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OHESS IN ICELAND
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CHESS IN ICELAND
AHD IN
ICELANDIC LITERATURE
WITH HISTORICAL NOTES ON
OTHER TABLE-OAliES
WILLAED FISKE
FLORENCE
THE FLORENTINB TYPOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY
HOMY
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PREFACE
The story of its compilation may explain, although it may not excuse the
mongrel character and untidy arrangement of this Tolume. Many years ago,
at an age when neither the author's acquaintance -^ith Icelandic literature
nor his familiarity with the game of chess was in any wise commensurate
with his interest in these subjects, he wrote and published two brief articles
concerning chess-play in Iceland. * The periodical of very restricted circu-
lation in which these essays appeared has long been out of print, and is
rarely to be found either in private or public collections of books. Certain
circumstances determined the writer to reprint them for limited distribution
in Iceland. Upon reading them in the printer's proofs, their meagreness and
defects became markedly evident ; thereupon some omitted incidents in the •
history of the game in the northern island were hurriedly written out, and
added to the earlier matter. Subsequently, in the same planless way, further
passages illustrative of the subject, discoverable in the older or newer
literature, a number of notes on the terminology of the game, especially
as it is represented in Icelandic lexicography, and various other items of
greater or less interest, were likewise appended. While making these
hasty studies and additions, the knotty question of hnefaiafl, or hnott<tfl,
came up, and led to a desire to ascertain what that mysterious sport,
mentioned at such an early period, really was, or, at least, what it was
not. Editors and commentators of the old northern monuments are, in the
first place, divided in opinion as to whether the word just cited represents
the same game or two different diversions ; in the second place, they have
* Compftre pp. 1 and 10 of the present volnmo.
Ed.
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PREFACE
explained or translated these vocables in many varying ways — as chess,
draughts, backgammon, fox-and-gecse, and so on. In order to learn whether
any of these still practised sports resemble the extinct northern one (or ones),
it was deemed essential to devote, preliminarily, a few pages to the history
and nature of the different table-games which were introduced during the
early ages into Germanic Europe. It was found, however, at the very
outset of this investigation, that, except in the case of chess, the historical
accounts which had been compiled, in any country, in regard to those games,
were of the slightest character and of little note or value ; from this sweeping
statement are only to be excluded the contents of the second part of Thomas
Hyde's noteworthy treatise, "De ludis orientalibus," which saw the light just
before the close of the seventeenth century. But that scholar devoted com-
paratively brief space to the games in vogue in central and northern Europe^
confining his enquiries, for the most part, to the lands of the East, and to the
two classical countries of the Mediterranean. Other tractates on Greek, La-
tin and Asiatic games are, like Hyde's book, very generally in Latin, and
have thus not been generally available to the compilers of manuals treating
of these pastimes. In addition to the not inconsiderable bibliography of
printed literature in connection itith this topic, the remarkable manuscripts
relating to mediaeval table-games, now known to be preserved in several
European libraries, had, in a casual manner, come to the cognizance of the
writer. Their existence was, for a long time, a sealed fact to most scholars ;
few indeed had examined their pages — brilliant with the highest art of the
illuminator — and of these few, none, so far as is known, had carried their
studies beyond the portions devoted to the venerable game of chess. It is,
moreover, less than half a century since the groups of codices at Rome and
Florence, in some respects the most important of all, were alluded to in any
printed publication, while the one housed within the monastic walls of the
Escorial, which owes its execution to Alfonso the Wise of Spain, had never
been critically treated, even as to its chess section, until within the last de-
cade or two ; while its accounts of other table-games in use in the thirteenth
century have remained up to now a field untilled by the investigator.
The author, in pursuit of his purpose, began a cursory examination of
such of these documentary relics as were within his reach, and of such prin-
ted sources, hitherto unfamiliar to him, as might cast any light on his subject.
The result was that a considerable amount of material, little of which had as
yet found its way into manuals of games or into encyclopiedias, fell into his
hands. To all this it seemed essential to add some slender notices of the
mode or modes of practising each variety of these old amusements, in the
hope that the changes which they had undergone, from time to time, might
be traced, and a fairly complete idea of the terminology used in connection
with them, at difierent periods, might be gathered and studied. "For it is
from a comparison of the technical terms belonging to them, the precise signi-
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PREFACE
fioations and probable etymologies of such words, that we can hope to derive
more thorough infonnation as to the origin, development and spread of the
game ; and, despite his own light sncoessy the writer is still convinced that a
closer scrutiny of these elements, and a more carefnl search into their rela-
tions to each other, at various ages and in various languages, will not only
enable us to clear up, partially at least, the many lacunse in our knowledge
of the beginning and growth of this social diversion, but will result in a val-
uable contribution to universal folk-lore, as well as to our knowledge of a
not uninteresting field embracing both oriental and occidental linguistics.
The interest of the writer in these new researches, as they went on, was
greatly spurred so that he wholly abandoned for a time the theme with which
he had set out, and suddenly devoted himself to this otlier which had obtruded
itself upon his notice. So absorbing did the novel subject become that, in the
end, it has grown to occupy the whole remaining part of this first volume
and rendered a second necessary, if so be that the author is to complete the
treatment of Iceland's part in chess history and chess letters. The absurdity
of the extraordinary and extravagant course thus pursued is quite plainly
evident to the author himself. It is as if a cook, starting to make a pasty and
having partly completed it, should end by turning it into a pudding, or as if a
scribbler, having begun a poem on love or some other fine emotion of the
heart, should suddenly try to transform it into a dissertation on affections of
the liver.
The specially regrettable thing in regard to the work is that neither of
the two matters discussed has been handled with proper fullness and thor-
oughness. This is partially owing to the way in which the compilation has
been made. From the beginning, whenever an amount of copy sufAoient
to fill a printed sheet was prepared, it was at once sent to the press ; and
this inconsiderate and eccentric method of composition is the cause, to a
great extent, of the repetitions and other imperfections which will be found,
thick-strewn, in the following pages. The author, then, cannot pretend
that he has presented a satisfactory sketch of Icelandic chess ; nor does he
flatter himself that he has done more for the other table-games than to
call attention to certain historical sources, which demand investigation by
younger and less occupied haiids. These games, always of a minor import-
ance when compared with chess, but most of them nevertheless as old as
civilization, and as widespread as human culture, have hitherto been dealt
with, as to their historical position, if so dealt with at all, by scholars who
had little practical familiarity with the games themselves, or by professional
compilers who were utterly unoonversant with the ways and means of scholar-
ly research — in other words by investigators who were not players, or by
players who were not investigators. In fact, if we exoept chess, no table-game
has had any adequate notice given to its origin or history except by writers
or in writings not easily accessible to the general litt&ateur. Lexicology,
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VIII PREFACE
especially, as this book abundantly shows, is rich in singular errors, and
striking by equally singular omissions, in its attempts to illustrate the
technical words and phrases belonging to these widely disseminated re-
creations.
The second volume will contain, it is hoped, a detailed account aiid
discussion of the hnefatafl matter ; a list of Icelandic chess proverbs and
sayings ; notes on the carved chessmen and other chess objects found in the
Museums of Scandinavia and England, commonly regarded as the pro-
ductions of Icelandic workshops ; reprints of Dr. Van der Linde's article
on Icelandic chess, published in 1874 in the Nordisk Skaktidende, of two
brief articles relating to chess in Iceland for the Deutsche Sohachz^tuug,
and of the complete Icelandic text of dlafur DavlQsson's paper on chess in
his ''islenzkar Skemtanir^' ; and will close with a Scandinavian chesft
bibliography with notes, compiled in Icelandic but never yet published
[WlUJ^KD FiSKE]
Thus far the preface, written in the last weeks of the author's life.
An additional pencilled memorandum indicates his intention to acknow-
ledge with his thanks the help and counsel which he had received from
various sources. May this brief mention reach those friends whom he had
in mind !
The proof sheets of the present volume were examined by Mr. Fiske
through page 344. During the summer of 1904 he was engaged on the
preface, and at the time of his death, Sept. 17, 1904, he had compiled a
portion of the index, and had corrected the first proofis for the final pages.
The work has been concluded with the assistance of Mr. George W. Harris,
Librarian of Cornell University, and Mr. Halld6r Hermannsson of Beylgavlk,
who were testamentarily named for this purpose. The latter has revised
and completed the index itself.
A reproduction of the latest photograph of BCr. Fiske, taken in April,
1904, forms the frontispiece. The original frontispiece selected by the
author, who had not even placed his name on the title page, directly pre-
cedes the text. An eminent English authority on chess, Dr. Harold J. B.
Murray, identifies it as appearing on the title page of an Italian work
published at Milan in 1829, and entitled: '' Volgarizsamento del libro de' co-
stumi e degli officii de' nobili sopra il giuoco degli soacchi di frate Jacopo
da Cessole tratto nuovamente da un oodioe Magliabeohiano''. The preface
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PRBPACE IX
of thia work states that the iUnsirfttions were copied firom an older edition of
the same work entitled : '' Libio di ginooo di Scaochi intitolato de costiimi
degP hnomini, et degli officii de nobili. Impresso in Firenie per maestro
Antonio Misoomini Anno MCCGCLXXXXIII. " Dr. Murray also quotes Van
der Lindens description of the aforesaid work in his " Gesohiohte und Lit-
teratur des Schachspiels", 1874, I., Beilagen, p. 123.
Some of the material already collected for the second volume may appear
later in the annual publications relating to Iceland, to* be issued by Cornell
University on the foundation left by the author.
It is further the purpose of the undersigned, as literary executor, to
publish a collection of reprints of the tales and sketches composed by Mr.
Fiske in 1857-61 for the Ckmi MonHUp ; and in a memorial volume which
has been planned, some account will be given of Mr. Fiske's devotion to
the game of chess and his efforts to advance its interests.
HOBATio 8. Whitk.
Villa Landob.
Florence, March, 1905.
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CONTENTS
Polar Chess 1
Chess in the Sagas 9
The Story of Frilhiof 25
Stray Notes :
MagnAs 6lafs80D*s Latin Poem on Chess 33
Two Witnesses. 34
The Chess Lays of Stettn 6Lafiwon 37
Among the Lexicographers 43
Dr. Van der Linde and the Spilabdk 61
A Orimsey Legend 68
Tables and Hnefatafl :
Tafl 69
Chess and Draughts 92
Mdrelles or Morris Game 97
Foz-and-geese 146
What was "Tables"! 157
Backgammon 175
Conolasions 357
Index 365
Corrigenda 399
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THE GAME OF CHESS
IN THE
LAND AND LITEEATUEE
OF
ICELAND
1. -- Polar Chess.
The island of Iceland is an anomaly and a marvei--an anomaly in its
natural history, for almost everywhere in its domain we And the living
fierceness of volcanic heat coping with the death-like desolation 'Of Arctic
cold; and a marvel in its political history, which exhibits the spectacle of a
pagan people, at an age preceding the morning o( modern civilization on the
mainland of Europe, building up, without any aid from the jurisprudence or
polity of Rome, a complex but consistent code of laws, and a remarkable
system of self-government, in which both the rights of the individual and
the general good of the community were cautiously cared for. In the ingen-
ious minds of its early lawmakers originated the existing form of trial by
jury— that palladium of personal liberty; while the people themselves, sprung
from the best blood of mountainous Norway, whose inborn love of freedom
had sent them to the distant oceanic isle, created, as if by an impulse of in-
stinct, a representative parliament, the yearly sessions of which took place,
almost without a break, for nearly nine hundred years ; so that its legiti-
mate successor— the present Althing—may boast of being, by some centuries,
the oldest legislative body in the world. The classic writers of the Common-
wealth thus established, bequeathed to posterity many delightful pictures of
the wonderful life of the unique insular nationality, and of that of their kin in
the other Scandinavian lands— narratives scarcely excelled in literature for
minute and characteristic detail. The old Icelandic poetry, too, from that sub-
lime mythological and legendary epic, the so-styled Elder Edda, down to the
elaborately wrought longer Skaldic lays, and the briefer, metrical impromptus
and epigrams— witty, dashing, biting— scattered throughout the sagas, mark-
edly displays the fact that the imagination is not alone excited by the genial
air, the spicy perfumes and the luxuriant nature of the South, but glows with
fervor even in the rocky, treeless, icy North. Like the very earliest blossoms
of the Northern temperate zone— such as the winter-born trailing-arbutusand
the modest hepatica — the flowers of poesy bloom even amid the snows.
< Sw the Ctuss Monthly, (N«w York 1857), I., pp. 201-205.
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CHESS IN ICELAND
In the chronicles, the romances, the poetic productions of Iceland there
are many allusions to chess. Certain of the romancers do not hesitate to put
allusions to chess, or some similar game, into the mouth of all-father Odin
himself. * Archueologists, who have made the island's antiquities an object of
their research, travellers who have visited the country, and various native
authors themselves are all agreed in the assertion that the game has been,
for several centuries, esteemed and practiced in the land of the Geysers. The
Icelandic chess-nomenclature indicates— as will be more particularly noted
hereafter— that a knowledge of the sport reached the island, at a very early
day, by way of Of^t Britain, while the variations introduced into its prac-
tice—such as giving^ different values to diflercnt sorts of checkmate— show
that it soon became a favorite winter-evening diversion in the farmsteads of
the Northern land. From one of the best-known books of travel in Iceland,^
published in the last century, and the more trustworthy because its authors
were natives of the soil they traversed, we are able to glean some particulars
relative to the peculiarities of the Icelandic game.
' In Ihe famoiu riddles of the *UIervmrar smga,'* propounded by Uie disguised Odin. The
game referred to is hnefatajl,
' This woric, not only well known, but even yet the best record of travels relating to
Iceland— the best, because it was the work of two broadly lutelilgeut natives of the island-
is : — *' Vice-Lavmand Kgg'ert Olafseus og Land-PfaysicI Biarue Povelseus Relse Jgienuem
Island, foranstallet af Videnskaberues Soclskab 1 Kiobcnfaavu, og beskreven af furbemeldte
Kggert Olafsen, med dortll h0reudo 51 Kobberst0kker og et nyt fcrfacrdlget Kart over Island.
Soree, 1778. " The whole narrative was written by the first-named of the two travellers,
Kggert Olafsson, scientist, economist, poet, patriot— in many ' respects the most notable leo-
laudio figure of the eighteenth century, whoso comparatively short life was one of great
activity. He and his oompauiou, Bjarni P&lsson, surgeon-general of Iceland, spent the years
1758-1757 iu visiting every portion of the country, a task undertaken by coniuiaud of King
Frederie V at the instance of the Danish Academy of Sciences. The appended " Flora Islan-
diea '* was prepared from their collections by the Danish botanist, Johan Zoega. The map
(dated 1771) waa elaborated by the care of the famous Icelandic scholar, J6u Kiriksson (1728-
1787), an ornament alike to his native country and to Denmark, in which much of his la-
borious life was passed, with the aid of the Danish historian, Gerhard Schfining. The latter
wrote the brief preface to the first volume. The German translation by Joachim Mluhat'l
Geuss ('* Keise durch Island ") appeared at Copenhagen in 1774-76. The French version (" Voy-
age en Islande "), consisting of five octavo volumes of text and a quarto atlas, was trans-
lated In part (volumes I-III) by Gaulthlor de La Peyronie, and in part (volumes IV- V) by
K. Bjernerode, and was published at Paris in 1808. The Kuglisb, greatly abridged, version
(" Travels In Iceland *') was printed in a slender octavo at London in 1805. The translator signs
his notes : F. W. B. A second German edition forms the nineteenth volume of a " Samm-
lung der besteu und ueuesten Reisebeschreibungon,*' and was Issued at Berlin 1779. These
travels contain almost the only description of chess, as it was developed in the isolated re-
gion of Iceland, which has been accessible In a printed shape until within the last few years.
The too brief section relating to the game is to be found In the first volume of the Danish
edition (pp. 468-64). The original Danish text is as follows, the orthography of the Icelandic
terms having been modernised: —'" 8kaKspill have Islieuderne lagt dem mcget efter fra gammel
ttid af, og endnu Andes iblandt dem store spillere; istcr have Vcsterlaudets indvoancre ord
derfor, og det saavel bender, som de fornemme. De tage derved i agt de samme hoved-
regler, som bruges i audre lande, nogle faa ting undtagne, og beholde end I dag alle de
gamle danske og uorske navne og talemaador, som dette spill vedkomme. Matadorer eller
oflRciererne kaldes Afenit og 8kakm9nn\ Konwigur^ kougen; Fru og DroUning^ domeu ; BUkupy
bispen, oiler l0berea ; Uiddari^ springeren ; Hrokur (en kloempe eller fribytter), llgesom I
det franske sprog, taarnet eller elephantcn. Knegterne kaldes Ped ; 8kdka og Mdta, at
sntte skak og mat. Stanz og JafnUfii, eller jsevutavl, kaldes det, naar dot er llge leeg paa
begge aider, da deu eno spiiler ikke kan komme nogen vei, undtageu med kongen, som man
aldrig er skyldig at traskke, uden han bllver sat skak med det samme; og hvis han da el faaer
mat i det samuiei, er spillet ude, og det regnes for lugen vindlug for nogen af parterne, men
heller for en ukyndighed af dem, der bar giort standsen. Beri^ det er bart oiler blot, kaldes
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POLAR CHESS
SUk, SkAktafl.
The name of the game in Icelandic is etymolojiieally aimilar to that cur-
rent among the central occidental nations, originating in the speech of Per-
sia. It was also often styled, by Icelandic writers, tafl (pronounced tabl),
although that word was, and is, properly a generic term applied to all games
played on a board or table— usually with round pieces or men^the term
itself being a corruption of the Latin tafmla. It corresponds to the early En-
glish and French tables, as in Chaucor^s lines (^* Death of Blanche,** 1. 51):
For mo ihoKhte it bolter play
Than playe at cheaRO or tablen.
In its generic use it might mean either chess, draughts, backgammon, fox-
and-geese (in Icelandic refsMh^ that is, fox-chess), nine-men *s-roorri8 (Ice-
landic mylna, frequently called in America iwelve-nien-morris), or any game
for which a plain surface and men, or pieces, or figures were necessary. With
the word tables may be compared the German brettspiel (from 6r^«= board and
spiel=gSLme) signifying literally any game played on a board, with men. Skdk-
tafl would be, therefore, a precise designation signifying cA<?s.v-t«6tev, or that
kind of tables which we call chess. There were other words of the same sort,
such as hnefatafiy hnettafl, hnottafl (these throe, being possibly variants of
den mindete viudins:, da den eenes mandskab er ganske borttagot, og dog kongen Ikke sat
mat : bvis ban •nites skak i del aamroe er del /uUU Bert ; hvis Ikko kaldet det litla Bert.
ITeimamdt. hiemmeroat, Pedri/ur^ knegte-mat, og Blddtitt, kongsknegtemat, holdet for de
S st0rsto enkelte viudinger, og haanligito for den der tabor. Det f0 rate skoer, uaar kongen
siettes akakmat i bcgyndolnen af Mplllel, aaaledes, at den hvcrken er bloven sat akak 1 for-
▼elen, og et belter bar r0rt aig af stcdet. Det audet akakmat faaer kongen af een af knieg-
teme : det tredte, naar ban faaer mat af den kniegt, som tUb0rer den anden kongo, og endna
Btaaer paa sin rspkke. Utkomumdt er nipst dUae det Rt0rtte, og regnes dog ikkc for haanligt.
l>ct beataaer derl, at kongen sspttca mat med det satnme en knipgt koramer tid, eller 1 det
tnek, som giar en knsegt til matador. Don mindate fuldkomno vinding or Frtiamidt, naar
der a«ttes mat mcd damen. Den starste dobbeite vinding er fold, og aielden dorover; dog
akal det viere en stor apnicr, og hana mod«tauder knn lidet erfareu, naar matene kunne drives
saa vidt. I andre lande er man forn0let mod enkelt akakmat ; men ber siettcs kongen saa
mange akakmat, aom man baver mandakab til ; dog akal aplllct vmre bragt i aaadan en orden
i forvelen, at i det kongen aiettea det fdrato mat, da fnlgi: do andre atrax derpaa, uden at
der maae akce andre trak Intel lem, eller at kongen kau sHppe fra nogen af disse mater
imidlertid ; men 1 denne omgang kan den mindate foraeelae tabe beele apillet. Oodo aplllere
kande aaette 6 til 7 alige akakmat ad gangcn, cndakient det andet partie veed alio reglerno,
og er evet deri. I akakaplU lagca her gierne aecundanter, og Iblandt gaacr det Skko af uden
fortnsd eller bidalghod, hvllket kommer meeat af de dobbeite vtndinger; tbi det kan gtere en,
is»r den, der I forvelen er tungstndct, lorgerllg dorover, at ban akal i lang lild Jagea med
kongen from og tilbage, tilllgemed eon af biaperne eller leberue, hvilken som den mindat bin.
derlige offlcier, overmanden gicrue lader den anden beholde, knn for at faao deato sterre og
anseeligere seier over bam. Delto bar maaskee andre natloner sect paa, i det de bruge
meest Ikknn enkelte vindinger, bvorved Icegen bliver rolndre kicdsomroelig. Alligevel vilser
det en stor knnst, at knnne Jaevnlig glere mange dobbeite vindinger ; thi det kommer baade
an paa en dyb eftertanke, og at holde tankerne beatandig samlcde. Skak spilles vel I Island
paa fleere maader, som bliver for vidtlvftigt at fortnlle ; men denne er den rette, aeldate og
almindeligste. De andre, aom er lettere, meer foranderllge og mindre kunaUge, synes at yiere
de nyere tliders paaftind.** In bis "Gesrhlchte des Schacbspleia " (TT. pp. 177-178), Dr. A. van
der LInde reproducea tbia paaaage from the German tranalatlou of the leelandie travollera*
narrative (p. 24A), Interaperslng It with brief eomments, aomo pointed and proper enongb,
others less so. He has copied the Danlib text in bis series of articles on ** Skak paa laland^**
wbieh will be foand In an appendix to this volume.
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CHESS IN IGSLANb
the same word),^ interpreted by some as draughts, by others as fox-and-geese,
(but perhaps more likely to have resembled the former), boddata/l, Freystafl^
and kotrutafl (backgammon, also simply styled hoira). The indefiniteness of
the word tafi has given rise to much confusion. Not a few of the passages
in the old writings, to which references arc often made as allusions to chess,
really relate to draughts, or some other game resembling it, rather than to
chess. The pieces, or higher figures, have the common name menn (men),
and hence chess is occasionally spoken of as manntafl or mannskdh, to dis-
tinguish it from draughts and other sorts of tables.
Xonunsrur ; Drottning, Fni.
So the Icelanders designate the two chief pieces of the chess-field. Kon-
ungur (abbreviated kongur) is cognate with our word King; of the last two
words, droitning is the genuine Icelandic equivalent of our Queen, while fru
means lady^ and its former use in Icelandic chess is probably owing to Danish
influence. The usual name of this most powerful piece is now drottning,
Hr6kur ; Biakup ; Biddari ; PeO.
The first word is, of course, the very early Eastern appellation of the
Rook, a term hopelessly disguised by the popular etymologies given to it in
the various countries through which it has passed— one of its phases being
a confusion with the fabulous bird (roc) of the ^^Arabian Nights,'" a process of
etymological obscuration repeated both in England {rook, the chess-piece and
rook, the bird) and in Iceland, the form hrdkur being ascribable to the in-
fiuence of the older word hrokur, a rare Icelandic name of a bird. The
name of this piece is sufficient evidence, if there were no other, of the En-
glish origin of Icelandic chess, since, in the other Scandinavian dialects, the
rook (in accordance with the German nomenclature) is known as the ** tower "
(Swedish torn; Danish taam). — Biskup \s out Bishop, English and Icelandic
being the only languages in which the piece bears this ecclesiastical title (Ger-
man Idufer; Swedish, lopare; Danish, Softer— literally "runner," but in the
sense of "herald" or " courier"), although its Polish name is pop (t. e. priest).
In English its earliest title was alfin (Arabic al=Xhe, and /t/= elephant),^ and
so it was called by Caxton (1474) :— " The manere and nature of the draught
of the Alphyn is suche that he that is black in his propre siege is sette on
the right side of the Kyng, and he that is whyt on the left side." The appel-
lation was occasionally used in England as late as the sixteenth century, for
Rowbothum, the translator of Vida*s " Scacchia" (1562), says :— " The Bishoppes
some name Alphins. ^^—Riddari is the ordinary translation of our word knight;
and it is worthy of note that while the Swedes call this piece, according to the
older dictionaries, the " horse " {hast), or like the Danes adopt the German word
springer (Swedish, springare; Danish, springer-^from the springing or jump-
ing character of its move) their fellow Scandinavians of the Northern island
^ * Thia la denied by the leelaadle arcluBologItt, Slgurftar Gu^undMon, who, In hia flrat
report m director of the Arehasologloal llnaenni at Reykjavik (KaapmannahOfti 1868, p. 89),
Btatea that "in onr andent wriUnga two kinda of Ublea** are mentioned, knoOafi or hneUt^,
and hnsfaU^fi or kn^ft^fi'-tLa aaaertion to which we ahall return on another page.
• The extatlng ItaHan {aljter*) and Spanlah {alJU or arJU^ natnea of the Biahop have the
same etymology.
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POLAR CffBS3
retain the mediaeval term (derived either from the Romance cabcUlus =:ihoTee, or
ft'om the Germanic verb, ride, reiten, or else borrowing the form of the Germanic
knechu knight) signifying a military leader or (hor8e)soldier of rank, and cor-
responding to the one employed by the Italians (cavaliere), Spaniards and
Portogaese (cavallo)^ French {chevalier), and English {knight). It is to be re-
marked that, although the Germans and the continental Scandinavians possess
a word cognate with the Icelandic riddari (German reiter\ Danish, ridder), those
w<^rd8 are never employed in chess. — Pe^ comes from the Middle-Latin pedes
(witlfthe inflectional %iem pedon-) meaning foot-soldier, thus having the same
etymology as the English Pawn, the French pion, the Italian pedina and
the Spanish peon. — The names of the chessmen used in England and Iceland
not only reveal the track pursued by the game in reaching those countries,
but betray the fact that chess in the Middle Ages was especially a diversion
of the court and the cloister. But much more light might be thrown upon the
story of chess in Iceland by a careful study of the nomenclature employed,
at present and in the past, by the chessplayers of the island — if underta-
ken by an investigator familiar alike with the story of chess and with Ice-
landic philology and letters.
8k&k (akika) ; K&t (m&ta).
Here the first word is the English chess and check {skdka being the verb,
to check). The varying forms of these words, in all the European tongues, are
derived from the Persian shdh (or schdch)^ signifying ^* King "'—the game
thus owing its name to its most important— all important— piece. The En-
glish *^check I '' (interjection) is in Icelandic skdk! As in English, the exclama-
tory phrases, skdk ^er i (check to you I) and skdk konginum ! (check to the
King I) may likewise be used when attacking the opponent's chief piece.— Afd<
is the English '^ mate '' {mdta being the verb, to mate). The origin of both
— being virtually the word used by every nation— is the Arabic md<=dead (or,
according to recent investigators, the Persian md<= surprized, confounded) ;<^
*^ checkmate, *' therefore, means simply: *^the King dead,'' or *'the King is
dead" (or ^*the King is confounded"). The Icelandic renders '* checkmate"
by the phrase skdk og mdt (t. e, *^ check and mate "), the verbal expression
being skdka og nuUa.
' Dr. A. VM dar LInde, in bU " Qaelloustadfea sar QeMhiehte dM SchaohspleU " (1881,
pp. 14-15), eltOB the latMt authoritiea, the OrtonUIUU Ond«melitar »nd Doxy. The former,
In an article In the "Zeltiebrift der deatachen Morgenlftnditehon Qeeellaebaft" (Z XVIII,
p. 8M) eayflt^ *< In $MhmAt die Baeammeneelannff einee peraSaeben aabataaUTa mlt einem am-
blaaben perfeet in nngewdnlieher wortatalinng nnd bedeatong .... aasnnemen, aolite man den
einbeimiaeban lexikografen llberlaaaen. Mdt lat Tlelmehr mlt Mfrsa Kaaem Beg ala adjeetiv
in der bedeatung verbUiffl, nithi au» noeh «i» witaand sa faaaen, da die bel den Persern
gebranebten aynonyma wie mUkrd/M, b^aUgt, an Aomiabi w^fdkig adjeetfra aind, nnd der
apraebgabraaeh dafttr aprlebt.** Tb« latter, In bla '^Sapplament aaz dletlonnairea arabea"
(I8V8. I.) eolneidea with OlldemeUter: — •*GoaTaioea par lea obJeeUona de M. Qildemelater
Je Be Tola pina dana le mot wtAt le yerbe arabe qui algnlfle Ml eat mort'; Je penae an eon-
traire avee In! et Mirma Kaaem Beg (dana le * Jonrnal Aalatiqne' 1851, II, p. 585), qa*ll efte et
qnt merlle d*6tre eonanltd, que e*eat Tadjeetirqae lea Peraane emploieut dana le aena dVlomitf,
aufprtfa.** Thla anawera all the pMlologieal objeetlona to the nae, in one hybrid phraae, of
tbo Peraiaa anbetantlTO aMU and the Arable Torbal form mdl. At the aame time it makea
the action performed by the checkmate more logical* The eTer«ezlating, all-eaaential ebeaa-
klng la no longer eoualdered aa dead, bnt aa merely "anrpriaed** or " eon/oanded ** by the
reatrainta or roatrlettona, which hfa adveraarlea have plaeed npon hia morementa.
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CHESS IN ICELAND
Jafatefli, Stanz ; {>r&tefli; Patt.
Those are the terms for various sorts of drawn games. Jafntefii (even
table, even play, or even-manned) and Stanz (standstill, stopping) are posi-
tions which are drawn by reason of lack of mating force on either side.— ^rrf<<?/li
(the former element derived from the adjective ^rdr^ stubborn, obstinate, per-
severing, the latter a derivative of iafl) is the Icelandic expression for a game
drawn by perpetual check. — Pati^ the equivalent of our English "stalemate,"
came into Icelandic from Danish. It is a word common to most of the Euro-
pean languages (German patt^ French pat^ Italian patla)^ but its etymology
seems never to have been satisfactorily determined. Both an oriental and a
western (Latin) origin have been suggested. The word has always been
wholly unknown in England.
Bert ; Heimam&t.
These are two of the simple mates or winnings. The first-named is reck-
oned, according to Eggert Olafsson, the least honorable method, for the
winning player, of ending a game. The term signifies bare of men, and an-
swers to the French roi d^uilU. It is stated, somewhat obscurely, that, if at
the time of taking his adversary's last piece, the winning player does not mate
the other, it is called liila (little) hert; if ho mates simultaneously with the
capture of his adversary's last piece or pawn, it is styled stora (great) hert. —
The second term cited is literally " home mate, " and is a mate given at the
first check, and before the King has moved from his square. We might per-
haps paraphrase it by our "Scholar's mate" or "Fool's mate."
PeSrifiir ; H16886tt ; '6tkomum&t.
The former of these words describes an ending in which mate is given
by one of the pawns ; instead of it may be used pechmdt or pe^smdt^ pawn-
mate. Each piece, in fact, except the King, gives its name to the mate ef-
fected by it, such as drottningarmdi (or fruarmdt)^ "queen's mate," hroks-
indt^ " rook's mate," and so on. Blo^soii (that is, "dysentery") is a coarsely
humorous appellation given to a mate efi'ected by the King's Pawn while still
remaining on the King's file. Such a conclusion to the game is regarded as
particularly disgraceful to the loser. Wwniumdi is one of the so-called
complete mates, or double winnings. It signifies a mate given by a Pawn
at the eighth rank at the very moment of becoming a piece. Others of the
double winnings are mates given by two or more pieces, and increasing, of
course, in difficulty as the number of mating pieces is increased. For it was
a singular rule, before the modification of the Old Icelandic chess to make
it conform to the modern rules in other lands, that the player might so con-
duct his game as to be able, after giving a mate with one piece, to make
another move, which should bring a second piece to bear upon the King so
as to give, as it were, a second mortal blow, and by still another move to
repeat the operation again with a third piece. These mates were to be
given on successive moves; and it required the greatest caution to prevent
the losing party, by interposition or capture, from avoiding any of them.
Later on in this publication it will be seen that many more varieties of
mate were practiced by'Icelandic chessplayers, so that, if a chess magazine,
or chess column, had been formerly published in the far-off Thule, the edi-
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POLAR CHESS
tors thereof would have been obliged not only to note, at the beginning of
each game, the title of the opening played, but also to designate the par-
ticular style of ending brought about by the winning party. There are also
enumerated, in accounts of the Icelandic game, many other technical terms,
which, in this sketch, we have been obliged to leave unnoticed. It cannot be
doubted, as has been already hinted, that an art having so extended a no-
menclature must have been practiced by a great number of individuals through
many generations.
When Chess came to Iceland.
In regard to the date of the introduction of the game into Iceland it is
undeniable that the country's most distinguished son, Snorri Sturluson, was
more or less acquainted with the game, when he narrated, in St. Olafs saga,
the story of King Canute the Great and his retainer, Jarl Ulf the rich. This
saga was composed not far from the year 12'^, but the incident related oc-
curred two hundred years previous, so that, if we could accept Snorri's ac-
count as absolutely correct, we might infer that the oriental sport had become
an accustomed diversion at the courts of the Scandinavian North as early as
the first part of the eleventh century. But it is more than probable that the
game played between Canute and Ulf was another sort of ** brettspicl " (tart,
or "tables"), while Snorri, knowing only chess, or deeming it, as it was
in his own time, the proper court-game, uses the words shnhiafl (game of
chess) and Hddari (knight)— the latter being the sole piece named. A sug-
gestion has been made that a knowledge of chess might have been brought
from England to Iceland, in the later portion of the twelfth century, by
any one of three well-known men, or by all of them. They are not the
only natives of the island who sojourned in Groat Britain during that period,
but they are the most noted, and the most likely, from their surroundings,
both in England and Iceland, to have learned and imported such an intel-
lectual amusement. "^ The first of the three notabilities in question was I^or-
lakur I>6rhalls8on, bishop of SkAlholt, Iceland's southern see {h. 1133 d. 1193).
After his death he enjoyed the singular honor of canonization, not by the
pope, but by authority of the Icelandic Althing, or parliament (1199)— an
act popularly ratified in the Scandinavian countries and Britain (and even
by the Icelandic colony then existing in Greenland), in which lands he was
always styled St. Thorlak, and had many shrines erected in his honor. His
appointed festival (Thorlaksmas) fell on December 23. Somewhat before 1160
he went, for purposes of study, to Paris, and thence to Lincoln in England,
passing six years in those two places. In his saga, one of the most interest-
ing of the histories of the Icelandic Bishops, we are told in reference to his
stay in the English city that ho "learned there great learning,'' ^ and returned
home with a varied and extended knowledge. He was followed into foreign
regions by the Icelandic notable, Hrafn Sveinbjarnarson, a man of many
accomplishments — scholar, poet, artist, physician, jurist. His most impor-
tant visit to the continent apparently took place before or about 1190. He
went first of all to the Orkneys, whence he returned to Iceland, but subse-
^ In eUboratiug this coujecluro I have been greatly aided by niy frieud, Mr. Bogi Th.
Melate^, DanUh aaalaUnt-arvhivlst, and one of the moat prefuund living studeuts of luelandio
bUlory.^
* "Ok nam t>ar enu ntlkit uim. ^* — Bukupa SCgur^ (Kaupmaunahcru 1858), I., p. 9X.
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8 CHESS IN ICELAND
quently crossed over to Norway, and passed on to England, where he paid his
devotions at the sanctuary of St. Thomas-a-Becket in Canterbury, to which he
offered as gifts specimens of his artistic skill, one being an elaborately carved
walrus-tusk. Thence he sought the fl&mous shrines of St. Giles in Ilanz
(Glion), Switzerland, and St. James at Compostella, Spain, and thereafter he
proceeded to Rome, as the last and crowning goal of his pilgrim-tour ; then
he went back to Iceland by way of Norway. Hrafn made at least one more
voyage to the British Isles, and finally fell in a feud at home in I2I3. It will
be noted that the ingenious Hrafn thus had an opportunity of familiarizing
himself with chess, not only in England but also in Spain and Italy, its oldest
seats in Europe, in which lands it had then been known for two hundred years.
His saga is printed as an appendix to the Oxford edition of the Sturlunga saga,
and also in the Biskupa sOgur. ^ More remarkable still was the third conspic-
uous Icelander, who became acquainted, at that early day, with English life
and manners. This was Pall Jdnsson (&. II55), bishop of Skalholt, the direct
successor of Thorlak the Holy. In the years about 1180 he was at school in
England. His elevation to the episcopate took place in lllM, and he went
abroad again the same year to be consecrated by the primate of Norway at
Throndhjem, but as Archbishop Eirikur, in consequence of a quarrel with
King Sverrir of Norway, was an exile in Denmark, Pall proceeded to Lund
(then a Danish city), where, by the authorization of Archbishop Eirikur, he
was consecrated by the great prelate Absalon, who held the see of Lund.
Both Archbishop Eirikur and Petur, bishop of Roskilde, Denmark's ancient
capital, were present at the imposing ceremony. Bishop Pall went back to
his diocese, and did noble work until he died in 1211. His saga says that
when he departed from Iceland in his youth for foreign study, he stayed for
a while at the court of Harald, Jarl of the Orkneys, and then went on to his
English school, '' and learned there such a vast deal of learning that scarcely
had there been a case in which a man had learned equal learning, nor of the
same quality, in an equal space of time; and when he came out to Iceland, he
was above all other men in the grace of his scholarship, in the writing of
Latin, and in book-lore. He was also a man of fine voice, and a singer surpass-
ing all his contemporaries in both melody and sonorousness.'' <<> Bishop Poll's
great-grand- father was Iceland's early scholar, Saemund the Learned, whose
name has been given to Iceland's ancient mythological epos (Ssemundar Edda);
while his father was J6n Loptsson (6. 1124, d. 1197), the master of the historian,
Snorri Sturluson {b, 1178, d. 1241), the very writer who first mentions chess.
The bishop must have known Snorri well in the latter 's study-years in J6n
Loptsson's house, during the decade before 1197, and must have told the youth
much of what he had seen and learned during his own student life in Eng-
land. And after 1197, when his able teacher, Jdn Loptsson, was dead,
Snorri lived, for at least two years, in the house of Bishop Pall's brother,
Ssemundur J6nsson, which he left only on his marriage. It is noteworthy
that in the Arons saga one of Snorri 's nephews, I^6rQur Sighvatsson, is rep-
' "Sturlaoga Saga,*' edited by Dr. Gn^braudur yigfussoD, (Oxford 1878), II., pp. 295-311,
and *< Biskapa S«gur/* I. pp. 889>676.
* " Ok nam I>ar uwk mlkit Dam at trautt var dsenii til, at nokkurr mtihr heR)! Jafomlkift
oim namlt n^ Jivilikt i jafnlangrl stund ; ok ftk er haun koin dt til islands, ]>a var hann fyrir
511am mfinnum ddrum at kurteisi Iserdoma sins, Tcrtagjdr^ og b6kallBt. Hann var ok svAmlkiU
raddmadr og sSngmadr, og af bar sfingr bant og r6dd af 6&rum monnum, ]>eiiD er voru honam
Bvnii7>m,'* ■- Bvtkupa SGgur^ I. p. 187.
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POLAR CHESS 9
resented as playing chess wliitli another Icelander, Hrani Kodr^nsson, in
Norway. ^^ The incident described took place in the autumn of 1238 while
Snorri was still living. This is another piece of testimony tending to prove
the great sagaman's acquaintance with chess.
All these three observant and acquisitive students were in England,
among men and youth who felt a keen interest in the revival of learning
and the arts, at a time when chess had come to be extensively known— espe-
cially in the convents and schools ; for it was about 1180 that the abbot of
Cirencester, Alexander Neckam, produced his treatise, *' De naturis rorum,*'
which had a special chapter—and a very remarkable one — devoted to an
exposition of chess. This was the earliest chess-writing in England, and of
course, before it could have been composed the game must have become
widely spread and esteemed.
2. — Chess in the Sagas. ^'
In treating of some of the places in the Icelandic sagas where chess is
mentioned, we shall pay heed only to those passages in which the word
sfuik^ or skdkiafly or skdkborth, or the names of the pieces given, indicate that,
in the mind of the writer at least, the incident recounted relates to chess,
and not to some other game at '^ tables. '' The first citation is from St. Olafs
saga, an historical record usually ascribed to Snorri Sturluson, but which,
in any case, he edited, since it is a part of his great work, the " Heims-
kringla"— the sagas of the kings of Norway, of whom Olaf the Holy (Olafur
helgi) was one. But really the field occupied by Snorri's work embraces not
only Norway, but Sweden and Denmark likewise, the author portraying,
more or less fully, the stories of the kings of those lands during the period
he treats.
6laf8 Saga helga.
Canute the Great {Knutur riki), the ruler both of England and Denmark,
"Sovereign of five Realms*' as he is styled in the old British chronicles,
once went to Southern Sweden — then Danish— to suppress a rebellion, which
had been incited by his son Hardicanuto (HorZ^aknutur) and by Ulf Jarl
(TJlfur jarl, or Earl WolO, a powerful chieftain and courtier. Rumors of the
advance of the royal fleet having reached them, these latter deserted their
followers and allies, among whom were the kings of Sweden and Norway,
and hastened to make their peace with the monarch. The fleet sailed into the
mouth of Helga river (Icelandic, din Jielga=ihe holy river), where a fierce
battle ensued. The Anglo-Danish King's own ship was at one time in im-
minent danger, but Ulf Jarl, at great personal hazard, succeeded in saving it.
Canute now went to Roskilde, the capital of his Danish domains, where he
arrived the day before the feast of St. Michael in the year 1027. Here Ulf Jarl,
eager to wipe out his former offence, welcomed him with a siilendid banquet,
and endeavored, by merry words and submissive speeches, to reinstate himself
in Canute's graces. But all his efforts to please the incensed monarcli were
futile; the latter continued to look grave and ill-natured. In the course of
the evening the Jarl challenged his sovereign to a game of chess, and the chal-
" "Peir I>6r9r ok Hrani litu at nkiktafli. '' — Stiirlunga Saga (1878), IF., p. 344.
^ See the Che»$ Monthly, (New York 1838), II., pp. 194-195.
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10 CHESS IN ICELAND
lenge was accepted. During the game, Canute made a hasty move and left
a knight en prise ; the Jarl captured it, but the King requested him to replace
it, and either make another move, or else allow him (Canute) to recall his for-
mer move. The Jarl refused, arose from the table in anger, overturned the
pieces, and walked away. The King, with a bitter laugh, called to him and
said : — '' Are you running away, you cowardly Wolf « " The Jarl turned and
replied : — " You would have run much farther away at the Helga river, if you
had been able. You did n't call me a coward then, when I came to your help,
while the Swedes were slaying your men like dogs. " The next morning the
pious sovereign, who rebuked his irreverent courtiers by the sea-side with such
religious philosophy, and who had just returned from an humble pilgrimage
to Rome, sent one of his Norwegian men-at-arms to the church in Ros-
kilde, in which the poor Jarl had taken sanctuary, and had him slain in the
choir. This adds another to the singular parallels of history, for Ulf Jarl
appears to have been to Canute the Great what Thomas-a-Becket was to
Henry the Second. *3
Kn;^tlinga Saga.
In 1157, something more than a hundred yeai*s after the death of Canute,
another historic game of chess, and another royal violation of hospitality, took
place in the ancient city of Roskilde. In that year the kingdom of Denmark
was divided between three monarchs, Svend (Sweyn), Valdemarand Canute the
^ For an KngliMh rendering of tbii episode see Bnorri Sturlason's Storiss of th€ Kinga of
Norway, translated by William Morris and Klrikur Magudssou (Loudon 1894), II., pp. SS6-3S7.
We transcribe bore the whole episode in tho original text : — ** Kuutr konungr reld upp til
Urdlslceldu dag inn UKsta fyrir Mikjils-niessu ok mcA houum svcit mikil manna. Kn )>ar hafM
gdrt yeizlu i m6ti honum Ulfr jarl, m&gr bans ; veitti Jarl allkappsamliga ok var allkatr. Kon-
ungr var f&milogr ok beldr 6(r^uu-y jarl orti or^a Abann ok Icital&I t>eira in&lsenda, or haun
vaelti, at konangi myndi beat ])ykkja. Konungr svarar fi. Pk spurM Jarl, et bann vildi lelka
at skikUfll ; bann j&tti ^vi ; toku t>eir t>& skaktafllt ok l£ku. Ulfr Jarl var maftr skjototdr ok
6vsglnn hscpl i or^um ok i Sllum 6drum blutum ok binn mestl frarnkvicmiSar-maSr um riki sitt
ok beruaftr miklU, ok er saga mikil fr4 bonum s<Jgt> ; Uifr jarl yar maJbr rikastr i DaumSrk,
l»egar er konunginu liddi. Systir I'llfs Jarls var Gy^a, er 4ttl GuT^ini jarl tllfnadrsson ok v&ru
synir I>eira Haraldr Kngla-konuugr, Tosti jarl, Valt>j6fr Jarl, Mdrukari Jarl, Sveiuu jarl, Gy2»a
ddttir I>oira, er &ttl Batvardr inn gdJih Kngla-konungr.
Kn er |>eir I^ku at skiktafll, Kndtr konnngr ok Ulfr jarl, ]}& 16k konungr flngrbrjot
mikinn; Jiisksek^i Jarl af bonnro riddara ; konnngr bar aptr tafl bans ok segir, at bann skyldi
annat lelka ; jarl reiddisk ok skaut nVbr taflborMnu »t6b upp ok gekk i brot. Konungr maeltt :
« rennr l»d nd, Ulfr inn ragi. " Jarl sn0ri aptr yib dyrrin ok maslti : *' lengra myudir l>d
renna i Anni helgii, ef )>u kvinmir )>vi vi'b ; kalla&ir ])d eigi )>i Ulf inn raga, cr ek lai;&a til at
hjilpa I>6r, er Hviar bSr^u y%r st-ra bunda " ; gckk Jarl ]>i dt ok f6r til svefns. Litlu sidarr
gokk konungr at sofa. Kptir um morgoninn, pi or konungr kltnddisk, pa meltl bann vih
8k6sveln sinn : *'gakk pu, seglr bann, til Ulfs Jarls og drep haun." Sveinuinn gckk ok yar 4
brot nro bri?) ok kom aptr. I>4 maslti konungr: '< draptu jarl?" Ilann svarar: «eigi drap
ek bann, pviat bann var genginn til Ldciskirkju." Ma5r h6t Ivarr bviti, norra:nn at kyni ;
bann var l>i hlr^ma^r Kudts konungs og berbergls-madr bans. Konnngr moDlti til ivars:
" gakk pd ok drep jarl. " Ivarr gekk til kirkju ok inn i kdrinn ok l^i par sverbi i gdgnum
Jarl ; fekk par ^Ifr Jarl bana. Ivarr gekk til konungs ok baf^i sverMt bld^ugt i hendi. Kon-
ungr spnrdl: " draptu ndjarl?. *' Ivarr svarar: " nu drap ek bann. " '* Vel gerMr pd p4*^
kvai^ bann. En eptir, p4 er Jarl var drepinn, I6tu munkar liesa kirkju. I>4 var pat sAgl kon-
nugi. Hann send! manu til munka, htub pi lata upp kirkjn og syngja tiMr ; peir gerdn, sera
konungr baa?). Kn er konungr kom til kirkju, pi skeytti bann JarMr miklar til kirkju, svi at
pat er bera)^ mikit, ok bofsk si sUdr mlklt si&an ; af pvi bafa pser Jar&ir par til legit sidan.
Knutr konungr reid siAan ut til skipa sinna ok var par long! nm banstlt mcd alimikinn ber. " —
** Heimakringla, ** (Noregs Konuuga Sdgur) by 8norri SturUison, edited by Fiunur Jdnsaon, II
(eonUining the Ola/s ^o^a helga), pp. 370-87B (KMbenhavn 1896).
