| Chess One 2006-08-03, 2:52 am |
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<n_cramerSPAM@pacbell.net> wrote in message
news:20060717181709.137$1V@newsreader.com...
quote:
> "Chess One" <innes8@verizon.net> wrote:
quote:
> Excellent, Phil. Sportulary, Supported by, dependent or subsisting on, the
> doles or gifts of patrons. The last reference to the word in my OED is
> from
> 1649, a time when many artists, philosophers and chess players were on the
> dole, IIRC.
But not Greco, which can be this week's QUIZ - having published some Codex
material in Paris in 1624/25 and after some appearances in London and France
immediately precedeing these writings, he dissapeared! Presumably he
couldn't find anyone to dole him. Later writing mentions he may have gone to
the West Indies and died there ["in the 1630s"]. So what happened to the guy
who brought the serious new chess to England and France?
We owe much to (Gioachino) Greco, since there was a printed pamphlet
published in Frnace in the 1530s, the /Sensuit Ieux Partis des eschez - then
no more mention of the game at all. In England material was as scarce and
one Roger Hartwell had a problem manuscript in 1529, but this was in fact a
record of medieval problems. A poem by Henry Howard [undated, but Howard
died 1547] contains some references to chess. Chess seems to have migrated
to Germany circa 1536 and there is a record by Christian Egenolff in his
/Jacobus de Cessolis' morality/ final edition only.
If there are German scholars out there, here is another question: The origin
of the new game in Germany was given as from the word "welsch" which is
usually translated to "foreign" and is sometimes translated to "Italian",
but Eales says this is likely a mistake "for that part of Germany it is more
likely to refer to France". Of course, the term may not be specific at all.
To be on topic, if ironically in the case of Damiano who was a sort of open
plageriser: Damiano's claim to fame was to republish almost entire from
Lucena, except that he wrote his own introcuction to largely the same
material [only 2 exceptions from the Gottingen Manuscript].
It would be interesting to discover any writings extant from Luca Pacioli
(1455-1509) since the gent was a mathematician and friend of Leonardo da
Vinci, whose own papers as we know were to uncertain degree destroyed.
Leonardo met Ruy Lopez in Rome, and was defeated, and which could have been
as early as 1560, if "it is the contest referred to by Lopez himself."
Subsequently Leonardo played many games with Boi, and was apparentlyu of
equal strength.
-----------
I didn't know SPORTULARY was in the OED. There seems no exact date, though
Sir James Maurray's NED, 1919, cited "1600s".
And the word is mentioned in Henry Edwards's Old Engish Customes, Curious
Bequests and Charities (1842)
A very uncertain definition leads to [A. Sax], in SPORE; spur; prick - from
which the derivation might be "to bleed" someone for cash.
He smote the stede wyth the sporys
And sparred nother dyke nor forowe.
/MS Cantab. Ff ii 38, f 159
Though more recently may be from A. N. and SPORGE: to have a lask; to clean
or cleanse, and a word still in use 1850, and some derivations mean 'to
bring to an end' - hence, ending suffering or want by means of a dole.
Phil
quote:
> --
> Nick. Support severely wounded and disabled Veterans and their families!
>
> Thank a Veteran and Support Our Troops. You are not forgotten. Thanks ! !
> !
> ~Semper Fi~
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