Scachs d'amor

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Scachs d'amor (love chess) is a chess poem in the Catalan language from the 15th century. The full title of the work reads: Hobra jntitulada scachs d'amor feta per don Franci de Castellvi e Narcis Vinyoles e mossen Bernat Fenollar sota nom de tres planetes ço es Març Venus e Mercuri per conjunccio e jnfluencia dels quals fon jnventada (work entitled “Liebesschach “, Made by Don Franci de Castellvi and Narcis Vinyoles and Mossen Bernat Fenollar, under the name of three planets that are Mars, Venus and Mercury, under whose constellation and influence it was invented). It was probably created in Valencia, Spain, between 1470 and 1490. Garzon mentions the year 1475. The authorship is attributed to the literary circle around Bernat Fenollar , Francí de Castellví and Narcís Vinyoles .

Scachs d'amor is the oldest evidence of modern chess, which was then called de la dama (from the queen) in Spain , in reference to its most characteristic and powerful new piece.

Reception history

The manuscript was discovered in 1905 by the Jesuit P. Ignacio Casanovas in the Real Capilla del Palau in Barcelona and is said to have included 13 written and 30 blank leaves measuring 290 × 215 cm. In 1912, several essays by the Catalan chess historian José Paluzíe y Lucena (1860-1938) appeared. The first complete edition was published by Ramón Miquel i Planas. The influential chess historian Harold James Ruthven Murray paid little attention to the Catalan chess poem in his extensive work A history of chess (1913), which contributed to the fact that further treatises, despite its enormous importance for the origins of the modern chess game, met with little response. The most recent (private) edition of the text was published in 1992 by Salvador Juanpere i Aguiló. The manuscript has been missing since the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939).

content

The poem describes a game of chess in the form of an allegory . Mars (Castellví) plays with the red stones and advertises the love of Venus (Vinyoles), who plays with the green stones. Mercurius (Fenollar) acts as referee. The game was probably not actually played, but constructed. White plays 21 moves in 21 stanzas. Black plays 20 moves in 20 stanzas. Together with the 3 stanzas of the referee, this results in 64 stanzas (each with 9 verses), i.e. as many as the number of spaces on the chessboard. From this game it is therefore difficult to infer the strength of the players at that time, but it is very possible to draw conclusions about the intellectual climate in which modern chess emerged.

  a b c d e f G H  
8th Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess qlt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess kdt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess rdt45.svg 8th
7th Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess pdt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess pdt45.svg Chess pdt45.svg Chess pdt45.svg 7th
6th Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess qdt45.svg Chess --t45.svg 6th
5 Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess rlt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg 5
4th Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess bdt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg 4th
3 Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess plt45.svg 3
2 Chess plt45.svg Chess plt45.svg Chess plt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess plt45.svg Chess plt45.svg Chess --t45.svg 2
1 Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess klt45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess --t45.svg Chess rlt45.svg 1
  a b c d e f G H  

Position after 21.Qd8 #

Template: checkerboard / maintenance / new

The first known game of new chess

Francisco de Castellví (white) vs. Narciso de Vinyoles (black)

Opening (according to today's system): Scandinavian defense : Mieses-Kotroc variant ( B01 )

1. e4 d5 12. d4 Nd6
2. exd5 Qxd5 13. Bb5 + Nxb5
3. Nc3 Qd8 14. Qxb5 + Nd7
4. Bc4 Nf6 15. d5 exd5
5. Nf3 Bg4 16. Be3 Bd6
6. h3 Bxf3 17. Rd1 Qf6
7. Qxf3 e6 18.Rxd5 Qg6
8. Qxb7 Nbd7 19. Bf4 Bxf4
9. Nb5 Rc8 20. Qxd7 + Kf8
10. Nxa7 Nb6 21. Qd8 mate
11. Nxc8 Nxc8

See also

swell

Wikisource: Scachs d'amor  - Sources and full texts (Catalan)

literature

  • Ricardo Calvo: Valencia Spain: The Cradle of European Chess . Presentation to the CCI, Vienna 1998 ( PDF file, 163KB, English ).
  • José Antonio Garzon: The Return of Francesch Vicent: The History of the Birth and Expansion of Modern Chess. Valencia 2005, ISBN 84-482-4194-0
  • Bill Wall's website , (accessed August 13, 2016).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ José A. Garzon: La tesis valenciana como cuna del ajedrez moderno. Scachs d'amor (1475) , chap. 7.1, (Spanish), (accessed November 9, 2012).
  2. ↑ Notice on a Manuscript en langue catalane existant à l´Archive du Palau à Barcelone . In: La Stratégie, Paris 4, April 1912, pp. 121-123; and half a page in: Deutsches Wochenschach, No. 21, May 1912, p. 189; and in his Manual de Ajedrez , 6 volumes, Barcelona 1912.
  3. ↑ Escachs d'Amor, poema Inèdit del XVèn sail . In: Bibliofilia, Recull d'estudis, observacions, comentaris I noticies sobre llibres en general i sobre qüestions de llengua i literatura catalanes en particular, Volume 1, Barcelona 1911–1914, pp. 413–440.