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CHESS IN THE SAGAS 11
Fifth. This took place, after years of contest between Svend on the one hand
and Valdemar and Canute on the other. Each King was to rule over a third
of the realm, and each swore before the altar to preserve the compact invio-
late. But it did not last three days. Canute asked his brother monarchs
to spend a few days of festivity with htm at Roskilde. Svcnd came with a
crowd of soldiers. One evening Valdemar sat at the chess boani, where the
battle waxed warm. His adversary was a nobleman, and Canute sat by Val-
demar's side watching the game. All at once, Canute, observing some sus-
picious consultations between Svend and one of his captains, and feeling a
presentiment of evil, threw his arms around Valdemar's neck and kissed hini:
— " Why so merry, cousin?'' asked the latter, without removing his eyes from
the chess-board. "You will soon see," replied Canute. Just then the armed
soldiery of Svend rushed into the apartment and instantly drew their swords.
But when King Valdemar saw this, he sprang up from his seat at the chess board
and wrapped his mantle about his arm to serve as a shield, because he, his
opponent at chess and King Canute were all without arms, for no one expected
violence. Valdemar was the first of them all to march towards his assailants,
and plunged with such force against I*6ttleif, one of the assassins, that they
both fell through the door; then another, T61i Hemingsson, struck at King Val-
demar, wounding his thigh, but not deeply, for his weapon scarcely reached
the bone ; he also received a cut on the thumb. But when Valdemar's men, who
were without, suddenly became aware that he had fallen, they covered him with
their bodies, and were all hewn in pieces. But he was thus enabled to make
his escape, and lives in history as the powerful Valdemar the Great. Canute,
however, was slain, and was sometimes called by his countrymen St. Canute. *<—
Perhaps it will not be greatly out of place to note that in the following cen-
tury chess again makes it appearance upon the historic stage of Denmark,
though at too late a date to be recorded by any Icelandic sagaman. At that
period, Eric Plovpenning or Ptoughpenny (so called because of a penny tax
" "Annan dag epUr drukku |»oir allir, konangarnlr i «inu berl>ori?i, ok voru k&tir. Menn
Rveins konnngs hoHSu torg ok iikumtan, ok leika ikti bja herbergjuautnt ok ilrifu Di«nn >augat
til or herbergjunum, er aleiS daglun. ok potti uulnnum t>at k&tara, eiin at nltja ciuart vih drykk-
inn; var ]>4 Ckii manna i horberghiu, nenia t>«ir konuugarnir ; l>i kumu |>ar ion in<5nn Svein«
konikngii^I>6UI«irr EMarstou ok nokknrlr menn a<Vrir, ok h&knuTiu lit Sveins koniings. Hiinn
st6d iipp i inoti ]>c1in, ok l31^^u■<<t ^o\r vi5 lilla bri& ok [>A leynilega ; siAan gokk Sveinn kon-
UDgr lit mod |>eiin, baun gekk i hi'is eilt, ok byrgM sik ]>ar, «n P^lUoifr ok T61i Hemlngii«an
ok V'ngvar kveisa ok a^rir Tirktampun SveiuH konuiigs nn^rii \>k aptr til herbergiH sins, par er
t»eir Valdlroarr konungr tkm fyrir ok KntUr konuugr. Valdiinarr konungr Mk at skiktafll
vid annann manu, en Kudtr konungr sat 1 palliunm bji houuro ; ok or )>«<c I>Attleifr geugn i
dyrnar, laot Kuiitr konuuKr til Valdlmars konnngs, ok kysti bano. Valdioiar kouungr sA eigi
af taflinoi ok ipur5i : bvi ertu nA sva bIi<Sr, mkjr. KnAtr konungr svaraM : vita ninntii l>at
bratt. Sveins inenn )>a»tii ^k inn hverr at o^rum ok alHr a1vapna<!)ir, pc\r brug^u ]>egar svcr5un-
um. Rn er Valdimarr konnngr sa |>at, hijop bann upp, ok vafM sklkkjunui uin hfind sdr, er
hann bafM yflrsir, ]>Tiat]>eir voru v&pnlausir InnI, t>v{at eiigi vlssi 6frl(^arv:in. Valdiinarr kon-
ungr hlj6p npp ok fram k gollU fyrst allra manna sinua; bann stiklaT^i rvk bart upp A PtUUeif,
at I>(ilr folia hkb\r ntar fyrir dyrnar ; ]^k bj6 Toli IIoroingMsou til Valdiraam konnngs, ok kora
t>at hogg i Iserlt. ok var tiat svGdiis&r og ekki hscttligt ; baun rurh ok sir k pumalfingrl. Ok er
menn Valdlmars konnngs s&, at bann var fallinn, |>& Idg^ust )>6ir k bann ofan, ok voru |)ar
saxaMri on Valdimarr konnngrkomst vi5 petitk, undan. I>4komHt P^ttleifr k f»tr, ok hjo l>egar
6fgri bondi til KnAtii*konung8, ok var<l> |>at bo;;g sva mikit, at bann klaiif allt bSfuAit til bits,
ok var ]>at bans banaii4r. Annarr nia^r veitli ok Kuuti konungi ivorka, r& er IIJ&IrosTiAarr
b^t, Kni&tr konungr f6\\ 1 einn skorstoin ; segja Danir baun belgan.*' — Fommanna SOgnr^ piib-
iisbed by tbo Royal Society of Nortbern Antiquaries, XI (containing tbe Knytlinga 8aga)j
pp. Mf-367 (Kanpnannabdrn 1898).
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12 CffESS IN ICELAND
laid in his brief reign on eacli plough in the kingdom), had begun to rule
wisely and well over the fierce and war- loving people of his realm— then a
much bigger country than now. In the summer of 1250 ho was on his way
to defend the town of Rendsburg on the Eider, against the attack of some
predatory German bands, when he received an invitation from his brother
Abel to visit him in Slesvig. The unsuspicious and opon-hcarted Eric ac-
cepted. After dinner, on the ninth of August, the very day of his arrival under
the fatal roof, he retired to a little pavilion near the water, to enjoy a quiet
game of choss with a knight whose name was Henrick Kerkwerder. As they
were thus engaged, the black-hearted Abel entered the room, marclied up to
the cliess-table, accompanied by several of his retainers, and began to over-
whelm the King with abuse. Finally the unfortunate P]ric was seized,
thrown into chains, and basely murdered the same night. Poor King ! Little
did he merit so cruel a checkmate, for the commencement of his career was
full of promise for himself and his dominions.
{>orgil8 Saga skarSa.
Our next chess event took place in 1241-42 and is narrated in the saga
of Porgils skarIJi (which is to say, I^orgils of the hare-lip). It chances also
that this incident, like one already treated, has a certain relation to Snorri
Sturluson, for Gizur I*orvaldsson--known as Earl Gizur (Gizur Jarl) in Ice-
landic history — who appears in it, was the chief actor in the assassination of
the great historian. Bo5var, the son of I^drOur Sturluson, and therefore the
nephew of Snorri, after the conclusion of the political feud which termi-
nated in his uncle's death, was obliged not only Ho take an oath of feudal
lealty to Gizur, the enemy of his house, but to hand over to the latter as
hostages his own son (l^orgils Bol)varsson, the one who afterwards became
noted as I*orgils skarOi) and his own brother (Guthormur I*6rSar8on). I^or-
gils was at that time only fifteen years of age, but sturdy of arm and will
as became the race he sprang from. Ho spent the. first winter at Gizur's
residence, called Tunga, and Grda, Gizur's wife, treated him most kindly. It
happened, one day, that I'orgils and Samur Magnusson, a kinsman of Gizur,
quarreled over a game of chess. Samur wanted to take back a knight^ which
he had set e^i prise (t tipptuim)^ but I*orgils would not permit him to do it.
Then one of Gizur 's retainers, called Marki^s MarOarson, advised that the
knight should be allowed to go back to its old square, " and don't be brawl-
ing at chess I " he added, torgils said that he did n't intend to accept either
counsel or (;ommand from Markus, and suddenly swept the men off the table,
and let them fall into their pouch ; then, standing up, he struck at the ear
of Samur (with the pouch of chessmen, as the construction would seem to
imply), so that the car bled. At the same time he exclaimed : — *^ It is much to
know that we cannot venture to hold ourselves equal in anything to the kins-
men of Gizur." Then there was a running out of the room to inform Gizur of
the deed, and of Porgils' slighting remark ; Gizur entered and asked whether
Samur did n't dare to avenge himself. Guthormur and Gr6a were sitting on the
same settle, when Gizur came into the room, and they heard that he scolded
the boys angrily; whereupon they drew near, and a priest with them. Porgils
was answering Gizur in a way that was very provoking. Grda took her
husband's hand and said: — *^ Why do you act in such an angry way? I should
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CHESS IN THE SAGAS 13
think that you are the persoQ to be reRponsible, even if he should do some-
thing demanding legal compensation *'— meaning that Gi/ur was obliged by
law to pay fines for acts committed by hosta<;es while in his household or
charge. Qizur answered:— ** As to that 1 will not accept your judgment/*
She replied : — " Then I will pay tlio fine, if we be adjudged. " With that they
led torgils aside, and begged him to reply submissively to Qizur, but I*or-
gils cried out that he would not do that. Various persons then offered their
advice, calling the whole thing a childish affair. So the matter was allowed
to rest, but after that Oizur was always colder towarif^ I^orgils.'^— This story
is interesting in more than one way. It shows that even youth— of the better
classes— were, at that day, acquainted with chess ; that the custom was to
keep the chess -sets in pouches, or purposely -made bags; and that chess
nomenclature thus early included a phrase equivalent to our eti prise. The
young chessplayer, I^orgils, became in time a champion of high importance,
warmly trusted by his friends and feared by his enemies, and of all Iceland-
ers of his time stood highest in the regard of the Norwegian King, H&kon
the Old. He was slain in a political flght January 22, 1258, only thirty-two
years of age, and his saga- which is a part of the great Sturlunga saga — was
written not many years afterwards.
GhiBmundar SekgtL g68a.
We have alluded, on another p.ige of this volume, to a bishop of Skilholt
in Iceland who was popularly canonized and styled St. Thorlak. A like in-
stance also occurs in the history of Iceland*s northern see — that of II61ar.
QuSmundur the Holy, a most pious prelate, who presided over the H61ar
diocese, died in the year 1237, and many were the miracles performed by him
both before and after death. His successor was B6t61fur, a Norwegian, whose
unauthorized consecration by the primate of Throndhjcm was not very grate-
fully received by the Icelandic clergy and people who were thus placed under
his jurisdiction. His life is contained in a short appendix (for he held his of-
fice only eight years) to the saga of Bishop QuOmund, and it includes the
following anecdote: — *Mt happened once in H61ar, at Christmas, that two
deacons, or minor priests, were playing chess, one of whom was hasty of
speech and quarrelsome. Bishop B6t6lf came into the room, sat down on a
settle in front of the players, and interfered in the play by giving advice to
one of the combatants, in whose favor the game soon began to turn, so that he
was near mating his adversary, a feat which was largely the result of the
^ '* SA atbnrdr varft, at }>4 ikllM k uni tail, I>orgll8 BClbvarsson ok Sim MaguiUiou fmnda
Oisarar. vildi SAinr bera aptr rlddara, i>r bann haff^i telft i uppniio, en ]>orgiU I6t |>irl ekki nk.
Pk lagM til Uarka« Marftarion, at aptr skUdi bora ridiarann, ' Ok latift ykkr ekki k tkilja am
tafl.* I>orgfia sagMak ekki fyrlr bans ord muoda gGra ; ok tvarfaM taflinu, ok I£t i piiORinn ; ok
at&b npp; ok laimt vlh eyra Kiml, svi at blAddi, ok mnUt vi^: * MIkit er ]>at at vit», at T^r
sknllro dngan blut ))ora at halda til jafOH vift friendr Uixarar. * Pk var fram blanpit ok Hagt
Gisuri ; ok kom banu Inn, ok spardl bv4rt Siror )>yrdi ei;(l at hefua tin. I*aa Gatbormr ok
Oroa bdrba Betih k palli er Qlsarr kom i ttofu, ok beyr^u at bann andaakaM tveinana reiftalega;
gengo >aa til ok prestr meb Jielin. I>orgllii ivarar Qisuri bridr akapraunar-tamllga. nr6a t6k
i bOnd Olsuri ok mnltl : 'HtI l»tr )>A svi roll^ulcga? mir lintti |>A elga fyrir at nvara, )i6tt bann
betM P$X> nokkud gOrt er b6t.))arfa vjcrl. ' (Jixarr ararar : *Kigi vll ek k pena piun d6m.*
H6b svarar:* Bk akal p6 beta ef tiarf. ' Lciddu ]>au Porglla 4 brott, ok bifta )>aa banu vel
•vara Gisuri ; en ]>orgil« kvesk )>at elgl niundn gOra. I^gl&u pk marglr til, ok kSlluftn petttk
vera bernskii-bragd. ¥kl\ )>at pk nlftr ; ok var Olxorr fierri vid Porglia en kbr." — Sturlunga Saga
(whiob Inolodes the pprgUa Saga •karda)^ edited by Ga^brandnr VIgittsaon, (Oxford 1878), 11., p.105.
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14 CHESS IN ICELAND
bishop's counsel. Then, naturally, the priest, whose game had gone so badly,
became angry, and said to the bishop, without any regard to the latter's epis-
copal dignity: — * It is better for you, brother B6t6lf, to go into the cathedral,
and read over the talk you have got to make to-night, for what you said last
night was all wrong ; moreover your predecessor, the holy bishop GuSmund,
gave his attention rather to the saying of prayers and the giving of alms than
to the schemes of chess.' Thereupon Bishop B6t6lf answered his deacon more
wisely and calmly than he had been addressed : — 'Thanks, my good deacon,
I shall take your wholesortio advice, and betake myself to the cathedral. What
you say, too, is true— many things and great things distinguished the charac-
ter of Bishop GuOmund, when contrasted with mine.' " The chronicle goes
on to say that B6t61f was always thereafter a quiet and modest man— in fact,
not severe enough for those he had to rule. Ho died on a visit to Thrond-
lijem— which was called in those days NiOar^s— and was buried in the mon-
astery of Helgisetur not far away from that episcopal city. *6
Sr6ka-Be£i Saga.
There is a brief Icelandic saga, the text of which, in its latest and best
edition, fills only a little over forty not very large pages, which is known as
the saga of Kr6ka-Rofur. It is the history of an Icelander, who received
from his parents at his birth the name of Refur (— fox), which, on account
of the character its bearer developed subsequently, became Kr6ka-Refur, that
is "Refur the wily." The book is full of adventures, and the number of
manuscripts of it extant evince the popularity it long enjoyed. It has hitherto
been classed among the fabulous sagas, but the various later editors agree in
recognizing not a little historical truth at the bottom of it, and consider that
some of its events, which are recorded as liaving taken place in the tenth
century, were really transmitted traditionally — somewhat distorted in their
chronology — to the period when the saga was written down, about the middle
of the fourteenth century. The scenes are laid partly in Iceland, Norway and
Denmark, but in good part, too, in the fjords of Greenland, among the Ice-
landic colonists, so that the saga belongs, in a certain sense, to the litera-
titre which relates to the early Icelandic discovery of America. At any rate
it shows that, three centuries and a half after the first voyages to the unexplored
western hemisphere, the idea of commercial and friendly relations with the
settlements in the new world, to which those voyages gave rise, was still, in
^ *' Sv4 bar til oinn tima & HolattaS, at jolum, at tvcir dj&kuar tafldu sk&ktafl, var aunarr
djakuinn Ororftr ok uppiv57).sliiiiiikill ; kom ]>» hcrra Rot^lfr biskup Itiii i atofuna, ok sottist
uidur k elDii kiiakk ]>ar f ram an at sein klcrkarnlr tvirdu, lagAi lianu tit mcd 5&rum klArkinnm,
t6k |)4 ad hallaat tatlit,Ava»t u^ruin var komit at iii&tl, mont af tlli6|(iiin biskupo; rolddlat klerkr-
Inu, •& er vcrr gckk taflit, t\k tegjaiidi til biskup* : betra or l>£r. br6dir Dotdlfr! at fara tt
til kirkju ok aj& yfir rasping pinn, or )^j!k &tt at loaa i n6u, pviat t>i& laat alll rangt i fyrrf n6tt;
■Urfa&i ok (Su&muudr biskup, sera fyrir l>1k Tar, nieirr i bsnahaldi ok olinuragJOrl&uni en i
taflbrogftum. Pk svarar berra Rutolfr biskup djiLkuanum aptr i gegn, betrok b^gvasrligar en
til var talat: baf ]^«kk fyrir, dj&kni mlun ! potta ]>itt hoilricM tkal ek bafa, at fara til kirkju,
•egir 1)^ l>at ok oatt, at mart ok iniktt miiu ikilja hcrra Giiftmnnd ok inik. Var berra B6t6lfr,
biskup i dllum hhitum hogvierr ok HUIi&tr, ok kotn oigi itJ6rn k viti sina uudirmeun sein htofM ;
var ok k bans dSgum Ittill gaumr at gefinn, at halda npp jarteguuui Utt4!>uiuudar biskups. Var
bann Il61ab{akup nm vllj 4r, ok for uUn ok andaMst i NiAarusi ok bvillr at Helgiaotrl.*' —
BitkHpa SCgur II. (containing the appendix, or Vidbatir, to the Oufimtmdar Saga hint gdda by
Abbot Arngrimur), pp. 186-187 (KanpmanDahGfn 1878).
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CHRSS IN THE SAOAS 15
the minds of the Icelanders, a familiar one. Ref, having; killed a man in a
fend— for feuds and liillinfrs were ordinary things in those days— is obliged to
betake himself, as an outlaw, to Greenland, where he pets possession of some
land in a not easily discovered and quite uninhabited region on-Uie upper
shores ofaQord, which lay ftir North of the Yestri-byg?^, the remoter of the
two districts of the Icelandic colony. This fjord is described with much detail,
and has been supposed to be the Franz.-Joseph's Qord, rediscovered some thirty
years ago by the second German Arctic expedition. ^ Later on. King Harald
har0r4!)i of Norway sends another Icelandic voyager, B&rl^ur, to Greenland to
bring him back some of the products of that country. In executing his com-
mission B4r6 becomes intimate with Gunnar, the principal man of the colonists,
and from him learns all about Ref^who has meanwhile got into fresh difliculties,
not of his own seeking, and has been obliged to fortify his lonely dwelling on the
distant inner Qord. Henceforward Bdrft seems to regard it as a special mission
to bring Ref to justice. But with the many turns of Refs affairs— his clever
evasions of his foes, his defences of his strongly guarded dwelling, to which
he had even contrived to lead concealed water-pipes from the neighbouring
mountains, his changes of name and abode^we have nothing further to do.
Having assumed his final name of Sigtryggur, ho rose to distinction under
the protection of the king of Denmark, who assigned him a residence, in which
he lived for many winters. At last he made himself ready for an expiatory
pilgrimage to the holy city {f>jo hafm ferih sinn ut i Roniaborg og sotti heint hinn
helga Petur postula^ as they expressed it in the days of the saga-writers), but
he fell mortally ill on his way back, and was buried in a rich monastery in
France. t>orm68ur, his son, returned to Iceland after the fall of the Norwegian
King Harald, who had pursued his father, acquired land at a place called
Kvennabrekka, and married; from him, says the saga, have sprung many
gifted men.
The chess episode of this tale is a somewhat obscure one.*^ BarO, after
we left him in Greenland, returned to Norway with a cargo, Gunnar seizing
*^ *' Dio xweite deuUehe Nordpolarfabrt in den Jahrau 1869 und 1870 uutor FOhrung dea
Kapil&n Karl Koldewey, Krater Baud. Loipalg 1879.*'— This reference U gtvcii by P<nl
PiUson, editor of the Kroka-Refa Saga, in hli preface (p. xxxl), but it hai been impoaaible
to Terffy it. lie apcaka of the identlile«ilon of Refa Qord with the Franz-Joaepb*a f}ord *a
made by Dr. Konrad Manrer— tbe higbeat of all antborltlea on any matter relating to leo*
land — bat In the two eaaaya on <*Or(>niand Im Mittelalter" and "Gr5nlanda Wioderentdeck-
ung,** which Dr. Manrer eontribnted to the volume elted, no statement relating to aucb
identifieatlon is to be found. In the same sentence Pilmi Pilaaon aiao citea tbe " Sturlunga
Saga" edited by Dr. Gudbrand Vlgfdssou (Oxford 1878), in the " Proldgomeua '• of which
(p. Izili), the editor saya of tbe '' Kr6ka-Ref8 Saga" that it "shows real local knowledge
on the part of the author, so that Dr. Maurer haa even believed It possible to identify a firth
which he deaeribes as the lately-discovered Franz-Joeeph's fjord.'* But Dr. Qu5brand Ylg-
flksson glTes no reference to any of Dr. Maurvr's writings.
is '« Gunnar sendir Haraldi kouungi ])rj4 gripi; t>a& var hvita-bj5rn fullli<^a og vandr
i^«ta vel ; annar gripr var tanntafl og gert rae^ miklam haglelk ; ])ri9jl gripr var rottuugBbans
me15 511ura (Snnam sinum, hann vsr grailnn iilir og vil^a rent i gulll ; tennurnar voru fastar i,
faauainum ; var |>a9 alli hln mesta gcralmi. Bardr Ictr nil i haf og ferst vcl ; kom hann i }>Kr
atd&var, aem hann muudi kjoaa. Hann fser&i HaralJi konuugi luargan grsoulcnKkan varu-
iug igactan. Ferr Bar&r fyrir konuug einn dag og nisclli : "HJer er eitt tafl, herra, er y&r
aeudl hinn gSfgaxti ma^r af GrsDnlandl, er Gunnar heitlr, og vill ekki f6 fyrir hafa, heldr
viufeingi y^ar. Yar eg me& honum ij v«tr og rart m^r hann %6f>t drcngr; vill hann gjama
vera vin y^ar.** I>aS var baelbl hneftafl og skiktafl. Koniingr leit k um hrift og baft hann
hafa )»5kk fyrir, er slikt sendi, " skulu v^r vist vin4ttu vera k mdti leggja.*'— JTrt^fca-ifs/s
Saga og Kr6ka-Be/» rimurj udgiven af Film! P4lsaon (KCbenhavu 1883), p. S3.
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16 CHESS IN ICELAND
the occasion to send to King Harald three valuable gifts of Greenlandic origin.
These are a full-grown white bear in good condition ; a tanntafl, made with
great skill ; and the skull of a walrus (or perhaps some object formed out of
the jaws), having all its teeth, which were carved and, in places, enamelled
with gold. When the tanntafl is presented to the King, BarSur accompanies
the gift with this speech :— '* Here is a to/f, my lord, which is sent to you by
the foremost man in Greenland, who is called Gunnar; he demands nothing
for it except your friendship. I was with him two winters, and he treated
me nobly; he will most gladly have your favor." Then the writer adds:
— "*a^ var ha:H hneftafl og skdhtafir' This statement would be most in-
teresting could we make sure of comprehending it rightly. Tanntafl (tann
= tooth, or tusk) may mean:— 1, a set of men used in playing any game of
tables, made of (walrus) teeth, or (walrus) tusk ; or it may possibly signify: —
2, a board for such a game, made out of the same material ; or one may
conceive that it might include:— 3, both the men and the board. This is,
however, little more than guess-work, on account of the dubious signification
of the word to/l, which we discuss elsewhere. It is also difficult to under-
stand the final underscored phrase except by assigning to tanntafl the second
of the three meanings which we have indicated. Literally the phrase reads: —
'* It [i. e. the tanntafl] was both a hncfatafl [board for playing finefatafl] and
a chess board. " Now wo do n't know precisely what s)fort of a game hnefatafl
was, nor can we be certain that the writer intends to say that the two games
were played on a board, marked or designed in precisely the same way for
whichever game it was used. It may possibly be that the surfaces used for
the two games were of quite unlike forms, and that the board was both a
hnefahor^ and a shdkbor^, because ono was drawn upon one side of the board
and the other upon the other, as one sees old (or even modern) chessboards
having upon the reverse side a fox-and-geese board, or a twelve-man- morris
board. Were the meaning that only a chessboard, with its sixty-four squares,
was represented, and that it was used also for hnefatafl, it would go far to
tell us what hnefatafl was, namely, that it was draughts (checkers), or some
allied sport. There is little doubt that an Icelander writing in the fourteenth
century would know all about the game: perhaps it was even so familiar a
diversion that the author of the saga took no pains to describe it precisely.
M&guB Saga.
In the varied domain of the literature written in the speech of Iceland a
special field is occupied by the romantic or knightly sagas. These are mainly
translations, or paraphrases, of tales drawn from the mediaeval legendary
cycles of western Europe. In their Icelandic form they date back to the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and are the work of writers attached to
the Norwegian court. In one of these compositions, the long Karlamagnus
saga, there is a casual mention of chess. It is stated— wc quote from both
the extant manuscripts, one of which is slightly earlier than the other — that
the renowned champion Oddgeir (Holger Danske) was playing chess with Glo-
riant, a daughter of King Ammiral {pau Oddgeir ok konungs dottir Ichu at
skdhtafli), when ill tidings were brought in, whereupon Oddgeir shoved the
board from his knees and spake {Oddgeir skaut taflborHnn af hnjdm ser ok
mcelti)*^ concerning the evil intelligence thus received.
*' " Karlainagntis saga og kappa bans,*' edited by C. K. Ung«r (ChriBtiaiiia 1859), (• 111.
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CHESS IN THE SAGAS 17
There is a still more incidental allusion to the game in another of these
^* sagas of the southern lands'' {sdgur Su^nrlanda)^ as they haye been styled.
This is the ''Tristrams saga ok isondar''— a romantic narrative, remotely
of Celtic origin, which exists very nearly in the same form in early English
(the poem of "Sir Tristrem," written in the last years of the 13th century),
in Middle High German (the metrical romance, ''Tristan und Isolde,'* written
by OottAried von Strassburg early in the 13th century), and in Icelandic (in
prose). This last was translated from the French by command of King Hakon
Hikonsson (the Old) of Norway in 1226. The author of the version is stated
to be a monk called Robert, who is likewise named as translator of another
of these stories of the South, the '*Elis saga ok R6samundu." Fragments
of the Tristrams saga are to be found in a vellum codex of the 15th century
(including, as it happens, the portion containing the references to chess,
which does not vary essentially, in this respect, from the later transcript) ;
but it is complete only in a paper MS of the 17th century. The French poem
on the same theme, which served as the ground-text of the three versions
here indicated, is almost wholly lost. As to the Northern saga, whoever the
friar Robert might' have been, his work was, at a later day, revamped by an
Icelander in Iceland, but this production is inferior both in style and inci-
dent to the Norwegian narrative. It was likewise transformed in Iceland
into a popular ballad (the ''TristramskvseOi")."^ The hero of the saga, Tris-
tram, at the date of the chess episode a boy of extraordinary activity and
accomplishments-^precocious youths are common in these old sagas, an in-
dication of the early development in strength and character of the Scandi-
navian races— went one day with his fosterfather, his tutor and brothers, to
visit a Norse vessel, which had Just arrived in the harbor near the castle
in which he dwelt, laden with many strange and rare things from divers
lands. Tristram, already skilful in the languages, talked with the merchants
and sailors, and bought some beautiful birds, which he gave to his brothers.
Then, the saga goes on, he saw there a chessboard, and asked if any one
of the merchants would play with him ; one came forward, and they set the
pieces, each staking at the same time a considerable sum on the game. When
his fosterfather saw that he was sitting at the chessboard he said to him :
—"My son, I am going home; your teacher will wait for you and accom-
pany you, when you are ready." This master, who remained behind, was
a courteous and gentle knight. But the merchants wondered at the youth,
and praised his wisdom, his accomplishments, his beauty and agility, his
quickness of wit and manly bearing, in which he excelled them all; and
theyr thought that if they could carry him away with them, great gain would
accrue to them from his expertness and proficiencies, and also that, if they
chose afterwards to sell him, they might obtain a large sum of money. As
the youth sat there absorbed in his game, they secretly hauled in the
cable and anchor, and worked the ship out of the harbor. The boat had its
awning up, and was moved along gently by the breeze and current, so that
" For an abttraot of th«ttory m rewritten In Iceland see: — '* Die nordlache nnd die eug-
litcheyereiM der Triatan-Sage,'* edited by Bogen K61bing (Heilbronn 187S-8S), I., pp. xv-zTi—
For the " TrletramekTiBfti " see the ** Islensk fornkrsBdl/' edited by Sven GrundtTig and J6n
Slgarteson (Kj0benhayn 1854-85), L, pp. 186-S07. lint the ballad,— which U printed from
three varying M8S— doea not contain the cheaa Incident, relating only to the lovea and mia-
fortnnea of Trietram and laSnd.
3
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18 CHESS IN ICELAND
Tristram was not aware of the changed situation until they were at a dis-
tance from the land. Then he said to the merchants:— "Why are you
doing this?" They answered:— "Because wo will that you accompany us."
Then he began to weep and to be distressed, and to bewail, as did also the
knight, out of his love to Tristram, their sad condition. Thereupon the Norse-
men took his teacher and let him down into a boat, giving him an oar. And
now the sails are set and the ship is at full speed, but Tristram is sitting sad
and sorrowful at the mercy of these strangers. ^^ Afterwards he wanders about
—a Northern Ulysses — for a long time, meeting with many marvelous adven'
tures. In the English poem, Tristrem, as he is there called, catches sight of
a chessboard on a chair, and wagers with a sailor twenty shillings against a
hawk; he wins six hawks, which he oflFers to his brothers; and his foster-
father, Rohand, taking the fairest one, bids him good bye, and walks away
with the other youths. Tristrem continues to play, and gains a hundred
pounds by his skill, but suddenly noticing that the boat is moving, weeps
sorely. Then his master is sent off with the boat and oar, and Tristrem is
left a captive. 22
A third one of these knightly romances, the "BragSa-Magus saga," has
two long chess episodes, not unlike each other. King Jatmundur, by some
called LoS6vikus {sutnar nefna hann Juliand^ er hann 16k heisaratign; en
iner pikkir svo helzt til visa sd titull^ er af cefi keisaranna er skrifa^r^ at
hann muni verit ha fa sonar son Karlamagmis keisara, ok svo segja flestar
baskr^ at hann hafi Lo^ovikus heitit), who ruled over Saxony (Saxland), finds
a princess captive in the hands of a Jarl, Hirtungur, and longs to possess
her. He demands the amount of her ransom. The Jarl replies that he will
only release her in return for three objects of great value belonging to the
King. These three things the Jarl was to be allowed to select. After con-
sultation with one of his counsellors, the monarch tells the Jarl that he will
accept the terms, with the proviso that, if he choose, ho may subsequently
redeem the three valuable objects by substituting for them two costly gold
rings, which shall be deemed of half the value of the precious objects pawned;
for the other half of the debt the Jarl and he are to play three games at chess,
the winner to possess all the valuables in question. The Jarl agrees, and
'* Beaidea the edition of tbls saga by Bugen KSlbIng, already cited, thoro is another by
tbe Icelandic scholar, Qisli Brynjulfsson, *'Saga af Tristram ok is5nd samt Mdttuls saga"
(Kj6beDhaTn 1878). The text of the passage cited is here taken from the edition of KGlbing
(p. 18): — '*Si^an b4 hann liar, skiktaflsbor^ ok spurlM, ef nokkurr kanpmanna vlldi tefla
vift hann, ok einn f6r til, ok settu t>eir ok 15g9u viS mikit f6. 8em f6strl bans sit, at hann
sat at skaktaflsbordi, l>a mrelti hann til haps: 'Son mlnn,* scgir hann, 'ek geng heim, en
nieistari t>inn bidi t>ia og fylgi ])^r hblin, ^k er l>u ert bAinn,' og dvaldist ]>i meS h&nam
einn karteiss og htcverskr riddari. Kn kaupmenn undru^u ])enna unga mann og lofu(&a kuun-
ustu bans, list ok fegrS ok atg6r9, vizkti ok nic^ferift, er hann upp \&k t>& alia, og ibugu^a
pelr, at ef ])eir kacmi binum brutt med sir, at ))eim myndi mikit gagn af standa hsnskunn*
ustu ok margfraslbi, Bvk ok, ef l>elr yilja seija hann, ]>& fi l>elr mikit f6 fyrir bean. Bern
hann sat gcymandi luiksius, )»i drdgu }>eir upp sem leyniligast strengi sina ok akkeri ok idta
lit bera skipit lir v&ginum. Sklpit var tjaldat ok rak fyrlr vindinum ok strauminum, svi at
Tristram Tard ekkl varr vi^ fyr enn t>«ir v&ru fjarri landi; t>& maeltl hann til kaupmanna:
-~*Uerrar,' segir hann, * hvi vili ^^r st& gSra?* I>eir aegja : — * I'yrlr l>vi at ver Tiljaro,
at l)d fytgir oss.* Pi lok hann l>egar at grata ok ilia lita ok sjAlfan sik harmandi ok 8t4
riddari un, sakir istseindar ; ok ]>4 t6ku Nordmeun meistara haus ok 16tu i hki ok fengu
hkunm kr eina. Nu er nppi ECgilt ok skipit fuUskri^a, en Tristram sitr nil i ]>eirra yaldi i
harmi ok bags6it.*'
^ In the second volume of KSlbing's work is the English '* Sir Tristrem,*' of which Sir
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CttRSiS Is THE SAGAS
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says:— '*! need not go to your camp or treasury to select the three things
I desire; I choose, as ransom for the maiden, the horse you now sit on ;
the falcon which rests on your wrist : and the sword which hangs at your
side." "Even if you had searched my treasury," replies the King, "you
could not liave chosen three objects which I so unwillingly part witli; but,
however that may be, I shall stand by our agreement." Ho then strips
himself of the three rare possessions, and sends them by his man IIr6lfur
to the princess that she may herself purchase her freedom. But he orders
to be brought a beautiful chessboard which he owns, and declares himself
already ready to play the three stipulated games. The two begin their
Walter Seolt pabltshed In 18(H an elaborate edition,
deteribe the carrying off of Tristr£in : —
The following ttanaa*! (xxix-xxxiii)
A ebeker he fond bl a eheire
He aaked, who wold play.
Pe mariner epae boualr :
"Clilld, what willow lay?"
"Ogaln an hauke of noble air
Tventi Mhilllngefl, to lay :
Whe|>er eo nates o^er fair,
ISere hen bo}>e oway. **
Wlp wille
Pe nariuer swore his faye :
*' For tope, Ich held per title ! *
Now bo])e her wedde lys
And play |»ai biginne ;
Yflctt he hai> |»o long asise
And endred bep per inne.
I>« play biginnep to arise ,
Triatran delel> fttvinne ;
lie dede als so lie wise :
He gaf has he gan winne
In raf;
or playe ar he wald bliiine,
Sex hankes he gat and gaf.
Rohand toke leae to ga,
His sones he cleped oway ;
Pe fairest hauke be gau ta,
Pat Tristrem wan ]>at day.
Will hin he left na
Pans for to play;
Pe narlner swore al so,
Pat pans wold he lay
An stounde ;
Tristrem wan ]iat day
Of htm an hundred ponnde.
Tristren wan pat |ier was layd.
A troNonn ]>er was made.
No longer l>an ]>e malster soyd,
Of gate nas )>er no bade.
As |>ai best sat and playd,
Ont of hanen >ai rade ;
Open ]>e se so gray
Fran |>e brines brade
Oun flete:
Of lod pal were wul glad(>.
And Tristrem sore wepo.
His naister ]>an |iai fand
A bot and an are :
Hyo seyden : " Zond Is pe land,
And here schaltow to hare :
Cheie on aijMsr hand,
Wheper ^e leuer ware
Sink or stille stand :
Pe child schal wil> ons fare
On flo<l 1 *'
Tristrem wepe ful sare,
Pal long and ]>ougt It gode.
Those stanxas are In volume II of K61blng*s pnblication, pp. 11-12. Once more, In this
old Knglish poem, rhess is mentioned. It Is when Tristram goes to Ireland. He hsd been
severely wounded, but ho was still a man fair to gaze at (stsnr.a CX1I, p. 85): —
An heyo man be was like.
Pel he wer wounded sare;
His gles weren so selllkc,
Pat wontier pougt hem paro.
* His harp, his eroude was rikc;
His tables, his chcs ho bare.
Here Is a distinction made between tabU* and e/iefc, as elsewhere in early Knglish.
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20 CHESS IN ICELA NJD
games. The first one is of long duration, but at last tlio King finds himself
mated by his adversary's rook {Kanungr f^hk hrdhsnuU). The Jarl at once
exclaims :— **1 have won the precious objects; I don't care to play any more."
The King answers: — "We shall now play the second game." Then they
played the second time, and that contest turned out much worse. The King
had to submit to a mate given by a pawn. The Jarl said:— "Little conso-
lation do you derive from the game of chess, for now I own your costly
•objects ; methinks you must see by this time that you cannot play against
me. Besides I would rather that you retain your beloved pieces of property;
so we won't play any longer, since I do not care to oflfend you too griev-
ously. " But the King cried out: — "Do you think you have me in your
power ? We shall play the whole match as agreed upon. " " I merely wished,"
said the Jarl, "to save you from the most disgraceful of all mates." That ill
speech made the King so angry that he could give little heed to the final
game, which terminated in a mate given by the very pawn opposite the mon-
arch's king at its first move. « The Jarl suddenly rose and rushed into the
castle. The King was greatly enraged against the Jarl, and longed to get
back, by any means, the treasures he had lost ; but the Jarl guarded his
castle on every side, and went up into the tower and, looking down at the
King, shouted:— "Thus do we play with over-bearing men I " «< And the
princess was no more in the King's power than before he sent her his horse,
his falcon and his sword.
Before we reach the next mention of chess in the saga a new character
comes upon the scene, namely, the fifteen year old Rognvaldur, a son of the
** Tbo deflnitton of thit mate is not wy clear. It •eama to Im a mato giran hj the
pawn of the adrertary wbJeh ttanda on the klng*s file, and whIoh>-ona of the weakeft of the
cheMmen—Tentaree to nore airaight at the enemy** most ImporUat pieee. At least, this Is
the definition found in the old lezleon of Oians Verelius, '< Index liagva reteris Scytho-
Seandias •' (Upsalin 1691), pp. 91-99 aub voc*. The name of the mate, as glren in the text, is
/relf/crlMmdl, a vulgar epithet, If talcen In its literal meaning. Bat Johan Fritsner, In his
<* Ordbog over det gamle norske Sprog " (Sd edition, Kristlania 1866), I., p. 48R, suft ooce^
deelares ita real derivation to be from /er« (rr vixler), the mediseral name of the qaeeuohe
refers to ▼. d. Llude*8 « Qesehiehte des Sehachspieis ** In this eonnecUon— and Its apparent
relation with the leelandie verb frtta (of coarse slgnffioallon) to be thus only an InsUnco of
erroneous popular etymology. See also his explanation of the synonymons Toeablp, fuAryltu-
mdt, in which he rather complicates the matter. The truth Is that these terms are by no
means the sole instances of sneh forelblo and ungentle expressions used to describe the mates
possible in the now antlqnated style of chess-play in Iceland. For other examples, see the
^KvseM eptir Stef4n 6lafsson,*' edited by Dr. J6n torkelsson, the younger (KaupmannahSfn 1886)
IT, p. 49, as well as the essay in the present ▼olume by Mr. Olafur DaviScson. These vulgar
appellations are now wholly oot of date among leelandie players. Bat consalt on all these
subjects Tarions later pages in the present volume.
^ ** Konungr l»tr Uka eltt igiptt tafl, er hann 4tti. Taka ^Ir pi Ul at tella, ok varS
t>etta tafl mJGk langt, en svo l^kr t>elrra f milium at konungr f^kk hrdkamit. Jarl mcnltl :
nnnit hefl ek griplna, ok blrftt ek elgl lengr at tefla. Konungr maelti : tefla skulam vlt annat
tafl. I>elr tefldn nd annat, ok er tiat miklu akeromra, ok f^kk konungr pedsmit. Jarl moeltl :
litlt traust ipegi pir hafa k tafllnu, ok a ek nd griplna ; ]>ikkl mdr pat nd reynt, attd tkM
ekkl vi9 mik at tefla. Kd vll ek heldr, attd elglr einu griplna, ok teflum vlt eigl lengr, pvi
at ek vll elgl angra hug plan. Konungr moeltl: hyggst }>d pi eiga vald i m^r? Skulam vlt
tefla 611 158, sem moelt var. Jarl mcBlti : elgl mun l>at ok purfa at spara at gera pik s«m
hrakllgastan i mitlnu. Vift ^at lllmoBli vard konungr rel^r, sro hann giftl ekkl at tafllnu ;
gekk petu tafl skemmst af, ok fdkk konungr fretstortumit. Spratt Jarl snart i foefr, ok
bafU slk Inn i borglna. Konungr var9 mJ5k reiSr Jarll, ok vlldl fyrtr hvetvetna fi aptr pi
grlpt, er Jarl af honum tefldl. Jarl loetr nd aptr Idka dll borgarhllMu ; sidau gengr hann i
turnlna, er yflr hllMnn var, ok moelU : svo emm v^r vanir at lelka ofiitopamenn.'* — firo^a-
Mdgu§ Smgrn, edited by Gunnlangnr Mrtaieon <Kaapmaanah6lki 1868), pp. 18-88.
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CHISSS IN THE SA GA S 21
i&rl Amundi. Though still a boy, he— like Tristram, of whom we have just
read -^ was an adept in all the accomplishments of the day, and it was whis-
pered that King IxAi^vikus (Louis), though older, was filled with jealousy of
the precocious youtlu Just then, as we are told, the King was keeping high
festival, and he and all his ministers and men-at-arms drank deeply at daily
banquets ; and there was a good deal of talk, says the sagaman, ^*as there is
wont to be at drink." This talk turned one day on the many arts known to
the King. In the course of it some of the retainers asked a man called
Ulfur (WolO whether he thought it possible to find in the land any one who
was the King*s equal in feats of skill ; of course, they added, there can be
nobody who would not shirk playing chess with him. Ulf said it was not un-
like that a person might be found who could play that game nearly as well
as the King. The others asserted that there could be no one in the world
able to do even that, and one of the men, Sveinn by name, added :~" We
know that you are thinking that Rognvald jarlsson does n*t play any worse
than the King.'* 'M donH say that,'* replied Ulf, ''but 1 do think that
RiJgnvald plays well. ** Sveinn then said :— " It would be futile to put Rogn-
vald before the King in regard to any sport or skill, but the King shall
know what disgrace you are casting upon him and his rank. '* •' Repeat
my words rightly to the King, and 1 shall not disavow them," retorted Ulf.
Sveinn replied:— 'Mt will not need to report worse ones," and the company
separated. Not long after, the King sent for tjlf, and said to him:— ''We
learn that you declare ROgnvald jarlsson to be better at chess than we. "
. Ulf said that those were not his true words, '' for 1 have never thought
of underrating your strength at chess, or at any other art, but often I do
not remember what I say over my drink." After some not very pleasant
discussion the King said:— ''Two conditions 1 desh^ to lay upon you; the
first is that ROgnvald must meet me at chess ; the second is that otherwise
I must have you slain. " tu replied :— " Bold Is a roan when his life's at
stake; if you make it a mortal matter, then I must try to get Rognvald to
play with you. " Ulf then goes off to ask the yonng champion to come to
his rescue by meeting the King over the board. The Queen, unhappy at the
prospect of bloodshed, sends a message to Rdgnvald urging him to accept
the King's challenge. ROgnvald declared that he consented— chiefly be-
cause the Queen wished him to do so— on condition that the playing should
take place outside the King's castle ; a grove near the castle, in which
tournaments were held, was accordingly selected and the day for the com-
bat fixed. Rdgnvald's father, a man of frank and upright character, pre-
dicted much evil from the encounter, but all met at the appointed hour and
place, including many courtiers of the court, and also the Queen. ROgn-
vald told his men to see that the horses of himself and his brothers were
saddled as soon as the chessplay seemed to be half over. On arrival he
Umnd the King and Queen seated on chairs, of which there were two others.
R(igBvald, after saluting the sovereigns, took one of the seats and awaited
the King's pleasure. A chessboard was lying on the knees of the King, who
began by saying:— "Is it true, Rognvald, that you have offered to play
with me, and that you call yourself a better chessplayer than I ! " Where-
upon Rognvald:— "That I have not said, but they have announced to me
that you bade me come to chess with you to-day; although I do not
know too much about the game, still I am willing to act according to
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22 CffBSS TX IGKLA ND
your wish and play, for I do not care even if I am mated by you {pott eh
fdi mdt af y^r). " The King exclaimed:— "Your speech is ill, but not the
less shall you now play; but where is your stoke?" Quoth Rognvald: —
" I have brought no stoke, for 1 have no mind to play as a champion or
rival," The King replied:— "On tlie chair beside you hang three rings of
gold ; those shall I wager ; but if you have not other three rings, then you
shall wager your head ; methinks, in that case, you will not spare your
strength." To which Rognvald:—" I do not toke your jest in earnest, lord,
and I will not let my head be stoked, for it is not a thing to be sold or bartered."
The Queen interfered to make peace, but was sternly rebuked by her spouse.
To spare her, Rognvald hastened to stote that he would play for his
own head, or in any other way the King might wish, " for we are all your
men. " Then the table was set up. The King claimed the Urst move as
lord and master. They began to play at the hour of breakfast (nine o*cIock),
and at noon the game was finished, and Rognvald won, though there was slight
difference in the positions. He arose and said:— "Now liave 1 gained this
game, but only because of the King*s carelessness, in that he has not chosen
to display his real strength ; so 1 will not take the stake, for I think it more
proper that he should retain it. " After this Rognvald resumed his seat, and
tliey placed the men for another game, which reached its end before three
o'clock ; the King had to yield to the rook's mate. Rognvald arose as before,
but there is no need to repeat his words. The King, by this time, was filled
with wrath. They sat down for the third game, but that came to an end
not long after three, with a mate inflicted by a pawn {okfekk konungr pe^s- ^
mdt). The King, in his anger, upset the pieces, and swept thorn into their
pouch. Everybody was unarmed except VI gvarSur, Rognvald's eldest brother;
he carried a great battl»-axe, and, standing behind the King, while play
was going on, stiffly held his huge weapon at guard. Rognvald's youngest
brothers, one twelve and the other nine years of age, were on his eitlier liand.
When the final game was concluded, Riignvald stood up and said:—" This is
a case quite otherwise than might have been expected; 1 liave played with the
King, and he has combated as a champion, putting forth all the chess arts
which he has been able to acquire, and has lost these three games, together
with the three gold rings which he wagered ; he has been miserably beaten
in the final game, in that 1 have given him mate with a paltry pawn. 1 can-
not see why I should willingly try any further exercises of skill with him, for
it seems to me that he does everything worse and worse, and therefore shall
we separate ; but I shall take the rings, and ho can take the scorn of all for
his folly and vehemence. " By this time the King had 'got the chessmen
well into their pouch, and said in reply to Rognvald's speech:— "Not thus
shall we part," and springing to his feet, struck with the pouch full at the
face of R()gnvald, so that the blood flowed from it. At the same time he
cried :— " Take that with your stoke, until we can cover you with the greater
shame, which you have so well merited. " Said Rognvald to the King :— " I
do not take into account such small matters at this time ; 1 see that this must
be a jest of yours." Then Rognvald and his two young brothers went to
their horses. ^ But the oldest brother, VigvarSur, was nowhere visible. They
^ "SiSan reiM ]>eir UfltL Konungr vlldi liafa ]>at fyrir rikin mnn at dratr» fram fyrri.
]>e{r t6ko at tefla at dagmilnm, en t>*t var Ati at bidegt, ok varft enn litlt mnnr, ok blaut
Rfigovaldr. Hann st^^ ]>4 app ok moBlti : nA beB ek hlotit tall l)«tta, ok er ))etta af Sngra,
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CHESS ly THE SAGAS 23
rode otr without finding him, but soon learned that he remained behind to
some purpose ; for, enraged at the treatment of ROgnvald, he used his battle-
axe to cleave the unworthy King's head. Thus this unhappy chess-match
led to many woes. The Queen incited the emperor Carloman to avenge the
death of her husband, but, after much fighting, the clever Rognvald was
reconciled with the powerful monarch, married the beautiful Queen Ermonga^
and passed his last years in peace, encountering, as may be hoped, no more
such stormy chess incidents as the one here recorded. <^
Other Sagas.
