing third in his final event, the 1975 World Open.

[6] The strongest players Rossolimo defeated were Efim Bogoljubov, David Bronstein, and former World Champion Max Euwe, against whom he had two wins and a lifetime plus score.

He also scored draws against four world champions: José Capablanca, Max Euwe, Bobby Fischer, and Vassily Smyslov.

According to the site Chessmetrics, which estimates historical ratings of players based on results, his highest ranking was 15th in the world, reached in December 1953.

Al Horowitz, the late chess columnist for The New York Times, called this game "a brilliancy of astonishing character, elegant and explosive".