Two new books

[Arie van der Stoep]

Twice 424 pages

Within six months, two beautifully illustrated books of 424 pages were
published with chess as a subject, among other things. In English "The
Horta-Osorio Collection of Antique Chess Sets. Volume 1: India", with
212 photos and 68 illustrations. In Dutch “Schaken, dammen, molenspel
en triktrak. Een Nederlands/Vlaamse cultuurhistorie” (Chess, draughts,
morris and tables. A Dutch/Flemish cultural history, with 534
full-colour reproductions.

The Dutch book presents the results of half a century of in-depth
research. Point by point:

1. Draughts is older than chess.
2. Draughts may have inspired the creation of chess.
3. In European culture, draughts and tables were the great board games.
4. In the Middle Ages, chess was played by the lowest classes in
taverns that had a bad reputation, the dice decided the outcome of a
game.
5. Chess was permanently under pressure from draughts. See for example
Philidor 1749 or 1750 p. 17. The new 15th-century chess queen can be
traced back to the long king in Spanish draughts.
6. The book contains dozens of tables. One type of table shows the
number of game boards found in estates, as shown on p. 163 in the
major cities of Leeuwarden, Amsterdam and Leiden. Number of
chessboards registered between 1500 and 1700 5, number of registered
draughts boards 233, number of registered tables 972.
7. Chess penetrated Europe with difficulty, in the Netherlands after
1770. The table on p. 391 of draughts and chessboards in five Dutch
19th-century municipalities provides a sociological picture, because
the financial wealth of the owners was included in the study. The
draughtsboard, the researcher registered 119, was found in all social
strata; the chessboard, the researcher registered 15 of them, almost
exclusively in the richest group. This was the group with the greatest
social influence, an explanation for the breakthrough of chess at the
expense of draughts around 1900.
8. In addition to the tables, the visual arts reflect the position of
draughts. In 1652, Michael Sweerts (1618-1664) portrayed some bored
boys from the better Roman families in Italy, playing draughts on a
game box. Oil on canvas, 48x38cm [Mauritshuis, The Hague].

Finally, I would like to point out two areas where chess history is
sinking through the scientific lower limit, I am sorry to have to
conclude this. In the first place, chess history is limited to tracing
sources that mention chess, concluding that chess occupied a special
social position. But such a conclusion is of course only possible
after describing and comparing the position of several board games. In
the second place, chess historians "explain" the meaning of words such
as Fr. dame / Sp. dama and Fr. (jeu de) dames / Sp. (juego de) damas
without realizing that etymology is part of the field of linguistics,
a university discipline. They are pretty guesses, all of which are
wrong with the truth. In the absence of other types of sources, I used
linguistic methods in Part One and Part Two of the Dutch book on the
social position of chess, draughts, etc.

Purchase the ‒astonishing cheap‒ book from Wim van Mourik and enjoy
the illustrations. He delivers it with a PDF, so that you can
translate it: wavan...@planet.nl.

Arie van der Stoep, historian linguist