In the Viglundar saga, one of the fictitious sagas, or wholly invented
tales which came long after the close of the classic period, and are little
nema athusaleysl konnngK, )>\i at bann heflr en;;! taflbrCgS sin me.tri frammi baft; nina ek
ekkl helrota l>eita taflf^, l>vi at m«r pfkkir allvel konilt, ]>6tt bann bad. Bi^an settlst KGgn-
valdr ni9r» ok settn )i«ir annat tafl, ok var t>vi loklt fjrlr n^n j f6kk konungr broksmat. ROgu-
valdr Ktod pk upp mcd aama bcBltl ok fyrr, ok part t>at efgl optar at groina. Konungr varft
nd harMa roi^r. l!»cUu t>eir taflil t>ri^ja; var ))at lokit |i4 nkanimt var af u6ul, ok fekk kun-
angr pe'^smat. Konungr svarfar ]>& taflinu, ok berr i punginn. AIl!r nivnn vora ]>ar vopn-
lauslr, nema VigTarftr ; bann gekk me9 dxi nilkla. Uann ttdS jafuan 4 bakl konungs, neftan
]>oir tefldu, Tift rcldda oxina. Markvarftr sat a aftra b6nd Rdgnvaldl, en Aftal«arftr & aftra.
Rognvalilr stuft ]}& upp ok uicelti : nu niun vita vi9 o^ruvi9, enn meun rauudu oetla ; ek bufl
teflt vi^ kouuug, en haun bctir tvflt af kappi, ok lagt fram ull taflbrog^, l>au er bann ]>ikkUt
kunna, ok bcAr baun uu liLtit t)ci*sl I)rju toll ok trj4 guUhringa, er bann bvflr vifi lagt, ok
■TO vcflalliga yflrkomiuli i si^asta tafli, at baun fekk af m^r bit fdlasta pef»«m4t. Nu kann ck
ei t>at sja a miqu r4di, at l>royla t>urfl vift bann floirf iliroUir, ))vi at ek l)]kkjttniat Tita, at
bann kunnl allar verr, en pk niunu Tit at ]}vi skilja, ok mun ek bafa briuga |)C«*a, en banu
muu bafa spott af ollum fyrir sina beimaku ok kappgirnf. Kouuugr baf^I 1*4 i borit taflili
punginn. Hann moelti: ekki aknlum T^r at l>€a8a' skiljaat. Sprettr baun 4 fsetr rei^r, ok al«r
meft pungluani framan 4 naair RagUTaldl, sto at bloft fell um banu. Konungr nioeltl : haf uu
]M)tta met taflfdnu, ^ar til T^r mlftlnra )>^r meiri arivirMng, aen pd heflr til unnit. RdgUTaldr
maelli : herra, ekki bregft ek mer 8To njjok Tift alikt at siuni ; Ann ek, at }>etta diuu Tera
glcna yftTart. Uekk Rognvaldr 1)4 i brutt ok iTeir bra-ftr baua meft b4num ok til bestaalnna.*' —
Bragda-Mdgu,* Saga, edited by Guunlangur l>drftar(ion (KaupmannabOfn 1S58), pp. 48-45.
^ Anotber and earlier M8oftb1« aaga waa edited by Guataf Cederachidkl In bia "Forn-
adgur Suftrlanda " (Lund 1881), pp. 1-48, tbo text of wbicb diflfera aomcwhat from the later
one which wo have cited. In the Introduction to his collection, CederachiSld trcata intereatingly
of the origin of the M4gua aaga (pp. Ixxx-lxxxvi). In the MS he uaea, tbo King, J4tmundur,
who contended in the first chesa cpiMode with Uirting, is here ealled emperor, and Hirting ia
introduced aa Irlngur, Jarl of Ireland. Tbo reault of the three gamea ia the aama, but aftar
the first conteat, when bia opponent triea to doclino the pricelesa objecta, and to terminate the
match, the emperor aaya : — "You can't be allowed to run away without having rec«lTed
checkmate ; for now I intend to giTo you a moat acurriloua mate. " Tbo other, or Rdgu-
vald epiaode, though more conclaely recorded, dooa not Tary much from that In the young-
er tranacrlpt. The aaga exiata in both French (**Quatre flla d'Almon,** or "Renaud de
Montauban") and Dutch (**Renout van Montalbsen"), the latter from the end of the thirteenth
century. In both, the main incident ia the chcaa match between Rognvald (Renaud) and the
King. The first of these productions waa well known to the Eugliahmaa, Alexander Meck-
bam (Neckam), and ia mentioned in the chapter D« ScaccU of bia book, '<De uaturia re-
rum," the date of which Is about 1180. In the course of the chapter the writer cxolaima: —
**0 quot mlllia auimarum tranamisaa aunt oceaaione illlua ludl, quo Roglnaldua [ROgnvald]
flliua Kymnudi in caleulo ludena militem gcneroaum eom illo Indentem in palatio Karoli magni
cum uno acaccorum interemit!" Coderachiold opinea that If the author of the Icelandic Ter-
aiou learned the atory outaldo of France it waa probably iu England— to which, aa we have
aeca in anotber place, not a few Icelandera of literary ability reaorted In thia Tery twelfth
century. Qaatoa Paria auppoaea that Neckbam knew the legend iu an Anglo-Norman ren*
daring now loat. The atory of M4gu8 reached the North in the 13th century, and may baTo
come llrat to Norway, but it la remarkable that all the MSS containing it are the work of Ice-
landic hands. The oldeat one datea back nearly to the year 1800.
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24 CHESS IN ICEL A ND
esteemed, there is a not uninteresting allusion to chess. The principal man-
uscript of the saga (Arnaraagnsean collection, 510, 4<^) dates from the close
of the 15th century, and the text Is probably not much older. One of the
characters proposes to another to play [chess], which they do. But the in-
vited player, Orn by name, gives little heed to the game because he pays
too much to the lady of the house (the wife of Ihe other player), and he was
therefore about to be mated {at honum var komit at nulti). But the lady
in question comes in, and advises him, in a metrical speech, to move a cer-
tain piece. His opponent deprecates the interference of his wife, who counsels
his adversary, and tells the latter that she does it only because he is younger.
But Orn follows the advice given, and is able to make a drawn game (Oi-n
iefldi pat er til var lagt og var pd jafntefli). Though chess is not mentioned,
nor the name of any piece given, the expressions at mdii (towards a mate),
at 6€hrum reiti (to another square), and jafntefli (drawn game) indicate that
the game was chess. ^— The passage in the Hervarar Saga ok HeiDreks kon-
ungs, in which the word skdktafl occurs, in one of the two oldest MSS, is as
follows:— "Einn dag cr GuSmundr lek skdktafl, ok bans tafl var mjfik svA
farit, pa spurdi hann, ef nokkr kynni honum rdD til at Icggja. t'a gekk til
Hervardr, ok lagDi liila stund til, d?)r Gu&mundar var vaenna.'" It is these
sentences of which Dr. Gu5brandur Vigfiisson says that the word slalk^ in
skdktafl, proves nothing as to the age of chess in Iceland, since its use is
here mythical. The passage from the original text which we have given is
in the prose portion of the Hervarar Saga, in a fragment from one of the cod-
ices (copied not long after 14(X)), called by a distinctive name:— *'Saga
HeilJreks konun^'s liins vitra," and may be thus rendered : — **One day, when
GuSmund was playing chess, and his game was going badly, he asked if no
one could aid him with good advice. HervarOur then came forward, and
gave the matter a little attention until Gu!Jmund was in better condition."—
There are possibly a few passages in sagas that we have not mentioned, in
which the writers may have had chess in their minds when using the word
tafl. But they must be examined when the whole theme is titeated more
thoroughly, and more intelligently, by future investigators. «
"^ '*I>ikir mdr ad ri9, at vit •kemlim okkr ok teflim ; ok svo ger9a ^eir. Litt gMi Om mi
toflluu fyHr hng ^eim er hann bafbi 4 hdafreyja svo at bonum var komtt at mitt. Ok i t>Ti
kom hikafroyja i stofuna ok 84 4 taflii ok kv«» l)eona vi^ubelniDf :
Bdndi leit til hen oar ok kvad :
I>oka mandir t)i& l)andar
X>innl tOflu hinn gj&fli,
R49 era tjalda tr6»u.
Teiir at ^rvau reitl.
JBnn er Ddtsnain maiiiii
Menlin i dag Bioum,
Blnikta mi ueina elil
Auftbaldr fri ])dr gjalda.
Orn iefldi ))at er ttl var lagt ok var ]>4 jafntefli.'* --27dr^ar«aya Sna/elUdu, Viglundarsaga,
edilod by 6u«brandr VigfAfsoa (KJebvnhavn 1860), p. 87.
^* See the "Fornaldar aSgur'* (18S9), I., p. 583; and the <'Icelandic-BngUah Dlellonary**
of Ga^brandur y)gfii8to%, anb voee «ilrdJic, as quoted hereafter In the payee devoted to eheee
'* Among the Ltzicographere. "
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THE UTORY OF FRITH I OF 25
3. -The Story of Frithiof.'' .
There is a romantic, or non-historical, saf^a, the action of which is largely
laid in a tract in Norway, which is styled Frithiofs Saga. In it there is an
episode describing a game at *Mables,*' of the sort known in ancient times
as ^^hnefatafi,'' between two of the characters. The passage has been thus
Englished : — *♦ They [the sons of King Bele] sent their fosterer to Prithiof to
bid him come help them against King Ring. Now Frithiof sat at the knave-
play [hnefaiafl] when Ililding came thither, who spoke thus: — * Our Kings
send thee greeting, Frithiof, and would have thy help in battle against King
Ring, who cometh against their realm with violence and wrong." Frithiof
answered him nought, but said to Bjorn, with whom ho was playing:— 'A
bare place in Ihy board, foster-brother, and nowise mayst thou amend it; nay,
for my part I shall besot thy red piece there, and wot whether it be safe. *
Then Hilding spake again :— *King Helgi bade mc say thus much, Frithiof,
that thou shouldst go on this journey with them, or else look for ill at their
hands when they at last come back.* *A double game, fosior-brother,' said
Bjftrn; 'and two ways to meet thy play." Frithiof said: — * Thy jjlay is to
fall first on the knave, yet the double game is sure to be.' No other out-come
of his errand had Hilding ; he went back speedily to the Kings, and told them
Frithiofs answer. They aske<l Hilding what he made out of those words. Ho
said:— 'Whereas he spake of the bare place he will have been thinking of the
lack in this journey of yours ; but when he said ho would beset the red piece,
that will mean Ingibjorg, your sister; so give ye all the heed ye may to her.
But whereas I threatened liim with ill from you, Bjorn deemed the game a
double one; but Frithiof said that the knave must be set on first, speaking
thereby of King King.' "3" *
On the incidents of this Icelandic saga, Ksaias Tegnor, the foremost of
Swedish poets, built, in the first quarter of this century, his immortal poem of
^ See the CAe«« Monthly (N«w York 1851)), lU., pp. 265-S68.
*> Thii EaglUh Tersion of the episode of the game at *' tables,** in the orlgiaal Baga of
Prithiof, is from <* Three Northern I^oTe Stories,*' translated by Kirikur Magudsson and Wil-
liam Morris (London 1876), p. 73. For another rendering see the Knglish version of Tegner's
"Frithiofs Saga" by Qeorge Stephens (Stockholm 1839), pp. 7-8 of ibo introduetorj matter,
which inelades the whole saga in Bnglish. The leelandie text is as follows :_Senda ]>eir
Ililding fostra Ul Friftlijdfs og skyldl biftja hann ad fara til 11^ met kongunum. Frl^pjdrur
sat aft hnefatafli, er Hildingar kom. llann mspltl svo : ** Kongar Torir sendu ]ijor kvetju og
vlldu hafa lltslnui t>Ut til orusto i moll llringl kougi, er ganga vill a riki Jieirra met ofsa og
6JafnaSI.** Frid^J^fur svarar bonum engu og mwiti til Bjarnar, er hann tefldi vit: '* Bil er
l>arna, fdstbroftir, og mnntu ei bregma l)vi, heldur raun eg setja at hiunl rauftu Idllunni, og vita
hrort henni er forH9. '* Hildingur mseiti )>i aptur : " Svo bat> livlgi konjrur mig segja l>Jer,
FriS])j6fur, aft t>ii skyldir fara i herfor l)esea. efta )?u mundir stcta afarkostum, 1>4 er )>«ir
kaemi aptur.** BjSrn, nisiltl )?k: ** Tvikostur er parna, fostbrudir, og tvo v^n fra aft teHa. '*
Frift]>j6rur sagfti : *' I>& mun raft aft sitja fyrst aft huefanum, og luun ))a verfta 6lrauftur tvikost-
urlnn. *' Eugan Qekk Hildingur annan urskurft siuna eriuda; for hann aptur skjolt til mots
vift kongaua og sagfti l^elm svor Frift))j6fs. l*eir spyrja Ilildiug, hverja V^ftingu hann twki
ijr liessum orftnm. Hildingur sagfti : " Par er hann rnddl um billft, l>ar mun hann k bil hygg-
ja nm ]>essa ferft meft ykkur ; en ]>ar er hann IJest sf tja mundi aft fogru tOtlnnui, ]>sft mun
koma til Ingibjargar systur ykkar ; gs?tift hennar vel svo vist; en ]f4 er eg lijot honum afar-
kostum af ykkur, tiaft virtl BJOrn tvikost, en Friftl)j6fur kvaft, aft hnefanum moudl verfta fyrst
lagt; paft mclti hann til Hriugs kougs. — &'ayan ocfc rimoma oat Fridpio/r Man /raknif
edited by Lndvig Larsson (Kebenhavu 1899) pp. 5-6.
4
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26 CHESS IN ICELAND
Frithiofs Saga. It may be styled a love-epos, composed of lyrics, in each of
which the metre corresponds to the sense. As the commentators of his time
rendered the name given to the game in the old saga by "chess," the poet
was enabled, partly by paraphrasing the original account of the game, partly
by availing himself of his knowledge of chess and its nomenclature, to
construct, out of this portion of the saga, a lyric of striking interest. Thus,
although the anonymous author of the Icelandic saga did not have chess in
his mind, but quite a dififerent game, Tegn6r, by the sixth song or canto of
his poem (" Frithiof plays chess ''), has managed to connect, by a new link,
the art of chess with Icelandic literature. 3'
The story of the poem follows closely that of the saga. The hero of the
poem, as of the saga, is Frithiof, a Norse peasant- warrior ; the heroine is In-
geborg, a daughter and sister of kings. These two were placed, when young,
under the care and in the house of the same foster-father, Hilding, where
their affections soon turned to each other. King Bele, who was on terms of
intimacy with his bold brother-in-arms, Thorsteinn, the father of Frithiof,
did not look with displeasure upon this disposal of his daughter's hand.
But, unfortunately, Bele and his friend, Thorsteinn, died, and the haughty
sons of the King came to reign in his stead. They had no idea of seeing
the proud blood of Odin mingle with that of a peasant, and Frithiofs suit
was sternly and publicly rejected. The disappointed hero retires to his
estate, full of bitter thoughts against his sovereigns. But all at once a war
breaks out between the sons of Bele and a neighboring monarch. King Ring
'* Tegn^r Ant published lome eantos (XIX-XXIV) of hit poem in a literary Journal ** Iduna,"
In ite eighth (18S0) and ninth (18S1) parte. Thle magazine appeared at Stockholm, and wai the
organ of the '* Gothic Union** (gdtleka f5rbandet)— a bellettrietlo eoeiety, which, drawing
ite inspiration from the old Scandinarlan literature and history, and from patriotic themes,
made a rcTolatlon in Swedish letters. " Frithiofs Saga** was issued in its complete form at
Stockholm In t895, and has since gone through a great number of editions. Such is still its
popularity that it Is not uncommon to meet Swedes who can repeat from memory the entire
poem. It has been rcAdered into nearly all the languages of Borope— even the modern Greek
and the ancient Latin — and into some of them by many different hands. Two Daniith-Nor-
weglan renderings came out almost immediately-- one by J. O. Miller (Copenhagen 1826), and
the other (Bergen 18S6) by U. Foss ; they were soon followed by sereral others. The Brst
German version was by Lndolph Schley In 18S6 (Upsala) ; the first English rendering wss that
of William Strong in 18SS (Loudon); the first French one was not Issued until 1845 (Paris)
by Mile R. da Paget ; the first Dutch one was gWen to the publle in 1851 (Utrecht) by P. L.
F. 0. Ton Biohstorff, and in the same year the poem appeared in Italiair (Verona), rendered
by Alessandro Baszonl. The earliest Slavonic version was the Russian ouo of 1841, followed
by a Polish one in 1856 — parts having appeared previously. Into Hungarian many portione
of the work were translated at an early day, but the poem was issued complete only In 1867
(Budapest). Later are the translations Into Finnish (1878), Bohemian (1891), and other tongues.
The best Bnglfsh version — so far as it goes— is that by Longfellow, firnt printed in the « North
American Review ** of Boston (n* alvl. July 1887, p. 149), but unhappily it eousisU only of
fragments, and the chess lyric is not among them. The poem has been frequently illustrated —
best, perhaps, by the Swedish artist, Malmstr(5m (Stockholm 1868), whose designs have been
published with texts in Swedish, Danish, German and English — the last-named In Boston.
The most recent illustrated edition Is the German rendering by Bmil Engelman (Stuttgart 1887),
adorned with engravings from drawings by a group of noted German artists. Frithiofs Saga
has been more than once dramatised, and all Its most popular cantos have been repeatedly
set to music by Scandinavian and German composers. An excellent bibliography of the Ice-
landic saga, and its poetical paraphrase by Tegn^r, was prepared by Gottfried von Leinborg
(Sd ed., Frankfurt 1878) — fairly completo down to 1871 — and was issued, together with tbe'
Swedish text, a German prose translation, very full illustrative notes, and a complete Swe-
dish-German vocabulary ; it is to be regretted that Lelnburg's lists of editions, translations
and comments, have not been continued.
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THE STORY OF" FRITfflOF'
27
(for, in that day, Norway was partitioned among various sovereigns), and
Prithiofs good sword and warlike sliill are needed. The Kings consequently
send Ililding on an embassy to the affronted warrior. Hilding finds him
playing chess with his trusted companion, Bj($rn. The indirect, allegorical
way in which Frithiof contrives, by addressing remarks concerning the game
to his adversary, to answer Hilding^s queries, is thus described by the poet.
We translate literally, and do not attempt to preserve either rhyme or metre : —
Frithiof plays Chess.
BJorn and Fritliiof both were Hitting
At a cheflsboard foir to gaze at ;
Evory other flqnaro was tUver,
Every other one was gold.
Then came Hildlng in : "Be eeatod !
Take the fitting chair of honor,
QnafT tliy horn till I the combat
Finish, foster-fiither good ! "
Hildlng qnoth : — " From iions of Belo
Come I now to thee beseeching;
Fall of eril are the tidings.
And to thee the oonatry looks. '*
Frithiof qnoth : — ♦• Be wise and wary,
BJ8m, for now the King's in danger ;
Sacrifice a Fftwn ^ and sare him,
Fawns are made for saoriAoe. '*
"Frithiof, ronse not Kings to angor,
Stardy grow the eaglets* pinions;
Though 'gainst King their forco be feeble
Mighty is their power to thine."
'* So my castle, Bjom, then threat'nest !
Fearlessly' I wait the onset ;
Not so easy is its capture.
Defended by my tmsty men. "
Ingeborg in Ba]der*s garden
All tlte day-long sits a- weeping;
Cannot she to strife entice thee —
The weeper fair with eyes of bine f "
" The Qneen, Bjoni, then Tainly bnntest; —
Dear to me in every oontest
She's Uio ohessfleld's noblest flgnre,
Howe'er it go she mast be saved."
• • Frithiof, wilt then never answer f
Shall thy foster-fiither leave thee —
Unheard from thy tower departing
Becanse thy doll-play will not endf "
Frithiof then arose, and taking
Jlilding's hand in his responded : —
" Father, I've already answered.
Thou hast heard my soars resolve.
Ride and tell the sons of Bele
What I've said ; they scorned my frienilship,
Broken are the bonds that boand as,
Never will I bo their man."
" Well, follow then the path thoa choosost,
I cannot thy anger oonsnre,
GT«at Odin gnide all things aright ! *'
Spake old Hilding as he went. "*
The modern Icelandic translation of Tegndr^s poem was first published
at Reykjavik in 1866 under the title of " Fri6pj6fssaga, " and was rendered
in the original metres. It may, with truth, be said that the reading of this
version affords even greater pleasure than the perusal of the Swedish original.
In the first place, the rendering is very exact, and the melody of the verse
most effectively reproduced, and, in the second place, not only the proper
names and the old mythological terms, but even the incidents of the tale
have an effect, when given in the language of the saga, which it is diMcult
to match in any modern tongue. The translator is the Rev. Matthias Jochums-
son (6. November 11, 1835), the foremost Icelandic poet of the present gene-
ration, who has published many volumes of original verse, while among his
^ The play upon words cannot be preserved in Biigllah ; bondey the Swedish voeable, sig-
nifies both paum and pea$antt and Frithiof was himself a peasant.
^ A freer translation Is that by the Rev. William I^wery BlaelcUy (Dublin 1857), though
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28
GUESS /Y ICELA ND
translated works are four of Shakespeare's plays ("Macbeth," "Othello/'
" Hamlet " and *' Komeo and Juliet "). We give his version of the chess-
p«rhapii not the beat of the many Ragliah verslont. We qaoto it from the American reprint
edited by Bayard Taylor (New York 1867), and we add, side by side with it, tlie Swedish
text : —
Prithiof plays Chess.
Frlthiof sat with BJSrn the true
At the chess-board, fair to view ;
Stiuares of silver decked the fVame,
Interchanged with squares of gold.
Hiiding entering, thns he greeted : —
*' On the upper bench be seated ;
Drain the horn until my game
I finish, foster-father bold. **
Quoth Tlilding : — Hither come T spccdiiif?,
For King BeleU sons entreating;
Danger daily sounds more near,
And the people's hope art thou.'*
" Bj5rn, '* qUoth Frithiof, " now beware ;
111 thy King doth seem to fare;
A pawn may free him from his fear.
So scruple not to let it go. **
"Court not, Frithiof, Kings* displeasure.
Though with Ring they iii may measure ;
Yet eagles* young have wings of power,
And their force thy strength outvien.**
" If, BjSrn, thou wilt my tower beset,
Thus eanily thy wile I meet ;
No longer canst thou gain my tower,
Which back to plaoe of safety hies.*'
« Fngeborg, in Balder*s keeping,
Passeth all her dayK In weeping ;
Thtne aid in Mtrife may she not claim,
Fearful maiden, azure-eyed."
What wouldst thou, Bj5rn ? Assail my quocn.
Which dear from childhood's days hafh been —
The noblest piece in all the game ?
ITcr I'll defend, whatever betide."
<* What ! Frithiof, wilt thou not reply ?
And shall thy foster-father hie
Unheeded from thy hearth away,
Because thy game is long to end ? "
Thon stood Frithiof up, and Ia!d
Hllding's hand In his, and said :
" Already hast thon heard me say
What answers to their prayers I send.
<* Qo, let the sons of Bela learn
That, tlnoe my suit they dared to spurn,
No bond between us shall be tied,
Their serf I never shall become.*'
" Well I follow on thy proper path ;
111 fits it me to ehide thy wrath.
All to tome good may Odin guide,"
Hiiding said, and hied him home.
Frithiof spelar Schack,
Bjorn orh Frithiof suto bada,
Vid ett schackbord, skSnt at ^kada,
Silfver var hvarannan ruta,
Och hvarannan var af guld.
DSi ateg Hiiding in : " Sitt neder,
Upp i hogbKnk Jag dig leder,
Tom ditt horn, och lat mig alnta
Spelet, fosterfader huld ! "
Hiiding qvad : " Frun Beles seiner,
Kommer Jag till dig med bdner,
Tidutttgarue iiro onde,
Och till dig st&r landets hopp."
Frithiof qvad : "Tag dig till vara,
BjGrn, ty un &r kung I fara.
Fr&lsas kan ban med en bonde,
Dej) &r gjord att offras opp."
" Frithiof, reto Icko kuugar,
Starka r&xa ornous nugar ;
Fast mot Ring de aktas svaga,
Stor iir deras makt mot din."
" Bjorn, Jag ser du tornot hofar,
Men ditt anfall liit Jag motar.
Tornet bllr dig s?art att Uga,
Drar sig 1 sin skGldborg in."
" Ingeborg i Baldershagen,
Sitter och fSrgriHter dagen,
Kan hon dig till strids ej locka,
Graterskan med Sgon bl& ? "
'^Drottning, BJdrn, dn fuf&ngt Jagar,
Var mig k&r frdn barudomsdagar ;
Hon &r spelots b&»ta docka,
Hur dot g&r, hon r&ddas m&."
<' Frithiof, viU du fcke svara ?
Skall din fosterfader fara
OhSrd fr&n din gard, emedan
RJ ett dockspel vill U slut? " —
Da steg Frithiof upp oeh lade
Hildings hand i sin och aade :
"Fader, Jag bar svarat redan,
Du har hOrt min sjftis beslui.
Rid att Beles sdner lira
Hvad jag sagt ; de kr&nkt min ara,
Inga band vid dem mig f&sta,
Aldrig blir jag deras man." —
" VU, din egen bana vandra,
£J kan Jag din vrede klaadra ;
Oden sty re till det b&sUI "
8ade Hiiding oeh fSrsvann.
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TUR STORY OF PRITHIOF
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canto from Ihe second edition of the " Fri»J)j6fssaga " (Reykjavik 1884),
pp. 39-41: —
FrOf^pjofur siiur a^ tafli.
Sat rood fnekonm fiiAtarbr69ar
Fri»t>Jufiir ad taHl hljo^nr ;
Rpntlir silfri og raa^agnlli
Kfdtir skiptoRt borM &,
Hiiding )>4 f iitilla frengnr,
Hod am fAfroar pnl^iir drenj^or.
"Sit og iak vift nigra folH,
P5etri kier, og tail rort t^. "
" KveSJa ber eg Bela aiTja,
BA»ir Fri»))j6f hjilpar bi^ja,
Naa»flyn kn^r ]?& lifts aS leita.
liuidlS gjurvalt treyatir t»6r. "
Bragniog nifeltl : " BJorn, I)fn gspUa,
BoSluDg er f 8t4>rri hmtta,
B6ndina bonam bjiirg mA veita,
B6adiao jafiian skoUp6iio er. '*
" Egn ei, fuatri, nnga hara,
(yhxask t>r<Mka«t J6din ara,
IMtt ]>eir Hringi miftar loegi,
Meiri bneftar era l>^r. "
'* Bjom, 1 biptta brtik K> actur,
Hetja valda skal eg betur,
Hans )>tk franiar befor eigi,
Hr6kor ino 1 skjaldborg fer. "
" logibiurg i Baldarahftga
Beiskan gnetar alia daga^
Getar )>ig ei ginot a5 mor^i
Gr4tin micr me) angan bli T '*
" Drottning, BJurn, tiii bifar eigl,
Brt)»ar ^ fni teskadegl
K)kki' eg, bAa or bezt A bor^i,
BJarga l>eirri vlst eg mA. "
" Skal eg JaAinipr IM t»6r fara,
Frifttu^^fnr, t>A vilt el syara,
Leikar eins eg ekkl vferi,
<>bienheyr5an lietar niig. "
Kappino app }?& MCA aS stnoda,
Styrka Hiidiag r^btir monda :
" Svfiram, fiVstnrfaMr kierl,
Fall am hcf eg stemdan )>ifr.
Belaannom svtir min tj^fto,
Saklaaaan mig gylfar smilSa;
£g er laas vift Jofra bAfta
£g Rit aldrei ik t>olrra bekk."
"^1% skal ekki t>ar am aaka,
I>i) maut flJAlfar r&fi ^v taka;
Alfaftlr skal ollu r&^a, "
Aldinn kva5, og bruato gekk.
Before the time of Bishop Tegn^i^ the poetical adaptability of (he story
of Frithiof the bold (hinn fr?ckni), and his fair Ingebor«;, had been recognized,
and not a few writers had sought to clothe it in a new dress. The earliest of
these was the anonymous author of a versified composition in Icelandic,
which was written down at least as early as the earlier half of the 16th cen-
tury, for that is the date of the codex containing it in the great Arnamag-
nsean collection of Icelandic manuscripts at Copenhagen (cod. 604, c. 4"). It
is one of those productions called ^^rlmur*' (rhymes)— made up of a single
'^rima'" (canto, song) or more— which have been composed in such great
numbers, in all quarters of the island of Iceland, ever since the close of the
classical period of Icelandic literature. These rimur are stories in verse
— resembling somewhat in kind, if far inferior in degree, the narrative
poems of Walter Scott. Their subjects are drawh from an infinite variety
of sources— from the old sagas, from foreign history, from the biblical nar-
ratives, from biographies of heroes, from legendary lore, and so on ; and
until the present generation, they have enjoyed— the best of them at least-
unbounded popularity. A few men— like the late SigurUur Brei^QOrtJ— have
made themselves reputations as rimur- writers, but multitudes of these com-
positions do not rise above mediocrity. They usually comprise, as has al-
ready been said, one or more cantos (rimur), each introduced by a so-called
mamdngur (literally "love-song"), defined in the lexicon of GuDbrand Vig-
fusson as " lyrical introductions to the epic rhapsodies or ballads (rimur),
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CriFSS IN ICELAND
for originally these were addressed to the poet's lady love/' These ear-
liest "Friiipj6fsrimur'' — which lack the raansongup — are in five cantos. A
notice of the work was published by Eugcn Kdlbing, ^ with some extracts,
which are compared with portions of the Swedish poem, in order to prove
the probability of Tegndr's acquaintance, not only with the ancient saga,
but with this more modern metrical version. Dr. Kolbing's essay is of in-
terest, but J6n I^orkelsson, the younger, considers that the Frit>pj6fsrimur do
not rise, in point of literary skill, above the average of similar productions
of an equally early date. ^ More recently these old rimur have been prin-
ted in full at the end of Ludvig Larsson's edition of the prose Fri6pj<3fs
saga, and carefully annotated. The' account of the game at hnefalafl oc-
curs in canto ii, stanzas 12-22, as follows: —
Fylkir snndi fncf^on maun
Fri«]>juf lite aft kveftja ;
Fyrftar sej^ eg aft fanda l>anu
Fleygl Dciftra beftja.
PrOftan kyodda plAta ninn,
Pr^ddan handar skafli,
ITvonij^n n&a I>eir hneni mnnn
Hcrsi no Bjorn aft tafll.
B&ra t>eir hcmi bnuftra orft
Og bAftn hann liftinu aafna ;
Oat eg hann fyr ylft falda Rkorft
Fyaast 86r aft gamua.
Talafti hann nm tallAina skil
Fyr traustam hringa baldri,
Lita vQ&KXxx BJom MA\,
Bregftnm vift l>vi aldri.
Frift])J5fl Hlldingnr b.-ctti H
Horftn af fylkia arfa,
Illnm koBtam iDmti fik,
Annaft hyggst aft starfik
Bjorn fhik eg telja tvlkost |»ann
Treilnnr fyrir aft tefla,
Hinn kvaft mnnda aft hneCaanm lagt,
Jlolga yil eg ei efla.
Ekki fengn crindi raonn
Onnur hcldiir en ))es»i,
Kappinn ])d fyr konga renu
Meft klitlog orftin I>AA8i.
Helgi npnrfti Uilding aft,
nvaft alik orftin |>^fta,
Groina md. eg, kraft garpnrinn, )>aft,
£f gramnr yill til )>om hl/fta.
Par or hann talafti nni tnflsina skil,
Tiifla fagra eina,
KJKKI^^ K^t ^Si l^r berai A bil
Halda i drifti fleina.
En or eg hrottl' af hendi \\n
Ilorai yondam koati,
Voik l>d lltt }»aft yornm sin
Yopnameiftar og brosti.
Bjorn gat tranftan tvikost sagt
Tyeimnr fyrir aft styra,
Hinn kvaft mnndn aft hnefannm lagt,
Brings nafo osa vill sk^ra.
Syo m&ttn fyr seima vift
Systar ]>innar gseta,
Hygg eg iDtla hersis nlft
Hitta brAfti ma>ta. "
In the present century the history of Frithiof has been twice similarly
treated, but subsequently to the publication of Tegner*s work. The first is
in the ** Rimur of FriSJ)j6fl frsekna,*' comprising seven songs, composed in
1837 by Ami SigurOsson, of Skutar in North Iceland, a little-known rimur-
writer. They exist, still jnedited, in the manuscript collection of the Ice-
landic Literary Society (B6kmentaf61ag) at Copenhagen, with other rimur by
the same liand. ^ They are little likely to see the light, since the libraries
** '* Beilrftge rar vergleiehenden geschlchte der romantltohen poesle and prosa dea mlt«
telalters" (Breslan 1876), pp. 207 -}17, being an eway " Ueber die vorschieienen bcarbeitangen
der FrifttJ6fMaffe."
* *<Om digtalagen p& laland I det 15. og 16. Arhandrodo'* (KMbenbavn 1888), pp. 148-li9.
^ " Sagan oek rimorna om Prift])j6fr hinn frcekni," edited by Ladvig Lartsou (Kdbenhavn
1893), pp. 101-10S.
^ See *' Sk^rsia um handrltaaafn hinn islenxka b^kmcntaf&lags," by SIgurftar J6nasion
(Kaupmannahfifti 1869), I., p. 117 (8" n* 38, rimaakver).
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THE STORY OF FRITHIOF
31
of Iceland have, on their shelves, accumulated stores of similar productions,
which, if they have had any publicity at all, have only obtained it by cir-
culating from hand to hand in written copies. ^ The second work to which
allusion has been made has, however, attained to the dignity of print. This
is the "Rimur of FriCpjdfl fra?JLna," written in 1863 by LiiOvik Blondal,
but only printed in 1884 (Reykjavilt). These rimur are in ten songs, in the
third of which is to be found the account of Hilding*s mission and o( the
game he witnessed.— Besides these productions in rimur form, the Danish
poet, Johan Samsoe (6. 1759, d. 1796), wrote a romantic tale "Frithiof,"' pub-
lished in the first volume of his " Efterladte digteriske Vtcrker *' (Kjeb-
enhavn 1796), pp. 1-32, and subsequently translated, with two other tales
from the sagas by Samsse, into Swedish— '^Frithiof, Hildur, och Ilalfdans
Sdner. Trenne nordiska Sagor'* (Stockholm 1814)— a production which was
very likely known to Togn<^r, but which appears to contain no mention of
" There to little of poetical worth In the •* Rimar af Frl^l^Jofl frskna frortUinwynl," a«
It it atyled in Ami Big urftMon'* US. The writer does not make hto peraonaset play cheaa,
but holds to the hna/aUkJi of tho aaga, like hta 16th eentury predeceaaor, and In hia second
rima, rersea 57-T4 (pp. 85-86), thua portraya the fame : —
Tefldu branda bdrfarnir
BJffre, Fri91>J6fur Ilka,
Ilildiuf vanda hoHaan fcr
Uveran iatandl fltfggaat t^r.
Bar npp ikirast b6n um 119,
BIrta nam af Hring!,
A8 Tildl hiirum velta 6tt\^,
Velgatir me^ rauglnti^.
Styrkja hara hlitar d/r,
Hara i fara mnggu ;
Rngu avarar tjorgu tir,
Til BJarnar hann m»ltl ak^r :
Billna aufta bert i ata»,
Bregfta el muutd, vinur !
Vtl 6trau9ar — tekat m£r l>a»-
Tdflunnt raaSu aetja aft.
Hvort aft forftaft henni er,
Ilelat mig girnir vita.
Sendur korfta tir enn t6r :
Tja akal orftia Helga )>6r.
Hiiram fara ef hikar meft,
Hit t>6r ofurkostum.
^gja bara bragnlog rM;
BJdrna kom rara audaTsreft :
Tvikoat lita i tafll mk,
Tvo fr4 vegl aft lelka,
Til hnefans ita eg man 1>4;
Byftlr riu m6i nam tj4 :
Otraaftarl t>6 man )>ir
I>ykja tvikoatarlnn.
I{llding bara hurt aA fer,
Bifta a vara gagnlauat er.
F6r til baka, birti i aUft
Braaftram Frlft])j6fa racftu,
Hvaft orftUkift |>iftl [>aft, *
I>elr allapakan fr6tta aft.
Bllift l>iftir : baagaver
• BIft 4 lff>tur verfta
M«ft ykkur alrifta Hrlnga vlft her,
Ilygginn akifta njotnr l^r.
Taflan raiifta merkja ra4
UaMa InglbJ5rgn,
Best mun auftar beftju g4,
Brodda hauftur mieiti |»a.
I>«gar haeita l>nndl b6t
I*t!kQgu af ykkar hcudi,
BOrlun akeyta, best avo m«t,
BJ6ru )>aft heita tvikoai 16t.
Ifaeflun t>^ftir Hriug eg akil,
Hvaft Frlft)>J6far meiutl.
K6ogar l^ft ainn t^a til
TIriluga atriftau heya bll.
Lata frida frit — or tjeft —
riytja i Baldnrshaga,
DS aita bliftar mvyar meft,
Margt t>»r pr^ftlr llnnabeft.
8irhvor Ufla aouur kvaft :
Siat Friftt>j6fur vogar,
(IJSra vol i grifta staft,
Goftunum vel el likar l>a?>.
The title of the other modern work, now printed, In : — " Rimur af Friftl>jdfl fr«ekua, orkt
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CHESS IN ICELAND
choss. Another Danish poet, Nicolai Bierfreund Sotoft (6. 1790 d, 1844), also
left a composition— in dramatic form— taken from the same source. It is
contained in his " Romantiske Digte " (Kjobenhavn 1815), pp. 1-180. It is in
blank verse and is called " Skjon Ingeborg og Frilhiof, romantisk Skuespil,"
in five acts. The chess scene occupies a very scanty space, in the second
act, and betrays no great familiarity with any game on the part of the au-
thor. At the end of it, in response to Hilding's appeal for an answer, Fri-
thiof starts up and exclaims:— ** Kast Spillet sammen ! spsend mig Bry-
nien paa ! *'
heflr Lii^vik Bldadal (18(>S)," (tteykjavik 1884). We copy the portion of the third rima devoted
to the game of hnefatafl (Stanaaa 27-46, pp. 19-2«) : -
Br«9ur vcudu vih am atund
Vjelaray , *r meat pd akeyta ;
Uilding aendu & Fri»t)j6r« fund,
Fyl^d hsna b4du ajer ad velta.
Bryujufa&tli beztan gat
Daugaflcyi^l litid iuui,
Hann a& taill hncfa sat,
Il^r ]>6 e<gi akemmtaa aioui.
Halt avo talar Uildiugur:
"HingaS parfa mrolll vonia;
I>Jer nu valinn I>or8tclu8 bur
I>eDgnsarfar kve?ju aoiida.
Uoti Hriugi bara H^
Hollaet bi^ija \>\e VLf> vita,
Sto ei allngur flwml fri?,
Fleiua i i&Ju ralJur avelta.
I
Hann peim aka^a heflr tje?>,
Hugara^kl' er vaktl atranga,
OJafnai&i' og of»a mcb
A vlll riki telrra gauga."
KappiQD efldl litid m
LagM glldom fleinahara,
Bj5ru hann tclldf v«skur vld,
Vill ei Ililding neinu avara.
Sto til BJariiar aag^M hinn
Sverdablynur tlgnarlegi:
«'BiI er liarna, br6&ir minn,
Bregma vinor muuta elgi. "
Helct otraudur hann 1*4 kva«
Hugar meinam var oi skerftur :
•< T6fla raulba* eg set aTi,
Og avo reynl' ef for»a» verftar."
Bendibodinn aagM l>i :
<<6iu ]}6 haa hver aft gafU;
I»etta atofta ])ig el ma,
yd mant afar koatum tseta.
Yiat ei QSlga vluir hjer
yOakum dreng ]>6 aukfat bagi ;
8vo baft Helgi aegja ]>jer.'*
Svarar engu kappinn fricgi.
Ilreyatiiega herkjum ))a,
HJalift Bjarnar lir nam akera :
*• Tvo mi voga toila' fri,
Tvikoat tiarua met eg vera. *'
Svorfta-auftuu avarar hion :
" Setja' aft hnefa gaman vari,
Pa olrauftau tvikoatinu
Tel an efa, broftir kterl. *'
Ilildiugs sotMi hugur m&,
Harmapiou IJoiri aeldur;
Anoau fn^r ei iirakurft ]>a;
Aptur ainar Iciftir heldur.
Sr^iriii mildiugs souuui iijott
Scgja n&ir hann aft vonum ;
lluiptin trylldi hugi akjolt
lliyra pa i vaudroeftonum.
Spurftu uiftiugs tamir trd
T^rar korfta luanniun Mpaka,
Hverja i^yfting ])j6ftin uii
TTr t>«aaum orfturo megi taka. —
" Litt eg bricddur leugi ajeat"
— laufa yggur avarar kaetti, —
" I>ar hanu ricddi um bilift beat
Bil k hyggja' um lift hana m»tti.
I>6lt aft anauftir vierum vjer
Vit og liatir Frift|>j6r pr^fta,
Taflan raufta eflauat er
Ykkar ayatir bl6ma frifta.
Aft l>elm atefndi' eg orftum ])4
ITui aem gift! litt aft hirfta,
Br4tt um hefndir brasftrum fri ;
Bj6rn ]}aft nifti tvikoata virfta.
'Utotti kneflnn merkja Ilring
Meat aem kefur hugi granna
I>anu in efa )>j6ftmscring ;
I>etta gefur raun aft aanna.
Ykkar masta ayatir aizt
Sorgar byrinn ntti* aft kanna,
Hennar gsetift vel avo viat
Yondra fyrlr brfigftum manna. '*
#
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STRA Y NOTES
33
4. — Stray Notes.
Kagndfl OlaliBSon's Latin Poem on CheM.
The reverend Magnus Olafsson, a posthumous son of a poor peasant, was
born in EyjaQarQars^sla in North Iceland in 1573. His mother, in wandering
about one winter night to beg food for her child, perished with cold, and
was found, the next morning, with her living son lying upon her breast. He
was adopted by the well-to-do Benedikt Halld6rs8on, who had discovered
and rescued him, and who sent him, later on, to bo educated at the Cathe-
dral school of H61ar, whence he entered the University of Copenhagen
about 1590. He became a man of great learning, compiled what may pos-
sibly be looked upon as the first printed Icelandic lexicon (^' Specimen lexici
Runici,'* published at Copenhagen in 1G5()), served for a while as rector of
the HOlar school, and died as priest of Laufas, not far from his birth-place,
in 1636. He was a constant correspondent, on archaeological and philological
subjects, of the distinguished Danish antiquary, Ole (Olaus) Worm, to whom
he dispatched in 1627 or 1628, a set of Icelandic chessmen, accompanying
them by two stanzas in Latin, whicli we here copy, with the author*s notes,
as printed in Worm's correspondence, so making only some slight orthographic
(or typographic) changes in the Icelandic vocables:—
AD D. D. OLAUM WORMIUM
De Skdkus ad eum missis.
LairoDes ad litee
Lodioraa hant rnden,
CaroA claaaoa lev!
Clare vir due in lares.
Cnia oampam dari
Cominas m promunt,
Getioe gi-ares i-oiet
Geus dincolor, onaea.
TranstaUt in monatri
Thyrao plectooda Cyrce,
Sermone, sic, fornias
SatelUtea. atro»
rostqvam Yidat vir custiis
Venn ceoinlt ierao,
Forte qrod confertim
Canam Ueseriut auaoi.
8k&kU9 sivo Sl&kfMaur in
yetori iingra Norvi^g. idem est,
qvod Latro viatLeut (Scheoher
ctiam Germ. Latro didtor,) itsm
ad Skdka (inlhiitiv.) est InUr-
fture, umic abusive utimur, In
jurgio couvitio aliqvo moi-dsjci
alterlaa famam vulneraro. Hann
Bkilkar honam i. e. eonvitiwm
dieit. Qvara mi hi Ludu$ non
ScaehicE, sed Sehachi appellan-
das vidctar.
Y pro I matatio liiterie liccu-
tia vetut) in hoc geoere Rliytb-
mi, ut dire< Uo consonantiwqvam
orfchograpbisu migor habcatur
raLio.
Talis forma Rhythmi generalissima olim fait in Lingva Norvcg. ut etiam
Danica, qvam appellabant Drottqvieft, qu. rulgo caniabiie; Drdti enim turham
significat. Hac etiam Heroum facta dccantabant.
The peculiarity of this brief poem is that it is an attempt to reproduce
in Latin the so-called* drdu/tror^, an antique Icelandic metrical form in which
the very ancient skaldic verses, which appear in so many of the sagas, are
** "Olal Wormil et ad earn doctorum virorum epiatolse** (IFavni^c 1761), pp. S56>3o7.
6
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34 CHESS IN ICELAND
composed— with its peculiar alliteration (the two or three emphatic sylla-
bles of each couplet beginning with the same consonant, or with different
vowels), and other characteristics. In his first note the writer commits the
error— which, as we shall see, later and more pretentious lexicographers
have done — of making the Icelandic skdk cognate with the German schdcher
(robber), and of comparing it to the Latin latro of the same meaning — a
word entering into the name of the Latin game, ludiis IcUrunculorum, which
was regarded by the archeologists of an ignorant age as identical with chess.
The reply of Worm to this letter, dated 1628, begins thus:— "Literas tuas
una cum transmissis Scacchis probe accepi, Vir eruditissime, pro qvibus
gratias ut ago debitas, ita occasionem do te vicissim bene merendi oblatam
iri unice exoptarem. Literaturam nostram ut ot poesin elucidantia qvjo com-
municasti, exosculor ; de lis enim libruni conscripsi, ut spero baud inutilem,
in qvo suo merito et haec locum inveniont, non sine tui honoriflca mentione.
Qvod si a te Rythmum Ih'otqvet [Drdttkvaett] antiqva nostra lingva,juxtaque
poeseos vestrse leges conscriptum, in hujus commendationem impetrare pos-
sem, magno me affectum beneflcio existimarem.'* These are not the only
chessmen carved in Iceland which we hear of in connection with the cor-
respondance of Worm ; we shall find another poet alluding, twenty years
later, to a similar set.— Perhaps it is well to note also the acquaintance of
the author with Vida's epical poem, ^'Scachei's,*' as evinced in the second
stanza, showing that Iceland, in the 17th century, was not wholly destitute
of foreign chess literature.
It is proper to state that these verses by Magnus Olafsson were first
printed by Worm in his "Danica literatura antiqvissima " (Hafniae 1651,
pp. 176-77), in connection with an Icelandic imitation of the old dr6ttkva)(3i,
also in two stanzas, and also by Magnus Olafsson. This latter is reproduced
both in Runic characters and in the Latin letter. The Latin poem on the
chess pieces is there preceded by the following lines from Worm's pen: —
'' Quo fine Latinum qvoq3 subnectere libuit paradigma generis quidem
Drbttqvaett, sed absq^ literarum intricatione et logogrypho, ab eodem au-
tore concinnatum, et ad me, ante annos aliqvot una cum ludi Scachici in-
cunculis affabre in Islandia ex ossibus elaboratis, transmissum.*' Magnus
Olafsson's " Runic Lexicon," was a dictionary of the oldest Icelandic, chiefly
as used in Runic inscriptions, and was, for its time, a remarkable work. The
vocabulary was in Runic letters, and the definitions in Latin characters.
Two Witnesses.
