Chess -- Chess History And Reminiscences

Chess History And Reminiscences

or Mohammedan years over the East (Spain, Africa and Egypt)
having been successively detached from their Empire, until the
last of them, Al Mut'assem, was deprived both of his kingdom and
his life by the Tartars under Hulaku Khan, 1258.

NOTE. The Khalif Al Mamum was one day playing with one of his
courtiers, who moved negligently and in a careless manner, the
Khalif perceived it and got wrath, and turned over the board and
men, and said: "He wants to deceive me and practice on my
understanding; and he vowed on earth that this person should never
play with him again." In like manner, it is related of Walid ben
Abdul Malik ben Merwan, that on an occasion when one of his
courtiers, who used to play with him negligently at chess,
omitted to follow the proper rules of the game, the Khalif
struck him a blow with the Ferzin (or Queen) which broke his
head, saying: "Woe unto thee! Art thou playing chess, and art
thou in thy senses."

NOTE. The 37th and last Khalif of Abbaside, was dethroned and put
to death by Hulaku. the son of Genghis Khan in 1258, when the
Tartars were also sorely troubling part of the Christian world,
and frightening the Popes. Unluckily for Oriental Literature we
are told, scarcely any of the comparatively few works of the
"Golden Age of Arabian Literature" saved from destruction, have
been translated or made known to us, but we may conclude that of
the one hundred and sixty rulers, not a few emulating Harun, Mamun,
Walid and Mutasem, were more or less like them, devoted to the
game. The powerful Abbaside Dynasty lasted from 749 to 1258, and
there were 37 Khalifs of that race, the chess sayings and doings
of whom alone, it is said, would fill a good-size volume, chess
has had to contend against the consideration that the greatest
historians and biographers, with the exception of Cunningham and
Forbes, and perhaps Gibbon were not players, hence what we do
possess is gathered from scattered allusion, incidental and
accidental rather than sustained or connected narrative or
biographical notice. Canute the Dane, 1016-1035, William the First,
and other English Kings, not so well attested, are absent from
Philidor's list. Henry I, John, two of the Edwards, I and IV,
and Charles I are identified with the chess incidents. Accounts
of Henry VII and Henry VIII, contain items of expense connected
with the game. The bluff king it is said played chess, as Wolsey
and Cranmer did, and as Pitt, and Wilberforce, and Sunderland,
Bolingbroke and Sydney Smyth have in our generations. The vain and
tyrant king, like the Ras of Abyssinia, who we hear of through
Salt and Buckle much preferred winning, and was probably readily
accommodated. Less magnanimous and wise, these two, Henry and Ras,
did not in this respect resemble Al Mamun and Tamerlane, whom Ibn
Arabshah, Gibbon and others tell us, had no dislike to being beaten,
but rather honored their opponents. The chessmen of Henry VIII were
last heard of in the possession of Sir Thomas Herbert, those of
Charles I were with Lord Barrington. Chess men were kept for Queen
Elizabeth's use by Lord Cecil, the Earl of Leicester, and Sir
John Harrington.

In olden times as supposed, Alexander the Great, perhaps from
acquaintance with India and its Kings, and their powerful Porus,
326 B.C., may have known chess and possibly Aristotle, sometime his
tutor, who some say, invented chess, also played it. The most
ancient names are the renowned Prince Yudhistheira, eldest son of
King Pandu of the Sanskrit chess period, the yet earlier Prince
Nala of the translated poems, and further back we have the Brahmin
Radha Kants account from the old Hindu law book, that the wife of
Ravan, King of Lanka, Ceylon, invented chess in the second age of
the world. Associated with games not chess, but more like Draughts
in China, there are Emperor Yao, 2300 B.C., Wa Wung 1122 B.C.,
Confucius 551 B.C., Hung Cochu, 172 B.C, and in Egypt, Queen Hatasu
about 1750 B.C., Amenoph II, 1687 to 1657 B.C., and Rameses IV
1559 to 1493 B.C.

NOTE. The Throne, Cartouche, Signet, and other relics. The
Draught Box and Draughtsmen of Queen Hatasu in the Manchester
Exhibition 1887. Date B.C. 1600. The catalogue says: These
remarkable relics, the workmanship of royal artists 3,500
years ago, i.e., 200 years before the birth of Moses, are now
being exhibited for the first time, by the kind permission of
their owner, Jesse Haworth, Esq. Queen Hatasu was the favourite
daughter of Thotmes I, and the sister of Thotmes II and III,
Egyptian Kings of the XVIII dynasty. She reigned conjointly with
her eldest brother, then alone for 15 years, and for a short time
with her younger brother, Thotmes III. She was the Elizabeth of
Egyptian history: had a masculine genius and unbounded ambition.
A woman, she assumed male attire; was addressed as a king even in
the inscriptions upon her monument. Her edifices are said to be
"the most tasteful, most complete and brilliant creations which
ever left the hands of an Egyptian architect." The largest and
most beautifully executed obelisk; still standing at Karnak, bears
her name. On the walls of her unique and beautiful temple at Dayr
el Baharee, we see a naval expedition sent to explore the unknown
land of Punt, the Somali country on the East coast of Africa near
Cape Guardafui 600 years before the fleets of Solomon, and
returning laden with foreign woods, rare trees, gums, perfumes
and strange beasts. Here we have 1. Queen Hatasu's throne, made of
wood foreign to Egypt, the legs most elegantly carved in imitation
of the legs of an animal, covered with gold down to the hoof,
finishing with a silver band. Each leg has carved in relief two
Uroei, the sacred cobra serpent of Egypt, symbolic of a goddess.
These are plated with gold. Each arm is ornamented with a serpent
curving gracefully along from head to tail, the scales admirably
imitated by hundreds of inlaid silver rings. The only remaining
rail is plated with silver. The gold and silver are of the