Buckle's Chess References, which are not so full as we could
wish contain the names of Gerbert (Pope Sylvester, 2) (992, 1003),
Cranmer, Wolsey, Pitt and Wilberforce, as chess players, but do
not refer in any way to Beckett, Luther, or Voltaire, names
mentioned in Linde, neither think of Alcuin, or consider the
chess probabilities of the contemporary reigns of Offer, Egbert,
Charlemagne, Harun, and Irene.
Van der Linde assigns the 13th Century for first knowledge of
chess in England, and places it under the head of Kriegspiel,
but on what grounds, or what he conceives this Kriegspiel to be,
or how it differs from chess does not clearly appear in his book,
his space being rather devoted to sneers or dissent from the
statements and conclusions of previous writers, than at advancing
any distinct theory of his own.
He labours much to cast doubts on Charlemagne's knowledge of
chess, and to infer that the chess men preserved and considered
to have belonged to him, reported upon by Dr. Hyde, F. Douce,
and Sir F. Madden, are of comparatively recent date.
Einhard, the historian of Charlemagne, he says does not mention
chess, Cranmer, Wolsey, Pope, Pitt, Chatham, Fox,
Wilberforce, and other well accredited names which interest us are
absent from his list, which is surprising, considering his mass of
petty detail.
More than two-thirds of these volumes are devoted to descriptive
catalogues of books and magazines from Jacobus de Cessolus, the
first European work devoted to chess in the 13th century, down
to the various editions of Philidor, Sarratt, Allgaier, W. Lewis,
G. Walker, the German handbooks, and Staunton's popular works.
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