The last years of the 16th century, and the last years of the 17th century,
present the testimony of two foreign witnesses— of the most intelligent and
trustworthy character— in regard to the cultivation of chess in Iceland be-
fore and during those periods. The first of these is the learned Norwegian
priest— a provost or rural dean— Peder Clausson Friis (1545-1614), the earliest
of his modern countrymen to appreciate and translate the historical work of
Snorri Sturluson— the monumental history of the Kings of Norway. Friis
wrote, as far back as 1580, a tractate "Om lisland," which, towards the close
of the century, he revised and enlarged. It was somewhat altered by Olaus
Worm, the Danish scholar, of whom we have Just spoken, and incorporated
by him with other writings of Friis, published, eighteen years after the au-
thor's death, under the title of ** Norriges oc Omliggende 0ors sandfajrdige
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STRAY XOTES 36
Bescriffuelse'' (Kjobenhaffn 1632). The author not only knew Icelandic well,
but was in a position to obtain the most accurate information as to the
customs of the islanders in his time. The island, in his day, was still looked
upon as belonging to Norway, rather than to Denmark. His work, as compiled
and edited by Worm, on Norway, her colonies and islands, remained the great
authority, until it was superseded by the topographical writings of a still
greater man and a still better scholar, the Icelander, I^orm6{^ur Torfason
— a life-long resident of Norway— better known in the learned world under
his Latinized name of Torfjeus. Lately, the noted Norwegian philologist and
critic, Gustav Storm, has published an admirable edition of the writings of
Peder Glausson Friis, in which is found the treatise "Om lisland" in the
exact form in which the author's final revision left it. From it we translate
the following paragraph "Om Skag-TafTll:" —
Concerning the Game of Chess,
They [the Icelanders] have also in their country especially occupied
themselves with the practice of the game of chess, which they are said to
play in such a masterly and perfect way that they sometimes spend some
weeks' time— playing each day— on a single game, before they can bring
it to an end by the victory of the one or the other combatant. But of whom
they first learned this art I have not read. ^
The other witness to whom we refer is the author of a book widely read in
its day— both in English and French. It was styled ''An account of Denmark,
as it was in the year 1692,'' and was published at London in 1694. A second
and a third issue followed within a year, but the best edition is the later
one of 1738. The author was Robert, Viscount Molesworth (6. 1656, d. 1725),
who, besides having been sent as an extraordinary envoy to Denmark, was a
member both of the Irish and the English parliaments, as well as of the
English Royal society, an intimate friend of the great Earl Shaftesbury, and
both the friend and adviser of Queen Anne and King George the First. He was
the author of other productions besides the " Account of Denmark," but that
is the book on which his literary reputation chiefly rests. In the first issue
of Molesworth's work occurs (pp. 39-40) the following brief paragraph on
Chess in Iceland.
Island «^ and Feroe are miserable Islands in the North Ocean; Corn will
not [will 5carc«— edition of 1738] grow in either of them, but they have good
* "Satnlode akriftor af Pedcr Claaiiaen Friit.— Udglvne for den norske hUtorlike fore-
« uing af Dr QusUr Storm*' (Kristiania 1881), p. 199, tho text, in the quaint orthography
of the wrlter*B time, reading thuii: —
" Om 8kag-TafflI.»'
" De haffiier oo beaenderllgen der paa Laudett befllttet oo eflFuet nig paa dot Spill
Skagetalfll eller Skagsplll, haUcbot der slgea at de kunde taa mesterligen oe fuldkommeli-
gen loge, at de knnde nogen IJgers TIJd lege hver Dag paa et Spill, ferend de kande faa
det til Knde oe den ene kand vinde den anden offaer. Men hnem de feret haffue faaet den
.Konst aff, hafltier leg iehe lent."
*^ In •nbsequent edition! (nee that of 173S, p. S6), this Is corrected to Ifland^
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3G CHESS IN ICELA ND
Stocks of Cattle. No Trade is permitted them but with the Danes ; the Inhabi-
tants are great Players at Chess. It were worth some curious Man*s enquiry
how such a studious and difficult Game should get thus far North-ward, and
become so generally used.
The historian of chess, Antonius van der Linde— to whose profound and
long-continued labors in a field not easily tilled the world is greatly in-
debted—reprints, from the French translation of Molcswortlf s book, the pas-
sage we have here cited, and endeavors to riddle it with his sharp critical
shots.* As those who have perused his stupendous "Geschichte des Schach-
spiels," and his series of articles on "Skak paa Island'' in the "Dansk
Skaktidende," will have had occasion to observe. Dr. v. d. Linde's knowledge
of Iceland and of Icelandic is too limited to enable him to treat Icelandic chess
with the extraordinary accuracy and logical judgment evinced in his investi-
gations into other domains. He does not seem to have seen Molesworth's
original (English) text, but the French version is satisfactorily exact. He
tries, first of all, to depreciate Molesworth's testimony in general, by saying
(in allusion to the writer's use of the form *'Feroe") that he evidently regards
'* Iceland and Feroe" as two islands ("die der^'erfasser fiir zwei insoln zu
halten scheint I ") If Dr. v. d. Linde had looked a little more closely into
the history of geography, he would have found that the English —and the
French as well — have never been able to settle on a proper way of adapting
to their own tongue the name of the island group which the Danes now call
"Faerarer," but of which the official Danish orthography, in Molesworth's
time, was "Faerae" (without the final r). The word is, of course, a corruption
of the Icelandic "Fscreyjar" (i. e. sheep islands), and terminates with the
Danish plural form (^ = island, 0er=islands), the singular of which, descended
from the Icelandic, remains in the final syllable of our place-names, 'horsey,"
'* Guernsey," ^^Anglesea"— -not to mention the appellations of other islands.
Some English writers haye tried to solve the difficulty by getting as near
the Danish form as our alphabet will permit, and have written "Feroe"
(like Viscount Molesworth), thereby running the risk of being charged by
some too wise critics (like Dr. v. d. Linde) with considering the group as a,
single island. Others have boldly added the English plural ending, and
written "Faroes" (or "Feroes"), thereby running tlie risk of being charged
with committing a grammatical solecism in the use of a double plural. The
ignorance here is thus Dr. v. d. Linde's, rather than Viscount Molesworth's.
The former next denies the truth of the latter's immediately following asser-
tion, in regard to the good stock of cattle in Iceland, and states that the island
has no cattle ('*auf Island werden im gegentheil nur schafe nnd kleine pferde
gehalten"), while by a very little research— the briefest enquiry at the Danish
statistical bureau, for instance — he could have ascertained that on this point,
too, Molesworth was much better informed than himself. The fact is that in
1703— a decade after Molesworth wrote— the cattle of Iceland numbered 35,860
head— more than one to every two inhabitants. He passes by the English
writer's succeeding statement, namely that the Icelanders are allowed to have
commercial dealings only with the Danes, which was then, and for a century
^ " Quelleoatadicu sur geftchlcbte det achacfasplela von Dr. A. ▼« d« Lind« " (Berlin 1881),
pp. 311-912.
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STRAY NOTES 37
and a half afterwards, perfectly true. Finally, in a foot-note, he falls foul of
the information given by Molesworth in regard to Icelandic chessplaying,
saying that his remark merely sliows what was thought at Copenhagen in
1692 about chess in Iceland. But at any rate it does show that, which counts
for not a little, for in the 17th century, as both before and since, Copenhagen
was the one European capital in which trustworthy accounts about Iceland
and its customs were to be had. Then, as now, every year witnessed tlie
arrival of Icelanders in Copenhagen, and the departure of Danes— merchants
and officials— for Iceland; then, as now, there was always a considerable col-
ony of Icelanders— numbering in this year of 1900 some seven hundred souls —
resident in the Danish metropolis ; then, as now, there was always a body of
intelligent young Icelanders— the number this year is sixty or more — from
all parts of their native land, pursuing their studies at the university of Co-
penhagen. What was thought about chess in Iceland at Copenhagen in 1092
would, therefore, be apt to be pretty near the truth. ^
The Chen Lays of Steftn 6lafiMon.
Next to Hallgrimur Petursson, the almost inspired writer of the "Fifty
Passion Hymns,'' the most prominent Icelandic poet of the 17th century was
undoubtedly Stefan Olafsson, born somewhere about 1620 and dead somewhere
about 1688. The son of a country priest, he had half a score of brothers and
sisters, and, a country priest himself, he became the parent of nearly as
many children. Late in life (1671), he was made a rural dean. It is a fact
worthy of mention that directly from one of his daughters were descended
the two most noteworthy poets of the island during the first half of this
century. ** Liice the priest, Hallgrimur Pdtursson, he was also a hymnologist,
for besides composing original hymns he rendered into Icelandic many of
those of the famous Danish hymn-writer, Bishop Thomas Kin^o. ^ He pos-
sessed a layman's wit as well, and an abundant measure of wanton humour.
Many are his still-remembered quips and epigrams and quaint and curious
conceits. Ho was, moreover, learned in ancient lore, and a good Latinist,
both in verse and prose. But wiiat we have to note in these pages is his
three chess poemettes (if we may use the word), each of a single eight-line
stanza— models of compactness, of hidden fancies, of sonant alliteration, of
correct metrical form— indeed, in this last characteristic, they show some
of the weaknesses of his age, and of the age of the rimur-writers, with whom
sense had sometimes to give way to sound or rhyme. About the authorship
of the third piece there is some dispute, though it is ascribed to his pen in the
two oldest MSS. We first present the Icelandic text of the three as it is given
by his latest editor. Dr. J6n I>orkelsson the younger, whose knowledge of the
post-reformation verse of Iceland is unequalled. His edition is published by
the Icelandic Literary Society. ^
^ It may perhapt be eousldcred, In Its way, a noticeable comment on Dr. v. d. Lindens
disbelief In the leclandern* fondness for ohess that an Icelander, Mr. Maflpnus Smith, resid-
ing at Winnipeg, Manitoba, is now the foremost chess'player of Canada, having won the
eharopionship of Bnglish North America last summer (1899).
^ Bjami Thorarensen (1786-1841) and Jonas Ilallgrimsson (1807-1845).
^ Many of the hymns of this bishop of the Danish island of Fyen (1634-1703) are still
kept In the hymn-book of the Danish chureh.
^ "Stefan 6lafsson. KraeM'* (8 vols. Kanpmannshofb 1885-86), II., pp. 47-50.
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38 CHESS IN ICELAND
Taflvisur.
I.
Til Porsteins Magnussonar^ er skdldich misti mann % skdk.
MflBli eg nm og mmli eg &
AA inenn haon Steina falli 1 ntvA,
Houam hrifl glettan gr&,
Gefl i eina tvo og t>ijA,
Gamla hrapi Qorina fr4,
Fwikki nin reita pcMn smii,
Falli |>anninn fnodnaknl,
FAi bann mAlin Ug og M.
II.
J6n leiknr ak&r ak&k,
Sk6k haun af m^r hvem hr6k,
Biaknpinn f6kk nSrask,
Riddarinn og peftsnidd,
A gomin er komilb gaDgsvingI,
Gm hdn ekki a» nA br«9.
Kongarinn mfii forfang
F6kk m&m oMt.
III.
Fallega Bplllir frillan akollana olln,
Frtkin sti, aem l>li liefar ntk a& antia,
Heinian Iseniist hamiu i sliBina skmiDl,
Hr6k 6kl6kan kKikdtt t6k tkr fl6ka.
Biddarion ataddar, reiddar, leiddar, hneddar
RelSnr veSnr me^ 6geft a9 peTii,
Biakaps'htekinn bloakrar nisknm htiska,
Vis bekklnn gekk, bvo hiekkinn l>ekktr ekki.
The following literal English prose translations, with their brief com-
ment, are the work of an Icelandic hand, ^ and reproduce with all possible
clearness the meaninoj of the originals: —
Chess Lays.
I.
To Porsteinn Magnusson^ * when Vie poet lost a piece at chess.
My malediction I utter-— May Stoini*s men fall in heaps 1 May my fear-
ful incantations bewitch him so that peril shall beset two or three of his pieces
^ Both the renderinfif of the lUDias and the comment hare been obligiugly made in
Knttlieh by my fk-iend, Mr. 8IgfUa B16ndal, whose great familiarity with his own and other
modern literatures Is well known.
^ It is possible that the adviirsary at chess, to whom these lines are addressed, Is that
I>orsteinn Magniisson (d. 1656), chief offlelal (syslamaftur) of Skaptafellssysla, the county next
to that In which the poet dwelt, who wax the author of a description of the eruption of the
vuleano Katla, which took place in 1635, and of other works still In MS. Or was he the
I>or8teinn Magniisson, who. In 170S, wrote the *' Rimnr af Hr61fl Qautrekssyni '* (preserred
among the Arna-Magn«an treasures) ? But the latter's home was far from that of Dean Stefan.
Nothing is known, or surmised, of the poet's other opponent at chess, alluded to as " J6n **
In the aeoond piece.
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STRA Y NOTES 39
at once ! Biay the Old One ^ lose her life ! May the wee pawns grow fewer and
fewer on the squares, and may he be mated both with the low and high mates !
II.
John is the better man at chess ; he has wrested IVom me each rook ;
the quiet of my bishop, my knight and my pawns is ruthlessly broken ; the
Old One is moving about aimlessly, not seeing her prey when within reach ;
my king is overmastered and completely checkmated.
III.
She is spoiling all beautifully, that damned jade, your queen, whom you
are now moving; she steals away from her house, clever in her coarse boast-
fulness, neatly picking the stupid rook from the throng. The knight, on
hand, kept ready for combat, well guided, falls afeard despite his own
wrath, and dares only attack sullenly a puny pawn, while the cowardly rook,
fearful of the bishop's menace, keeps to his border line and thus evades the
stratagems of the enemy.
Comment.
The text of the three stanzas is, in some places, very diAlcult of com*
prehension, and possibly corrupted. The following notes may perhaps be of
some use to the student : —
I.
moeli eg urn og mceli eg d. — Here two constructions are confounded :
lYUxla um and leggja d, the meaning of both these phrases being <Ho pro-
nounce and impose a magic spell ; *' the use of mcela d can only thus be
accounted for, or defended. This sort of metaphorical confusion occurs
sometimes in Icelandic, though hardly as frequently as in the classical liter-
atures.
faUi i strd^ literally *'fall in the straw;'* compare strd-drepa^ "kill a
great number."
grd ''gray, *' but used here in the same sense as in grdii gatnan^ ''dan-
gerous," "dreadful." A kindred use is to be seen in Vulgar^ enn grd^
" the perfidious " (in the Njila), and in the compound ^r«7ynrfttr, "malicious."
gefi i ei7iUy "give [to danger] at one and the same time." This is the
only rational interpretation, as two or three men cannot be given up [that
is, by capture, to the adversary] at one and the same move, but they can be
simultaneously endangered or menaced.
frceiNiskrd is simply "song," but here in the sense of "incantation."
truUin Idg og hd alludes to the singular Icelandic custom, now obsolete,
of arranging the men, or closing a game, in such a way that there might be
a sequence of mates — the more numerous the better. The multitudinously
mated player was hindered meanwhile from moving by the circumstance
that every succeeding move of his adversary was an additional checkmate.
The first three mates effected, uninterruptedly, in this manner were known
as the "low checkmates", lag mdt; if more followed they were styled the
"high checkmates," hd mdt. See the essay on chess by Olafur Davil^sson
^ By the tUl« of the "Old One" the poet alludes to the eheat-queea. Tbla epitbeti in
mediaeval cbeM, was sometimet applied to the bishop.
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40 CHESS IN ICELAND
in his *'Gatur, Jwilur og skemlanir," wherein the names of the different
checkmates are enumerated— reprinted as the second appendix to this volume.
II.
skok^ "shook'' "wriggled/* "wrested.'*
forfang^ can have but one meaning here, namely, that the king was
overpowered, but its etymology is doubtful. Mr. Eirikur Magnusson, of
Cambridge, points out to me that it may be the Danish forfang (Swedish,
forf&ng) ; I believe he is right, and that it can possibly be used as Icelandic,
in which case it is likely that it is employed in the sense of eiga fullt i
fangi, or something to that effect —the meaning being nearly identical.
ofldt. Mr. Eirikur Magnusson proposes the ingenious textual emen-
dation offdu^ which, from a graphical point of view, seems probable; ofldu,
"without treachery," that is "genuinely," "thoroughly", would yield an
excellent interpretation. If, however, we read ofldl, the signification must be
something like "shamefully or proudly treated by the adversary," (compare
ofldtutigr); but as oflrH can hardly be brought into grammatical relation with
any of the words in its vicinity, I feel convinced that something is at fault
with the text— unless there be an unpardonable introduction, by the poet, of
a meaningless word simply to furnish a rhyme, in accordance with a deplo-
rably frequent usage of the period.
III.
frillan shoUans^ literally "the devil's concubine;" but, in cursing, the
genitive form of the devil's numerous names is only used appositionally, so
that the meaning would be "the damned harlot."
hamin i, compare henija ("restrain"), ohetnja^ hamr, here with the
sense of "skilled in." I suspect that Stefan Olafsson wanted to say tamin^
"educated in," but as this was impossible on account of the alliteration,
which demanded a word beginning with h, he substituted hamin in the sense
of the other vocable. Such unwarrantable substitutions are especially com-
mon in the rimur.
floki must hero mean "the press or thronging of the chessmen."
biskups hdskinn, here the "danger arising from the bishop," not the
"bishop's danger." Analogies are numerous in the poetry of the time.
niskum hnska^ most probably the rook is meant, as the word hr6kur is
often used in a bad sense, like /uV^Ai, and indicates sometimes a proud, some-
times a corrupt person, the latter especially in the compound kvenna-hrokur.
vi^ hekkinn can only mean that the rook kept himself close to the
border of the chess-board— 6eAAr=roNd.
hrekkinn pekkir ekki, that is " does not know the dodge, artifice, trick,"
"evades the stratagem or attack of the bishop."^
On account of its remarkable use of identical vocal sounds— carried as it
is to an extreme— the third piece is often committed to memory by young
^ The third of these pieces, as we haro stated, has other clalmalnts to Its authorship.
One HS attributes it to Gu^mundur Bergi^orsson (166.)- 1705), a proliAc riiaur-vrriter; and
there is a story which ascribes it to Kaguhcidur Brynjolfsdottir, the unfortunate daughter
of tbu well-known and erudite Brynjolfur Svuinssoo, bishop of Skalbolt. An allusion to this
talc is made by Mr. Olafur DaviCta^on, Su the article which wo priut later on.
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STRAY NOTES 41
Icelanders as an exercise in phonology, or as a curiosity of composition. To
understand its extraordinary structure it is necessary to examine each line
separately. Thus the first line is marked by a consUnt repetition of the
double liquids U (a combination having the pronunciation in Icelandic of dl);
they form the medial consonants of each word. In the second line, the empha-
sis falls persistently on the long vowel w (with the pronunciation of the En-
glish 00 in tool), which occurs five times. In line three, the middle consonant
of all the vocables but one is m, preceded and followed by vowels. The
fourth line presents the syllable ciA— all long— in five recurrences. Line five
is that producing the most notable sonant effect, with five instances of me-
dial dd. Lino six, in each of its fiwe words, has the dental ch (the English
th in this). The seventh and eighth lines, the former with its recurrence of
medial sk, and the latter with its harsh double consonants kk, are nearly as
effective to the ear as the fifth. The sound of it all, when well read, is
strikingly strange— being a kind of rattling jingle. Neither Homer, nor any
other classic author, has produced anything quite like these cadences, while
the only resemblances to them in English are found perhaps in "The Bells"
of Poe. But alliterative oddities, somewhat similar, are not infrequent in
the exuberant poesy of Iceland. There is a long lay called "Uattalykill
rimna'' by a I6th century bard, Hallur Magnusson, in which the metres
employed by the rimur-poets are enumerated, among them being one enti-
tled "dyri hittur,'' of which the author gives the following example": —
Stttttur, steyttur, duttar, fleyttr
Fljott or breyttur, akjdtt her proyttr
I>dkitiir Bkreyttur, h&ttur hreyttr
Bxiti noittaTy msetti reittr.
There is also a jingle by a modern rhymster, Olafur Gunnlaugsson Briem,
portraying a ride on a stumbling pony : —
Jog hlaui u9 stautttBt blaata braut,
Bykkjon Bkrykkjdtt nokku^ ISoiik. -,
Hi'iu Jiaat, htin hnaut; Jeg hraat i Uut,
Og bnykk ined rykk & skrokkinD fjekk.
Of real nonsense- verses there are no end— such as the stanzas of the priest,
Ogmundur SigurSsson, known as the *'Syni rimnaskaldskapar," satirizing the
extravagancies of the rimur- writers, of which we cite only the first three^': —
Kjalars liet, jeg klunkara hlonkara tlimkinu
Arka <vc kjarkiirs orte hull
Ambara yauibara fram 4 voil.
Hlninpani stompara hlampara trampura stampi
Liftrings viSrings legg eg lU At
LeiNJlfs hlei^61f8 ha<lda^a^ brdr.
Mausoogft fungin glyiujara gougin gagara jag»,
rt am )>rdngin dnuhtfa draga
DrakoiiB apongiu laga alaga. *
As to the metre— Strictly so-called— of the little lyric in question there seems
to be no term exactly defining it, but possibly one. might speak of it as a sort
" ** Om digtningen p& Island." p. 366.
« " Sn^t •• (Reykjavik 1866), pp. 878-79.
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42 CHRSS IN IGKLA ND
of **dr6ttkvseBa hrynjandi — the precipitating, dropping, or running sort, of
dr6ttkv£e8a hattr**, alluded to by Eirikur Magnusson (of Cambridge) in the
interesting introduction to his rendering of the medizeval religious poem,
*'Lilja," (London 1870). »
The following feeble attempt at a quasi-metrical paraphrase will pos-
sibly give the English reader an idea, though a faint one, of those Icelandic
verses. No effort has been made to adhere, with any exactitude, to the laws
which govern the Icelandic alliterative system. The reproduction in another
tongue of the complicated structure of Icelandic poetry — its hidden imagery
and symbolic verbal paraphrases {kenningar)^ its combinations of rhyme and
alliteration, its assonances and resonances of every sort, its great variety of
metres— is impossible unless some of its striking features be omitted. Yet,
with all its complex features, Icelandic poetry can hardly be called — at least
in the most modern examples— artificial. Alliteration, so difficult in the
other Germanic languages, which are now spoken, has become natural to
the Icelandic ; and in no land is improvisation so common, or in appearence
so facile — not even in Italy, in which, as a foreigner expressed it, there is
no need of "an art of writing poetry," but only of "an art of not writing
poetry.'' But licre are the versions which do such scant justice to their
originals : —
I.
I adjure thee, fell fate,
That Uiou fall foal of Steinn !
That thou try all thy treachery
To trip up his troops !
That hU qaeen thoa make quail,
And hia pawns quit their squares,
Till his king be well-muzEled
By a mnrdorous mate !
II.
From the chesa-fleld John chases
My champions, the rooks ;
My knights and my bishops are badgered ;
My pawns are battered and bound;
My Old Woman has wandered astray —
Witless and wild are her ways —
And, majestic monarch no more —
A mate has murdered her spouse.
III.
Your Queen's a doubly damuM jado ;
She's dished my dastard mitred dolt,
And stealthy, sternly stalking, striding
To stem the stormy stir and stress,
She's made my nobby knight afearod
To nab a nimble ninny pawn.
And kept my wretched rook a-reeling
Boiling along the regal rank.
Stefdn Olafsson, like Magnus Olafsson, of whom we have only just been
treating, was a correspondent of the erudite Olaus Worm. In the latter's
published correspondance, already cited, there is a letter from the Icelandic
» «<LllJa'* (The Lily), edited and translated by BIrikar Magnuason, p. xxxiv.
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STRAY NOTES 43
poet dated from his parish, Kyrkjubser, September 15, 1648, in which the
closing lines mention the transmission of a snuff-box carved out of a whale's
tooth, and state that the young artisan who wrought it also made pretty
chessmen of the same material,, and at a moderate price: — "His adjungo
pyxidem, a quodam juvene Islando ex dente balsenio formatam, qua nico-
tianam pulverizatam sternutamentis evocandis osservari voluit. Hicjuvenis
pleraque artificiosa, quse oculis usurpat, imitatur, ipse sibi magister; in
primis vero latrunculos scacchidis affabre format et mediocri pretio vendit/'
Thus we have accounts, by two contemporary parish priests of Iceland, of the
manufacture by natives of sets of chessmen — two centuries and a half ago —
which does not look as if the Icelanders had so little fondness for the game as
Dr. Van der Linde would have us believe.
Among the I«exicograpliera.
It is only by turning over the many volumes devoted to the elucidation of
the extensive vocabulary of the Icelandic tongue, in all its periods of devel-
opment, that we shall be able to acquire a definite idea of the words and
phrases connected with the terminology of chess. In the course of our re-
searches we shall doubtless come across some interesting facts and some amus-
ing fallacies, and we shall especially learn how impossible it is to make dic-
tionaries without a combination of philology and technology — without the
assistance in every art and science, in every branch of human action, of a
technical specialist, familiar with the exact significations and shades of mean-
ing of all the terms used in the field in which he labors. The study of
philology, and in particular of its department of etymology, shows how dif-
ficult is the task of delving truth out of the deep obscurity which envelopes
the early history of human speech, and teaches us how long and persistent is
the life of an error, however often and forcibly it may be refuted. We have
already observed that the studious priest, Magnus 6lafsson, working in his
distant and lonely Icelandic parish, produced, in his *'*' Specimen Lexici Ru-
nici,** the first attempt at any sort of an Icelandic dictionary which got itself
printed, and we have learned what he knew about the philology of chess. He
was evidently an admirer and practitioner of the game, but from its scope he
could not well introduce any of its terms into his Runic glossary; yet we have
been able to note, through another product of his pen, that he regarded the
name of the game {skdh) as akin to the German schacher^ signifying "robber**
—in the making of which unlucky guess he docs not stand alone, as wo shall
find when we come to examine the work of the latest Icelandic lexicographers.
But the earliest Icelandic dictionary of a more general character was that
of QuOmundur Andr^sson (Qudmundus Andrese. d. 1654), whose "Lexicon
Islandicum** appeared at Copenhagen in 1683— of course with notable omis-
sions and with some errors, especially of arrangement. He interprets the
word skdky by the Latin "Indus latrunculorum,** and derives it from a Hebrew
verb— which he quotes— signifying "commovere, ludere etc.** Hebrew, it
will be remembered, was the favorite tongue of etymologists (and the tower
of Babel their great castle, or storehouse, of primitive sources) in the time
when that famous chess-writer, Sir William Jones, had not yet introduced
Sanskrit to the erudite world of Europe. The compiler of the " Lexicon Islan-
dicum** proceeds to explain one of the technical meanings of sMk (in its
sense of check) as "ejusdem ludi in regcm irruptio, undo at skdka^ id est
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44 CHESS IN ICELAND
insultaro regulo» duci latronum, vulgo pro scommatey'' the final word being
intended for sMhnult (little used in Icelandic, the regular form being skdk og
7n4t), or for the Danish skakmat. Mdt he defines:— "Nex, mors: sic vocant
in ludo latrunculorum extremum reguli interitum, ceu csodem ejus, cum h me-
dio tollitur," and hints that he does not know its origin unless it be from
another Hebrew vocable, the meaning of which is "death" {mors). Of the
chessmen, he treats only hrdkur, "longurio, latro, latrunculorum satelles,
elophantes" — the last word evincing some little reading in chess history, and
pechy "pedites in ludo latrunculorum,'' saying that it also means "boy,'* quo-
ting a diminutive, peHingur, icatc— this final word, for etymology's sake
perhaps. Pe^linyur, we may remark, is not a common form. He has reitur,
"locus quadrangulus in ludu latrunculorum." Tafl he dwells on at some
length, explaining it as "ludus Ulis aleu vel latrunculis structus: generali-
ter enim hjec vox ista omnia signiflcat: qvim et ipsa simulacra, qvis iudi-
tur"— about as good and as comprehensive a definition as can be found in
far later works. It is followed by tafia, "orbiculi aleie" and iaflborcf>, " fri-
tellus," whence, he says, the general verb tefla, "talis, aled vel latrunculis lu-
dero"; and then he presents us with another verb not found, wo believe,
elsewhere, at puiuja tafli^y "colligcre ct claudere simulacra lusoria" — the
phrase being, he tolls us, an "adagium pro jactura." This word for "em-
pouch," or replacing men, after a gamo, in their pouch, is significant, as
we may understand, when we hear, in the sagas, of the noun punyur. Fi-
nally the author cites taflnui^r mikiil, **vocatur qvi gnarus est ludere ita."
These items about the Eastern game are few, but how many more relating to
chess are to be found in any dictionary, issued anywhere, before the end of
the 17th century, and particularly in one of not more than 2G9 not very large
quarto pages ? Jlnefatafl, occurring so frequently in later works, is not given
in any of its various orthographical forms.
Much larger and much more pretentious is the "Lexicon Scandicum" of
the Swede, Glaus Verelius, which saw the light eight years later (1691) at
Upsala. But it yields comparatively less of matter having reference to chess.
The definitions are in both Latin and Swedish — which latter we cite in paren-
theses. There is first sTcdktafl as the name of the game (with a citation of
the Olafs saga helga), "ludus latrunculorum" (skakspel), followed by tho
verb skacka [sic], " stratagematibus in ludo isto uti " (skaka), the remainder
of the rubric, relating by error to quite another verb, skahka. Under tafl
(p. 252) and most of its derivatives, the explanatory words are generally
chess terms, as tafl, "latrunculi" (skaktaflor), taflbor^y iaftbriig^y "viles et
Btratagemata in lusu latrunculorum " (list och konst att spela skack i briide),
taflspekiy taflfe. There are several references to old authors, especially to
what is called the "Orms Snorrasons Book," an ancient codex which con-
tained a number of "Sul^urlanda sogur" like the M&gus saga.^ At the end
of the taflfe rubric, the author, singularly enough, puts the word mdt (written
** This important MS, one of the many Icelandic book-rarftlei which reached Sweden
In the 17th century throngh the Icelander, Jon Rairman, wan iiabacqnently lost becaato ■ev*
eral oi 'he Swedish tcholan of that time, men like Vereliua, the elder Rndbeek, Loeeeniu
and others*— or their heirs ^ were unable to make up their minds to render Csasar's thlnfs
unto Ciosar by returning the book- treasures which they had borrowed from public collections.
See that moat interesting and raluablo publication, ^'Fornnordlsk-Isl&ndsk lltteratar 1 Sve-
rige, I. ** (Stockholm 189T) by Vllhelm GSdel, of whieh, unfoHoaately for the learned world,
the socend part has not yet appeared.
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STRAY NOTES 45
maU)y and gives the compounds, rogstnatt (t. e* hr6k8m&t), pe^meit^ fretstertu-
mdt^ with some passages, and derives the term from *' Ital. tnatto,"^ Removed,
in the printer's make-up, from the compounds of mdl, and probably ap-
plying to the last of them, is the definition ''stolidus,** and the quotation
hrakligasturi taflinu. It is in Verelius that the term frets teriumiiu of which
we shall hear too frequently hereafter, is first noted. Besides the above cita-
tion, he has a separate rubric for it (p. 81), defining it:— "Est terminus et lo-
cutio ludentium latrunculis,'' (Kallas, nar den bonden som star mitt mot [sic]
kongen i skaktafiet, kommer honom sa nar, at han skakar, eller stanger
honom, och fljs for nasan pa honum) — followed by a citation from the M^us
saga referring to the third of the mates given by Hirtungur to the King. He
gives the derivation of the first member of the word from the infinitive freta.
His explanation in Swedish is the most deUiled, as well as the oldest in the
dictionaries, and amounts to "a mate by tlie adverse kiig^'s own pawn." Of
the chess figures he has only (p. 197) pe^ma^ir^ "pumilio," and 39^^, "latrun-
culus lusorius," adding p^^^twri^ which he interprets as **exprobatio impe-
ritije in collocandis et promovendis latrunculis." Ilrokur is absent from its
alphabetical place, but on page 82 there is a reference to another vocabulary
"in voce Hocco, turricula in latrunculis*'— there being perhaps an incom-
prehensible omission of some kind. The work of Verelius is a solidly-print-
ed folio of more than 300 pages, and, though the vocabulary displays a lack
of care and orderly arrangement, the compilation is a credit to the scholarship
of that day —but it is most probably, to a considerable extent, the work of Ice-
landers then resident in Sweden. »
*^ Following tbe story of Old-Northern philology, from it« beginning down to oar own
dfty, It It impoHibl€ not to feel atlonfihment At the nnmbor of learned labonrem which a com-
mnntty 10 small as the popalation of Iceland, has predtieed. As In the ancient days, when the
sagaman reeonnted his tales and the skald recited his lays, nearly all the literary life of the
North was hers~.whlle the other greater and richer lands of Scandinavia were well nUh bar-
ren— so, In modern times, she has been the ehlef interpreter of her own crestlons, which
embody the history, the mythology, the laws of the early Qothle world. It Is true that the
island commonwealth possessed — to begin with — a splendid heritage. All the lore of the
primeTal ages was hers. Her sons sUll spoke the langnage of those days In whieh there
were giants ; to them the larger utterances of the gods were still household voices ; even the
whispers whieh startled nature, at the dawn of our elvlllsatlon, they could yet repeat. The
key of the treasures concealed by the mysterious runes— powerfhl as the seal of Salomon
against the endeavors of other hands — was likewise in their possession. All the deities of
the Odinie theology found their final reftige on Ieeland*s shores. Only among her icy moun-
tains lingered, at last, the faint echoes of the songs of the heroes who battled, and battling,
ohanted, in the twilight of our raee. On every Tuesday, and Wednesday, and Thursday, and
Friday, the morning breeses brought to her sons ^ and are bringing them yet — messages from
tbe halls of Valhalla ^ messages which would be meaningless, even If they were not deaf to
them, la the ears of the degenerate children of the Goth and the Saxon. The sturdy repub-
lic which the oftpring of kings and vikings had built up amid the snow of glaciers and the
6re of volcanoes, continued to be governed by tfie archaic codes established by the Moses and
Solotts of the old Teutoale times. To these Insular Northmen, too, were alone known the
stories of the years when their ships sailed over the Northern waters of the Atlantic to an-
other world In the west— centuries before the keel of the Italian Columbus ploughed a way
through Its Southern waters. The empires of the Boulh could see the setting sun In all Its
glory, but only le^and knew of the lands of tho Hesperides beyond, or could guess what
that sunset glory foretold. They f«lt, (00, the burden of the past, and the honours and du>
Ues of long deeeent, for, in tradition at 6rst, In Inscribed Ubles afterwards, they could trace
back from son to sire, from sire to grandsire, and from grandsire to the remotest progenitor,
the story of eaeh household. These genealogies went back far beyond the Iceland-ward
wanderloge of their people, while the narratives of the wanderings themselves had been
transmitted with the detail of a diarist. The families that migrated In the »th and eth een-
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46 CHESS IN ICELAND
A long interval separates Olaus Verelius from the scholarly Icelander,
Bjdrn Haild6rs8on, whose " Lexicon Islandico-Latino-Danicorum," edited by
Rasmus Kristian Rask, was published at Copenhagen in 1814. Feeble as the
work is, when compared with those which have superseded it, it was, in its
day, a great boon to students of the ancient Northern literature— to the cul-
tivation of which it gave a marked impulse. Rask was assisted, in his edi-
torship, by several Icelanders then studying in Copenhagen; Danish defini-
tions were added to the Latin ones of Bjorn Halld6rsson, and are here, as
usual, cited in parentheses, while Icelandic terms are in Italics. The name
of the game, sMk, is explained as ^'ludus latrunculorum'' (the better Latin-
turUa from the soathern borderi of the North Sea, to the eoast of Kent, like tho«« that in
the 17th eentary, croued the broader eeaa that separated Old Bngland from New England,
took little or no paint to hand down to posterity the annale of their progresc; but the Ice-
lander!, whenever the^^hose, could walk again In the recorded footstep* of their fathers,
who, In the 9th and 10th centuries had left the Qords of Norway and the islands of Scotland,
to take possession of the green ralleys that open to the ocean along the shores of their far-
northern home. And as each of those valleys b^an to make its history, every Incident and
accident, every gest and scene, was remembered and transmitted and described again and
again to the descendants of the settlers unto the latest generation. But all this was not
true of the home-land merely. Icelandic bards and story-tellers, champions and ramblers,
brought back from foreign courts and camps accounts of the life of the outer world — the
doings of kings and warriors, of courtiers and prelates, of soldiers and peasants — and told
them afresh to Their children and their children's children. Then it happened, in the course
of time, as was natural, that Iceland not only kept the old tongue, bat learned to wield the
new pen as well— the new pen that Christianity brought with it Into the North. In the
houses of her chiefs, in the cabins of her yeomen, In the cloisters of her priests, hundreds
of scribes, through many lifetimes, wrote down the sound and the sense of the words that
were vanishing, and the tales of the deeds that were fading. But for their seal — writing
mostly under the pale sun and during the brief sunshine of winter — the most powerful peo-
ples of the present worlds would long ago have lost, past recall, the knowledge of what
their far-away forefathers thought and wrought ; of how they lived and laboured ; of whom
they prayed to, and of what they fought for. Thus each great man's house, in the lapse of
years — for there were seekers after rarities in those days, too— became a library rich In
lettered wealth elsewhere unattainable — in the varied learning of the North-Teutonic bard
and pilgrim and chronicler and rhymer and romancer. There could be read such legends
of Germanic heroes as were not to be found In other Germanic lands ; such narratives of
the Scandinavian kings as no other Scandinavian region possessed; such lives of Bnglish
saints and Scottish island Jarls as Britain knew not of. Bat In the end the lore-loving little
land was fated to lose much of this well-earned wealth and glory. The manuscripts on vel-
lum and paper — so many that the number of them still extant seems incredible— were carried
away— as Rome despoiled Greece of her marbles, as Napoleon despoiled Italy of her can-
.vasses— to enrich and make famous the libraries of foreign lands, not a few of them perish-
ing in transit by aoeidents of fire and flood. But It turned out that to the foreign despoil-
ers the manuscripts were dumb. Their words were voiceless except to those who wrot«
them. They were as unintelligible as were the hieroglyphs carved on the obelisks of Egypt
to the Romans who pulled them down on the banks of the Nile to set them up again on
the banks of the Tiber. Thus the children of Iceland had again to rescue from oblivion the
records of our ancestral wisdom. They had to interpret to the duller generations of the old
family the words their ancestors had formerly committed to stone and parchment, to reeon-
stmct the monuments and muniments, of which their new owners proved to be unworthy keep-
ers. It is to Icelanders that we owe the first grammars of the primitive speech, published
at Ciopenhagen and Oxford. It is they who have been the compilers of dictionaries, and the
commentators of the classic writings. But even before the outflow of manuscripts had fairly
begun, the renaissance of Icelandic philology had already dawned— in the 16th century and in
Iceland Itaelf. The leading figure of the new period was Amgrimur the learned— as he waa
styled, both at home and abroad— Arnfprfmur J6nsson (Jonas) Vidalin— the ancestor of a vig-
orons and erudite race— whose many works were made publio partly by the Icelandic,
partly by the foreign press. In the first oontinental school of Old-Northern lingnlsUe re-
search— whloh floarlshed in Sweden during the 17th oentnry— the names which accompany th«
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STRA Y NOTES 47
ism, *4uda8 scaccorum,*' has not, we see, even yet reached the Icelandic
philologists), and is succeeded by the compounds, shdkbor^^ skdktnenn (the
plural only), "latrunculi," (brikker i skakspil); and by the verb, shika^
under which several phrases are cited : skdk per^ with a figurative meaning,
"tua res agitur " (et overmods udtryk ; skal betyde : nu er du i knibe, eller og:
nu er min tilstand bedre en din) —with no attempt at an elucidation of the
technical signification; skdka i hroksvaldu ^^superbire patrocinio potontioris*'
(vise sig overmodig under en mjegtigeres beskyttelse) — a phrase which we
shall comment upon later; and at rjitfa skdk^ ^^frangere mandram** (befri
kongen for skak i skakspil) — this last given as a real technical phrase, "to
tlU«a of the learned foil on were the names of the acholars ef Upeala and Stoekholm, but the
labour between the eovere wai to a larir* extent that of the line of Iceland le "trantlatore,"
as they were styled, which from J6u Rugnian was carried on throngh the brothers, OuA.
mandur and Helgl Olafssou. They had been summuned to Sweden by the College of Antiqui-
ties (AntiquItets-UoUeglum) first in tho hope of obtaining more spoil from Iceland, and sec-
ondly to enable the learned editors to read the ▼olluus they hal already garnered. It is as
amasing, as it Is sad, to read of the rivalry between Denmark and Sweden In exploiting the
strange mines that had been opened in the distant Islet, to which so little heed had been
paid in the preceding centuries. Secret agents— Icelanders— were sent home by Sweden, and
the harvest gathered was landed on her coast, while the boat and agent went on to Copen-
hagen. It was a singular commcrec. What wu have said of the works of the Swedish school
is equally true of those of the Danish, which. In those day«, was aUo the Norwegian. It Is easy
to note, for Instance, how many of Olo Worm's publleatloBS in the ITth centnry were the
result of leelandio knowledge and toll— his own letters indicate this -and the books edited
by Stephanlus and Resenius could hardly have been iisued without help from the same louree.
Arngrimur Jonsson was followed by many of bis countrymen— the bishops I»orlikur Skiilason,
Brynj6Ifnr Sveinsson (the "discoverer of the Bdda'*) and I*or&ur l>orliksson, the diligent
annalist, Bjdru J6n8son (a SkarftsA), and, above all, by the lllustrioaa I>orm6&ur Torfason
(TorfsBUs), the foremost Northern scholar of his day— these wore the real workers in the lin-
guistic hive. To some others of no less merit, the lexicologists Magnus Olafsson and (iud-
mundur Andr^sson, and the grammarian Bun6lfur j6nssou, we have already alluded. Take
away from Danish Old-Norihero letters In the next century the names of Torfseus— who lived
through its first two deeades— Aral MagnAsson and Jon Eiriknson, not to mention those of
the bishop, PInnur J6nssoD, whose monumental **Uistoria ecclesiastioa *' (1 vols. 4* Hav-
nia 1773-78) covered the Catholic period of the iiland, during much of which the classic
spirit was still alive; of the lexicographer, BJdrn HalId6rsson ; of the Juridical archseologi«t,
P&ll Vidaliu ; and of the commentator, Grimar J6nsson Thorkelin— take away these names,
and of how high a quality Is the foreign residuum ? Take away, again, the names ot Finnur
Uagnnsson, Svelnbjdrn figilsson and J6n SIgur&ssou from the earlier portion of this cen-
tury, and of the same high class only a single name— that of Rask, a great one— remains.
But Rask, at the very outset of his career, made himielf an Icelander by passing the better
part of two years on Icelandic soil, and by long and close association with Icelandic students
In Copenhagen. Of the valuable work done by such learned bodies, for Instance, as the Royal
Society of Northern Antiquaries, far more has come from the pens and brains of Icelanders
than appears on title-pages and In indices. Natives of the island are still active in the
field'we purposely omit living names— and withlu these last years a keen sehotar and a
xealons student has passed away in the person of Konrid Gislason— also a lexicologist. But it
oaght to bo acknowledged that in the generation now upon the stage, Denmark Is represent-
ed by two figures of the foremost order— those of Kaluud and Wimmer— while in the two
youngest generations Norway has produced the brIlUaut group which includes Munch, Keydcr,
Unger, Storm, and Bugge. But the general literary production of Iceland in modern times, In
branches of letters other than those we are treating of, is likewise surprising. Her people
number 76,000, to which may be added 20,000 more In Northern North America who still
prefer to speak their own tongue rather than the Bngllsh. This Is the popnlatiou of a minor
city in the larger lands of civilisation. But an examination of the yearly output of her
presses— Journals, magatlnes, books, pamphlets— and a comparison of it with the literary
productions of any other community of many times the slxe, will show h«w marvelous is the
love of letters still fostered by the rocky soli to which the Rddas and Sagas of Iceland's first
centuries owe their birth.
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48 CHESS IN ICELA ND
release the king from check at chessplay/' though it may not be easy to com*
prehend the exact application of the term, which is found in no later dictionary
{tyufa means "to break, break up"); at missa alia menn i skdk, "excalcu-
lari" (tabe alle brikker i skak)— menn referring to all the figures; at eiga
einn mann eptir^ ♦*monochorus esse" (have en brikke tilbage)— where again
mann may mean, apparently, either piece or pawn. Of the chessmen the
following are mentioned in their proper alphabetical places:—!, hrdkuvy
"longurio," " latrunculorum satelles" (brikke i skakspil)— the Danish, as
well as the Latin appellation of the rook being apparently unknown both
to the author and the editor. Under this rubric is repeated the proverbial
phrase already entered under skdk^ namely, at skdka i krdksvaldi, "aucto-
ritate alicujus potentioris niti " (trodse nogen i haab om en stormsends
beskyttelse)— which is the same definition as above in slightly different words.
2. Pec^^ "latrunculorum verna," "anteambulo*' (on bondo i skakspil), and
figuratively, "homuncio," "nanus'* (et drog, unyttigt menneske); with peo^-
lingur *' vel -peplingiir " (?) and pe^ma^ur in the metaphorical senses of
"pusio"" (pusling, en little dreng), and illustrative phrases. As to other
words, having more or less a chess character, reilur^ "square,'' is found
with the signification of "bed in a garden," and then comes reitur i shik-
horH^ "loculus latrunculorum in alveo" (tavl paa skakbrjettet). Tafl, here
written, in accordance with its pronunciation, tahl^ its derivative and com-
pounds, do not receive any chess definitions. i7>i£?/¥="pugnus" (nteve), also
written knefi^ is here, but there is no trace othnefatafl in any of its shapes.
Stans (that is, stanz) is explained as "incitae in ludo latrunculorum" (skak-
mat), instead of citing its real signification, "drawn game." It is not unlikely
that Rask-'keen linguistic student and observer as he was— when, later in
life, he returned from a journey to India, the birthland of the game— was
possessed of a better knowledge of chess and its technical terms.
The next lexicological work to be brought under notice is the Danish-
Icelandic one of Konr^O Gislason (6. 1808 d. 1891), "Donsk ortJabrtk meft islenzk-
umpyttingum" (Kaupmannahofn 1851)— a most valuable, admirably ordered
work, and the result of immense industry. To be first observed is that the
game of chess (skakspil) is given as sMktafl ; to play chess is leika a^ skdk-
tafli, leika skffktafl ; to check is scfija shfik^ skdka ; chessboard (skakbr»t) is
taffbor^^ or more rcstrictcdly, sknkbor^ ; chessplayer is skdkma^ur ; chess-
man (= chess-figure) is ma^ur e^a pe^^ and a set of chessmen is the plural
of the same expression — mennimir og pe^in^ indicating that, in the author's
opinion, ma^ur and menn relate only to the higher figures— excluding the
pawns. All the names of the pieces are specially treated except konungur-^ but
the queen is styled /?•«, the name drottning being given only to the queen
at cards. Mdt (/ .?ArrfAc) =Danish "skakmat," which is not literally exact; with
a wider knowledge of chess usage in Iceland, it would have been skdk og
tndt. KonrA5 Gislason's dictionary, however, is the only Icelandic one, which,
so far as we know, registers the word ;w«— our "stalemate."— It is conve-
nient to notice here, although out of its chronological order, another, much
smaller and less pretentious Danish-Icelandic dictionary— but a very excellent
one of its kind — the "TVy dmisk orchabok me^ islenzktim fy^ingum^" of the
pains-taking priest, J^nas J6nasson. This hand-lexicon was issued at Reyk-
javik in 18%. The author makes chess (Danish, "skak") both skdk and
tafly and has the phrases, **play chess," tefla^ and "offer check," skdka.
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STRAY NOTES 49
He follows conversational usage in employing, in chess nomenclature, tafl
and its compounds, and has a few quite modern chess-expressions. Chess-
problem is iafldcemi; a game at chess (that is, the French, ''partie'')— for
which meaning in English we lack a special equivalent-* is interpreted by
tafl; the game of chess is skdktafl; chessplayer is taflmcUhur^ skdkma^r;
chessboard is iaftbpr^^ skdkhor^ ; checkmate and mate are both rendered by
nidi. In regard to the piece-names, queen (Danish '*frue'*) is properly given
as drottning (i tafli); the remainder noted are hrokur, biskup^ riddari ^ndpe^.
Under the Danish "spille" (to play), we have **to play a game of chess "=a^
tefla eina skdk, which gives the added signification of *'partie" to the word
skdk — a modern conversational expression. Under the Danish *Meg*' (game),
we have end-game =leikslok. The noun "move'' is rendered by leikur, to
'^make a move at chess'' being leika einn leik i tafli. The dictionary's Da-
nish vocabulary does not include "pat," (stalemate), **rokkerc" (to castle) or
the foreign terms *' en prise," "partie remise," (Icelandic, >a/>i(«/fi) **en pas-
sant," and so on.
In 1856, at Leipsic, Theodor Mobius— an Old-Northern linguist and biblio-
grapher of high rank— produced his *' Altnordischer Glossar," explaining the
vocabularies of only a limited number of Old-Northern works, but which
was, so far as it went, judiciously arranged and excellently edited, like
everything that came from his well-ordered mind. The word skdk docs not
come within his field, and lie is not correct in his rendering of knettafl or hnef-
tafl as "schachspiel." He has taflpungur~^ha.Q for men or pieces used at
chess and other games, and says that such bags were sometimes provided
with jewelled bands as in the Gullt)6ris saga. From the same saga he cites
the phrase, "^cpr leku at hnet- tafli ok var taftit alt steypt af silfri^ en gylt
alt hit raucf'a^^' and interprets tafli^ as referring to the board — though, in
that respect, the sentence is obscure. He likewise renders tafl by "move,"
in the quotation, ve}'^a tafli seinni, which is interpreted as to "come a move
too late," and in a later citation from the Eyrbyggja saga which reads peir
hof^u orthit tafli seinni en A?*nA;eW— but in both, the sense seems to be
figurative.
Between the years 1854 and 1860 the Royal Society of Northern Antiquaries
issued at CJopenhagen the important "Lexicon poeticum" of Dr. Sveinbjorn
Egilsson (6. 1791, d. 1852), rector of the College of Iceland at Reykjavik, a
deeply learned and unweariedly industrious scholar. This work is never
likely to be superseded. The author's Latinity is above criticism, as is
evinced by his rendering of skdk as "ludus schacchicus— getting rid, once
for all, of the "ludus latrunculorum " of his predecessors-— or rather confin-
ing its use to other games than chess. Under skdk we have tefla skdk (to
play chess), and mention is made of an anomalous genitive skdks (instead
of skdkar) in the compound skdksleika (in the Sturlunga). Hrokur is first
defined as the bird, ''pelicanus ator," the sea- raven— being the same word
we are told as hraukur —iheny secondly, as "longurio, vir longus, adjuncta
ignavise et inertia) notione" (being very much what we mean in English by
a "lazy lout");' and thirdly, as "hodie centurio in ludo scacchico^ est Per-
sicum roch quod significat a) ingentem avem, b) camelum bellicum, cui in-
sidet vir, arcu et sagittis armatus." This is less erroneous than one would
expect, considering that the author quotes as his authority an article in the
Copenhagen "Annaler for Nordisk OlUkyndighed" (1838-9), which treats of
7
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50 CHESS IN ICELAND
chess in Iceland, and which bristles with misinformation. Under tafl we
have tefla tafl (to play to/f), taflpungur (*•*' sacculus latrunculorum *'), and
other compounds. A compendium of the "Lexicon poeticum/* the original
edition having become rare, has been published by Dr. SveinbJ()rn Egilsson^s
son, the still living Benedikt GrOndal, a man of great ability and versatil-
ity—poet, publicist, satirist, naturalist.
It was likewise for the Royal Society of Northern Antiquaries that Eirik-
ur J6nsson (&. 1822, d. 1899), an Icelander, whose life, like that of Konr&O
Gislason, was passed in Denmark, compiled the ^'Oldnordisk Ordbog** (KJ5-
benhavn 1863), Intended, we believe, as a sort of prose complement to the *' Lexi-
con po^ticum** of SveinbJ6rn Egilsson. Skdk includes the phrase segja skdk^
to give check ; and is stated to have two specially Icelandic figurative mean-
ings, namely, 1. A somewhat high-lying flat (level place) in a ttin (the
meadow surrounding an Icelandic farmstead) ; and 2. A (low) loft in a house,
of which it embraces or covers only a portion— we translate the Danish de-
scriptions literally, and shall return hereafter to these senses of skdk. Under
skdktafl we have, here as elsewhere, the phrases leika skdktafl and teika a9*
skdktafli; while the word is also rendered '* chess-play,*' *Uhe game of
chess,'* and additionally "chess-figures and chessboard as well." The two
compounds skdkborcf' and skdkma9^r (chessplayer) follow. Under the verb
skdka occurs the phrase, skdka einhverjum (to offer check to some one— the
verb thus governing the dative), with the passage, which we already know
from the 6lafs saga helga, ^d skdka^i jarl af hdnum riddara^ rendered by
**he captured a knight in giving check." Thereafter we are presented with
the familiar metaphor, skdka i hroksvaldi (vise sig anmassende, dristig under
en maegtigeres beskyttelse— the interpretation being virtually that of Bjorn
Halld6rsson); but thereafter is quoted another and similar phrase, which we
have not heretofore seen, and which is said to possess the same signification,
to wit, skdka f sli^jdli einkvers^ to ** check (attack) under the protection (shel-
ter) of some one." Mdt and mdta are indicated as Icelandic. Tefla i upp-
ndm is to ^'play a piece so that it can be taken" (t. e. to set it en prise),
Stanz (eller slans) is interpreted as ''stoppage" (Danish, ''standsning"), but
is not connected with chess, and we are told that it has no plural. Tefli
occurs in its place without definition, but with it are cited both JaftUefli and
prdtefli (the latter inserted in no other dictionary)— they also without defini-
tions. They mean respectively "drawn game" (remise) and (a game or po-
sition drawn by) "perpetual check." The chessmen explained are hrdkur,
riddari and p€€^. The first-named reads (we English the Danish renderings)
as follows: 1. (bird), see hraukur; 2. the rook at chess; 3. "a tall, drowsy
fellow, a lout;" 4. "the principal manager, mover; hrdkur alls fagna^aVy
the chief originator of all social amusements." It is not easy to decide at
a glance how far these metaphors (3 and 4) relate to the bird, or to any other
literal signification of hrdkur. She ft is "the principal piece in a game called
hneftafl;'* and hneftafla is a piece in that game; while we are supplied with
the usual orthographical variants. Tafl and its family take some space. We
have already alluded to tefli. Ta/f, itself is:~l. (Danish tavl^g, i. e. "ta-
ble play" and brcetspU^ "tables"); h^ eru hrog^ % tafli, "something un-
derhand is going on" 6. a move at " tables;" verif^a tafli seinni^ to "be fo-
restalled" (a move to late); 2. (Danish, tavt)^ set of men at "tables," or at
chess; hann svarfarH taftinu^ he overturned the men. The noun tafta is
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STRAY NOTES 51
here a board for tables, ** chessboard/' and subsidiarily '* figures*' in a game;
taflbrag^ is an *' artifice at tables/' and in the plural taflbrdg^y ** know-
ledge, skill in table-play;" taflmat^ur is ''one who plays tables, chess."
Under the verb tefla we have tefla skdk^ "play chess" (St. Olafs saga); tefla
m^ einhvem (to play with or against any one); tefla um eitthvert (to play
for something), with the proverbial saying, fegar um lif er at tefla (when
life is at stake); teftdr^ the participle, has a singularly modern meaning
in vera upp tefdr (to be played out, i. e. finished, ended, exhausted).
But of the various Icelandic dictionaries that of GuUbrandur Vigfusson
(Oxford 1872)— the sole author of which he was, although the title-page in-
cludes a second name— is by all odds the greatest and best; indeed it is
hardly too high praise to class it among the foremost score of lexicological
works— in or of any language whatever— which have hitherto seen the
light. ^ To some extent it likewise treats the modern dialect of Iceland,
^ GuSbrudar Vlgf&Moa (6. Uareb 13, 18S7, d. January 81, 1889) is the repreMnteUve
leelasdic acbolar. With a knowledge which woald have given him the highest plaoe aa a
Germanist, he ehose to restrict the work of his llfo to a field in which he may be said not
only to have had no peer, bat not even a second. For no man has ever known so thoroughly
the linguistic history of his native land as he that of Iceland, and of its broader old-north'
ern domain; and none has ever been so minutely familiar with every period, and every
product, of a literature of so great a compass, and of such long duration. His erudUlon was
not merely profound, bat amaslngly comprehensive. It is impossible to review the offspring
of his pen, from such essays as the youthful but novel and able tractate on the chronology
of the sagas of Iceland (''Um timaUl i iiilendinga sSgnm**) to the stately volumes which he
issued under the aosplces of Oxford Uulverslty, without a feeling of stupefaction at the depth
and breadth of his learning, and the continuity and bulk of his labor. His mind and mem«
ory were Imbaed with all the life and lore of by-gone times. He had wandered through
every highway and byway of Iceland's past, and through those of the past of all the other
lands traversed and chronicled and sung by her sagamen and her skalds, until he could be-
come, at will, a citlxen of any age, a contemporary of any genoratlon — voyaging backward,
hither and thither, in time, as a man travels to and fro geographically. To employ a com-
parison suggested by the g&me of chess, he could reproduce every forgotten episode, re-shape
every lost literary creation, revivify every vanished scene of all the centuries which make up
the seven ages of Icelandic letters, jnst as the blindfold player of many simultaneous games
rebuilds, after each of his moves, by a flash of volition, a wholly differing position, bringing
again within his vision a battle seene whleh had disappeared — a field of action with schemes
and stratagems, moves and couuter-moves, pieces and pawns, wholly other than those which
he viewed a moment before, or will view a moment later. He could almost interview the
heroes, the historians, the poets of ancient dsys, and get the real meaning of a histor-
ical passage out of Snorri Stnrluson himself, or persuade Bgill Skallagrimsson to Interpret
an obecnre Icenntn^, or replace a corrupted word. "Quftbrandur,** says Dr. Konrad Maurer,
himself a man of gifts as marvelous, "war ein gana ungewShnlioh begabter mann, von
raschester faseungsgabe nnd nnermadllchem fleisse. Seine fertlgkeit Im lesen und In der
beurtheilung von faandschriften war eine gans ausserordentllche ; die verlosehenste scbrift
vermochte er noch an entsiffern, und wochenlang konte er von morgens bis abends absehreiben
ohne dass seine angen ermUdeten. Kaseh wusste er sich auch In den filiationsverhAltnissen
der handsehriften surecht su finden, und von bier aus fOr seine quellonansgaben stets den
Vlchtigen text su wAhlen und die nfttlgen varianten aussatesen. Seine ausgebreitete bekant-
schafi mit der gesamten gedruckten und ungedrnckten lltteratur seiner helmet Hess Ihn aber
dies Im verelne mit seinem bewnndemngswttrdlgen gediehtnisse stets alle beaiehungen gegen-
wArtlg haben, die Ihm fUr die erledlgung irgend elner aufgabe von nutzen sein konten, and
eine seltene komblnationsgabe gesttaiete ihm aus dom reicben materiale die flberraschend-
sten sehlilsse sa alehen.** His memory was so astounding, his sense of metre and style and
expression and verbal force, so acute, his knowledge of the literary phases of every locality
and every age so complete, that, perhaps, as Dr. Maurer says, his trust In his own vast powers
now and then l>etrayed him into errors, which less self-eonfidenee would have led him, by
a new verification of his authorities, to avoid. But his instinctive guesses were often better
than other orltica* studied certainties. His life was too Industrious, and therefore too ■eeln-
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52 CHESS IN ICELAND
which fact adds greatly to its value. We shall endeavotir to discuss its state-
ments at some length, and to connect with them some observations omit-
ted when reporting the chess vocables and phrases included in preceding
dictionaries.
Skdk,~-We are told that the word is of Persian origin; we have the ver-
bal expression tefla skdk (play chess), while, with the same meaning, we are
given under iefla^ the form, tefla skdktafly but we nowhere find Konr&9
Gislason's leika o^ skdkta/li (precisely our English "play at chess.") The
term for chessboard is skdkborth^ and under tafl, also taflhorih^ while skdktafl
ded, to ftdmit of many Intiinaciet, tfaoagh the few who knew him nearly cherished for him
an ardent esteem. **The more closely the career and life-work of Vigrdsson are examined,"
asserts Mr. Bdmand Gosse, '*the more his genius will be found to shine, and only those who
have, in some poor and undistinguished degree, followed where he led, can even begin to
estimate his greatness.** Enumerating the philologist's characterlstles, he exclaims: — *' Who
that has seen it will forget that pale and fretted countenance ? Who will forget the enlha-
siasm, the Melity, the sweet and Indulgent unworldlluess ? ** Gul5brandur Vigf&sson^s col-
league and fellow worker, Professor York Powell, declares that *< Those who knew him will
not need my testimony to his strong, sincere and generous character, his extraordinary and
well-controlled memory, his wide learning In many tongues, his eager and unwearied Indus-
try, and his fine literary taste. For myself, I can only say that the longer I know hira the
more I honoured, truflted and loved him.** He calls him ''the greatest Scandinavian scholar
of our century.** Another of his Oxford contemporaries, the head of Corpus Cbrlsti College,
Dr. Charles Plummer, characterises him as "one of the most remarkable men that Oxford
has seen during the present century," and adds that " to say that his loss Is irreparable is
to use feeble language.** After an enumeration of some of his works Dr. Plummer goes on : —
'*Bot in spite of all that he did, it is rather on what ho was that those who knew him best
will love to dwell; on his simple and noble character, his genuine and npconventional piety,
his— not so much superiority to as — nneonscionflness of evory petty and selfish motive, his
single-hearted devotion to learning, his scorn of anything like pedantry or pretence, his
loyalty to his friends, his remembrance of, and gratitude for any, even the smallest acts of
kindness done to himself. In the midst of those who were privileged to know him there will
remain that longing memory of which the great Italian poet speaks for —
Lo di c*han detto al dolce amlco addio.*'
Gnl&brandur Yigfdsson was a man of simple life, of kindly nature, of generous sentiments. As
a writer of Icelandic his style was as clear as it was concise, and it possessed an unaffected,
sometimes subtle charm which those who have perused his notes of travel In Norway and
Germany will well remember. He rarely allowed himself to be drawn into polemics — which
have such a baneful fascination for so msny of bis literary compatriots, with whom argument
too often degenerates into abuse, and criticism into Invective — even lampoons, open or anony-
moos, inuendoes and misstatements, leers and Jeers and sneers, scurrility and calumny, being
all regarded as legitimate weapons of the publicist. Of anything like this weakness of Igno-
bier minds there is to be fonnd almost as littlo in his career as In that of his great contem-
porary, eonntryman and friend, the pure-mlndud J6u SIgurSsson. The last work of the an-
ther of the *' Dictionary,** though left nearly finished, has not yet seen the light. It was a
book on the Origins of Iceland, comprlaing the Landu&ma, or Book of Settlement, and other
works relating to the earliest age of Icelandic history and the foundation of the Icelandic state.
It will doubtless reach the learned public In time, and will add to the vast debt which the
world owes to him and to his memory. A eomplete list of his multitudinous works, and bf
the biographies published since his death, complied by his friend, J6n I>orkelsson the younger,
and aeeompanied by an excellent life and portrait, will be found In the periodical *' Andvari**
(XIX, pp. 1-48, Reykjavik 1894). He was buried, in the moaming presence of all learned
Oxford, under the green turf and amid the quiet walks of the cemetery of St. Sepulchre.
The spires and lowers of the noblest of universities, upon which his labours shed such lustre,
rise above the grave of one of the two greatest Icelanders of the nineteenth century. The
halls of the ancient school have sheltered few scholars, whether Kngllsh or foreign, whether
of earlier or later times, whose work was more arduous, more sinoere, more brilliant, or likely
to be more enduring than that of this adopted Oxonian— over whose birth-place gleam the auro*
rasof Iceland.— The following unpublished letter from Dr. Gu^brandnr YigAUson was written
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STRAY NOTES 53
is restrictedly deOned as "a game of chess" (that is, **paWi«,'') for which
there are numerous references to the old writings— one to the year 1155 (the
partie, which we know of, between Valdemarthe Qreat and one of his cour-
tiers), another to 1238 (Bishop H6t6lf and the deacon), and again to deeds
of the 14th century in the "Diplomatarium Norvegioum" (Kristiania 1849-95)
—in which last the meaning would hardly be *'agame," but ratlier a ''set
of chessmen,'' or a "chessboard,'* or both. Here GuUbrandur Vigfusson, in
accordance with the encyclopandic character of his lexicon, says:— "There is
no authentic record of chess in Scandinavia before the 12th century, for the
jntt before he made hU last wMt to Copenhagen. It allndee to his "Orlfloes Islaadleic,** and
tome other of his literary plans ; It will gire, too, an Idea of his terse, Informal English. It
U dated from the Deanery, Winebestor, March 81, 1B87:~*'I write this with a aomewhat
reliered mind, having lately eleared my desk, and -sent to preae a moon tain of MSS towards
the Origineg htandieoe. The Landn&mabok is all In print, text, translaUon and Introduction,
some 240 pages. The whole work is (after the fashion of the Corput) to be In S vols, divided
into five books, the books Into aeetions, whereof Landnimab6k is I. 1. ; the Sd beok Is on
the Constitution, Lih^llM leading, and anelent Laws ; the Sd book on Conversion, and Lives
of Bishops. All this is in the printers' hands, and makes volume one. The 4th, old Sagas ;
5th, WIneland and Arctie recorda.
I am now ou the wing to Copenhagen, on a short visit, to finish some US work. I did
a pile of work in 1884 — so I shall one day be an emancipated man hero, Independent of Co-
penhagen.
It has long been a day dream — a waking dream as we say— to see Italy, and I long
more to see Florence than even Rome; on account of bor pure Italian, glorious records,
Michel- Angelo. The gods know whether I may not one day make use of your most kind
offer. — I live here in England (Oxford) an hermit life, have a few friends — Mr. Powell In
first rank of such ; bat don't mix In society, never did, never coald. In a drawing-room I
feel dullish and nnoomfortable ; it is a sort of ' mortal antipathy * as your countryman, Wen-
dell Phillips, so well and appropriately calls it. In term time I have a few lectures to give
(though usually reading with a elass, uo public lectures), and in the vacations I have the only
chance of working wiih Mr. Powell, who la all the terms talieu ap with lecturing and coaehlng ~
a great pity to use him for that. In the long vacation we mean to do a great spell of work
(or rather he) la translating for the Sd volume, so that the bulk may be In, in the course of the
summer ; then remains the Index (horriblle dlctu), and a few essays.
I have some hope next Xraas [of being able to reach Italy] or if not, then next Eaat«r or
Lent. In the summer I am besides bound to be here, for then the printers have more lei-
sure, and they proqilse to make two- fold progress In June-September; and that means a great
deal.
Be so good as to give my reiipectful compliments to your mother. Next I beg you ezcas«
a hasty and disordered letter. Is there any thing I can do at Copenhagpn for you ? if so, a
measage will reach me addressed to Mr. Bruun, the Librarian of the Royal Library (St. Kongl.
Bibl.).
I should advise you to get photographs of specimens of these old typos : —
1. 1540-58.
S. John Mathleson's types 1559-1576.
8. Bp. Qudbrand's fresh types, the first book I saw in them was Hemmingsen's Via
Vitae^ 1576, 18* or 8* — I write from memory. These types were battered and were used for
168 years — the last book I have seen in them being Widallns [Postllla] , 6th edition of 1744.
4. Bp. Harboe*s types.
5. Hrappsey types.
I made some very informal studies on this subject In 1860 or about then, so eomething
hangs or stfcks still in my memory.
I am here staying a few days with my old ft>iend of Oxford and Dictionary memory,
Dean Kitehin. By to morrow I leave for Denmark via Harwich and Esbjerg, west of Jutland;
hope to be at Copenhagen by Easter. Mean to see old friends in Jutland, my countryman,
Hannes Flnsen, In RIbe, and another Danish friend in Aarhus. Have in my head some queer
theories about ultima [Thule] being in Jutland ; will see it by the way. Powell and I have
spoken of making a little pamphlet at the forthcoming Rask centenary- OHytnee i>anie«B,
a brief essay on this subject I am big with."
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54 CHESS IN ICELAND
passage cited from the Fornaldar sOgur** (that is from one of the vellums of
the Hervarar saga) ** is mythical, " and as to Olafe saga helga, he considers
the game between King Canute and Ulf Jarl to be hnefatafl^ as it undoubt-
edly was. He goes on to inform us that *Mn Iceland there is still played a
peculiar kind of chess, called vald^kdk^ in which no piece, if guarded, can
be taken or exchanged." This variety, it may be remarked en passant^ must
be of Icelandic invention, since nothing similar is reported from other lands,
and we can add that, only a few years ago,— twenty years after the publi-
cation of the "Dictionary''— its practice was still continued in the island. It
must be one of the oddest "abarten des schachspiels,'' as the Germans call
them. Skdkma^ur is interpreted both as *' chessman" (figure), and "chess-
player;" while the other, but similarly formed skdknia^ur (being, as we
are told, the Old High German "sc&hman" and modern German "schacher")
signifies "robber," "highwayman," and is cited as occurring [only?! in the
I^iUrekssaga, or story of Dieterich (Theodoric). The v«rb skdka (check)
" is frequent in modern usage " as a chess term, and is used, in a meta-
phorical sense, in skdka i ]fvi skioli^ "to check one in that shelter, i. e, to
take advantage of one (unduly)." A modern use of this metaphor may be
seen in the following sentence written very recently:— /lann skdkar (checks,
attacks) i ^vi sh)6li (shelter, protection, cover) a^ hann sleppi viih dbyrgtHna^
" he attacks (acts) under, that cover, so that he may escape responsibility."
In the skdk rubric we have, too, a definition, (marked as section II.), given
to another figurative usage, "metaphorically a seaU bench^ in the popular
phrase, /yUtt >^r d skdk}na^ take a seat I" Looking back, therefore, at
Eirikur Jdnsson's vocabulary, and at the present one, we note that skdk,
in its figurative sense, means:— 1. an (elevated?) portion of the home-meadow
about an Icelandic beer; 2. a low loft in a house covering only a part
of the ground-story ; and 3. (here), a seat, bench, settle. All three have
been verbally explained, by a native Icelandic scholar, as bearing a certain
resemblance to each other— all conveying the idea of narrowness and
length and regularity, or rectangularity (like the shape of a bench or settle).
It is possibly too bold to suggest a rank or file on the chessboard (of the
same outline) as the link which connects them with skdk=che88. It is also
suggested that definitions 2 and 3 may be one and the same, namely, a por-
tion of a loft arranged as a large settle. The relation to skdka (check) of
the meaning "attack" (in the phrase cited, skdka i pvi skjoli) is less remote,
but the whole subject demands investigation by a competent Icelandic linguist.
Names of the figures, ^The special scacchic significations of konungur
(kongur), drottning and biskup are not referred to, although we have them
sub pe^ in the compounds, kongspeih (king's pawn) drottningarpe^ (queen's
pawn) and hiskupspe^ (bishop's pawn). But the following are included in
their alphabetical places:—!, hrdkur (rook) the derivation of which is set
down as "from the Indian rocTi =elephanVs castle, through the English—
which, as is now known, is not correct. The word roch or mch does not
exist in any Indian tongue; and, in no language, does any word similar to
it mean "elephant's castle" (the writer confusing the English "castle," as
a chess term, with the German thumi and Danish taom- both meaning orig-
inally "tower;" and perhaps also with alfin, alfil^ the mediaeval name of
the chess bishop, formed from the Arabic t;=the, and /!Z= elephant— thus af-
fording, if our suggestion be correct, a good instance of the complex con-
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STRAY NOTES 55
fusion which usually arises when a philologist, ignorant of chess and its
history, tries to write about the game and its terms). The truth seems to he
—to state the matter briefly— that the Sanskrit name of what we call the
rook was ratha (in the Bengali idiom, roiha\ meaning (war)chariot, and
that when this word had made its way to Perso-Arabian regions it found a
somewhat similar vocable— say rohh or rukh— in use (with a very different
signification in Persia but) among the Arabic people as the name of a wag-
gon, or other vehicle, and that the influence of false etymological ideas led
to the substitution of the extra-Indian word for the Sanskrit term. This
statement is not too clear — and not at all satisfying— but the exact source
and story of the technical chess-word rook (and consequently hrokur), are
still shrouded in doubt, despite the efforts of many Orientalists to elucidate
them. Its connection with the appellation of a gigantic Eastern bird called
roc (in the ^'1001 Nights'") is as fabulous as the existence of the bird itself;
and equally devoid of demonstration are some other etymological affiliations
which have been suggested. Arrived in Arabic Spain, the word took the
form of roque^ and, subsequently, in early Italian of rocco^ in old French
of roc and in English of rook, adapting itself in England by popular assim>
ilation to the already existing form "rook " (the name of a bird); from Eng-
land it passed— with a knowledge of chess-^to Iceland, where an old word
hrdkur (apparently of varied meaning, but most likely cognate, both ety-
mologically and in signification, with the English bird-name) was likewise
in existence, and was seized upon as furnishing, to the popular mind, the
proper orthography. What is notable, as we have before hinted, is that
the only nations, outside of the Romance group, to permanently adopt the
ancient Perso-Arat)ic name were England and Iceland— so that the geogra-
phy of the term indicates the path of chess after its introduction (through
Spain) to Europe. GuCbrandur Vigfusson's definition is **the rook or castle
in chess," and he has the compound, hrdksmdt^ ** checkmate with the
rook." In connection with this word, he cites two proverbial phrases, the
first of which is: skdka i kroksvaldi, "to check in the guard of the rook."
At first sight, his /endering of the saying seems to be meaningless as an
English clause, and impossible as the description of a movement at chess.
But recurring to the translations of the saying given by Bj5rn Hallddrsson
and Eirikur J6nsson, we can see that, as a n^taphor, the signification is to
"show one's self bold or arrogant towards another, knowing that we can
do so safely, being ourselves under powerful protection;" to "attack another
boldly, protected by higher influence." The literal meaning would seem to
be to "give check to the king with a piece that is guarded by another,"
as when a bishop gives check, on an adjoining square, but cannot be takeh
by the king because it is protected by a rook— which would be exactly to
skdka i hroksva'.dL The synonomous phrase, skdka i skJoli, we have exam-
ined under skdk. The second of the proverbial sayings under hrdkur is eiga
ser hrdk i horni^ of which the lexicographer himself furnishes no rendering,
and which none of his predecessors cite. Literally it is to "have or possess
a rook in the corner ; " figuratively, it would be to " have support at one's
back, or in reserve," to know that one has a protector or aid in a known
place, and therefore at once available in case of need— just as when the
white queen threatens to attack, or mate, the adverse king by moving
upon the latter's first or royal rank, the player of the black pieces may
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56 CHESS IN ICELAND
comfortably feel that he can nullify the action by means of his rook, which
is still standing in its corner. The use of hrokur, in these metaphorical
expressions, is evidently owing, in part at least, to the fact that hrdkur
is a distinctively chess word, while king and queen and bishop and knight
are not; they, therefore, do not lend themselves so easily to similes, or met-
aphors, which originate on the chess table. It is under mdt that we must
seek one of the compounds of hrokur^ which is hroksmdt, a mate effected
by means of a rook. 2. Riddari has, as a subsidiary signification, ^* a knight
in chess,'* with references to Olafs saga helga and to the Sturlunga saga —
being the episodes of Knut (Canute) and Ulf, and of young {^orgils arid
Gizur Jarl. But no compounds are cited, although we have under pe^ (see
below) riddarapech, that is, "knight's pawn." 3. Pecf* has for its only ety-
mological elucidation, **Fr[ench] p^on," and is defined as "a pawn in
chess," and thereafter are kongspe^, '*a king's pawn," hrokspe^, riddara-
pe^y drottningarpe^, biskupspech ; pe^mdt, with the citation of Magus saga,
23. 44 (the tales of Hirtungur and Rognvald), or pechrifur, "checkmate
with a pawn." Next follows, under a rubric of its own, pg^»iao^wr, "a foot-
man" (with a citation of the Karlamagniis saga, 31); and with the additional
gloss, "a pawn in chess = 2j^^." Noteworthy is the derivation of the
Icelandic form from the nominative stem of "pedes" (ped-), rather than
from the low Latin inflectional stem {pedon-)^ of which the Romance and
English languages have availed themselves ("pion," "pawn"). Or is there
a long-lingering reminiscence of the Arabic and Persian words (haidaq^pi-
y(idah—a.s they are transliterated by Van der Linde— in the Icelandic form?
Olhei' Chess Terms, — Tlie remaining words of a chess character occur-
ring in the "Icelandic-English Dictionary" are: — I. 3(a<, no derivation
being suggested; the definition is ** checkmate," with references to the Vig-
lundar saga 31 (the episode of Orn), the Pornaldar sogur (I., 443— the Her-
varar-saga), and the BragOa-Magus saga (the Rognvald tale) ; "various kinds
of mate are pe^mdt, glcicharmdt, fretstertsmat, hroksmdt. heimamdi,'' to se-
veral of which we have already alluded. Glei^anndi literally means a
"straddle-mate," and is described by Mr. Olafur DaviOsson, as a mate or
mates effected by the queen and rooks in three corners *of the board, the
king to be mated being in the fourth — being doubtless one of the successive
mates in the same game, on >vhich we have commented in our first essay ;
its title comes from the adjective glei^ury "standing astraddle," "with
one's legs wide apart." The verb mdia has merely the definition:— "to
checkmate, in chess." — 2. Jafntefli is given as "an equal, drawn game,"
citing the Viglundar saga (the episode translated in an abridged shape in
a preceding page), but it is not treated as a special term, the inference
being that it is applied to other games. The similarly formed compound,
prdiefli (drawn by perpetual check), finds no place anywhere in the "Dic-
tionary," perhaps on account of its modernity. 3. Vppndm^ of which the
second meaning given is "a chess term, tefla i uppndm^ to expose a piece
so that it can be taken (Sturlunga saga, iii. 123)"— the passage being the
known One from the anecdote of ]^orgils skarSi); "hence the phrase, vera
i uppndmiy to be in immediate danger." Of course, t uppndm (accusative)
and i uppndmi (dative) are exactly the French en prise (of which, for lack
of an equivalent expression, we make use in English). As we have else-
where suggested, it is worthy of remark that a technical chess expression
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STRAY NOTES 57
of this character should have been invented and established in Iceland five
hundred years ago— happily formed and precise as it is— when many of the
modern tongues of Europe have been satisfied to borrow a foreign phrase
to describe this chess situation. Literally uppndm means the *' taking up/'
in the sense of *^ capture,'* and i uppndmi is **in the position of being taken
up (picked up), or captured/' 4. Vald (meaning "power," "might," "au-
thority") receives a subsidiary interpretation as "in chess, a guard," with
the compounds: hroksvald, pe^svald^ the former of which we have discussed,
indicating, as the most suitable rendering, to be "defended hy ^"^ pethstxdd thus
signifying, "defended by a pawn." 5. Leppur has in the " Dictionary" only
the literal senses of "lock of hair; a rag, tatter," no mention being made of
its modern employment in chess as "interposed piece," which, it is possible,
grew out of the sense of "a filling" for a crack, hole or the like, or a "stop-
gap," inherent by daily usage in *'rag." 6. Stans^ of which the same note
may be taken of the absence of any chess definition, is explained as "akin to
sUU^sa (5s=n2" by a philological law), a rare verb having in it the stem
standy the equivalent of our similar English form. It is interpreted as "a
standstill, hesitation," and, in a phrase, '"amasement;" it is used in Icelandic
chess, as already noted, as "a game drawn by reason of lack of mating pow-
er." The noun is followed by a verb, stanza^ "to pause, stop."— These in-
dude, as is believed, all the terms relating to chess which are discoverable
in the Oxford dictionary. The most important omission is perhaps patt (stale-
mate), which is leA unrecorded because it is never met with in any of the
classical writings.
Tafl^ hnefatafl.-'The former word is said by Dr. OuSbrandur Vigfiisson
to be "fl*om the Latin tabula^ but borrowed at a very early time, for it is used
even in the oldest poems;" and it is described as "a game, like the Old-En-
glish tables or draughts; used also of the old hneftafl, and later of chess and
various other games"— whereafter follow numerous quotations. Then are
cited the compounds hnefataft, skdktafl (chess) and go^atafl, as well as the
popular sayings:— v^^a tafli seinni^ *Ho be too late," literally "to be too
late at or for the game;" brogif' I tafli, "tricks in the game," "foul play."
Finally we are told that tafl is used "also of dice- throwing, diceing," and il-
lustrative passages are given. The rubric closes with various compounds, in
which tafl is the first element, such as taflbori^, "a chess-board (for playing
the hneftafl or chess);" taflbrog^, "feats of playing;" taflf^, "a bet" [lite-
rally, ** game-money "]; taflma^ir, "a player at chess or hneftafl;'"' taflpung-
«r, "a bag for the pieces;" taflspeki^ "skill in playing"— all with citations.
It should be observed that in the quotations in which tafl appears to mean "set
of men," or "board," or both "men and board," and its plural tofl seems to
have the sense of "pieces," "figures,"— some of which senses we have noted
in reading the Kr6karefs saga— the author attempts no precise elucidation
of these distinctions, a fact which doubtless comes both from his want of
chess-knowledge, or knowledge of what the game, tables, was, and from the
late and, therefore, uncommonly modern character of their significations.
His next rubric is the brief one devoted to tafia, "a piece in a game of ta-
bles. " Under the verb which is formed from the noun tafl, to wit, tefla,
the rendering is "to play at chess or draughts," and, after several passa-
ges, is noted the metaphorical phrase, tefla [any one] upp, "to take one
up, beat in a game of draughts." Like the primitive noun, " the word is
8
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58- GUESS JiV ICELA ND
also used of dice; the passion of the Teutons for dice is attested by Tacitus
(Germania, ch. 24);'* and next, the Icelandic phrase, um Itfi^ er at iefla^ is
translated "life is on the die," that is, life is at stalte, "used metaphori-
cally of a great emergency." This section is followed by two others, tefli^
a noun employed — as would seem to be the author's opinion — solely in the
compound Ja/>i<e/Ti. "a drawn game," which he refrains from illustrating;
and teflingy "playing," also without citations. It ought to be constantly
borne in mind that nowadays the words tafl and iefla are in as much use
as chess-words, as are "chess" and "play," that is "play at chess" — and
so they probably have been nearly ever since the introduction of chess.
Now we come to the difficult word hnefi. First of all, we must call attention
to the fact that OulJbrandur Vigfiisson seemingly reckons it as a vocable
differing essentially from hnefi=z flst (the Scotch "nief," or "nieve," Danish
"nseve," as he tells us), since he puts it in a separate rubric; but he does
not venture on any etymological suggestion in reference to it. He explains
it as "the king in a kind of chess played by the ancients" (i. «., the old
Icelanders) ; " the game was called hnefatofl, which is variously spelt nettafl
and hnetiafl (which are contracted or assimilated forms); hneftafl; hnottafl
(a bad form) in a spurious verse; hnefatafl (the true form). The game is
best described in Fri!)}>j6fs saga, and in one of the riddles in Hervarar saga
(where, however, the rhymed replies are not genuine) : 'Who are the maids
that fight about their unarmed lord, the dark all day defending, but the fair
slaying 1 ' The players were two, as in chess ; there was only one king (hnefi),
here called Uhe unarmed lord'; the pieces {toflur) were white and red, the
white attacking, the red defending the hnefi: patf> er hnefatafi, enar dokkri
very a hnefann, en hinar hvitari soehja. Whenever tafl is mentioned, this
particular game seems [in the ancient writings] to be understood; and the
fatal game of chess between King Canute and Earl i5\i in Roskilde A. D.
1027 was probably a hneftafl. We see from Morkinskinna (p. 186) that it was
still played at the beginning of the 12th century, but in after times it was
superseded by the true chess (skdk) ; both games were probably of the same
origin."— the last remark indicating clearly the limited acquaintance with
chess and its annals enjoyed by the lexicographer ("der wol wenig von der
geschichte des schachspiels versteht," says Dr. V. d. Linde of this final
phrase). ^ For whatever we may not know about htiefatafl, we do know
that it could never have lain in the same cradle as chess. The rubric closes
with the citation of a compound substantive, hnetiafla, "the piece of the
hnefi ; " and by a reference to the words halatafl and hunn, with which we
are likely to have to do hereafter.— We have omitted several citations made
under htiefi. Dr. Gu?^brandur Vigfusson's too brief description, though it can-
not be called an elucidation, was the earliest at all consistent notices of this
form of "tables." It is impossible to take final leave of the Oxford work,
without expressing once more our opinion of tlie value — despite some errors —
of its treatment of the terminology of chess. It is of far more importance
than all that had been previously written— not only in dictionaries, but in
other books as well— in regard to the oldest periods of the Icelandic game.
The newest general dictionary of the old Norse, or ancient Icelandic, is
that of Dr. Johan Fritzner, first issued in 1867, and published anew, enlarged
into three goodly octavos, at Kristiania in 1886-1896. It is a compilation
»7 «Qa«lUnitadi«D/' p. 61.
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STRAY NOTES 50
of extraordinary labor, and, as a vast storehouse of passages from the old
writings, is of the highest utility. But its author*s knowledge of the laws
of etymology and of foreign idioms was not too extended— indeed the lineago
and affiliation of the vocables which he treats seem hardly to have come
—in a manner at all complete— within the scope of his work; but in the
case of chess terms he once or twice attempts to consider the matter of deri-
vation, doing so, however, with disastrous results. He does not illustrate
the word skdkmaeHir^ in its chess sense— as he docs not find it in the classic
period— but only in the sense, skdkmathur= rohher (Danish, rover)^ noting, in
a proper way, its Old High German and New High German kinship C*ght.
scdhman, nht. 5cMc7i^r")— though here may be, so far as Icelandic is con-
cerned, another case of an effort at popular etymology on the part of the
8aga*8 compiler— and ends with passages from the f'ilireks saga. In the
next column, he treats skdktafl^ **skakspil, brset med tilhsrende brikker
(t5flur),'' then, after entering his illustrative quotations, he turns into the
field of etymology, and says:— "At skakspil I det latinske sprog heder Ittdus
latronum eller latrunctilorum synes henpege derpaa, at vi i skdktaft har det
samme skdk som forekommer i 5^<iA;mao^r*'— that is, in the skdkma^ ^rohher
of the preceding column. This means:— That chess in Latin being called ludus
lairanum or latrunculorum would seem to indicate that in skdktaft [=chessj
we have the same skdk which appears in skdkma^^"" [== robber]. This is a
gem of blundering. To understand it fully, we most remember that in Latin,
latroy of which latrunculus is a diminutive, signifies *♦ robber." Now, first of
all, chess is not called in (ancient) Latin Indus latruncul&rum^ nor by any
other name; for the Romans knew nothing of chess, since it was not intro-
duced into any part of the Roman dominions until some centuries after they
had ceased to be Roman, and, in fact, was probably not in existence anywhere
until the Roman empire had itself gone out of being. It is true that in very
early modern times, some writers of Latin, out of ignorance, employed *4udus
latrunculorum*' to designate the game of chess, but the more intelligent have
used "ludus scacchorum, (scaccorum)/* a neo-latinism formed from the orien-
tal name of the game, at least as far back as when the friar Jacobus de Ces-
soiis wrote his widely read Liber de moribus hominum^ towards the beginning
of the thirteenth century. The old Romans did, indeed, have a diversion
styled 'Mudus latrunculorum," that is, "the game of the little robbers," but
it had no resemblance to chess except that it was a "brettspiel," played with
pieces, like many other games. So much for Itidus latrunculorum ! Now for
skdkma^r ! The skdk in this word — which occurs, to our knowledge, nowhere
but in what may fairly be characterized as the German saga of I^iOrek, a story
told in connection, principally, with localities south of the Baltic— was once
supposed by some etymologists to be of Hebrew derivation, but only two lexi-
cologists, so far as we know, Magntjs 6lafsson, as we have heard, and
Dr. Fritzner— have ever connected it in any way with the word or game,
"chess." It is now generally recognized to be, as Dr. Fritzner's etymological
statement tends to show, a word of Teutonic origin, occurring even in Anglo-
saxon, although it is lacking among the very oldest Germanic forms. On the
other hand, the word chess— \i one may here repeat the oft-recorded expla-
nation - and, consequently, the word skdk (as in $A;<iA;ma^= chess-player),
which is merely another form of chess — both come from a Persian word
(f&^^— the final h pronounced like a German c7i), meaning "king," which
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60 CHESS IN ICELAND
word is even now a living vocable in Persian, being the title still borne by
Persians ruler. CJiess and skdk, therefore, signify "(the game of) the king,"
and have nothing whatever to do with any robbers— either Latin or Germanic—
Another instance of Dr. Fritzner's etymological skill cannot be explained
with so much ease. Under the somewhat objectionable expression fret-
stertumdt he reproduces the meaning given to it in the "Index lingusB
gothicae," of Verelius (1691)— which we have already copied in its proper
place— and then says (we render literally):— "This explanation is assuredly
erroneous, and originates in the similarity of the fret^ occurring in the word,
to the verb freta\ but fret is rather a corruption offers^ which primarily had
the signification of vezier, but afterwards took the form of fierge^ vierge^
from which was evolved the name of * queen,' which this piece now bears
in the game of chess— see A. van der Linde, ^Oeschichte und Literatur des
Schachspiels,* II, 150 ff, compare 157.*' Thereupon Dr. Fritzner cites the
Mdgus saga, and refers the reader to an even more objectionable term fu^
ryttumdt, in relation to the first element of which he has a briefer but sim-
ilar explication:— "In fufhyitunidt the word {fu^rytla) seems to correspond
to the Latin virgo, French vierge^ which, in the Middle Ages, was a common
appellation for the queen at chess,'* and again he cites Y. d. Lindens "Ge-
schichte'* (II., pp. 149 ff. and especially the notes on pp. 150-151). Although he
does not say so precisely, it is pretty plain that he has got into his head
what Dr. V. d. Linde calls, on one of the very pages (150) referred to by the
lexicographer, "das beriihmte wortspiel mit der vierge,'' perhaps originally
a half playful blunder which has been traced no further back than the year
1610, seemingly finding its birth in a once popular anonymous Latin poem
entitled "De Vetula," first published at that date. In a day when the science
of etymology was young, some one else, if not the author of the poem just
alluded to, ventured to suggest that because the Persian word /"er^— meaning
vezier — which was used in the period of Asiatic-European chess as the name
of the piece standing beside the king— had a certain phonetic and orthographic
resemblance to the French ri^^e— meaning "virgin," therefore (a queen,
too, b^ing a female) the chess people had 'finally bestowed its present appel-
lation upon what is now the game's most powerful piece. In other words,
it was a case of what we call popular etymology, or etymology by incorrect
assimilation — such as we have two or three times cited in earlier portions
of the present work. But this is just what the pages of Dr. V. d. Linde's
work, to which Dr. Fritzner appeals, are devoted to disproving, as he would
have seen by a closer examination. The use of virgo or vierge^ by a few
comparatively late writers, as a title for the chess-queen, had nothing to do,
in any etymological way, with the old Persian name, fers. But, be that as
it may, no one who compares several of the other Icelandic chess terms
with those here explained by Dr. Fritzner will have any belief whatever in
his theory of the affinity between fers and vierge and the cited Icelandic
names for certain styles of checkmate, thus strangely glossed by the indus-
trious Norwegian lexicologist. Chess reached Iceland in the 12th century,
many generations before virgo (or vierge) was ever used as the name of the
queen, and many more before any ignorant writer thought of recognizing
its likeness to fers. After the century of its arrival, there could not well
have been— so slight did the intercourse soon become— any bond of union
between continental and Icelandic chess, by means of which this fantastic
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STRA Y NOTES 61
notion could have travelled North. Bat the very sight of the different words
which Dr. Fritzner proposes to bring into such close relations will suffice to
convince the linguistic student of the absurdity of his suggestion, aside from
its historic impossibility.— Dr. Fritzner's other chess- words are riddari;
hrokur (under which are cited the modorn-Latin roccus of Du Cange, and
the old French roc from La Came de St. Palaye*s and Littr^'s dictionaries);
pe^yna^r (but not p^^), with etymological references to Latin pedes and Old
French pion ; pe^^mdi and pe^smdt ; and uppndm^ which he interprets as
"removal" (borttagelse), citing the passage firom Sturlunga (II., p. 105— I*or-
gils saga skar6a), and saying that the knight, in the quotation, is placed
'^so that the adversary can take it*' (saaledes at modparten kan tago den),
which is as precisely as it can be described without using the proper technical
term, en prise.
To these notes on the treatment of chess terms by the compilers of Ice-
landic dictionaries, or word-lists, extended as they are, something might
still, very likely, have been added by more careAil research, as well as by
consulting the glossaries published in connection with a good many editions
of the sagas, and of other ancient Icelandic writings. Of course, there are
not a few technical words connected with the chess of later periods which
are found in no printed vocabulary. Some of those of which no lexicogra-
pher has availed himself — are doubtless preserved in the MS dictionary of
J6n 6lafsson (fp4 Grunnavlk), which we shall find frequently cited in another
place, or in similar inedited collections; others — especially those of the
present day (like hrdkskipti= cAaiMng^ for instance) —have never been written
down in any list, whether MS or printed. But the number of words relating
to chess and its practice which we have been able to gather from well-
known and easily accessible lexicons forms an abundant proof of the unusual
part which the game has played in the life and literature of Iceland. More-
over the many metaphors and proverbial sayings, drawn from the chessboard
and the movements of its figures, which we have encountered in the course
of our investigations, are so many additional demonstrations of the same fact.
Dr. Van der Linde and the Bpilabdk.
On the very last page (412) of one of his really epochmachende works,
tho " Quellenstudien zur Geschichte des Schachspiels" (1881), Dr. Antonius
V. d. Linde has a brief notice of the diminutive "Spilab6k,'' printed at Akur-
eyri, on Iceland's northern shore, in 1^8, which devotes several of its con-
tracted pages to chess. He begins by saying that just as the final proofs
of the **Quellenstudien" reached him, he received, for inspection, from the
distinguished German chess-writer and chess- collector, Mr. T. v. d. Lasa, a
copy of a miniature book of games (miniaturspiolbuch) in Icelandic, which
its owner had acquired with a good deal of effort. He thereupon gives its
title in fUll;» and then follow a description and criticism of the newly
discovered manual, evidently written with haste, and without having an
Icelandic scholar at hand:— "Die schachstiicke heissen : kongur, drottning
e^a fru, byskup, riddar [riddari] , hrdkar [hrdkur] e6a fllarn [filar] , peO—
also kein traditionelles sdgurschach sondern (wie das angeblicho keltische
" "SpiUbok, lem kcnnir a& »pSU DomlDO- off Qni-ipn, elnnlg Skik, Damm p. fl.—
Ko8tuaa»rin»»ur : J6ief gullimrtur GriniMOB. — Aknroyri 1868. f prenUmlBJu Nordar- og
AustaramdiDinltlnt, bji H. Helguyui." 8S«. f. [1], pp. 4-88. (8. Skiktafl, pp. 18-89).
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62 CBESS IN ICELAND
schach der Irl&nder und das moderne schach der Portugiesen) bloss iiber-
setzang aus dem englischen. Man darf zwar nicht aus den regeln solcher
kleinen sammelbiicher mit sicherheit auf die gebr^uche des landes schlies-
sen, allein es erregt doch ein ungunstiges vorurteil gegen das skandinavische
Strdbeck, wcnn noch im jahre 1858 nicht nur spielereien wie peSrifmat''^
and here he refers to his extract in the '^Oeschichte des Schachspiels"' (II.,
p. 178) from Eggert Olafsson's notice of modern Icelandic chess— "gelehrt
werden, sondern wenn sogar eine rochade vorgeschrieben wird, wo der
kOnig z. b. von el nach bl Oder cl, und der roch nach cl odor dl zieht,*'
and thereupon his comments close with a reproduction, between parentheses,
of the portion of the booklet upon which he bases his final gibe : (A me6an
ekki er htUS aB faera konginn og hr6kana ur staQ getur mabur hrdkskipt,
p. e. : skipt urn reit vi6 hrdkinn meQ konginum, pannig, aQ maOur setur
konginn & riddara e6a byskups reit og hr6kinn 4 fruar e9a byskups reit,
eptir pvi hvoru megin hrdkskipti er, pa© er a© skilja, pegar enginn mabur
er 4 mllli peirra, pvi ekki mi kongur el)a hrdkur stokkva yftr aSra menn).
The i^ention of Iceland, or Icelandic chess, or in this case, the opening of
a lilliputian yolume printed in Iceland, is the red rag which is always sure
to excite the critical rage of Dr. V. d. Linde. On such occasions, he assumes
a sort of ox-eye glare, and proceeds at once to toss the object of his wrath
high into the air. But generally — if we may turn our metaphor inside out —
his howls prove to be hardly more real or logical than so many Irish bulls.
In the instance under contemplation we have him at his worst, and must
take him into examination in the order of his truly bovine cavils— as they
turn out to be : 1. He extracts the Icelandic names of the chess figures from
the book, and then triumphantly shouts: — *' Ah, here is no saga-chess, but
only the merest translation from the English I '* But does it not occur to
him that the names of the pieces— so far as they are cited in the sagas-
are all virtually translations from the English, and are the very same as
are found in the list he is scornfully holding up ¥ In what saga does he
find any other f Or, if he means that anybody has declared that piece-
names, special to the sagas, exist in modern Icelandic -chess, when they do
not— then by whom and where is such an assertion madef Or does he mean
something elsef Those who are familiar with his ways and writings will
opine from his allusions to the Celtic chess of the Irish, and to the modern
chess of the Portuguese— references which have such an enigmatic air—
that he really wishes to say— what he has before asserted elsewhere— that
the pretence of anything like early Icelandic chess is simply a whim of the
ignorant. 2. He follows this up by a slur on the Scandinavian StrObeck— a
name which nobody but himself has given to Iceland— whereby he desires
to imply that, although it has been maintained that chess has been cultiva-
ted in Iceland with something like the devotion with which it has been said
to be cultivated at the North German village of StrObeck— *^mit seinen sa*
genhaften starken schachspielern,'* as he himself calls the StrObeck practi-
tioners (^^Qeschichte," I., p. 312)— yet any such ^sumption, as to Iceland,
is incorrect. But if it has indeed been played much in that island, as ill-
informed people maintain, then it has been played in an abominable style
as ho is now going to show. 3. There is, for instance, pecMfmat ; what— he
seems to say — does the reader say to that? This word, remarkably enough,
is not Icelandic at all, but wholly ^'Yan-der-Lindian.*'— It neither occurs in
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STRAY NOTES
the " Spilab6k," which is under criticism, nor in the reference, which the
critic himself makes, to the narrative borrowed by himself from Eggert
Olafisson. The explanation of this fact is that, if it did occur, it would be
as a linguistic malformation, which no Icelander could possibly be led to
concoct. Pethrif (that is to say, in the nominative, petHrifur) means " mate
(by a pawn)," and mdt (not mat) means "mate," so that the two terms com-
bined would be as if we were to talk in English of a kind of mate called
"checkmate mate," or " smothered-mate mate." What Dr. V. d. Linde
intends to say is doubtless simply peihr'tfur^ but the blunder of reading the
abnormity peiHrifmat in two different places and in two different works,
where it did not exist at all, betrays a state of mind hardly conducive to
sober criticism. But why are we told that it is a " fantastic trick " (spielerei) t
Why should "mate by a pawn" or "pawn's mate" be any more ridiculous
than a good many other chess eccentricities, which are to be found uncon-
demned, in Dr. Y. d. Linde*s and many other people's works on chess f Why
is it a "spielerei," when the "odds of the capped pawn," or "mate with a
pion coiff^'" is not? Why is it any more of a "spielerei" than a "suicidal
problem," or a "smothered mate!" Why is it more of a "spielerei" than
any one of a hundred singular conditional problems set forth in the critic*s
own most interesting chapter on "Das problemschach des mittelalters," »
for instance, one, in which white "gives check with one pawn and mates with
another; " or another, in which there is a "mate in three moves, the bishop
on b4 moving only when he captures a piece;" or still another in which
there is a "mate in five moves with the bishop at g 6," and so on. 4., this
being his most serious insinuation. He observes, preliminarily, that "one
cannot, with certainty, determine anything about the usages of a country
from such a small compilation, but nevertheless it excites an unfovorablo
prejudice, when, in the year 1868, not only are such flBintastic plays as pecMf-
mdt still taught, but even a method of castling is prescribed, in which the
king is moved, for example to b 1 or c 1, and the rook to c 1 or d 1." It
is true that the mode of castling is prescribed in the little volume, only the
prescription is exactly in accordance with the rules for castling all over the
wide world of chess— even in the works written or edited by Dr. V. d. Linde.
The trouble, as usual, is not with Iceland, or Icelandic chess, or the dimin-
utive Icelandic manual, but with the critic. At Wiesbaden— the same last
page of his book is dated at that city— there was evidently no Icelandic
interpreter, and the critic, unaided, failed to understand the conditional
phrase which we have underscored in the Icelandic text giyen^eptir pvi
hvoru megin hrdkskipti er. We will now render literally the whole extract
in which Dr. V. d. Linde has discovered such a maro*s nest:— "So long as
neither the king nor the rook has moved from its place, the player can
castle, that is, change the squares of the rook and the king in such a man-
ner that he places the king on the knight's [g 1] or the bishop*s square [cl],
and the rook on the queen's [d 1] or the bishop's square [f 1], according to
the side on which the castling takes plac«— that is to say, when no other
piece is between these two pieces, for neither king nor rook can leap over
other men." Dr. V. d. Linde thus reads both his Icelandic and the squares
of the chess-board wrongly. It is easy, however, to see that in castling on
the hinges side the king is moved to the knight's square [g 1] and the rook
>* "GcKhichto dei Scbaohapiels ", II., pp. aOS-S78.
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64 CHESS IN ICELAND
to the bishop*s square [f 1] ; and that, in castling on the gueen*s side, the king
goes to the bishop^s square [c 1] and the rook to the Queen^s [d 1], as stated
by the Icelandic compiler, who gives the two differing moves of the king in
one phrase, and the two differing moves of the rook in another— the grouping
being a little awkward, perhaps, but neither incomprehensible nor erroneous—
if only a man be sure of his squares and his Icelandic. But Dr. V. d. Linde
may, possibly, be allowed to stumble as he pleases whenever he gets to Ice-
land, for in all the rest of the chess world he is pretty sure of his steps.
Of this "Spilab6k'*— containing the first printed Icelandic description of
the game of chess and how to play it— though very briefly stated, the rea-
der will find in the next few pages an account in German, written for the
*' Deutsche Schachzeitung,'* a year or more before Dr. V. d. Linde saw the
book. It was from that article, in fact, that Mr. V. d. Lasa knew of the
little work^s existence. A re-examination, made at the present time, of the
Icelandic publication shows us that Dr. V. d. Linde, instead of running a
tilt against fancied facts, might have found, by a little more careful research
through the tiny pages, real errors quite worthy of his critical metal. Ho
would have ascertained— we take the misstatements in their order— that the
compiler makes the "Persians" call this game "Sedrenz" (it should be written
in Icelandic ^atrans), which ho renders by "a hundred difficulties*' {hundraif'
armcechir) in complete ignorance of the actual origin or significance of
the word ; that he gives to the rook the alternative name of fill (plural
filar), "elephant; " that he asserts that some say that the pawns may move
two squares at the first move if the player so will (^9 Idta sumir pau stokkva
yflr einn reit i fyrsta leik ef manni svo synist) ; that when a pawn has made
his way to the eighth rank the player may change it for any piece which he
will of those which have been captured (o^ sd, sem kemtir pvi upp, velji^er
fyrir pocf* hvern pann mann, sem hann vill, af peim, sem fallnir eru) ; and
that he finally sums up several methods of action which some players have
the custom of pursuing {sumir taflmenn Ixafa pd venju, acf* Idta), these being:
1. To consider the last man besides the king which a player has, near the
close of a game, as uncaptured, unless the other player checkmates at the
third or seventh move after taking him ; 2. To make the lalli—i\ie pawn
which has been moved to the eighth rank along the king's file— exempt
from capture, like the king himself; 3. To give the king, at his first move,
the movement of the knight; and 4. Not to allow an interposed piece either
to guard an attacked piece of his own side, or to give check to the opposing
king. Let us look, for a moment, at each of these abnormal methods of
play :— 1. In this obligation of the player having the stronger array to bring
the game to an end at a certain move, we may, perhaps see a forerunner
of the rule, only of late generally adopted, which compels the player having
the superior force to eff'ect mate within fifty moves from a particular stage
of the game, or to consent that the game be regarded as drawn. 2. This
exemption of a queened pawn from capture has, we believe, never been prac-
tised except by these exceptional players of Iceland. 3. The believer in the
force of tradition might trace, in this giving the power of the knight to the
king at his first move, a faint remembrance of the custom in Lombard chess,
which bestowed upon the king, when first moving, the privilege of covering
three squares (going from his own square to the third one from it) — which
was the germ of the later "castling/' 4. As to this idea of not permitting
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STRAY NOTES 65
an interposed piece to exercise its checking power, we may recall the Ikct
that even in Germany they have dehated the question:— *^Kann ein schach-
deckender stein auch oin schachbietender sein V'^ According to this theory,
we take it, the black king might capture a pawn, let ub say, even if, by
doing so, he apparently moved into check from an interposed or ''pinned**
piece. In the names of the pieces we observe filamiv as synonymous with
''the rooks**— the word being a definite form of /1^= elephant (plural
filar). It is notable enough to know that this Arabic word in its literal mean-
ing, as applied to an animal, existed already, at a very early day, in the
Icelandic vocabulary ; and, so far as its signification as a chess-word is con*
cemed, it would indeed be very interesting if only it were cited as an ap-
pellation given to the bishop, instead of to the rook, for, except in the very
oldest Indian, or ante-Persian, form of the game, the rook was never known
anywhere, until in quite recent times, as "elephant;** and such a usage in
Icelandic chess practice must have been extremely limited, or have existed
only in the mind of the word-monger, borrowed, perhaps, by him from
Danish books as an evidence of his learning. But one of the changes which
the Indian game is supposed to have undergone at the hands of the Persians
was the transfer of the name of "elephant** from the corner-pieces (our
rooks) to the pieces which stand beside the king and queen (our bishops).
Afterwards the Persian (or quasi-Persian) pil was replaced by the cognate
Arabic fU (elephant), just as it had itself replaced the Sanskrit luisiL And
this Arabic term for the bishop had a long life, extending through the
Spanish alfil (=aZ, the Arabic article "the,** and /fZ= elephant), Italian alfino
(now alfiere)^ old French aufin (in modern French /U, by volksetymologie^
having become /'ott=fooI, another form of fot)^ and Old-English alphin. To
continue this digression a little farther— the rare and very modern usage,
which occasionally makes the rook an "elephant** is derived from its name
in the oft-reprinted and oft- translated Latin poem (1525) of Qirolamo Vida
(who got the term, as a military expression, ft'om Virgil), who calls it elephan-
tu8 iurriii^y or "towered elephant.** This ultimately led to the adoption of
the title of tower for the rook in the German, Scandinavian and other idioms
(German, thurm or turm^ Danish taam^ Dutch hasieel^ Hungarian hdsUja^
modern Greek purgos and the alternative English form, castle). The influence
ofYida*s "Schacheis** ("Scacchia Ludus**) was so great that in literary
chess the term "elephant** for rook (instead of for bishop) also sometimes
occurs, and this is the case in Denmark, whence the knowledge of it, as an
echo of Yida, found its way into Iceland. Readers of early English chess
literature will remember, in this connection, in "The pleasaunt and wittie
play of the cheasts** (1562), which is cited under the name of Rowbothum,
the phrase, "The rockes some call elephants, carrying towers upon their
backes, and men within,** the idea of which the author obtained from Vida,
and which was repeated in the first English version (1597) of Yida*s work in
describing the chess-pieces : — ^^
Here footemen were aod horaemen both, arahen, some white, some blaoke;
Here elephants that vse to beare a castle on their backe.
—The contents of the third section of the little Icelandic book (3. Skdklafl) may
be hastily summarized as follows, omitting some matters already referred to:
•• See V. d. Llnd«*i "QeM»hiehte," II., p. MS.
** Both these qaoUtlons are given in V. d. Llnde*s *'Qesehlelite,** IL, p. 181.
9
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66 CHESS IN ICELAND
— The chess board ; the names of the chess-flgares ; their positions ; the law that
a white comer square shall be at the right hand of each player ; the moves of
the chessmen ; practice is better than rules ; in attaci^ing a king, the player must
say skdk ! (check !), and it is usual to do the same thing when attacking the
queen; there are three kinds of "check" (or "checkmate*' or <*game-endings*');
1. Simple check, from which the king escapes, by moving, by interposing a
piece or pawn, or by capturing the checking piece; 2. When a king has lost
all his men, and is so beset tha,t he cannot move without going into check —
this is called paf^ (stalemate); 3. Checkmate {skdk og rndt). ^Checkmate by
means of a pawn is called petMfur^ and is deemed dishonourable to the
defeated party; glei^armdt ("straddle-mate") is explained as a marvellous
position, in which the mated king is in one corner of the chessboard, and the
mating queen and rooks in the other three; and heimamdt (home-mate) is
when the king, still unmoved, is mated on his original square. Jafniefli
(drawn game) is described, and we are told that the king*s pawn (or the
king*s pawn when queened) is styled toUi, while leppur signifies '*an inter-
posed piece." Then we learn that vcUdskdk ("guard-chess") is a mode of
chess-play, in which the men protected by other pieces than the king cannot
be slain, while in contradistinction to vaMskdk the usual nmde of play is
known as drepskdk ("capturing chess"). A roughly-made little woodcut
of an empty chess board, scarcely five-eighths of an inch wide, and not too
rectangular in outline, adorns page 20.— We note the following chess-exprea-
sions (several of which are, however, given elsewhere in the present work);
reitir (squares); mennimir (the men); heldri tnenn (pieces, as distinguished
from pawns); drepa (to capture, literally to "slay"); fcera (to move a piece
or pawn); hrdkskipta (to castle); hrokskipti (castling); leikur (move); niot-
sto^umcUHir (opponent) ; &era fyHr (to interpose); ta/lmenn (players).— As the
book is now not easily to be found, we reprint the original text of the whole
chapter on chess:—
3. Skaktafl.
SkdktafliC er persiskt aJS uppruna. Nafni^J er dregiU af persiska orSinu:
"Schach" (littalast: "Sjakk," en viB nefnum paB "^Arrf*"), er merkir: kon-
ungur. Persar kalla tafl petta "Sedrenz," p. e. "hundra» arm»Sur," af
pvi menn purfa aC hugsa miki6 um pa©, og hafa hugann fastan viU :^msar
kringumstseUur. Vi6 tafl petta parf a» hafa mikiU athygli og heilabrot, og
er pa© skemtileg daegrastytting fyrir pd, sem vel kunna, pareb peir leggja
ekkert i sOlurnar nema bdnaegjuna yfir pvi aC vertia unnir, en hafa eins mikla
von um a6 verCa svo fr»gir a© vinna.
Menn tefia & svonefndu taflborOi, og eru & pvi 32 hvitir
ferhyrntir sm&reitir og eins margir svartir.
Myndirnar e6a mennimir, sem tefit er me0, eru vanalega
ur trje eOa filabelni. Mel$al peirra eru 8 heldri menn, sinn meJS
hverju m6ti aO stserl), nafni og tign, og er gangi peirra skipaO
eptir pvi. Hji. peim standa 8 minni myndir eOa menn, sem kallast pei^^ og
er peim fyikt fyrir framan hina stserri.
Kon^urinn er seOstur. I^egar hann er unninn, er tafiiO uti.
Drottningin c0a Frdin er bezti maSurinn bseSi til aO verja eOa valda
konginn og ssekja & Qandmanninn.
SB
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STRAY SOTES 57
B48ir Hr6kaniir eQa FUamir ganga trixnm nsest aO tign.
B&8ir Biddaramir era ^grotir liOsmenn til atlogu i byrjun tafls eSa
pegar fram i sdBkir.
B&8ir Byakupamir Jafagilda hartnser riddurunum og gj5ra mest gagn
seinast i taflinu.
Pe8in eru liVljettust, en geta I>6 opt orSiO a9 miklu liOi, ef t>eim or vel
og vitiirlega beitt.
Hinum 8 heldri m5nnum er fylkt & yzta reitina k taflbor9inu. Svartur
kongur er settar k hvltan miSreit og hvitur kongur k svartan, hvit friji k
hvitan miOreit og sy6rt k svartan, b&Oir byskuparnir sinn vi6 hverja hli0
kongs og drottningar, b&9ir riddararnir sinn yiO hverja hliS byskupanna og
baOir hr6karnir k hornreitina. Pedin, sem eru likt og varnarvirki hinna,
eru sett k nsesta reitina fyrir framan.
Pannig er hvorutveggju liSinu fylkt, en pd skal fess ceH^ gceiU a^
hvitur homreitur ^e til hasgri handar,
Kongurinn gengur aO eins k nsesta reit fram og aptur og til hliOar og k
skareiti, en aldrei lengra en k nsesta. Pegar Qandmadur verSur fyrir honum,
getur hann drepiO hann meS pvi a0 taka {>ann mann burtu ur taflinn og f»ra
sig k hans reit, ef kringamstse^urnar meina t>a9 ekki.
A meSan ekki or hin^ a5 fsera konginn og hr6kana ur sta9, getur maSur
hr6k8kipt, p. e. : skipt urn reit viO hrdkinn me8 konginum, pannig, a0 ma6-
ur setur konginn k riddara e9a byskups reit og hr6kinn k fhSiar eOa byskups
reit, eptir pvi hvoru megin hrbkskipti er, paO er a5 skilja, ]>egar enginn
maBur er k milli peirra, pvi ekki mk kongur e5a hr6kur stokkva yfir aSra
menu.
Fruin gengur eins og kongur og getur hun k dllum gangi &riO um pvert
og endilangt borOiO, pegar enginn maSur er fyrir og drepur hiin paO sem
fyrir verSur k sama h&tt og kongurinn ; af pessu mk rd0a, a9 fruin er li5bezti
niadurinn til a5 verja e5a valda konginn og ssekja k Qandmanninn.
Byskuparnir ganga ekki nema k sk&roitina. I^eir geta fariO svo langt
sem vill, ef enginn er Qrrir, og drepa peir eins, ef menn sjd ajer hag i. Af
^angi peirra fl^tur, a9 byskup si, sem stendur k hvitum reit, kemst aldrei
a svartan, og si, sem er k svdrtum reit, aldrei a hvitan.
Riddararnir ganga hvorki beint fram nje aptur heldur hli9skakkt k p4
reiti, sem eru til hliSar vi6 naestu skireiti, og geta pannig stokkiO yfir aSra
menn. I^eir eru pvi g68ir til framgOngu og til aO r&Sast a6 konginum og
jafnvel mita hann, pareO enginn ma5ur ver6ur borinn tyri p&. f^ess vegna or
ra51egast a5 faera p& sem fyrst fram, pvi peir geta betur neytt sin f^rst A*aman
af, en ekki er h»gt a6 m&ta meO tveim riddurum eingongu seinast i tafli.
Hr6karnir ganga beint fram og aptur og til hliOar, en aldrei k ski, um
pvert og endilangt bor9, of ekkert er fyrir peim, en p& drepa peir k sama
liatt og sagt er um hina mennina. l^afi er ekki r&dlegt aS brtjilia p& fyr en
fram i s^kir og t($luvert mann fall er orOiO.
PeOin ganga a6 eins beint fram k nsesta reit, en aldrei aptur k bak i^e
til hliOar. 1^6 Uta sumir pau stdkkva yfir einn reit i fyrsta leik, ef manni
Rvo s^ist. l^au geta eins og aOrir menn drepiQ pa6, sem tyrir verBur; en
aldrei nema pann mann, sem stendur k nsesta sk&reit. Ef ma6ur kemur
pc9i upp 1 bor0i5 hj& hinum, eru pa9 rjettust skikldg, a5 s&, sem kemur
\)\\ upp, veUi sjer fyrir pa5 hvem pann mann, sem hann vill af peim, sem
fallnir eru, og stendur p& si maSur k sama reit og pe9 kemur upp k.
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CITESS IN ICELAND
PaJS er ekki hjegt a© gefa reglur fyrir pvi, hvernig mabur k a» tefla, par paB
er komiO undir hug])6tta pess, or teflir, og seflngin ein getur kennt pal) bezt.
Beztu skakmenn era peir, scm ssekja mest a og reyna til a5 kreppa pannig
a5 kongi m6tst5Qumann8 sins, a5 hann geti ekki baett ur sk&k, pvi pk er
hann mdt.
Pegar einhver maSur stefnir pannig 4 konginn, sJS hann eptir gangi
sinum getur drepiQ hann, of hann vreri ekki aetlQ ddrscpur, segir maQur :
(Ixlib/ af lotninga' fyrir konginum til aS i&ta m6t8t00umann sinn vita, aO
kongi hans ^je hsetta buin, svo hann geti bori5 menn fyrir sig e6a fluiQ.
Bins er pa0 yenja aQ scgja til, ef maSur setur & frCina, svo hinn geti forOaO
henni, of pa9 er hsegt.
I^a5 er til prenns konar sk&k :
1. EinfSld 8k4k, pegar baett verQur dr me9 pvi a,}S faera konginn, bera
roann fyrir e9a drepa pann mann, sem skakaO er mc9.
2. I^egar annarhvor konganna er buinn aQ missa alia menn sina og
bui5 er aO kreppa svo aQ honum k alia vegu, a9 hann getur ekki komist ur
staO nema ofan i sk&k. I'etta kalla menn a& verQa eOa gjOra paU, Pegar
svo stendur i, er taflid uti, og sd, sem verQur patt, tapar pk ekki nema helm-
ingi af pvi, sem kann sJS vera teflt um.
3. Skdk og mdt, pegar sk&kin er svo l(lgu0, a8 kongurinn hyorki getur
fli&iQ, boriQ fyrir sig ivje drepiO nema ofan i sk&k, og p^ er bui0. Si mal^ur,
sem borinn er fyrir til a9 bseta Cir sk&k, er kallaOur leppur.
I^egar mAtaO er meO peQi, kalla menn pa9 pe^^if^ og pykir sminarlegt.
t>egar kongnrinn stendur i einhverju horninu og fruin og hr6karnir verba
pannig fserdir aO konginum meO pvi a5 segja sk&k og mki 1 hverjum leik,
aO hr6karnir standa hvor i sinu horni (it ttk konginum og fr^in i priQja
horninu, heitir pa9 glei^armdt, og pykir verra en hitt. En sminarlegast
allra pykir hid svonefhda heimamdt^ pegar kongur er m&taliur heima i
borDinu il^ur en hann heflir faert sig um reit.
I^egar svo er MMJS hj& biOum, a0 ekki er haegt aO m&ta, heitir paO
Jafnteflu
Samir taflmenn hafin pk venju, aO l&ta seinasta mann, er kongurinn hefur,
vera 6draepan, nema maOur pk mkii 1 priOJa eOa sjljunda leik eptir aO ma9ur
hefur drepiS hann. Eins lita sumir to/tonn— pe0, sem mal)ur kemur upp i
bbrO k kongsreit—vera 6dr»pan eins og kong, konginn ganga riddaragang
i fyrsta sinni, og lita leppinn hvorki geta valdaO annann mann nje skikaO
kongi.
Sumir tefla pannig, a9 aldrei sje drepinn maOur, pegar hann er vaidaOur
af (JOram manni en konginum. i*a6 kallast valdskdk^ eins og menn til aft-
greiningar nefna hinn taflsmitann drepshdk.
Um pessi iminnstu atrial um taflslOgin ver9a menn a9 koma ^er saman
i9ur en tafli9 byrjar, pared opt er undir pvi komiO hverjum 15gum fylgt er,
hvort ma5ur vinnur.
A OrlniMy X«6g6iiid.
There comes from Iceland a story— said to be a common one in the
schools of that country— about a native of the tiny isle of Grimsey, which
lies directly under the Polar circle just off the northern coast of the larger
island. In the summer there are few that traverse the sixty miles of silent
sea which separate it trom the mainland, and in the winter the stormy winds
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STRAY NOTES
and the turbulent waters shut it wholly out from the world. For the few
families who live on the rocks and earn their subsistence by gathering the
feathers of the birds that haunt the precipitous cliffs, and by fishing In the
surrounding seas, has been provided a small church, over which the poorest-
paid pastor in Iceland presides. The ancestors of these temilies came to the
solitary spot, to escape the consequences of a feud, Just after the days when
chess had made its way from England to Iceland. It is a widespread belief,
in Iceland, that the exiles have always found the game a great solace in
their isolation, and that many of their number have attained great skill in
its practice. Our story says that a fourteen year old boy once came with
his fatl|0r, from their home on the lonely isle, to visit the episcopal scat of
H61ar in North Iceland— in one of those good old years when H61ar still had
its bishops, who, with their brother-prelates of the Southern see of Skilholt,
were the great dignitaries of Thule. The lad had never been outside of
Orimsey before ; his manners were consequently rough, and respect for the
grandees of the world had not been one of the habits he had acquired. But
one thing he had learned, and that was chess. While the two stood, with
others, in the court of the bi8hop*s house, the prelate himself passed through,
and all doffed their hats except the boy. Being reproved by one of the by-
standers, he asked: *'Who then was that manT* **The bishop, you fooK
the biggest priest in Iceland.'* '*0h, the bishop, does he play chess well?
But of course, he does, for our parson is the second-best player in Orimsey,*'
said the boy. This remark was reported to the bishop, who sent for the
young son of Orimsey. ** What was it that you aslced in the court t *' en-
quired the dignitary. ** I only asked one of your people if you played a
good game of chess; for if you do, I should like to try one with you.** It
happened that the bishop was not only an excellent chess player, but also
rather proud of his superiority to others. Amused at the boldness of the
insular Tristram, he ordered the chessboard to be brought and to his aston-
ishment speedily succumbed, in three straight games, to his young oppo-
nent. ''Where did you learn your chess, boyf** demanded the beaten bish-
op, who in no wise took his defeat with episcopal serenity. *'From my
father and his people in Orimsey, for in the winter we play from early in
the morning till late at night.** '* I should rather say,** exclaimed the humil-
iated bishop, ''that you learned it from the devil, and that you have been
neglecting your prayers.** "Why, if that be the case, I should be quite
able to beat the fellow you mention, since I can beat the parson, and the
parson, who is very good and pious, can beat anybody else'.** The bishop
regained his good humor at the lad*s reply, invited him to remain at H61ar*
and, finding him clever at other things besides chess, put him into the cathe-
dral school. Later in life, he received a living, and became, like his own
parson, a good and pious priest— <iuite able to withstand the assaults of the
great adversary.
Tftbles and SbitCatefl."
' Taft, — Throughout the whole of western Europe, during a period begin-
ning at a date at least as early as the tenth century, there was played, par-
ticularly by the higher classes, a household game, the European name of
«* Th« matter wbteb b giTen under thia nibr1« Ii, In every reepeet, oniAUifMtory. To
mftke It at all ▼elneble woal4 demand far more time and reaeareb tban tbe writer baa been
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70 CffESS IN ICELAND
which was derived from the Latin word, tabtUa, which is likewise the source
of our common English vocable, *' table/' The amusement was thus called,
of course, because, in order to play it, a *' table," "board," or other flat
surface, was, first of all, necessary. The name usually assumed the plural
form, indicating that this "table" was divided, either literally or by painted
divisional lines, into two, that is, into two parts. In Italy this diversion
was styled tavole ; in France and England tables ; in Spain tablas ; in Portu-
gal (supposedly) tabolas ; in Germany sabelispieV) ; in Iceland to/f (the A &s
has already been stated, pronounced like b) ; and in Denmark tavl.^ In
Anglo-Saxon it occurs as tcefeU having an allied verb tceflan^ "to play (at
tables) " (like the Icelandic verb tefla^ of the same origin), and the coQipound
ta/Tpi^ton (literally, "table-stone"), signifying a "man (or piece) at tables."
In Gaelic, as would appear, it was known as taibhleas^ and in Welsh as tavoU
&riocW— the last element the equivalent of the English "board." But there
is no need of continuing this list ; it is sufficient to say that this ludus ta-
bularum penetrated into all the countries of the extreme Occident. The
domain, however, in which it was especially well-known, at the time of the
revival of letters, was the region which included the Italian and Spanish
peninsulas, France, and the islands of Great Britscin and Iceland, or, in other
words, the very tract over which chess spread with such comparative rapid-
ity, after it had once passed from the old Moorish to the Christian provinces
of Spain. We hear less of it, in those early centuries, in the lands of the Con-
tinent to the east and north of the Rhine, but that is no doubt owing to the
later- developed culture and literature of those parts.
Abundant as are the allusions to the game in both the poetical and prose
literatures of the Middle Ages, so little has been written in regard to its
character and story that there have been few attempts to evolve any theory
as to its birth-place or birth-time. The citation of it in Anglo-Saxon wri-
tings proper — in which, oT course, there is no authentic mention of chess —
would indicate that it preceded chess as a European game. Indeed, there are
some obscure allusions — in what literature survives from those ages of
obscurity that followed the close of the Roman period, which may possibly
refer to tables ; and which might almost incline us to believe that the pen-
insula of Italy was its first European home. We know that the use of dice
was considered essential in playing the game, and dice, even under their
modem name, certainly go back to the time indicated — not to speak of the
fact that, under a different appellation, they were an important feature in
certain ancient Roman games. For the etyhiologists are pretty well agreed
that trom the low-Latin dadus (a corrupted form of the classic participle
Able to devote to it. The itory of Dard-tablei-baekgammoii (If, indeed, we have the right to
aie that eompoelte title) !• full of taaUlisfag problemi awaiting lolntloD ; while an ade(|oate
reply to the queatlon, "What was knefataflt** ean only be given by one who It eont«at to
delve diligently in many fleldt, etpeeially, perhapi, in the Celtic. Of the paget which tin-
mediately follow this note none but those which attempt to narrate in brief the probable
evolution of the game of dranghts contain anything which can be regarded as novel.
" The word ** ublet " (perhaps by reason of its plural form) might come, sooner or later,
to be sometimes employed, by uninformed writers, generloally—to signify all household games
played on a table or board, with pieces or flgnres— that i«, which were table-games, or what
the Germans mean by hretUpMu, In this sense it would naturally Inelude chess, and thus
give rise to some confusion, not very marked, however, except in the case of the Icelandic
form toft (plural (J>f), as we shall note hereafter.
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STRA Y NOTES 71
daft<* = " given," then '* thrown") the -words dodo (Italian), d^ (French) and
die (English) are most probably descended. But, however fkr back it may
date, the game of tables certainly makes a ft-equent appearence, especially in
the Italian, French and English literatures, from before Boccaccio until after
Shakespeare, and is often so introduced as to show that the writer draws a
marked line of distinction between it and chess. A multitude of such pas-
sages are f)Bimiliar to the chess investigator, and we shall not attempt to cite
them all.
We begin with French mediaeval productions, in which, as Strohmeyer^
has observed, the games of chess and tables are often coupled together,
implying that both were favorites at court and castle. In the *' Chanson de
Roland"— the work of a Norman trouv6re of the eleventh century— we are
told that
Sar pnliM bUnos siedent oil oberaller
Aa tablet Joent por eli Mbftneier
B aa etehaci 11 plaa aaive e U Tieill,
— the idea hero expressed that chess was better adapted to the wiser and
elder members of courtly society being of not uncommon occurrence. ^ It
is found again, for instance, in the poetical romance, of the **Comte de
Poitiers : "
Li an Jaent k V eacreiuir
A r entro deux, por iniex ferir ;
Aa tabU$ li conto palda,
Li vUl et U $age at etcit, *
The so-called ten-syllable ''Oeste d' Alexandre "—pretty surely of the tweltlth
century — has a passage describing the slaying of a terrible and savage
beast, with a hide so huge that a hundred knights could repose on it ^' et
se juent as tables, as esch^s et as d^s" (''and play at tables and chess
and dice"). ^ In that vast metrical production of the thirteenth century, the
''Roman de la Rose," ascribed to Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meung,
and begun before 1260, we are again told :
De gieas do des, d' etches, de (oftie*, ^
where, as elsewhere, the mention of dice, apart from tables, is warranted by
their employment in other ways than in connection with that diversion.
^ The eatay of Dr. Frits Strohmeyer, *<Das achaehapiel Im Altfranzdalaehen," form* a
part of the Tolama of "AbhandlaDgen" dedichted by his disciplea — all acholara of note —
*'Herrn prof. dr. Tobler zur feler aelner ftlnfandswanslgj&hrlgen th&tlgkelt ala ordentUcbar
profenor an der anlTerslt&t Berlin*' (Halle a. 8. 1895X '" whieb the eisay with which we
are eoneerned fills pages 881-403. It la, of coarse, altogether Invaluable as regards the game
of chess, and incidentally Is of mach interest for the story of tables at well daring the pe«
riod treated. But a special paper on the latter game, equally tboroagh, equally acute, would
be a great boon to inTestigators. The other countries of the west are all fields — uatllled, or
comparatiTcly untilled, so far as chess, and tables, likewise, are concerned — demanding la-
boarers as sklUfbl and untiring as Dr. Strohmeyer.
^ ChanM>n de Roland (ed. Michel, Paris 1887), vlii, 1. 16-17, p. ft ; and ed. Gautler, I5«
ed. (Tears 1881), ▼. 110-112.
" "Roman da Corato de Poitiers'* (ed. Michel, Paris 18S1), p. 67.
" Bartsoh, *«La langue et la lltt^ratare fran^aises" (Paris 1887), p. 818, 1. U>81 (aecord-
lug to Dr. Strohmeyer), or In ** Li Romans d' Alexandre *' (cd. Mlehelant, Stuttgart 1846),
▼. 81 ff., p. 898.
«• •< Roman do la Rose " (ed. Michel, Paris 1864), p. 885.
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72 CHESS IN ICELAND
The writer probably refers to what used to be called the " casting of mains^''^
being, very likely, the same as to mine which greatly puzsles Dr. Van der
Linde in his "Geschichte" (II, pp. 159-160). "Throwing of mains"' as a
game, we hear of at fashionable Bath as late as the year 1700. » Proven-
^1 literature, in the romance of *' Gerard de Rouissillon," affords almost
the same phrase: ''D^eschays sab e de tatUas, des joxs de datz,'' also, as
we see, including the dice. ''^ Similarly, it is said of Duke Robert of Nor-
mandy, father of William the Ck)nqueror,
De seeir aa Jea Tolontien
Eeteit li dax tot ooatamera ;
TabUt amont, esobte e des, "
with which Strohmeyer compares a like expression from the ''Roman de
Rou " of Robert Wace :
BiohATt Mat en daneiB [i. t, Icelandic] e en normant parler....
L' altrni Boot e le saen Men prendre e doner,
Une chartre soot lire e lea pars doTiaer.
Li pere 1' oot bien fait e doire e doctriner :
D' esclies soot o dee tablet sun compaignnn mater, [». a. mate].
This is not the only time that, for the sake of rime or through ignorance,
these minstrels talk of mating at the game of tables (as well as at chess).
Nor is this the only passage in the "Roman de Rou" which alludes to
tables. In the second volume of the same edition we find these four lines,
the beginning of an anecdote :
li docs ama gieos conoenables.
Deduit d' osches, gaaln de tabUt,
Vn ior so aeeit al lablier,
Eotre loi e on oheiialler
the story terminating, some forty-five verses later, with another mention of
the "tablier'* or table-board:
Li dnos flat le oors remoer
K le lowlier rooa oster.^'
These lines aro likewise cited by Madden, in his " Historical remarks on
the introduction of the game of chess into Europe '' (1832, p. 283), from a
British Museum MS of Robert Wace's metrical romance. In the somewhat
later "Fierabras** (though for earlier than its earliest fourteenth century MS^
"* Main, in Ihla •onto, is the ordinary Preneh ** main '* (sa hand), and U uaed hero, like
the corresponding iSngllah word, as a technieal gaming term, like a <*hand at cards," ** a
good wMst hand," and lo on. A *'main," in Anglo-French is a **hand at dice,'* and the
** throwing of maina *' is casting dice to aeu which thrower will make the better or winning
"hand.*' The word ia not to l>e confounded with sisyiis, which oecura in early Aiglish
phrase* relating to chesa, and perhaps to other gamca, in the aenae of *'men** (pieces).
^ Ashton*s "Social life ia the reign of Queen Aune *' (London 188S), IL p. Ill — quot-
ing from an old pamphlet, the title of which we give later.
7< ** QlraU de Uoaailho ** (ed. Konrad HoAnann, Berlin 1855), r. 4MS ff. ; aee likewiao
" Oirard de RooMllon *' (tranal. do Hcyer, Paria 1884), aecUon 881.
^ Benolt, **Ohroulquea daa duca de Normandie,** ▼. 115 86-8.
^ <• Roman de Rou [a Rolf] '* of Wace (ed. Hugo Andreaen, Hellbronn 1879), I., p. 108,
linea 176S ff. and U., pp. 188-5 Unea 8888-48 and 8886-7,
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STRAY NOTES 73
going back probably to nearly or quite the twelfth century) we are told of
some of the paladins that
Li plalMor root u UtblM et m Md«c jner, ^*
while that other chanson de geste, "Parise la duchesse,"' which is from the
thirteenth century, says of Hugo, the son of Parise :
Puia aprist il m tablet et 4 MObas joer
n n'a home en cest monde qui Ten p^nst mater, ^
—mating (mater) again applying, if we take tlie sense literally, both to ta-
bles and chess. Dr. Strohmeyer has another passage of the same character
from the romance of ^^Aiol et Miraber' (a tale having a quasi connection
with the Icelandic ^«Elis saga''), which is almost unique in this romantic
literature in condemning the practice of the game of chess; *^as eskies ne
as tables, fleus, ne jute,'' ^ being the advice of a father in taking leave of
his son. From a British Museum MS of the *^ Roman de Tristan " (reg. B. A.
xvili, f. 190 b.)— the original of the Icelandic Tristrams saga ^ is quoted by'
Massmann, in his ^^Geschichte des mittelalterlichen schachspiels " (1839,
p. 61), a phrase in which it is stated of the hero that: *M1 sceut tant des
eschez et des tables que nul ne Ten peult macter [r=mate]." Bartsch, in
his already cited **Langue et litt^rature f^an^ises," extracts from the story
of the sexually transformed Blancandin the following triplet :
Li latimien par fa tant sages
Qae bien Taprist de tos langsges
D'eskes, des tablet et des des, "
in which we again have the dice as a third amusement. Of passages in
which chess is not mentioned we have an example in the old Belgian chron-
icle by J. d'Outremeuse, styled, we believe, the ^^Myreur des histors" (I.
p. 351), where we are informed that ^^Toudis prendoit delectation au Jeux
de taubles^'' (where it would appear from the form **jeux," as if the word
were used generically). Ducange, in his great lexicological work (sub ta-
bula), refers to a Latin document dated 1345 — originating in France and
seemingly theological in character — in which the canonical view of playing
^* Romance of << Fierabrat'' (publ. by Kroeber and Servois, Paris 1860), p. 88; and in
ibe earlier edition (ed. Oueuard, Paris 1800), also p. 86, line S900.
^ ** Parise la dnebesse, ebanson de geste " (S« dd., by F. Oaessard and L. Larebey, Pa-
ris 1860), 1. 066-7, p. 80.
^ '« Aiol et Mirabel und Rite de St. Gllle " (ed. W. Ffirster, Heilbronn 1876-88), ▼. 165-8.
Dr. Strobmsyer, In a foot-note referring to tbis exeerpt, states tbat in Lftsetb's erilteal
analysis of "Le Roman eo prose de Tristan" (Paris 1891), seotlon 481, tbere is an estimate
of Tristan as a obessplayer, bnt on examining LSiotb's work (pp. 838-834) we find tbat tbe
estimate Is made in two lines. Tristan and bis companion, Bmnor — tbe former incognito —
bave been talking abont rarlous tbiagf. *' Pais la couTersatlon," says LOsetb, continuing
bis summary, ** tourno sur reserime et le jen d*6ebecs, et Tan et I'autre se disent passte
maltres daus ees deux nobles arts.**
" Tbis will be found in Bartseb, p. 670 ; Dr. Strobmeyer refers to '< Blancandln *' (pnbl.
by Uiebelant, Paris 1867), v. 38 ff. ** Blancandln ** is an episode of tbat long poem of adren-
ture, ** Tristan de Nanteull " — wbleb bas notbing to do witb tbe loTor of Isenlt, tbe bero of
tbe ** Tristrams saga,*' altbongb botb bear in Freneb tbe same name. — An interesting note
on tbe providential ** desexing " of BIsnoandiae (wbo tbus becomes grammatically ** Blan-
eandln '*) will be found In Kristofer Nyrop's "Storia dell* epopea ftrancese *' (transl. by
Sgldio Goria, Torino 1888), p. 171.
10
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74 CffESS IN ICELAND
at games is set forth : *^Non possit, nee debeat ladere.... ad aliquot ladum
taxillorum, excepto ad scacchos et ad tabulas'' ^Sin immunity not always
accorded to tables, but frequently granted to chess.
In early English the game of tables plays nearly as important a r61e as
in oarly French— during those days when there were Norman courts on both
sides of the Channel, and while much of the old Norman spirit and taste
still remained. As has already been observed, chess could hardly have been
mentioned in Anglo-Saxon writings — certainly not until the years imme-
diately preceding and during the transition to the modern idiom — the pe-
riod which used to be styled " Semi-Saxon. '' But it is only necessary to
consult the dictionary of Bosworth and Toller (Oxford 1882), « to learn that,
on the other hand, tables was popular enough when the old dialect was still
spoken. As usual among the lexicologists the rubric toefel exhibits a lack of
technical research— the compilers giving up the task of investigation at the
outset, saying : ^* What was the precise nature of the games, to which this
word and related forms are applied, does not appear ; some of the references
below imply that games of chance are meant'* — and then Tacitus and the
Germanic love of gaming are lugged in, in close imitation of GuObrandur
Vigfusson, whose classic allusion we have already cited. The most impor-
tant Anglo-Saxon references are those to the well-known Exeter MS (Codex
Exoniensis), a collection of Anglo-Saxon verse given to the library of Exe-
n Til], reviBed edition of the old, *nd, for iti day, inTaluAble Bosworth of 1888, also
remarks sab voce *<t»fel** that *<In leelandio, taft is used of chess or draughts;'* this is not
correct, for however It may stand with chess, it is certain that the Icelandic tajl was never
employed with the meaning of draughts. Nor can the closing statement of the same sentence,
*' the Danes in Rngland seem to have played chess,'* be verified. This latter error Is akin
to one made by Brand In his " Popular antiquities of Great Britain " (London 1848, II.
p. 859): — <* The chequers, at this time [about 1609] a common sign of a pnbllc-house, was
originally intended, I should suppose, for a kind of draught-board, called tables, and showed
that there that game might be played." Of course, there is no such relationship as is here
implied between the games of *Uab1es" and ** chequers" or ''draughts*' — as will hereafter
be more ftilly noted. — A technical word cited by the new Bosworth -from a gloss — is <'cyn-
ningstan on tnfle, j>lr^tts." This " conning-pleee," as the later authorities explain It, was
a device to preclude deception by the dice-thrower. The definition pirgu* (or pyrgut) is the
Greek nvQyoq (tower, burg) in a Latinised form, having the sense of the pure Latin friUVliim
(dice-box), and was so used on account of the tower-like shape of the dice-box (for casting).
Among the Greeks themselves this word apparently never had any snch technical moaning,
indicating that the diee-box was unknown to that people. The " eynningstan,*' as we are
led to infer by the Anglo-Saxon lexicologists, was so constructed, or placed, that the thrower
could, by no trick of hand, decide the result — the word really signifying the " knowing-
piece," or the piece which makes something kuowu. This instrument Is described— in his
note on Roman dice— by Stewart Gulin, in his remarkable and uoique work "Chess and
playing-cards " (Washington 1898, p. 882), thus : " In order to prevent cheating, dice were
cast into conical beakers (pyr^Wi iurTieula)^ the interior of which were formed into steps '*
— down which it was expected that the dice would tumble and their movementa thus be heard
after they could no longer be controlled, in any way, by the thrower. This would seem to
imply that the "eynningstan" stood on or near the board— although the phrase, on tmM
in the original gloss, would probably be best rendered by " at tables," that is, a piece or
instrument at the game of tables, as we say, " the rook (is a piece) at chees." Colin goes
on to note that " A parallel to this [usage of the Romans] is found in the Siamese back-
gammon, sajto, where the dice are thrown into the ilrafto/c." All this however, appears to
be capable of a simpler interpretation. Dice are still sometimes cast by hand, each thrower
taking the two or three dice in his hand and then, by a motion of the arm, letting them
fall out^promlseuously, as one might say— upon any fiat surface. This is usually done while
standing, the dice falling upon a counter or table. Quite likely this was originally the an-
cient method of throwing dice at tables (or similar dice-employing games), illustrationa In
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STRAY N0TS8 75
ter Cathedral by the city*s first bishop, Leofric, and in which it is still pre-
served. It has been edited by Thorpe (1842), and again, in part, by Qol-
lancz (1895). ''^ Among the excerpts drawn, with varying orthography, from
this anthology, in lexicons and elsewhere, are
Bumble hroed-tnfle,
SmnbiS gewittlg.
the first line of which GoUancz renders "One is expert at dice;'' "Dryten
djelej) sumum ioefie crceft " (" skill at tables,'' Thorpe, p. 311) ; and thereafter :
Hy twegen aoeolon
XsDfle ymaltUn
(" these two shall at tables sit," p. 345). Four or five lines farther on we
find the expression hond tceflesmonnes ("the hand of the player at tables'*).
The only other recent Anglo-Saxon lexicological work— duo to English schol-
arship—beside the two editions of Bosworth, is Street's '^Student's dictionary
of Anglo-Saxon " (Oxford 1897)— an unpretentious, but, in many respects,
useful work. The compiler, however, repeats the old blunder of connecting
icefel with chess, and like his predecessor gives three significations to the
primitive noun, namely: a game; a die; and a man, or piece. He has, like-
wise, the derivatives tasflan (tceflian), "to gamble" (or rather, if we are
not mistaken, "to play at tables"); tce/lere ("player"); tceflung ("playing"),
and the adjective tcefle ("fond of playing tables"). The only compound is
tcefelstan^ rendered "die, or piece used in game"— which is even more un-
satisfactory, than anything that precedes it. The larger dictionaries cite
instances of the use of toefel (and its derivatives) from vocabularies or glos-
saries—earlier and later— like that compiled by the abbot ^Ifric, styled
the grammarian, who flourished not far from the year 1000 — a generation
or more before bishop Leofric. On the whole, flrom a very superficial exam-
ination of the more accessible sources, one gets the idea that the game of
tables was pretty well known in England during the tenth century, and
possibly even before— which is a good deal more than two hundred years
earlier than we hear authoritatively of any chess-playing in that region.
old codleea strengthening this nippoeltlon. In the eonree of time It woald be found th*t
knaTlflh-mlnded people acquired the knadc of eausing the dloe to lie ae they wished by an
adroit ase of their fingers— a sort of literal prestidigitation. Then, as a remedy or safe-
guard against this, would be Invented the dice-box, as we now know It, in which the thrower
bad to shake the dice so that the rattling eonld be heard before casting them ; it was of
such n form too, that there was little chance of digital tricks ; and it was also tower-shaped.
This looks very much like the kernel of the matter, in which case all the rest of the story
and comment would be largely a myth evolved by the lezieographers. — The throwing of
the dice was an important action in all kinds of gaming Into which dice entered ; hence, In
one of the Oeltlo Idioms at least, a verb meaning '' to throw or cast " appears, if we may
believe the dictionary-makers, to have been formed out of the Latin tofru/a, from its sense
aa the appellation of a dice-game. The dictionaries likewise say that the Anglo-Saxon tmftl
aometimea had the meaning '<dle'* or **dice." But, as we have hinted, snob statements must
b« received with due caution since they may well result from the lack of technlcnl knowl-
edge on the part of the compiler. When we see an indefinite definition like this : ** a die
or piece In a game,** we may generally assume that the writer knows nothing about the
game of which he Is speaking — and such definitions are very frequent.
^ Thorpe's edition (like all his work) was excellent for its time ; that of Oollancs has
remained anfioished for half a decade.
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76 GffESS IN ICELA ND
Earliest, perhaps, of all the occurrences of the word ^^ tables,'' in what
may be looked upon as English literature proper, is that in the celebrated
rhymed legendary story of Britain known as the "Brut," from the mythical
"Brutus the Trojan" (the ftibled founder of the newer Troy, which is Lon-
don), whose name, in the crude philology of that age, was connected with
the word "Briton." This production is commonly regarded as "the first
great piece of literature in Transition English." Great it certainly is, if
measured by the number of its verses, which are upwards of thirty thousand
—those early bards being truly epic in their fertility, Layamon's^ "Brut,"
as it is termed from the name of its writer, is a version of the Anglo-Norman
"Roman de Brut,"— by that Jersey poet whom we have just quoted and
who is usually designated as Robert Wace— which was itself a versified
paraphrase of the Latin "Historia Britonum" of Geoffrey of Monmouth.
Layamon composed his poem, as it would seem, not long subsequent to 1200.
The second or later of the two differing forms in which it has come down
to us, can hardly be more recent than the fourth decade of the century. It
was printed by Sir Frederic Madden in an edition of high merit. ^^ The ref-
erence to "tables" occurs in verse 8133, which reads in the earlier MS:
Sammen pleoden on tcewUbrtde,
while, in the later, the last two words become mid tauel^ that is, "Some
played at the tableboard (at tables)." This, it must be remembered, is a
generation, or a generation and a half, subsequent to the first known men-
tion of chess in Great Britain by Alexander Neckham (1180), and chess must
have by now got to be pretty well acclimatized, side by side with tables, in
the courts, castles, cloisters and schools of England, and even among the
well-to-do burghers of the great cities. Next in time comes the romance of
"Sir Tristrem," with which we have had already something to do in the
earlier pages of this volume. It was doubtless in existence before the close
of the last quarter of tho thirteenth century. In it occurs, as will be re-
called, the usual coupling of tables and chess (verse 1277) :
His liarp, his cronde whs rike.
His tablet, his chess he hare. »
Contemporary with the author of "Sir Tristrem" was Robert of Gloucester,
who eeased to write before the following century began. The work of which
he is the reputed composer was a rhymed chronicle of England somewhat
like the "Brut," and like numerous other histories in verso produced in the
^ Lsyftmon Is an incUnea of the derlTatlon of a periooal name Arom the ofBelal title.
The word Is Identleal with the familiar leelandfo Ufgmadur (<' lawman **). The poet doaht-
less filled the position of a Judge, or Jnstiee of the peaee, or poulbly sheriff.
*' Pnbllshed by the Royal Society of Antiquaries, London 1847, In 3 Tolames, following
the same society's text (by Thorpe) of the Bxeter Anglo-Saxon codex.
" We have heretofore dted the noted edition of Walter Scott, but the latest treatments
of the text by that master of Bngllth and Icelandic, Bugen Kdlblng, (Hellbronn 188S), and
by O. P. McNeill (Seotttsh Text Society, Bdinborgh 1886) are of coarse characterised by
more modem philological methods. Mr. McNeill follows Beott In ascribing the authorship of
the poem to Thomas of Brclldoune (about 1970).
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STRAY NOTES 77
lands of the Occident in that period of awakening. In it he makes Arthur*8
knights amuse themselves
Wy> pleyinge at tdbUg ol>e£«tte ehekere [ch«Mb<Mxd]. "*
But another historical writer ~" for many years that central figure of En-
glish learning," as Stubbs styles him— John of Salisbury, has a much earlier
allusion to the game under the name of tabula (singular). He wrote ih Latin,
and, besides his historical and biographical productions, indited a treatise
called the ** Polycraticus,'* in which he attacks the vices of the court, and
it is in this— in a list of ten games then prevalent— that his allusion to
tables is to be found. The " Poly cratious " was completed before 1159. " Of
somewhat uncertain date is our next work, •* Guy of Warwick " the most
popular of all the old English metrical tales. The passage referring to ta-
bles (as so often, with an accompanying mention of chess also) begins with
line 3175 of the codex known as the Auchinleck MS : ^
Into l»e ehanmber go we baye,
Among ^ maidens for the playe;
At tablet to playe, St at ches,
the citation preceding a description of a chess-game. In another MS (verse
3039 if.) wc have the lines given as follows :
Go we now to ohaamber same
On lome manor to make ts game
To the ehesMB or to the tabUa.
The great dictionary of Dr. Murray and his associates quotes from the
''Cursor Mundi,'* which is a collection of homilies in rhyme ascribed to 1300,
a fragmentary passage : '' I ha ne liked.... til idel games, chess and tables,^' ^
The Oxford dictionary accompanies it by a similar citation from the "Hand-
ling Sin,"' a rhymed version (finished about 1328), made by Robert of Brunne
(or Robert Manning), of the "Manuel des Peschiez" [pdch^s], a French work
by an English writer, William of Waddington. The stories— sermon-like in
character— are not dissimilar to those which a greater pen afterwards told
in the *' Canterbury Tales." The excerpt is
Take ftirl>e the cheeae or >e tabUi. ^
The chief prose production which remains to us from this dawning period
of our early literature is that morality (or, as some one has called it " di-
vinity"), the "Ayenbite of Inwyt" (i. e. the "Remorse of Conscience "), a
translation into Kentish English by a Canterbury firiar, Dan Michel (a na-
tive of Norgate, Kent), of " Le somme des Vices et des Vertus," which was
written, it is said, for the use of the French King Philip III, by another
friar, Fr^re Lorens (Laurentius Qallicus). The sentence, as given by Mur-
^ The paMage ii elted by M&tsner, **AltonglIiGhe ■praehprobea," 1. 1, p. U6 (foot-notot).
^ The complete worka of John of Salisbury hare been edited by J. A. Ollea (Oxford
1848).
^ Thia was the IfS oaed by Znpltia, and the qnotAtion will be found in hla <*i
of Guy of Warwiek," edited for the Early Text Society (London 188S), I. p. 184.
"> Rdlted by Merrla for the Sarly BnglUh Text Society.
" The <* Handling Syne" waa edited by Furnfyail for the Roxbnrghe Clnb In 1869.
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78 CffESS IN ICSLA ND
ray,« is ♦'Kueade [Wicked] gemenes [games], ase byep pe gemenes of des
and of tables" in which the author seems to exclude chess from the games
which he regards as sinful. But in a later place he utters himself in a dif-
ferent spirit : ** Me de]> manye kueades ase playe ate ches oper ate tables. "
In the latter half of the 14th century, as is supposed, was composed the vast
*^Qest historiale of the destruction of Troy,** its fourteen thousand verses
made up from the popular ''Historia Trojana** of Quido Golonna, who again
is said to have stolen his compilation from the writings of the chronicler
Benolt, whom we have previously mentioned. But what the unknown En-
glish rhymester says is as follows (the dialect is North English) :
Mony ganmes were begonnen ^ grete for to solas.
The ohekker was ohoisly Iwre chosen ^ first,
The draghtes, the dyse, and other dregh [tedious] ganmes,
The tablet, the top, tregetre also...."
where the author seems, like various writers we have cited, to set chess
above other board-games, and to likewise exempt it from the charge of
tediousness, which he makes against draughts and tables. But without
continuing our researches among the English writers of these pioneer cen-
turies we come down to Chaucer, who, in one of his earliest poems, the
'* Book of the Duchess " (line 51), says :
For me thoghte it better pUy
Than playe either at ohessQ or tablet :
and again in the ^*Franklin*s Tale"— one of the Canterbury stories-^the
poet has
Thoy danncen and they playen
At ohes and tablet,^
A writer on life in the 16th century ^^ has a mention of tables drawn from
some family archives, which is noteworthy because the board, owing to its
division into two parts, is spoken of as '^ a pair.** The original orthography
is here preserved— the omission of the word of being evidently only ac-
cidental: ^^Willim Jones proveth Mr. Darell and my ladye to sett U or iy
hours together divers times in the dyning chamber at ffarley with a pair
[of] tables between them, never playing, but leaning over the table and talk-
ing together.** The second word table^ used in the singular, apparently
refers to the ** table** upon which the board for playing "tables" was
placed. There is a quaint volume, of the same period, in which the writer
makes a character say : ** Well ; now, I perceiue by you, that table-playing
and chess-playing may be vsed of any man, soberly and moderately.'* ^
•* See the ediUon of Dan MSehel*s «Ayenhlte" by Morris (Undon 1866), p. 46, and for
the other passage, p. 51.
" See the edition of this hulky prodaetion made for the Early Hhigltsh Text Soelety by
Panton and Donaldson (London 1869-74), p. 64.
^ It is In this tale that Ohaneer Indicates a certain amount of knowledge of Alfonso the
Wise, the one royal writer on shess. He alludes to the ** tables Tolletones'* (that is, "tables
of Toledo**), which were astronomical tables by the wise Spanish king, who left his mark on
the medisTal selenee of star-gasing, as on so many other things.
** See Hubert Hairs *< Society in the Rllsabcthan Age" (London 1886, app. li, Darrell
Papers).
* The roT. John Northbrooke's *' Treatise on dicing, danneing, vain playe** fro. (London
1676). The book was sereral times reprinted, the edition of 1579 having a more explicit
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STRAY NOTES 79
Shakspeare, in whom technical blunders are rare, shows that he was (kmil*
iar with the mode of playing tables, when he sarcastically says of Boyot
This Is the Ape of fonn, mondear the nice.
That when he plaje *t loMct, ohidee the dice
In honoarable terms. *
Here the dramatist properly ases dice in the plural (as two, or throe, were
employed at tables). In the ** Winter*s Tale** (iv. 3) he has both (die and dice),
the singular form being of very rare occurrence in any earlier writer. The
citation we have given is a sufficient indication that ^^ tables,** as the name
of a game, was still well understood in the closing years of the 16th cen-
tury. In the very first year of the 17th, was issued a satirical tract in verse,
''Lotting of humours blood,** a passage from which is reproduced by Thomas
Wright in an essay of which we shall soon have more to say, as follows :
An honest Ticker, and a kind couaort,
That to the alehooae friendly would resort.
To have a game at tabU§ now and than,
Or drinke his pot as soone as any num.
Thomas Dekker, the dramatist and satirist, has at least two references to
the game, under its old appellation, during the first quarter of the ceqiury.
The name even lingered hero and there to a much later period. Two gene-
rations after Skak8peare*B employment of it, the diarist, Pepys (1665), could
write:— ** I walked.... to my Lord Brouncker*s, and there staid awhile, they
being at tables ;** but in a sixpenny pamphlet entitled : ^* A step to the Bath
with a character of the place,** printed anonymously a generation later (in
1700), which is, however, supposed to be the work of Ward, one of the so-
cial heroes of the once so fashionable English watering-place on the Severn,
and from which we have already indirectly quoted, there occurs a list of
names of games:— "From hence we went to the "Groom Porters," where they
were a- labouring like so many anchor-smiths, at the oaks^ back-gammon^
tick-tack^ Irish, basset and throvoing of mains.*^ Here we have both " back-
gammon*' and "tick-tack,** but "tables** was evidently growing obsolete. "
The two most modern instances to be found of the use of "tables** are in-
teresting as containing the technical-term "back-game.** The first is in
the "Non-Juror" (1716) of the dramatist, Colley Gibber: — "A coquett*s
play with a serious lover, is like a back- game at tables, all open at first; '*
and the second is in Mrs. Barbauld*s letters of Richardson (published in 1804,
but the passage dates from 1753) : "I must now, as they say at tables, endeavor
to play a good back-game.'* » After this, so far as wrritten evidence is
concerned, the word tables, as the title of a game, passes out of the domain
of current English speech. Possibly the earliest published work which plainly
titio: '*A treatise wherein dleiog, daonelog, Tslne plafes or enterludea, with other pastimes &e.
commonly rsed one [sa ou] the sabbath dales, are by the worde of God and auncient writers
roproned.** The author styles himself "minister and preacher of the worde of God," and
all his pablieatlons bear the same motto on the tltle-psge: "Spirltus est Tiearlos Christi In
terra. "
•■ **LoTeU labor lost," act t., so. 2.
»* See the citation of Ashton's <«8oeial life/* p. 7S, with an allusion to ** throwing of
lualns.**
^ "Correspondence of Bamnel Riehardson" (London 1804), III., p. 68.
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80 CHESS IN ICELAND
indicates the beginning of the period of exclusion is Cotgrave's French-Eng-
lish dictionary, which was first issued in 1611 and lastly in 1673. He uses
the English terms ^* backgammon " and ** trictrac/' but ignores *^ tables/*
although he employs the French word more than once, even giving a va-
riety of the French "tables," known as "tables rabbatues," which he ren-
ders by "the Queen's game, doublets." The very oldest lexicographical
appearence of the game "tables" is, perhaps, in a vocabulary dating back
to the early days of the 15th century, which is preserved in the British
Museum. Among the English name of games (nomina ludorum) there given
as glosses to the Latin terms, are the following:— Latin scckcus^ English
" chesse ; " Latin talus alea^ English " dyse ; " Latin tabella (tahelle f = taheUce)^
English "tabulles"— a form much resembling that adopted in one of the Celtic
idioms— and Latin scacarius, English, "chekyr." English students of words,
from first to last— from this old glossary to Cotgrave— have thus cited and
treated the name of the game for three centuries and a half.
In next looking at Italy, and the references to the game of tables in the
speech of that peninsula, we shall have to begin with Ducange's laborious
work. He has a rubric : " Tabula, seu Tabularum ludus, vel alearum, alveo-
lus, in quem tesserae jaciuntur," which opens with the names of many clas-
sic writers (Isidor, Martial, Julius Africanus and others less known). He
then cites the early statutes of some Italian cities (Pistoia and Vercelli
among them), but without giving any dates. Mostly later references— be-
sides some that we have noted in previous pages— are to a history of Jeru-
salem ("Historia Hierosolimitana," lib. viii) by Robertus Monachus, being a
history of the first crusade dating from the twelfth century ; the writer,
however, calls the game (if he indeed means "tables") alece, and follows it
by a mention ot scad (chess); and to the " Constitutiones " (chap. 8) of the
Emperor Frederick II (1194-1250)— issued in his capacity as king of Naples
and Sicily, as it is well to remember. Finally Ducange lets us know that
there is a late Latin verb tahlliarey meaning "to play at tables" ("tabula
ludere,") and he cites a passage from the "Ck)nstitutiones" of Julian Ante-
cessor (115. cap. 439) : " Neque episcopus, neque prosbyter.... neque alius
c^iuscunque religiosi consortii vel habitus constitutur tablizare audeat, vel
socius ludentium fieri, vel spectator." But no date is given to this excerpt.
Julianus Antecessor was, however, a Roman jurist of the sixth century, who
was a teacher of law in Constantinople during the reign of the great (first)
Justinian. He translated the "Constitutiones" or statutes (called "No-
velles") from the original Greek into Latin, which remained for many cent-
uries the authoritative code of law for all Europe. Julian seems to have
been engaged at thjs work in 556. Of course, though perhaps probable, it
is not absolutely certain that in this citation the word refers to exactly
that table-game (or that form of tables) which prevailed four centuries
later, and of which we have been treating. If it does, the fact leads to some
important Inferences regarding the introduction of the game into Europe.
This verb existed likewise in later Greek, and this fact suggests some
remarkable conclusions. We find it in every general Greek dictionary,
ta^Xi^eiv ("to play at tables or dice"), and it is given as derived from the
Latin tahvXa, which is itself represented, in a nominal form, by tapXa, "a
dice-table;" and then we have other forms, TapXtoff|(;, "a dice-player; "
tapXiorr)ptoy, "a place for dice-playing; " and a comic word, tapXc^iciQ, formed
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STRAY NOTES 81
in imitation of KaXXcoicv), said to signify ''a game at dice/' in connection
with which we may observe that a colloquial, comic vocable of this sort
hardly gets into speech or literature unless tlie thing satirized or treated
risibly is very common, and very much talked of. We may take it for
granted, knowing what we do of lexicographers' ways, that the **dice"
comes in here simply because it is used in the game of tables, and that
zit^hiy for instance, signifies merely a board with which tables is played
(table-board) ; and so with the other words. The first notable fact about ail
this ia that tables was played in the Eastern (Byzantine) Empire, and that
it went thither from the Western (Latin) Empire. Unfortunately the Greek
sources cited are mostly of an unsatisfactory character. For xa^Xiox'rjc we
are reterred to Suidas, who is supposed to be the author of a dictionary, and
to have lived in the Byzantine Empire in the 10th century, but in fact noth-
ing is really known about him. His glossary received many accessions
after the original compiler was dead, and nobody can say which are the
original words and which the later additions. It is very much the same
with the "Greek Anthology," which is cited for ta^Xa and xa{i>.t6icT,. That
well-known body of clever sayings, striking bits of verse and epigrams went
on growing from classic times down, perliaps, to as late a date as 900. Zo-
naras is a reference a little more defined. He was a historian and lexicog-
rapher, and flourished in the opening years of the 12th century; he uses
the verb xapXtistv. The last citation is from Thomas Magister— a Latin
name as will be seen— the writer of a Greek grammar, and hence styled also
Grammaticus. He it is who makes use of ta^Xisrrjp'.ov, and he belongs to
the very ultimate age of the Eastern Empire, being assigned to about the
year 1310. A great deal might be made of all this if only some learned and
patient Grrpcist would be good enough to look up all the passages in which
these borrowed words occur, and weigh them carefully. Even without in-
vesti^'ation the matter shows itself a subject of high interest. The inter-
ested student will find further instances of the employment of these Greek
derivatives of the Latin tabula in the great "Thesaurus lingute grecsc" of Henri
Etienne (Stephanus), among them references to a Greek glossary older than
that of Suidas. Its original compiler, Hesychius of Alexandria, lived, ac-
cording to some in the 4th, according to others in the 6th century; but his
vocabulary, like that of Suidas, was increased during subsequent generations,
making dates difficult. The "Thesaurus" furnishes many very valuable
citations.
But this is somewhat of a digression. In the romantic literature of Italy
tables does not seem to play anything like the r6le it fills in French and
English, or else no one has taken the trouble to bring together the passages
in which it is mentioned. With that remarkable character, the Emperor
Frederick II, just cited, begins, as far as our certain knowledge goes, the
medi2eval game of tables in the new Italy— as do so many other things —
and it is next spoken of about the end of the century in which he died in
the "Cento novelle antiche," a collection of tales made up, as is known,
from many sources. Their originals are found in ancient and later chroni-
cles, in the romances of chivalry, and in the fabliaux of the French trou-
v6res. Here, as in the story-writers that followed, there was the same custom
of grouping tables with chess which was so common in Old French. In one
of the hundred "novelle" wo are told that of the characters on the scene at
11
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82 CHESS IN ICELA ND
one time: "Appresso mangiare, quali prese a giuocaro a zara, ^ e quali a
tavola od' a schacchi, o ad altri diversi giuochi, e il duca si puose a giuo-
care con un altro nobile cavaliere." In the world-renowned narratives of
Boccaccio, which were produced not more than half a century later, is found
almost the same phrase (giorno 3, introd.);— *'Chi a giuocare a scacchi e chl
a tavole." This was reproduced by still another teller of tales a century
and a half later, the Florentine Francesco Sacchetti,*' in words again nearly
identical.
Petrarch, in his most important Latin prose work, the "De remediis
utriusque fortune"— a production overflowingly full of erudition, in an age
when learning was the rare possession of a few— alludes to the game of
tables. The "De remediis'' was the most popular of all lay Latin writings
in the centuries which lie between the 13th and the Hth. The libraries still
preserve many reproductions of it in manuscript, while it was translated
— despite its length— into many tongues, and, when printing came, was issued
in many editions. The first German version was given to the world adorned
with a multitude of wood-engravings by the cunning hand of Burgmaier, the
favorite disciple, in that branch of art, of Albrecht Diirer. The ** De remediis"
is in two books, the first attempting to show that good fortune is not always
a thing to be coveted, the second that ill fortune is not always a thing to
be deprecated. Each of these books contains a certain number of dialogues,
the interlocutors, being in the first book, Joy (or Hope) and Reason, and, in the
second book, Sorrow (or Fear) and Reason. It must be confessed that the first
speaker has very little to say for himself, his office being, in general, to utter
^ Novella V (Lfbro dl . . . oeuto noTelle, Fiorenza 1578, pp. 8-9). The gmme of '' sara,**
here grouped with tablea and chesi, represento the "dice," which wo hara so often seen
atmllarly need In Old French. Tommaseo derWei the Tocable ftrom the Greek xiaaoQa throng
the Latin, the word being applied to the die from its four-ildedneas. Bat Zambaldl, In hit
later " Vocabolario etlmologlco *' (^889), says that It comes firom the Arable sar= die —ft'om
the form with the assimilated article, aB-tar^ or, better, from the Middle Latin ad eardum
C at or on the dice," " by chance *'), from which originates the Italian astardo and onr
hoMard, The game was evidently a pore dice-game, the combinations thrown by means of
three dice counting >more or less according to their character. Dante opens the sixth canto
of the "Purgatory** with an image drawn from the playing of Mara:
Quando si parte II glaooo della aara,
Oolul che perde si rlman dolente
mpetendo le volte, e tristo impara :
Oon r altro se ne va totta la gento :
Qnal va dinansi, e qnal diretro il peende,
B qual da lato gll si reoa a mente.
EI non s' arresta, e qaesto e quelle Intende ;
A oui porge la man, pi& non fa pressa ;
B cosl dalla ealoa si dlfende.
The first three lines are admirably rendered by Longfellow, who gives a proper technical
definition to "volte":
Whenever Is broken up the game of sara
He who has lost remains behind despondent,
The throwM repeating, and in sadness learns.
In his notes the translator says : " Zara was a game of chance played with three dice.*'
^ Franoeseo SaechettI, <*Novelle** (FIrense 17SI), II, pp. 66-68, nov. clxv.
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STRAY NOTES 83
the briefest statements of C&ct, or ejaculations, to serve as hooks upon which
Reason may hang lengthy arguments and harangues. There are two dialogues
relating to the game of tables. The first (book I, dial. XXVI) treats of alece
Indus, which is tables, and oi Indus calculorum, which latter is called, in the
English rendering, *'lottes.*' Both are described, but we quote only the ear.
lier portion concerning " dice," or "tables"— both titles being used by the
translator, who is Thomas Twyne. His version is very quaint; it is styled
**Phisicke against fortune, as well prosperous as aduerse,*' and was printed
in attractive black letter, at London in 1579 ; it well deserves reproduction
by reason of its delightful English. The " tables " chapter, in the earlier book^
is entitled as we have hinted: ** Of playing at Dice and Lottes'' (De ludo alefp
et calculorum. Dialogus XXVI) : ^'Joy. — I am delighted with playing at dice
and lottos. Recison.^ln the one of these games is losse in the other folly : yet
it is reported that Scevola frequented them both, & that which is yet higher
that Augustus the Emperour used the one. Yet notwithstanding, that this first
chose these to be a recreation to hym solfe from the ceremonies of the Goddes,
& the lawes of men, in the knowledge whereof he excelled, and Augustus
firom the cares of his great Empire, which ho gouerned long and wel, now
and then to refresh himselfe from his toyle: I wyl not commend the like in
thee. For great and learned men haue certaine strange and peculier appetites,
which if thou imitate aswel in maners as in doctrine, thou mayst sone fal.
for al things are not worthy to be praised, which are prayscd. /oy.— I take
pleasure in playing at Tables. Reason,^ Who would not be delighted to
throw forth a couple or more of squared bones, with certaine numbers marked
upon euery side, and looke whiche way they runne, that way to direct the
fingers, to place the round Tablemen in order: A glorious exercise, which is
lyke to deserue a famous name, with a triumphant chariot, A renounod
dayes.** This is valuable because of the light it throws on the character of the
game of tables— being almost the sole, and certainly the best description of
it, brief as it is, in the general literature of the Middle Ages. The other
chapter (book II, dial. XVI) is one of the briefest in the whole work. Twyne
calls it: "Of vnfortunate playing at Tables'' (De aduerso ludo taxillorum).
We give the whole of it: Soroioe.^l haue lost at Table playing. Reason.
— Dyd I not tell thee when thou wonnest, that it was but vzurie, and not
gaynet Sorowe,^! am drawne dry with gamyng. Reccsou, '^This game is of
the same qualitie that Phisitions be, by ministring of a litle, to drawe foorth
a great deale: but beleeue mee, thou hast more cause now to reioyce, then
when thou triumphedst with fals ioy. Better is sharpe chasticement, then
deceitfuU flatterie. The lytic vantage which thou gottest then, dyd bryng
thee vnto the whirlepoole of gaming now, and this losse wyll reclayme thee
thence agayne. It is better to goc the right way with a foule brydle, then
to be dryuen into a pyt out of the way with a golden pay re of reignes.
Sorowe, — I haue lost at tables. Reason, —But thou hast wonne at the game of
manners, yf what thou hast doone thou marke diligently: otherwyse good
medicines were in vayne geathered ' togeathcr for an incurable disease, yf
neyther losse nor shame coulde reuoke thee from this bottomblesse pyt of
destruction: for when as experience bryngeth no proflte, there is it in vayne
to seeke to doo good with woordes." It is to be observed, however, that in
this dialogue Petrarch styles the game to which he is alluding Indus taxillorum,
which is, literally, "the game of the dice/' but being the counterpart of the
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84 CBESS IN ICELAND
one cited from the first book, the translator doubtless felt himself authorized
to consider it **table8."«
In all the larger bibliographies of chess there is included the title of a
quaint work in Italian written by bishop Angelo Rocca (or "Roccha," in
the orthography of the time), and published at Rome in 1617, in which
much is said of the game of tavole. The author writes to prove that cards,
dice and tsAAea—tavole con dadi^ as he takes care once or twice to say —
•• Before eiting the original text of Petrmreb, we give, by way of fntrodaetf on, the remarka
of the ItalUn Zdekauer — the title of whoae treatise we quote on a following page — on the
namea and ImplemenU of the gamea in which dice tvere nued, In tho Xlllth and XI Vth ecnturiea,
In Italy. He iaya:~'annansi tntto bfaogna Intenderai sal algnificato dolle parole tecnlche,
uaate nel medio cto in Italia per denominare I gluochi di fortana e gli strumenti adoperatlvl.
Qneato panto h dMmportanaa, perch6 allora si formarono parolo nuovo e principal mente,
perchft 11 aenio delle parole romane si era cambiato completamente, ed era qnalclie volta
diventAto proprlo 11 eontrario; come prima dl tntto aTveiine nella parola: alea. Mentre alea
in lingua romana lignlilea il dado dl set lati, pnntato dal n*. 1 fln'al n*. 6; — pol al preiie nel
aenao plti largo di 'ginoco di dadi* in generale; e flnalmente In quelle di ogni glaoeo di for-
tnna; qaetta parola negli statuti itallani serve, per signiflcaro un giuoco, in eni li adoperavano
pedine, e dadi sopra nn tavoliere. Qaeato 6 il coal detto 'ludua tabularum.' La parola 'alea*
e * tabala * direntano ainonlml ; e il Petrarca ancora, benchd fosse sommo conoscitore deiridlo*
ma, fa oao della parola ' alea,' per algnlfleare 11 giuoco delle tavolo (D« remed. utriutgue fort.
Dialog. 86. ' De ludo ateae et calcidorum.*) II mode, In eni la parola aUa perdette il sao si-
gniflcato antico, ed acquisld quelio del giuoco di tavole, al spiega eon queato, che easa gl4 di
baon era yenne preaa nel aenso dello aeacchiere; e coal facilmente pot6 dl poi eaaere adope*
rata, per signifloare an giuoco in cui II tavoliere era essenziale. Mentre dunque alea pcrdotte
il sao aenao antico, la lingua tormb nna parola nuova per 11 dado pantato, di ael lati. Questa
parola h iaxilUu, * TaxiUus * Invece non d che nn dimlnativo della parola latina taluty che non
algniflea 11 dado, ma Possetto, nella ana forma naturale, come proviene dal piede poaterlore
degli agnelll. Soltanto gU umanistl levarouo via questa confusione, ed 11 nierito al deve a
Cello GaleagninI, 11 famoso preoursore di Gopernico, il quale nel sue scritto *de tatorum,
(•8*€rarum ai ealculorum ludit* (Opera, Bas. 15U, pag. 886-801) chiarl i fatti. Queato ano
merlto h da stlmaral tanto piii altamente, in quanto ehe I ohloaatori molte volte abagUa-
rono nel eommentare i due titoll: Digest. ZI, 6 d« *aleatoribiu* e Cod. Juat. 8,48 *de al»a-
mm twtt' prendendo la parola alea ora nel auo aenso antico, ora nel aenso medloevale.
Traoele di queato errore ai trovano ancora anlla fine del see. XV. (ParU a Puteot 1. e. 40;
Costa, 1. e. 8, 84, e 4, 8). I due gruppi prineipall del giuoco di. fortune nel medio evo aono
adunque 11 giuoco de* dadi, e quelio d«lle tavole." Zdekauer accoropanlea these preliminary
remarks by notes of great value, citing many early writers on the subject of the Latin name
by whieh the game of tablea came to be known. Among them are Giovanni d*Andrea, the
Bologneae canonist (d. 1848), who speaka of the *'differentlam Inter ludum asari [dice], qui
pendet a fortuna, et ludum alearnm alve, tabularum, qui mixtus pendet a fortune, et in>
genio;** and Ifarinus Sooinus, a commentator on the Decretals, who says: ^'Ludas alsearnm
id eat tabularam cum taxilli*.** '* Slmilmento," Zdekauer goea on to say, '<gli atatuti [i. «. the
monlelpal eodea of Italy], uaano queate due parole [i. a. alea and tabula] come ainonlml, facendo
eeeeaione nel loro dlvieti ora del Wudiu ad aUat,^ ora per quelio *ad tahtiUu,*** It will be
noUoed that Petrarch naea the ezpreaalon, htdu* alecB for '* tablea," while later he speaka of it
as a dlce^game, Indui taxillorum. Isidore of Bevilie (born in the 6th, died In the 7tb century),
the author of the "Origines,*' aays alea^ id •«< ludtu tabulm, Zdekauer baa likewise a long
and Interesting note on the derivation of the word cara. The text of Petrarch reads thua in
the original Latin :—"De Indo aleie ft calcnlorum. DIalogns XXVI. GAT.->Alea» ladua &
oalenlortl placet. BA, -^ Damnoaum Iliad, hoc Inane, vtrdqae tame idem llle Scieuola, quddqae
eat altlua Augnatas Cseaar altero vtl aolltua fertar. Me^ rarsua, lde6 qu&d llle, 4 eerimonlis
deoram atque homlnum legibus quaa excellentissimi callult, late k curia summl ImperlJ quod
diutlsalmA atque optlmd rexit, tale slbl interdfl laboria dluertleulfl elegisset, hoe In te
probanerim. Slit enim & doctia ao magnia viria appetltus qttlda peregrini et ani, qaortl
al Tt in doctrinia ale In moribua imitator ftaerta, (kciI6 labl queaa, neqne enIm omniom qnl
laudator, laade dlgna sant omnia. G. — Aless ludo dclector. it.—Quia nS deleetetnr aoper
plota tabula eonalgnataa nnmeria oaaium quadrataraa erlspanti cubito laotare, qna^ llle
dlrexerit ftrepldantlboa digltia rotundaa in aoiem tabellaa mittere? Olorioaam exereltlam ft
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STRAY NOTES 85
are forbidden games, while chess is allowed by all the ecclesiastical author-
ities. But the noteworthy point of his discourse for us is, that we learn
from it the fact that as late as the first quarter of the 17th century the name
of the game in Italy was still tavole (in the plural), and that apparently no
other cognomen had ever been applied to it.^ In Italian, too, but of far more
recent date, is a dissertation — too brief and too limited in its scope— which
attempts to give a description of tavole. The writer is a well-known Tuscan
praokram nomen, & enrriM & Unreal meritaram.*'— Tb« extract from the Meond book
if M toUojn : — "De adaerao ludo Uxilloram. DialoguB XVI. Dolob. — Taxlllortl In iQdo
perdidl. RA. — Vdnne tlbl dlxeram dTm Tineerea, faunas Id euo doo lacrum? DO. — Lado
exhaustus aam. RA. — Ule est ludo flli mon, qui mediefs perexigno Ingesto plarimfl exhavrire:
rrerle autem mfhl nlle pot!ui gaudendam qo4in dum falfo f audio exniubaa. Mollor oat aeria
castigatio qnim blaada fallacia. Jllnd to lacellam ad ludl Toraginein voeabat, boo to damnnm
inde retrabet. Satiaa est turpi freno rectum Iter agere, quim habenU aorela prnceps in deaifl
ai;i. DO. — Amial in ludo taxlllorum. BAT.—WclM Id Indo morum, al quid agerla profundlna
attendisti: allcquln roorbo Inaanabili fmatra remadia cogorentur, al ab boe baratro noo to
damnum renoeat neo pndor, vbl rebua nil proflcltur, nee qnlcquam Torbla aggredlare."
nurfpnalor'a Illustration to book T, dialogue XXVI, Is of tbe blgbest Interest. Its date la
before 15S0, and It repreaents a terrace, on wbicb are seated, on the right band, two playera
engaged at tbe game of tablea (the board and men very plainly depleted), and on tbe left two
cbess-playera, also occupied at a game. Between these groups, In tbe background, at tbe foot
of a column, are two apea playing at merellea ('*nlne men*B roorria"). All tbe boarda giTO
a good Idea of tbe luxury of the medlcBval coarta In tbe matter of tables and other Implemonti
connected with tbe gamea In question.
^ Angelo Roccba, "TratUto contra I glrocbl delle carte e dadi problbiti** (Roma 1617).
The portions of this treatlae doTotod particularly to chess embrace pp. 71-81 (dlrlded Into
three chapters), and In this brief essay (pp. 75-76), tbe author interpolates the following atato-
ment concerning the derivation of tbe name of tbe game, aeoocAo as bo writea It;— '<Non &
parola detta dalla voce latlna tcandendo come malamente acrluo In quoato Polldoro VIrglllo ,
ma ^ voce ehe deriua, e ha origlne dalla lingua bebraiea; o giudiea, cbo Plnnentore di detto
rIuoco sla state bebreo, come moatrano qucate due parole, seaeeho, matthOf con le quail al
finisee detto gluoco ; nel qnale quandoM Re al trona droondato di maniera tale, ehe h for-
zato a lonarsi dal auo Inogo, si dice air bora scaeeho; perebd teach, in lingua bebraiea, h
quel modeslmo ehe appresso nol i cireondato e intomiato. Ma perohi'l morto da gli bebrel
6 detto mathf o meth ; per6 nel mcdesimo gluoco quando 'I Ra £ reao totalmento aaaodlato, e
fatto immobile, come morto, all* bora al diee, teaeh math ; ma corrottamento in Italia al dloo
*eaeel^> mattho e eon qnoste due parole al flu lace '1 gtnoco. TnUo qneato dice Qregorlo Tho-
loaano.** Tbe author hero cited, Gregory of Toulonao (1640-1697), waa a noted Jnrlat; hia
etymology of the word tcacco aeems to have escaped tbe researches of ctaosa bibliographers
and to be cited by nobody but Rocea. —One of tbe most anrpriaing pleeea of cbeaa etymol-
ogy— alnoo we are on that theme — Is one in which two distinguished lexicologists have each
bis share of honour. In Braebot's "Etymological dictionary of the French langoago,** the
English edition of which la lasued at the Clarendon Preaa (8d od. 1888) under the learned
aupervlslon of Oxford university, we find tub voce "plon," tho following statement: <'a pawn
(In cb« 48), O. Fr, pooiif or paonnet^ from paon, a peacock, q. v. LIttrA tell us that tbe pawn
In early times was in the form of a peacock." We should have regarded tbio astounding
derivation aa a printer's blunder bad It not been for the reference to Llttri, aJneo Bracket,
under tbe next rubric (" pion, a foot-soldier ")» gives tbe real etymology of the word (from
the Lat. arcuaatlve pedonem, from ptdet) in detail, and wo should have taken it for granted
that the two paragraphs were to be united, and tbe *' peacock" element eliminated from the
flrat. But, turning to the huge *< DIctionnaire do la langue fran^ae" of LIttri (ptoa), we
find tbe Unea cited to bo indeed there, and can only wonder at their exlatence — wondering
more, perbapa, that they abonld have misled Bracbet. It la quite evident that neither ety-
mologlat knew either cbeaa, or ehess history. Tho blunder Is corrected by Soberer, In bis
'* Dictlonnaire d'Mymologle fran^alse" (8e ed. 1888) — but then he has some sinllar sins of bis
own to answer for, aa when, in deriving tbe Old French roc (=rook) »'du peraan rokh,"
he adda the meaning of the Persian voeable, <'chamean roontA par dca archers,*' which Is
almost aa amazing a creation, in this connection, as the peacock of Seberer'a predeceasora.
Tbe blunder ia copied by the lateat Italian etymologlat, who, finding it in Beherer, took
lU correetneaa for granted without any further reaeareh.
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86 CffESS IN ICELAND
scholar, Lodovico Zdekauer, and his treatise, *'I1 giuoco in Italia nei se-
coli XIIl e XIV," was published at Florence in 1886, but is little known
abroad. In it (pp. 9-10), after treating of dice-play pure and simple, ho
says : **Non meno numerose che le variazioni del giuoco del dadi sono quelle
del giuoco di tavole. Esso si distingue da quelle, perch^ vi si adoperano le
pedine [strictly * pawns,' but here, as in some other writers, *men'], e lo
scacchiere [here * table-board' simply] sopra di cui {super alea) ora si get-
tano i tre dadi [meaning that, in addition to dice, necessary in all dice-
play, we have here a board and men]. La parola tabula non significa lo
scacchiere [board], ma le pedine [men, that is, all the pieces of the game]
lo scacchiere [which is used in this game] si chiama Uabolerium.^ £ owia
la disposizione degli statuti, che si debba giuocare con tutte le tavole [*cum
triginta tabulis'— that is thirty men were used in playing the gamej. Si-
mile giuoco ci viene raffigurato negli affreschi, che si trovano nel portico
della chiesa di Lecceto, vicino a Siena." In the wood-cut which accompa-
nies this passage, representing a portion of the fresco alluded to, it is not
easy to distinguish the character of the board, but there appear to be, as
stated, fifteen men on each side. At the present day iavola reale (singular)
is in Italian the common name for backgammon, the adjective perhaps in-
dicating that it is the best or oldest of all varieties of tables^ or that it was
once a court-game. Tommaseo, the lexicographer, says that it is played by
means of <*2 tavolette [the 2 divisions of the board] insieme riunite, dove
sono ventiquattro scacchi [points] movendo via via le pedine secondo i punti
che con i dadi si scuoprono"— a seemingly awkward definition in which
'* scacchi" must refer to the points (twelve on each side), of the table (back-
gammon) board, or to the spaces occupied by these points, affording a par-
allel to the oldest Arabic usage according to which the same word (bSt=
house) was applied to the "square" on the chess-board and the "point" of
the board on which "nard" was played. In modern chess the Italian "ta-
vola" means "drawn game"— -whether drawn by reason of lack of mating
force, by perpetual check, by obstinate repetition of the same moves, or by
the fifty-move limit. We must not forget to say, before taking leave of Ital-
ian tables, that in the tenth century the higher clergy of Italy are charged,
by at least two authors, with devotion to dice. One of these accusers is Ra-
therius of Verona (but a native of Li^ge), who attacks the Italian bishops as
living luxurious lives, in a passage cited by Gregorovius and copied by Van
der Linde. *» The other similar charge, aimed against all the clergy, is to
be found in the letter of citation against Pope John XII, who was dethroned
by the Emperor Otho I in 963. Unfortunately we cannot give the Latin text,
and hence do not know the word used to express the kind of "dicing" they
indulged in. The German expression is wurfelten, that is, "they diced."
In the following century we have the famous letter of Petrus Damianus (Ital-
ian "Damiano," but who has positively nothing to do with the Portuguese
Damiano, one of the earliest writers on chess, though the two are often
confounded), a cardinal and bishop of Ostia, hard by Rome. We know what
word he used. He speaks of the passion for bird-catching, the chace and
^ Bee his << Qetehiebto" (f, p. 189) where !■ given the exeerpt from QregoroTitts, "Rom**
(III. 1870), p. no. The worki of Ratberlat were publiabed by the brotheri Ballerlnl at Ve-
rona (176^, and there !■ a notable aoooant of tbie prelate (In wbieb be la atyled Bather) by
Albert Vogrel: "Ratberloa von Verona and daa aehnte Jabrhnndert** (Jena 185i).
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STRAY NOTES 87
especially for dice (?) and chess (alearum in super furiae vel schachorum)^
among the clergy of the peninsula. Those devoted to gaming are called
aleaiorii (episcopi), and alea is again used of the game a few lines further on.
The writer gives an account of his reproval of a Florentine bishop (or a
bishop of Florence). The latter excused himself for his interest in chess by
saying that the ecclesiastical statutes did not directly prohibit that game.
To which the episcopal critic responded:— "Chess, indeed, the statute does
not expressly punish ; but both kinds of games are comprehended under the
name of alece. If then that game {alea) be forbidden and nothing be indi-
cated about chess, still, as the same word includes both, therefore both are
condemned.'* ^^ The logic of Bishop Damiano was not any too sound, but
the Florentine bishop, "being mild of disposition and shrewd of wit," as
we are told, yielded to the argument offered and promised to err no more.
The reader should notice the use of alea both in the singular and plural.
The joining together of alea and scacchi^ after a custom which we have seen
was so common everywhere in that age, and the fact that thoy were the
two games familiar to the convents and schools of the time, make it pretty
certain that the dice-game alluded to was tables. We can hardly fancy a
wise bishop addicted to such a diversion of mere chance as the casting of
(lice without the opportunity of making any use of his intellect, such as
tables would give him. With this episcopal epistle we must take leave of
Italy until she produces a Strohmeyer, who will thoroughly search her older
literature for the many scattered notices of chess and tables which it doubt-
less contains.
As to Spain there is the same lack of material, in an accessible shape,
as in Italy. The celebrated MS book of games, composed by the command,
and probably under the direction, of Alfonso X, king of Leon and Castile, and
still one of the choicest treasures of the library of the Escorial— that vast
monastery, mausoleum, palace, which lies within an easy morning's journey
of Madrid— is both the earliest treatise on chess and the oldest document
relating to tables which have had their origin in Europe. Unfortunately
for our present purpose little heed has been paid to any part of this vener-
able literary monument except to the pages which treat of chess. Van der
Linde alone, ^« has endeavored to give a list of the subjects dealt with in
the non-chess portion, but he does not go farther. According to him the
first book of this splendid codex concerns chess only ; the second treats of
games played with three dice {Lihro de los dcuios); and the third, which
Van der Linde calls the Libro de los iablas— whether this be the actual title
it is not easy to say— apparently embraces games played with dice and men,
or, in other words, the varieties of the game of tables. Van der Linde's
enumeration of the chapter-subjects, that is, of the different games, in this
third section is as follows:— 2)o6te^, fallas^ seis, dos e as, emperador, medio-
^^ ''Ad qood ego soaehum, InquAin noQ panlt; sed utriuiqoe ladl g^ona alo» nomine
comprendit. Qaapropter dam ale* prohlbetnr, et nomtnalim de leaebo nihil dicltnr, oonetat
procal dublo atramqae genua nno vocabalo eomprebeuauro, unlue aenteutlao auctorltate dam-
natum." — B. Petri DamKnt Operum tomaa I. (Romae 1606), p. S4, KpUt, Z, ad AUxandrum IJ
Jiomanum ponteficem, tt Hildebrandum tardinalem. Foreellini aaya {tub voet) that aUw la a
general name for all gamea, tam timplices quam mixtif whtoh are played with pleoea or men,
Mrhilo alea la naed for those In which ehance ezcluaively prevalla (dice only, for inatauce).
Tho play on worda {alea and aUa) of the aubtle btahop la thus explained.
*^ '* Quellenatudlen der Geachlchte dea SebaohapleU" (1881X pp. 7S ff.
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88 CHESS IN ICELAND
emperador, la pareji de entrada^ cdby equincU, todas, tablas, laquet, la bufa^
cortesia^ la bufa de baldraCy los Rotnanos reencontrat. Of these doblet is doubtr
less the doublets of our old lists of amusements, ^^ and is thus defined by
one of the latest of our larger English dictionaries (the ''Century'') : ''A game
with dice upon tables, somewhat resembling backgammon,'' added to which
the following quotations are given :
They be at their doxMeU still,
a phrase from Latimer's fourth sermon before Edward YI (1549); and
What ! Where's yonr dook f . . .
To tell yoa tmth, he hath lost it at doubUU,
a passage occurring in "The Ordinary" (1651) of Peter Cartwright, who, sin-
gularly enough, was at once a poet, a dramatist and a divine of some little
eminence. Fallas, in our Alphonsan list, is probably the English failes, a va-
riation of backgammon which seems at one time to have been common ;*w oos
e as is our deuce-ace, used in connection with dice, and found in Shakspcare,
and may resemble the backgammon variant described in the "Compleat Ga-
mester" (1739) under the title of "Size-ace;" emperador is perhaps the kind of
tables called in France and England in the fourteenth century "the imperial
game"; iodas, or something similar, is found in French notes on table games;
tablas is, of course, the ordinary form of tables ; la bufa Van der Linde seems
to connect with puff, the German name for backgammon, of which there is
an early variant, huf. Several more — or perhaps all — of these games are
very likely varieties of tables, but in the present state of our knowledge it
is idle to discuss this section of the Alphonsan MS. Its fourth and final di-
vision is of a miscellaneous character, including first an enlarged che^
{grande acedres), followed by a game styled tablas de alcedrez (in the orthog-
raphy of the MS) a sort of combination of chess and tables, as is to be
inferred; then comes a kind of astronomical chess— the combined result
perhaps of don Alfonso's two favorite studies— the heavens and the chess-
board—styled escaques, the title of which looks as if it might be a varia-
tion of the word chess; and then the section closes with a very simple sort of
*^ See the "Compleat Gamester'* and other early treatises on games, English and
Frenoh ; alio the preceding p. 80.
^ To this game (as we learn from the Just-olted <<Contary Dictionary'' sob /ayU»),
Ben Jonioo, In his ''Brery man in hit humour" (act ill, 9), thus aUades :
He's no precisian, that I'm certain of,
Nor rigid Roman Catholic. He'll play
At fayUs and tlek-tack ; I hare heard him swear.
The areheologlst Francles Douce— he who wrote an interesting essay on **Tho Uuropean
names of the chess-men" (1794) ~has described the game of faylta: **It is a very old table-
game" [as old evidently as the days of King Alfonso], "and one of the numerous varieties
of backgammon that wore formurly uaed in this country. It was played with three dice and
the usual number of men or pieces. The peculiarity of the game depended on the mode of
first placing the men on the pointi. If one of the players threw some particular throw of
the dice, ho was disabled from bearing off any of his men and therefore faylad In winning
the game — and hence the appellation of It." FaylU is the orthography in the Latin XlVth
century MS on tables preserved in the British Museum, to which we shall recur.
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STUAY NOTES 80
dice-game called alquerque. This great work may well be ranked as one
of the hundred most fttmous codices in European libraries, was compiled,
too, at the instance of a most fomous king (between lt51 and 1282), and is,
artistically, of magnificent execution. It ought, morever, considering its
date, to be of considerable value to the linguistic student. Under all these
circumstances it does not seem too much to ask, In these days of reprints
and reproductions, of early- text societies, of accurate and easily executed
copying processes, that so interesting a monument of royal scholarship should
be made more available to investigators; and that the Spanish government,
having already given to the world the astronomical works of this enlightened
monarch, should follow such a good deed by another. Brunet y Bellet like-
wise consecrates one of his chapters (the fifth, **E1 Ajedrez,'' 1870, pp. 243-
268) to the **Libro de don Alfonso el Sabio,*' in which he confines himself
rigidly to the chess portion of the codex. But Alfonso, the most prolific of
all royal authors, and who contributed in so many ways to the develop-
ment of his country*s language and letters, ^ alludes in other writings to
the game of tables. It is mentioned. in his remarkable code of laws— still
the basis of Spanish Jurisprudence— known as ^'Las siete partidas** (in its
part II, as published, title Y, law 21); and again, on more than one page,
in his historical work on the Crusades (''La gran conquista de ultra mar'*) —
the most fi&miUar passage, perhaps, being that in wliich he relates how tlie
father of Godfrey of Bouillon made his sons learn tlie ''juegos des ajedrez
6 de tables.** Of another Spanish sovereign there exists a notable relic in
the archives of Barcelona. It is an inventory of the effects of Martin of Ara-
gon, the immediate predecessor of Ferdinando II, the husband of Queen
Isabella of Castile— the two being those jointly ruling monarchs who played
so large a part in the story of Columbus. iCing Martin, who was the last of
his house, that of Barcelona, died in 1410. The list of chess boards and chess-
men, table-boards and table- men, in the king*s possession is extracted from
the inventory, made doubtless after his death, and printed by Brunet y Bel-
let. *« It is too long to be given here, but we reproduce one or two of the
items relating to tables, in the orthography of the original. We find un
tauler dejugar a taules ab les puntes de Jaspi e de nacre (''a table-board
with points of jasper and mot her-of- pearl**), this board, with its resplendent
''points,** having on the reverse side a chess-board inlaid with the same rich
materials; and there were other boards of the same sort, chess on one side
and tables on the other— exactly similar to the chess and backgammon
boards of to-day. One had tables on one side, and tlie other side was de-
vided between chess and "nine men*s morris.** Another board is described
as a table-board of jujube wood {un tauler de taules de gingolers)^ and
there were cases {estuches) containing sometimes men for tables, sometimes
chessmen, as when the inventory speaks of a case of precious wood of two
divisions, in the first of which were 32 table-men and in the other 32 chess-
men, one half of each of ivory and the other half of ebony {de dues cases
^^^ Tiekoor, the hUtorian of Spanlib literatare, atales tb«t Alfonto <*fint made the Cm-
tillan a naUonal langaaffe,'* and eatliiiat«s at a high Talao the kinga'a Code and other works,
laying that they gave the right dlreetion and oharacter to Spanfah proae — **a aerriee perhapi
;reat«r than it has been permitted any other Spaniard to render the proee literatore of hie
sonntry.^*
*<* **iBl Ajedresi*' pp. S17-S19. The liat ia alao lingolatieally tatereeting.
12
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90 CHESS IN ICELAND
en la i^ de las qiwls hauia XXXII iaules e en laltre XXXII pesses de schachs
la meytat de vori^ el altre meytat de banus). In the same good king*s library
was a paper codex entitled *'Dels Jochs de scachs e de taules'' (to say nothing
of five other MSS devoted only to chess), the description of which in ^^El
Ajedrez'* would make the calmest-minded book-hunter*s eyes water. Brunet
y Bellet also tells us that among the Catalans of those times there were many
such treatises on chess and tables (and Just in these days in which we are
writing he has edited an old Catalan translation of the chess- morality of
Jacobus de Cessolis). From '^El Ajedrez*' we likewise learn that don Diego
de Clemencin, one of the commentators of Cervantes* great romance, in his
note on the well-known chess passage in "Don Quixote" (v., p. 46 of the
Clemencin edition), speaks of the games of tables and chess as very common
in the Spanish Middle Ages {Las iaUas y ajedrez eran Juegos muy usados
en Ul Edad Media, *^ Of Spain*s sister kingdom there is hardly anything
to be said, and nothing of an early date to cite. We will content ourselves
by remarking that the word "tables" {taboUxs) is yet in use in Porluguese
as the title of a game, though the fabricators of dictionaries don't quite know
how to treat it. A late lexicon of the English and Portuguese, that of La-
carda, translates, in its English-Portuguese part (1866), the word "tric-trac"
by (Jogo de) tabolas; while in the Portuguese-English part (1870), he ren-
ders (Jogo de) gamao (our "gammon") by backgammon, but gives {Jogo de)
tabolas as "the game called tables or draughts,'' Such is the intelligence,
as well as the consistency, of lexicographers!— This is a meagre notice of
what, at the present moment, can be hastily gleaned about this ancient
game in Europe's southwestern peninsula. The reader will understand that
Spain and Portugal, like Italy, remain virgin fields of great promise, await-
ing the zealous investigator into the story of the ludus tdbularum.
Into the language of Germany the Latin word tabula has made its way
in various forms. The oldest of these is sabal, found in the Old High Ger-
man period, which terminates with the 12th century; in the Middle High
German, the linguistic period which followed, the word became sabeL So
little has been written in Germany — the land of learned research— in regard
to the social games of the earlier periods that scarcely any examples of the
use of zabal or Jtabel^ in their simple form, to signify the game of tables, are
available. Massmann, in his "Geschichte des mittelalterlicben Schachspieles"
(Quedlinburg 1839, p. 53), asserts that in an Old German gloss of the 9th cen-
tury, Itidere tabtUis is rendered by za spilonne staples ("they play at tables").
Schmeller, in his "Bayerisches Wdrterburch " (IV., p. 215), cites the old
South-German words zabilstein ("table-stone") and wurzabelslein ("wurf-
zabelstein"), signifying a piece at tables. In the knightly poem of Wiga-
lois— which we shall cite again— (edited by Benecke, Berlin, 1819, and better
by Pfeiffer, Leipzig 1847) occur the following lines (v. 10601) :
Da fonden ai der aaelden sohlu
Und achdner konewile vil
Von tab4l and von seitespil.
The poet, Wirnt von Gravenberg, composed this work, derived from French
sources, at the very beginning of the thirteenth century.
^ Se« "EI AJodres," p. til.
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STRAY NOTES 91
It is meanwhile taken for granted that tables came over the Alps, or across
the Rhine, before the introduction of chess, *<" but when the latter arrived it
was at once seen to be a table-game like the diversion with which people
were already familiar. So, as in Iceland and Holland, it was deemed neces-
sary to distinguish them. The old game, because it was played with dice,
or accompanied by the casting of dice, was called wiirfzahel (or "dice-ta-
bles**), the latter became schachzdbel ("chess-tables**). The first appear-
ance of chess in Germany is in the fragmentary Latin poem, "Ruodlieb,**
seemingly composed in Bavaria— close by one of the most frequented routes
between Italy and the North— and now assigned to the middle of the Uth
century. *» Being in Latin it, of coarse, throws no light on the vocable
sabal. In the compound $chachzdbel the second element underwent much
popular deterioration, for we find schachxagel and schafsagel (which latter,
according to Van der Linde, now lingers as a Bavarian name for the mor-
ris-game), not to speak of the later schachtafel (exactly corresponding to the
Icelandic skdktaft). Wackernagel (p. 36) cites from the inventory of a no-
bleman*8 possessions (Count Sibotos von Neuenburg), towards the end of
the 13th century, foUr schahzabel and four vmrfzabel, and ivory men belong-
ing to both games {elefantei lapides tarn ad wurfzabeL quam ad scahzabel
pertinentes). In Middle High German literature there are various allusions
to tables. In the " Wigalois*' (v. 10582 ff.)we have an allusion to the splen-
did boards and men of early times, contrasted with the cheaper wooden
ones of later days :
DA lag«n Tor der froawen fior
WorfiEftbel node karrier,
Geworht Ton halfenbeioe ;
Hit edelem g^steme
Spilten d, mit holse niht,
AIb inan nn fronwen spilen tiht.
The word "kurrier,'* in this passage, has been much debated. It is too
early to bo considered a reference to the alia rabbiosa, or modern chess
(called in German the "Current oder das welsch schachspiel**); and if it
means the "Courrier spiel*' mentioned by Jakob von Ammenhausen in his
chess poem (1337), and long played at the chess village of StrObeck, then
this must be its first appearance in literature. There are various references
^ Seo Wackernagera '*U«ber dac Sehaebaabelbaeh Koaradt tod AmmenbaaMn" In
tbe ^'BeUrftge tar Oetebicbta aod LUeratur** of Kara and WelMenbaeb (Aaraa 1846), p. 38.
Speaking of flgaratire ezpreaaioni drawn from cbesa wbieh had bacoma aTory day ntteraneas,
tbe writer aaya: "Sehon daa wurfelaplel [tablea] batte aolcber aaadrQcke geang an die hand
gegeben/* implying a oonaiderable priority of tablea In Qermany.
^ Von der Laaa givea the moat intereating aeeonnt of the eheaa eplaode in the "Rnod-
lleb** («'Zar Qeachlehte and Literatnr dea Sebachapiela,** pp. 47-51). The earlleat writera on
thia poem decided that the handwriting of the MS prored it to be of the 9tb eentnry, bat
later eatlmatea have gradually reduced Ita aacribed age. Tbe eheaa atory ia not unlike tboae
oeearring in aome of the Icelandic aagaa, in which the eheaa ezpreaalona are now regarded
aa later interpolatlona, or erroneoaa naea of terma relating to tablea. Might it not be that
the Raodlieb MS waa written ia aome remote conrent of the Bavarian Alpa, where old fbnna
of writing lingered to a late day, which would make the palnographieal indieatlona nneer-
tala ? BtlU it ia not impoaaible that a German monk, having Tiaited Rome earlier in the
eentnry, might have brought aome idea of eheaa to hia tranaalpine home. The poem baa
been edited by Seller (1888). Aa to the <«Wigaloia" aea Maaaman> << Oeachiehte " (Rjglatar
eapMlally), p. 158.
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92 CHESS IN ICELAND
to Currier-schach and Currier- spiel^ as well as to current-cfiess, in the index
to V. d. Linde's "Geschichte." Wackernagel quotes (p. 35) a passage from
an early source— he gives no date— attacking the game of tables: "Noch
ist einer leie spil, des herren spulgent, von dem doch vil siinden und schan-
den kumt etswenne: wurfzahel ich daz spil iu nenne." In an ordinance of
the authorities of Bockholt (Prussia), of about the 14th cenlury, the game
of tables is styled werftafel^ but sometimes bretspil is used specifically for
the earlier game. In the great museum at Nuremberg, and in other Ger-
man collections, table-boards ascribed to the 14th and 15th centuries are
preserved, but descriptions of them are not easy to procure.— Mentions of
the game occur early in the Dutch, Danish and Swedish literatures— the
name being always a derivative from tabula, but exact references cannot
yet be made. In Icelandic, as we have seen, the word iafl is frequent in a
very remote age.
As to the Celtic lands there seems great reason to believe that tables,
in at least one of its forms, was a familiar diversion at a very early period.
The old Irish and Welsh literary monuments abound in notices of games-
all of which ignorant translators generally render by chess. But from lack
of any systematic investigation by Celtic scholars the subject is still most
obscure. But it is not improbable that the Britons acquired from the Ro-
mans a knowledge of certain classic table-games, and retained their practice.
The word taiolbwrdd ("throw-board" as it is rendered), if we are not greatly
mistaken, has tabula as its first element, and the English board (Icelandic
boref*) as its second. This is a Welsh term, which seems to have been
widely known and used. It occurs repeatedly in Dr. William Wotton*8
'« Leges Wallicse*' (London 1730, p. 266 and 583), in a passage cited both by
Van der Linde and Forbes. ii<^ In Erse, at the present time, the game of
backgammon is called taiplis (= tables). The lexicographers give, as cor-
responding to the Anglo Saxon uefel, the Gaelic taibhleas (backgammon) and
the Welsh tawlbwrdd (which the earlier Bosworth renders "gaming table
like a chess-table''). Bosworth (1838) likewise cites tool and iaul as Celtic
forms of tabula (the latter Armor ican).— Although the information is hardly
in place here, it may be of interest to know that in all the Arabic lands
from Morocco to Syria (the game of) backgammon is called {li*b) et iaula,
that is "(the game of) tables.'' The word taula is, of course, a descendant
of the Latin tabula, but at what time it came into the new Arabic it is
perhaps impossible to ascertain— though it was surely more than two centu-
ries ago. Modern Italian words abound in all those Vulgar-Arabic idioms
which are spoken along the Mediterranean shores, and this is very likely
no older than the Italian form (tavola).
Chess and Draughts. — Before we endeavour to consider more fully the
question of what the game of tables really was, and in order to clear the
ground somewhat, we will note that certain writers have hinted that the
Icelandic tafl (in one or another of its varieties at any rate) may be iden-
tical with the game of draughts; it is therefore desirable to look a little at
** Tlie pMsAg« nunet the obJ«oU to bo eo&ferred by the Welsh king on eerUln eoort
ofAr lata at the time of their installation, among them being always a ianVrwrdd, The Ta-
ried Talne to be plaeed npon thcf tawVnordd maanfaetared of diiTerent materials (a bolloek*s
horn, a hart*s antler, a bone of a sea animal, wood) is also indieated. Beading the list of
objeots one gets the idea that the sense of tawlfmrdd might be "diee-boz" or *'pyrgiis."
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this latter game, its character and its history. The first thing which siriJies
everybody upon malcing himself familiar with the game« is that it is played
npon a chessboard. After an instant of reflection follows the question :
Is this really the case f Is draughts played upon a chessboard t Or is not
rather chess played npon a draught-board t Was not chess a Airther and
more complicated development of draughts t Happily the various investi-
gations into the history of chess have answered these queries. Whatever
else is known with certainly as to the story of chess, this is at any rate
sure, that the game existed long before draughts had come into being. And
another thing may be taken as equally a matter of fact, and that is that
draughts had its origin in the game of chess, and is merely a modification
or simplification of that diversion. It is played on a board designed and
used for chess; the ordinary moves of its men are imitations of the moves
of some of the chessmen ; and a man arriving by forward movements at
the eighth, or farthest, rank of the board, undergoes a change very similar
to that which takes place, in the case of a pawn under like circumstances,
at chess. These three features make the ^'whence** of draughts quite clear,
and show the propriety of its alternative appellation of *' chequers,** or check-
ers, which is sometimes heard. <" Van der Linde believes that the game
of draughts was developed out of chess in Spain, and certainly the earliest
literature of the game is Spanish, ^'s He finds its precise origin in the
queen (or fers) of Arabic-Spanish chess, the draughtmen reproducing the
move of the queen, as it was in that period; and he seems to consider that
the presence of several chess-queens (in end-games), on the board at the
same time, (of which he presents some examples), M* may have first given
birth to the idea of the newer game. The historian of chess tkils, how-
ever, to continue this line of enquiry to its utmost limit, and through all
its ramifications— not telling us by what process, and with what scope in
view, the derived diversion was evolved. Otherwise he would have made
"* This would mean the game of the ehtkyr (Old-Buglish), or ebew-board, and belongs
really to the Amerioan dialect of Rnglfth. In New England ehe«a waa almoat wholly nn-
praetUed until a century and a half (or more) after the country's settlement. To tb« colo-
nists, tbereforo, the chess-board (or "cfaoeker-board,** as it was oftenest styled), was only
known ss a board used In playing the game of draughts, and draughts was accordingly looked
npon as preeminently the game of the chtkyr, with little thought or knowledge of chess.
*< Checkers*' continues to be the household game of the country districts in Tcry many
sections of the United States— especially in the winter OTcnlngs of the ▼lUagers and farmers.
It may thus bo appropriately styled ** rural che«s.'*
*tt The first printed books on draughts were of the 16th eentnry, and were all issaed in
a single city, Valencia. The earliest was: **B1 ingenio Jnego do marro, de pnnto o damat**
(1547) by Antonio Torquemada; the second, "Del Jnego de las damatf Tolgarmente el marro**
(1590) by Pedro Ruiz Montero ; and the third, " Libro del Ivego do las damat^ por otro nombre
el marro de pvnta** (1591) eompiled by Lorenio Vails. The game, It thos seems, had a sec-
ond name In early Spanish— marro, or wutrro de jnmto. We most always then bear in mind,
in this connection, that there is no trace of draughts, in any land, back of the 15th centnry.
*tt '(QeschlehU des SchacbspieU,** II, p. 894. For a Tast deal of interesting matUr
eoneeming draughts, see the full index to the **OeschIchte^* tub Damt (ssiteln), ^tmbrttt
and dam9»pitlj and in particular the remarkable section VIII of the third *VAbtheilang,**
entitled **daa Damensplel,** in Tolume II., pp. 899-416, which ends with a bibliography of
the game; also the **Qaellen-stndlen,** p. 941, as to the name of the game. Outside of Van
dor Linde's work there is to be found almost nothing of the slightest ralne In regard to this
'< llttle-ebess,** as it is styled in Russian— sftosM, its SlaTonle name being the plnral of thtukOf
a dimlnntive of the Rossian word representing «< chess.**
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94 Cff^SS IN ICELAND
V
it more clear that the inventor had in his mind's eye the continual forward,
and never retrograde move of the pawn, as the foremost characteristic of
the move of all the figures in the modified game; and, added io this all-
essential feature, the subordinate one of the pawn-attribute of changing its
character as soon as it could no longer continue its forward march. He
nftgiflcted. tfiff, \^ pftrr.^*--" *^«^ *iifi rantiir"^ "^'>*>^^^ ^^^^'^ Hr^p^h^man ^^i^.
inated ^i4l\9_flar^y Asla^ifi-Knronftan mnvfl nf thfihishnn-^tn tha third aniiar e
in g the c<j ^ntrft1 FIHT*^ ^*' **" *^**^^} />^«/.4iy ^^ ^^ draughtman now leaps
over the opposing figure which he thereby captures. He tells us elsewhere
in his invaluable writings that, up to the date of its introduction into Spain
(or, perhaps, a little later), the chessboard was all of one colour, the squares
indicated only by lines; he even states the fact more definitely, saying that
before the date of the chess- worJi compiled under the direction and authority
of Alfonso X, no indication is found, in or out of Spain, of a parti-coloured
board ; but he omits to observe what infiuence this novelty would be likely
to have in helping to originate the new departure in the history and use of
the checkered table. For this new colouring of the squares would, of course,
at once give a great prominence to the diagonals, making them of even
greater distinctness— as will be understood at a glance— than the rectili-
near squares. We may, therefore, say that draughts is a simplified chess,
designed to avoid the difficulties of the Indian game, and evolved from the
Indian chess by a process like this:— 1. The squares used were limited to
those employed by the queen and bishop in the old chess of Spain (namely
the diagonals only, for the movements of the queen as well as those of the
bishop, were then restricted to a single colour— as we now say since the
chessboard has become parti-coloured) ; 2. Two ranks were then left be-
tween the arrays of the opposing players for the opening battle-field (t. e.
skirmishing-ground) ; 3. The men were next given the move— as it was at
that time— of the chess-queen (one square each way diagonally), while, as
their capturing-move, was borrowed the ordinary contemporary move of the
bishop (to the third square, diagonally jumping over any intervening ob-
stacle); and, as a final characteristic, the men received the attribute of the
chess-pawn, which, upon attaining the eighth rank, acquires a great in-
crease of power, together with the new faculty of making retrograde moves.
Thus we see that, at the bottom of the inventor's mind, was the idea of dimi-
nution as a simplifying force— diminution of the squares by one half (32 in
place of 64); of the battlefield free to both forces at the outset by one half
(2 ranks in place of 4} ; of the number of figures by one fourth (24 instead
of 32); and of the variety of pieces by five-sixths (chess having king, queen,
rook, bishop, knight, pawn, all with varying powers). The evolution of the
new game, as here portrayed, seems so natural as almost to prove itself.— In
several very early chess MSS, composed on this side of the Pyrenees, the
chess matter is followed by explanations of other table games, such as
''tallies*' and "merelles,'* but among these additional games draughts is,
so far as we know, never found. This strengthens, if that were needed, the
existing opinion as to the Spanish origin of the game. The story of the be-
ginning period of draughts, its close connection with chess (as a game of pure
skill, into which the element of chance by the use of dice does not enter),
and its late appearence in the cis-pyrennan parts of Western Europe seem to
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stua y notes gs
forbid its identification with «' tables/* or with the Icelandic ^Wo/f,** to which
latter matter, though, we shall again refer.— There is some obscurity about
the origin of the continental and therefore earliest appellation given to this
chess-derived game— in Spanish, as finally, and exclusively adopted, Ju^go
dedamas; in French, J^u de dames; in Italian, giuoco di dama; in German,
damensjnel. Van der Linde (^^Oeschichte/* I, pp. 287 and 321-24) at first
thought that the word datna formerly signified simply ^'man** {i.e. in a
game), but subsequently abandoned— partially at least— that idea C^Quellen-
studien,*' p. 241), although in French dame^ in draughts, still has that pe-
culiar sense. In connection with the last citation he suggests that it is
originally a Proven^l derived form of the Latin domina (= mistress, lady),
but as a chess-term it was first used by the Spaniard Lucena (1497), where it
is employed alternately with fers (or, as Lucena writes it, alferezza\ the
Asiatic-European title of the piece now known as ** queen.** Lucena, as the
earliest writer on the new or modern chess, styles the transformed game
'^Queen*s chess** (de la dama), because of the fuller power given to the old
"fers.** The chess which was passing away he calls '*the old** («{ vtc^'o).
This, of course, gave prominence to the word dama (= queen). But it ap-
pears probable that the expression ''queens* game** (Juego de damas), came
in part, as is hinted elsewhere, from the adoption of the old move of the chess
queen (one square diagonally) as the normal move of each of the men at
draughts, but perhaps more from the frequence of ''queens,** (or crowned
pieces) in the new game. In chess, the change which the pawns undergo, on
arriving at the eighth rank, is not of very frequent occurrence, and was for-
merly even less common, while, in that game, the player has the choice among
several pieces, the powers of any of which the metamorphosed pawn may
assume. In draughts, however, the act of "crowning** occurs in nearly every
partie, and in many several times, so that each player may easily have, and
does have, three or four or more "queens** (or, as we call them in English,
"kings**) on the draught-board at once. In this light the name "game of the
queens** becomes most appropriate.— In the same way but little labour has
hitherto been spent in endeavoring to explain the exact propriety of the En-
glish name of the game. The earliest distinct allusion to draughts is in the
(p. 78) quoted passage from the "Destruction of Troy** (early in the 15th
century), where we read:
The draghtu, the dyte tnil other dregh [L e. tediooe] gaomee.
But the game and its name had become very familiar early in the 17th century,
when William Perkins, in his work "A Case of conscience*' (1619), speaks of
" the games of chesse and draughts.^* In France it was described in a book
styled "Recreations math^matiques** in 1630 (Rouen), and a special treatise
by Pierre Malet, "Le iev de dames,** appeared in 1668 (Paris) ; while in England
no book devoted to it saw the light before William Payne*s slender volume,
"An introduction to the game of draughts** (London 1756). In Germany an
inedited MS by Johann Wolfgang Schmidt, composed at Nuremberg in 1700,
IS preserved in the Royal Library of Berlin, while "DaserkiarteDamenspiel**
(by an amateur, "F. T. V.**) was issued at Magdeburg in 1744. In Holland, a
"Verhandeling over het Damspel,** by Ephraim van Embden, appeared in 1785,
but in all other lands the oldest printed treatise bears a nineteenth-century
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96 CffESS IN ICELAND
date. In Iceland very little was heard of draughts until within the same
period, nor is it any way common in the island even now. It came from Den-
marlc, and is usually mentioned by its Danish name {damm, dainspit). Its Scotch
name, damhrod, indicates its introduction into that country from France.—
Draughts, it may be remembered in conclusion, like all similar games, has
its different ramifications, or species. In the United States (notably in the
rural districts) is often practised the sort locally known as "give away""< —
a kind of suicidal draughts, in which each player tries to force his opponent to
capture as many men as possible, the real object being to lose the game in-
stead of winning it. To the same genus belong the suicidal problems of
chess.— A more important variety is called "Polish draughts," played on a
board of 100 squares (10 X 10), each player controlling twenty men. Van der
Linde says that this is the only draughts now practised in Holland— the later
treatises on draughts in the Dutch language limiting themselves to this spe-
cies. No investigator has ever, so far as we know, tried to trace the origin of
this so-called Polish game. Whether it came from Poland or elsewhere, it
appeared in France a few generations ago, attained a great vogue for a while,
and is probably slill played. The French chess-players, Philidor, in the last
century, and Deschapelles in the present century, were known as adepts at
this enlarged draughts. ^'^
The word draught, or draft, besides its various other meanings, has that
of "move" in a game, and at a very early period is so used in English chess.
Thus we find in Chaucer*8 "Death of Blanche la Duchesse'* (651-654) :
At the cbMae with me she gan to pleye ; «
With hir faliie drauffhtst divora
She stal on me and took my fers;
and in the early years of the 15th Century, in the verse of Thomas Occleve
(6. about 1370, d. 1454) :
And for that among draughUt oachone
That into tho oheoa apertone may,
and only a little later, in that of John Skelton, in his striking piece of imag-
ery drawn from chess: —
Oar days he datyd
To be oheckmatyd
With dtavfUyt of deth.
Draught was a very common word, to express what we now call "move,'* in
all the Old-English productions relating to chess, while its cognate, drag,
still continues to be used in Swedish in the same sense. Thus in Barbier^s
"Famous game of chesse-play'* (1690)— a revision and enlargement of the
'*< In Jbigland (and In American treatises) known aa "the loalug game."
**^ Booka on PoHah draughu hare lately been publiahed la Germany. Posaibly the game
waa originated at the half-PolIah, half-Freooh ooart of Stanlalaua Leesinaky, the exiled king
of Poland, (father-In-Uvr of Loais XV), who, from 1736 to 1766, reaided at Nancy and Lune-
▼llle aa prinee (or "king*') of Lorraine and Bar. — Hyde (16d4), of coarse, knew nothing of
the Pollah game. HIa treatment of the ordinary game of draughta la, perhapa the moat
nnaatlafaetory portion of hia two rolumea. He makea It identical with the Roman hMlMs
lo^runeulomm, but at the aame time aeema to think it of oriental origin. He glrea repre*
aentatlons of two draughtboards, one of which haa alzteen men arranged on the flret two
ranks of eaeh player— In whieh oaae nae ia made, not only of the diagonala but of all the
64 aqnarea of the board (aee Hyde, II, pp. 178-195).
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STRAY NOTES
97
earlier work (1614) of Arthur Saul, bearing the same title— we find the fol-
lowing verse referring to the usual mode of deciding the first move by lot:—
If OD yoar man yoa light
The flrtt drinigkt «haU yon pifty ;
If not, be mine by right
At flnt to lead the way.
Now the game of draughts has no checlcing, no mating, no castling, no va-
riety of movements among its men ; hence it is possible to consider it as a
simple collection of moves, or as a collection of simple moves— a game of
moves and nothing else. This suggestion as to the immediate origin of its
English appellation may be a far-fetched one, but no more acceptable ex-
planation can be found in the dictionaries, though the idea is perhaps best
of all expressed by Skeat in his well-known ^' Etymological Dictionary,**
in which he styles draughts '' a game of alternate moves.**
M^eUes (mylna). — There are two tabic games of minor note of which
something must be said, chiefly because one of them at least— as we shall
learn in the sequel— has been regarded by some writers as related, directly
or indirectly, to the Icelandic hnefataf^ while both have been practised, for
many generations, by the Icelandic people. The first one is, perhaps, best
known in general literature by its French name, m&relles^ or tnarelles. It
was intimately associated by the earliest European writers on chess with
that game, forming the third of the triad of table games (chess, tables,
mdrelles) treated by such early writers as Alfonso X, and the authors of the
so called '^Bonus Socius** and '^Civis Bononiae** MSS at Florence, Rome and
elsewhere. The last two of these old works, so far as the space they devote
to chess goes, have been ably edited and commentated both by Von der Lasa
and Van der Linde; but very little attention has been hitherto paid to the
portions occupied by the two other games, this being especially true of the
mereUes section.
We shall nevertheless endeavour to treat this m^eZte^ (or '* morris-game**
as it may be styled, for distinction *s sake, in English) with some of its
varieties, as completely as we may, considering that no work, or even essay
—of a general tenor— consecrated to its history and character has yet been
published, and that we must therefore depend upon driblets of information
—always scanty of detail, and nearly always inaccurate— drawn f^om many
sources. It ought to be premised that the table game called '^ morris** belongs
to the class which has received the generic title of '4ine-games,** or games
in which the men are placed and played on lines and not
on spaces (that is, neither on "squares'* nor "points**).
To this class it is supposed that many games familiar to
the older Mediterranean lands appertained. It may be fur-
ther premised that in the case of the morris game the lines
are right lines, and drawn, first, in order to formquadran-
gles, and, secondly, in order to connect internally the sides
and angles of these quadrangles. It may, moreover, render
the following pages a little easier of comprehension if we state that it has
been surmised, though not proved, that the germ of these games was a single
simple square, with lines running f^om the centre of one side to the centre
of the opposite side, and from one corner to the other comer, and that the
18
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98 ' CHESS IN ICRLA ND
line of development which this game subsequently followed increased the
number of these quadrangles from one to three, drawn concentrically, or,
in some regions, as it would seem, joined by grouping.
We shall put together all that we have been able to gather from different
countries — each land by itself — relating to this long-used social diversion
— its story, its name or names, its method or methods of play and the part it
has had, if any, in each country's literature. The geographical arrangement
adopted, however convenient it may be in other respects, has the disad-
vantage of rendering repetitions unavoidable.
We begin with Spain, because the oldest mention of the game known to
us is Spanish, but unfortunately we are not in a position to say definitely
what that mention is. It occurs in the important Alphonsine codex of the
Escorial (which dates back to about 1280)— its existence therein being posi-
tively stated both by Van der Linde and Von der Lasa, but since these wri-
ters concern themselves solely with the manuscript's chess pages, they throw
merely the faintest glimmer of light upon our topic. The former, in his
largest work, (" Geschichte," I, pp. 137 and 279), only informs us that the
MS, as left by its royal author, certainly treats of mdreUes (in German,
muhlenspiel or miUespier), although Van der Linde himself displays no very
exact knowledge of what the morris game is; for, on the last page just cited,
he gives, in a general way, the contents of the codex but in a somewhat sin-
gular manner. It consisted, according to him, of a series of '' spielbiicher,"
^* welche erstens das schach, zweitens das trictrac, drittens das miihlespiel
{dados y iahlas) behandeln"— thus seeming to imply that the words dados y
tdblas signify either mUhlespiel, or both trictrac and mUhlespiel, whereas the
word dados refers to games played with dice alone, and tablas to games
played with both dice and men. The indefatigable Dutch scholar, in a later
treatise (** Quellenstudien," 1881), comments on the chess section of the co-
dex much more fblly than had heretofore been done, having had access
meanwhile (not to the MS itself but) to an old transcript of some portions
of the Escorial volume. He tell^ us (p. 73) that one of the games outside
of chess described in it, is alquerque. This assertion is repeated (pp. 277-8)
a little more in detail, and supplemented by this statement: ^'Auch das mii-
lespiel ist ein linienspiel; Alfonso hat viele varianten und spieit auch hier
iiberall mit schachpeons" (that is, used as morris-men), but we are not
told what, according to Alfonso, is the Spanish appellation of ^* miilespiel,"
—of the sort now known to the Germans —nor what the variants are of
which his commentator speaks. Of alquerque he tells us enough to show
that the modern Spanish writer, whom we shall shortly cite, was greatly
indebted for the information he gives us, to Alfonso's work. Van der Linde
reproduces our figure 1 and informs us that it constitutes a quarter of an
alquerque board represented in the codex, upon which that game is played
with 2 X 12 chess pawns, placed and moved always upon the lines. Amongst
the forms of alquerque given is one denominated iuego de cercar cte liebre
("hare-hunt"). There is also described, as we are told, a more modern
variety, which was played with the help of dice— or, as the codex has it,
" alquerque de nueve que se uiega con dados "—the modern author (Van der
Linde) here correcting his former misunderstanding regarding dados. He
adds that this alqtierque de nueve was played with twelve white men against
one black; but the word nueve, although it may possibly signify either
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STRAY NOTES »
^'new'' or '^nine/* is here more likely to mean the latter, (nine men
morris), in which case we confess ourselves unable to comprehend the
" twelve white men against one black.'* Thus far Van der Linde. Tassilo
von der Lasa, unlike Van der Linde, had the opportunity of examining
the codes; the accuracy of the information he gives us can therefore not
be questioned. In the pages of that great work, ** Zur geschichte und lite-
ratur des schachspiels " (1897)^ the final and finest product of a long life
rich in many abundant literary harvests— he comments on the chess
writings of the Spanish monarch. Introductory to his treatment of the sub-
ject he says: *' Der codex ist ziemlich umfassend und beschS.ftigt sich neben
schach mit verschiedenen spielen, wie wiirfel, miihle, trik-trak, Jedoch nicht
mit damespiel. Das schach macht aber bei weitem den grOssten theil dee
ganzen aus'* (p. 116).
The only further addition, and that a too slight one, to our knowledge
of the Escorial codex, comes from a modern Spanish source. We find it in
the remarkable, and, in many respects, valuable treatise of Jos^ Brunet y
Bellet, entitled ''£1 Ajedrez** (Barcelona, 1890). The volume contains a
chapter on the '' Libro de don Alfonso el Sabio '* (pp. 243-268), in which,
however, the author, like preceding writers, has very little to say about any
other game than chess. That little occurs when he is describing (pp. 263-4)
the miniatures which adorn the Xlllth century MS. He observes that in the
supplement (called by Van der Linde '^Book IV) are 14 miniatures illustra-
ting some odd varieties of chess, as well as some other games, amongst them
five belonging to the pages devoted to alquerqiie^ from one of which he
quotes this inscription: ^^Esto es ell alquerque de doce que iuega con todos
sus trebeios.*' This means: '^Jhis is the alquerque of twelve, which is
played with all its pieces.'* ** Alquerque of twelve" most likely refers to a
kind of alquerque played with twelve men. Then the modern writer contin-
ues by saying that this game is called in Castilian tres en raya, and in Cat-
alan fTtorro, ^'del cual hablamos en capitulos anteriores." He notes that
Alfonso speaks of the pieces as trebeios (modern irehe^fos)^ a name which is
still sometimes given to the pieces at chess.
Turning next to the anterior chapter to which the author of '*E1 Ajedrez**
has alluded, we shall try to give a tolerably complete abstract of its earlier
paragraphs, although we shall find but little relating to the actual morris
game as we of English speech understand it. In fact all that we may bo
able to glean in regard to the nomenclature of the Peninsular m^relles will
not make it possible to draw any certain deductions as to its character,
much less to present any clear or logical account of the game as played by
the Spaniards, or to comprehend its technical terms. Brunet y Bellet fol-
lows his second chapter, in which he treats of " £1 Juego en tiempo di los
romanos,** with an appendix, or extra chapter (pp. 204-211), which he begins
by alluding to the well known work on chess of the Sicilian Carrera (1617) **•
who, he tells us, applied the name of 'Mine games** {giuochi di riga, or in
Spanish, Juegos de raya) to all varieties of this category of table games,
*^ "II gioeo degll seaeehl di D. Pletro Carrera eon dae diacorsi l*ano del Padre D. Oio.
Battlato Cbembiiio, l*altro del Dott. Mario Tortelli. In lllUtello iGl7.'* The book la one of
the elaaelea of ebeaa. Tbe Englltb translation of William Lewis (London 189t) raries in iu
arra&f«ment and is sllgbtly abridged. Carrera was the last of tbe great Italian ehese writ-
era of tbe 16tb-17th centnrlee (Polerio, Qreeo, Qiannalo, Salrio, Carrera).
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100
CffESS IN ICELAND
amongst them being a kind of draughts (damas), played on a table ** divided
into triangles by lines'" as in the existing marro grande^ and with sixty
pieces half white and half black, which is styled [by the ancients] gram-
mismusoT diagrammismus or gramma — this last word signifying *^any sort
of line/' "* This game/ says Carrera, * is to-day unknown, but there was
formerly played, and is still actually played, a similar one with twelve white
men and twelve black; but it is necessary to note that this game is diverse
from that which the Sicilians call marrellay and the Spaniards damasJ* He
then describes the method of playing one of the riga games, which he as-
serts is styled riga di tre^ and which is one that children play everywhere,
drawing the board upon a stone, brick or plank, or even marking its out-
lines on the earth, each player employing three men— never more. This game
is called in the Catalan dialect marro, and in Gastilian tres en raya, Car-
rera comprises under the name of giuochi della riga all those games which
are played upon a fiat surface marked in lines of one form or another, and
using a greater or less number of men/* The game described by Carrera,
as reported by Brunet y Bellet, it will be seen, is the English ^* three men*s
morris*' (see fig. 1).
In spite of the two argumentative paragraphs which the Spanish writer
then bases upon Carrera's use of the word dama^^ it is quite evident that
the Sicilian's employment of the term was the result of ignorance, for damas
means, and meant even in Carrera's time, the game of draughts. Resuming,
Brunet y Bellet declares that in the days of Carrerat the Sicilians might have
employed marreUa or marelle for the Spanish (juego de) clanuu— played
on a chess board — but that at the present time the Italians understand by
marelle the Spanish (juego de) marro, that is to say (giuoco de) riga,
with twelve white and twelve black men, called in Catalan castro, a name
which is equally applied in Castile to that game. It is also known as
alquerque. or ires en ray a— jnsi as Carrera calls both the games giuoco
de riga^ and Just as the Catalans
apply that of marro equally to
the line-game of twenty four
men, and to that of six— three
white and three black— the latter
being tres en ray a among the
Castilians.
All this seems unnecessarily
perplexing, but we get Arom the
final lines a clear idea that the
simple, single-squared *^ three
men morris" is surely known in
Spain. The author, however,
makes confusion worse confoun-
ded by inserting in his text the
design of what he labels a board
for **aZgii«rgutf or marro of twelve
men," which we copy (fig. 2).
Now this board is made up by
morris" boards of Tuscany (or
11
16
\
2
1 a
4
s
\
V
\
y
K "
u \^
/
K
IB \
/
/
\
21
22
23
Pig. «.
2«
10
IC
20
25
uniting four of the little ^* three men
Italy, and other lands) or, what is the same, four of Hyde's copped-crown
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STRAY NOTES 101
boards, "' and is different from any of the larger morris or mirelles boards
which we find elsewhere (excepting in recent manuals of social games pub-
lished in Paris and Milan, alluded to later). Afterwards he goes on to say
that it is very possible that this diminutive marro or giuoco de Hga (that
is, & fourth of his alquerqtte board), using only six men (three for each
player), its board traversed by four lines and divided into eight spaces, may
be the primitive form of the game of lines {rayas)^ from which is derived the •
other and more complicated varieties of these games. As combinations of
this original form he cites the alqtierque represented in the design; the
game called asalio in Spanish, and the game called fox and geese in English,
of the board of which latter he gives a sketch. Later on we shall find ful-
ler mention of this asalto^ but certainly, as we have already said, it has not
been our fortune to discover in actual use in any oUier country a composite
morris board of the character of that asserted to be alquerque by Brunet y
Bellot. ^^ But see the extracts from Italian and French handbooks of games
farther on.
The definition given in the *^ Diccionario de la lengua Castellana por la
academia espanola*' to tres en raya, under the word raya, is as follows : *'Agame
which is played by boys with pebbles or pieoes upon a square divided into four
others [that is lesser ones], having lines drawn from one side or the other to
the centre, where they are joined by diagonals drawn from one corner to the
^" See the labieqaent treatment of Hyde^a etateoieiitt In the aeoount of the morrle game
in England.
iM rpij^ 1^2^ ^g ij^^ ^^^ly paragrapha, of whioh we have made nae, fn Branet 7 BeUet*a
supplementary chapter, ia aa followa : •* Don Pietro Carrera, ne an obra H Oioeo da gli ScM-
ekif In MiUt«llOf 1617, dice : Bl aator da el nombre de Joego de la Riga, Raja, k todoa loa
que ae juegan eon tableroa aeflaladoa por rajaa, ontre elloa ol de nna eapecle de Damaa
Jagado eon na tablero diridldo en triAnguIoa por laa rayaa, eomo en el actnal Morro gran'de,
y con aeaenta piesaa, milad blaneaa y mitad negraa, el eiial jnego ea Ilamado OrammUmuM
6 Diagranmitmua y (?ramina, auuqae eate Ultimo nombre ei;aifloa toda claae de JUpa, 6
Raya — ** Bate Joego, dice Carrera, ea hoy deaeonoacido; pero ae Jogaba tamblin, y inn ae
Juega aetaalmente, ontro aemejante con doce piedraa blaneaa y doee negraa; debfondo ad-
TorUr qne eate Jnego ea diferenta de aqnel otro que loa alcilianoa llaman Jfarralto y loa
eapafiolea Damat,** Deaerlbe deapni* el mode de Jagar el AlUmo de lea trea en que dMde
loa Jnegoa de Biga^ que dice llamarae Riga d* Tv^ y qne ea el mlamo qne todavla Jnegan
loa mnehachea por todaa partea aenal&ndoae el tablero aobre ana piedra, ladrlllo 6 madera,
6 bien haoiendo rayaa en la tierra, y con trea pfedrecltaa nada m&« ; Joego Ilamado en ea-
talAn Marro, y en eaaUlIano 7V«« en Raya; Oarrera, en una palabra, eomprende bajo el
nombre de JutgoM de la Riga 4 todoa aquelloa que ae Juegan con tablero mareado por rayaa
de nna d otra forma, y con mayor 6 meuor nAmero de piesaa ..... Bn tiempo de Carrera podria
llamarae en Sleilla MarreUa 6 MarelU k nueatro Juego de Damaa, eon el tablero k onadroa,
eaeaqueado ; pero loa Italtanoa entJenden, adn hoy, por Marelle, noeatro Jnego de Marro, ea
deeir el Jnego de Riga de laa doce piedreeitaa blaneaa y doee nrgraa, Ilamado Olaafro en
oaatellaao, nombre que ae da igualmente on Caatilla al qua tambi^n ae llama Alqumr^ue 6
3Vaa en Raya; del miamo mode que Carrera da 4 loa doa el nombre de Gluoeo dl Riga, y
loa eatalanea Ilamamoa Jfarro al Riga de 24 pledreoita« y al de 6— trea blaneaa y trea ne-
graa— 6 Trea en Raya eomo loa oaatellanoa.** In bia next paragraph the author goea on to
obaerTe : << Be muy poalble que eate Ultimo aea el primitivo de loa Jnegoa de rayaa, del eoal ae
derlvaaen loa otroa diferentea de tablero m4a complleado 6 mejor reoltiplicado^ y eon laa
repetlolonea del euadro primitiro roejor diapueataa, atraveaado por ooatro rayaa y dividldo
en ocho eapaoioa, puea no aon otra eoaa loa tableroa del Jfarro (fig. S), Aaalto, Ladronea.
FosB and Qooee [aee a later page], ete. y ea porible y eaal probable qne laa Damaa que ae
jaaffan eon IS piesaa blaneaa y 18 negraa— en Bspafia, Francla y otraa naoionea ae Juegan
oon mayor nAmero — no aean otra eoaa que el antlgno Marro apllcado al tablero de ajedrea
do 8 X 8 oaalllaa, cnando eate Jnego aa Tulgarisd por el Ocoldente *'— a Talneleea gneaa.
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102 CffESS IN ICELAND
other. The aim of the game oonsists in the placing, by one player, on some
one of these right lines, his own three mep, and the skill of the game consists
in preventing the other player from accomplishing the same purpose with
his men." The Spanish definition is followed, as is customary, in the earlier
editions of the Academy's dictionary, by a brief LAtin one, which in this
case reads: '*Puerorum ludus lineis transversis in quadrum dispostis.'* It
will be seen that the Academy's definition seems to be, so far as the board
is concerned, a description of the alquerque of Brunet y Bellet (four small
squares making one large one). Alquerque^ in the same lexicon, is explained
to be identical with tres en raya. The incomprehensible thing in the definition
just cited is that, while Brunet y Bellet speaks of the board as used for the
^^cUquerque or marro of twelve men,*' the phrase "his own three men" (les
tres tantos proprios)^ in the Academy (and other late) dictionaries, implies that
each alquerqite player had (as in the smallest morris game) but three pieces
— which looks impossible. The statement may be only one of those examples
of confusion, through ignorance, on the part of the Academical lexicologists,
of which we have already seen so many in this volume.
In the voluminous "Diccionario enciclopedico hi spano-americano," recently
published at Barcelona, we are referred under alquerque to tres en raya^ and
under the last word of that phrase (XVII, 1895) we find this definition : " Juego
de muchachos, quese juega con unas piedrecillas 6 tantos, colocados en un
cuadro dividido en otros cuatro con las lineas tiradas de un lado k otro por
el centre, y anadidas los diagonales de un Angulo & otro. £1 fin del Juego
consiste en colocar en cualquiera de las lineas rectas los tres tantos proprios
y el arte del juego en impedir que esto se logre interpolando los tantos con-
traries." This, it will be noticed, is almost a word for word repetition of the
description given in the lexicon of the Spanish academy, and, as we said in
quoting that, though slightly inexact, it certainly refers to Brunet y Beliefs
alquerque played on four united three men morris boards ; it even reproduces
the Academy's erroneous "los tres tantos proprios."
Of what we, outside of Spain, understand by the nine (or twelve) men
morris, with the board of three concentric squares, we discover nothing
certainly in the recent lexicographical works which relate to the Spanish
language. As to another word cited by Brunet y Bellet, inarro^ its sole
signification known to the present generation is as the title of an athletic
sport described in the "Diccionario enciclopedico" in these words: "Juego
que se ejecuta hincando en el suelo un bolo u otro objeto, y, tirando con el
marr6n, gana el que lo pone m&s cerca." The dictionary of the Academy under
marroy gives, not only the game here mentioned, but another plainly more
violent athletic exercise, in which one band of players confronts another in
a sort of tournament. It seems, therefore, that as the name of a table-game,
marro is no longer used in Spain, unless dialectically.
Hyde, one of the historians of chess, in his chapter entitled "Historia
triodii "—of which we shall have a good deal to say when we reach the subject
of the morris game in England— remarks that certain writers state that the
game is called in Spain alquerque^ but that some other writers, and among
them Corvarrubias, apply that name to chess, or draughts, but that (O/juerque^
as he proposes to show afterwards, is the Arabic name of m^elles, "From this
we can form an idea" says the wise Hyde, "how great are the errors of
authors in assigning and explaining the names of games.'*
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STRAY ffOTES 103
Little information, but an abundance of misinformation, as to the game
is to be drawn from the larger and better bilingual dictionaries of the present
time. For instance, in recent editions of Salv&*8 French and Spanish dio-
tionary (1898), we have, in the French part, m^reUe (singular) interpreted by
ires en raya^ ^*juego de muchachos,'* while the plural merelles is rendered by
'''•dnciacos (otro juego di muchachos).'* Tres eti raya can surely not signify
the French m&elle (singular). In the Spanish part we find cUquerque rendered
"m^rello, espccc de jeu de dames''— a repetition of an old piece of inexactness
criticised and condemned even as far back as the days of Hyde. Under tres
en raya again we find the definition, mcrelle, **jeu d' enfant qui consists a
sautcr d doche-piod en poussant avec le pied dans un sens prescrit un palet
en des lignes circonscrites : ces lignes elle-memes.*' This is only a blunder
in the French-Spanish part repeated. We can find nowhere that tres en raya
ever has in Spanish the meaning of the French m4relle (singular), which is
properly that of the English children's game, ** hop-scotch."
In considering finally the whole question of the morris game in Spain,
one is almost inclined to think that of the two forms of the larger m&relles
involving three squares, one drawn within the other, neither has ever existed
in that country. We find, for instance, that no one o f those who have written
about the codex which owes it existence to Don Alfonso gives any hint of
the treatment of either of these forms in that famous work. Von der Lasa,
in noticing other early codices, often alludes to the presence or absence of
the morris positions, and occasionally characterises the game found in them
as the "larger " merelles. He has however nothing to say about any mention
of the game as he understood it, in the Escorial MS; but the strongest neg-
ative evidence is that of Brunet y Bellet, who supposably has had frequent
opportunities of studying the royal compilation. He takes pains to copy in
his book the board of four united squares {alquerque), and we may reasonably
suppose that had there been any markedly different kind of what he follows
Carrera in calling juegos de raya, he would have also reproduced the board
upon which it was played. (Certainly, as has been already hinted, we discover
no trace in the Spanish lexicological works of any other sort of mA-eUes
tlmn the three men morris and its quadruple, alquerque. If it be indeed
true that Spain has never got beyond the three men morris and the com-
posite alquerque, that fact will have great weight in discussions upon the
origin of the game, for apparently this shuts out India and Arabia as
probable home-lands of in&relles. Still, in this connection, one thing must
be much more carefully considered than has hitherto been the case, and that
is the derivation of the yrovd. alquerque. The latest Spanish authorities make
two rubrics of this vocable. Under the first it is referred to tres en raya as
a synonym, in the second we are told that it signifies the space in an oil
mill into which the "must" of the olive is placed between the two pressures
which it undergoes. Both are explained as coming from the same Arabic
root, or possibly from two Arabic words of intimate connection. The first
syllable is the article al (e?), the other, kark or harik. The editors of late
issues of the Spanish Academy's dictionary think that the Arabic root might
mean "flat surface," From the interrogative sign which follows this etymo-
logical suggestion— which however is omitted by later makers of dictionaries
it would appear that the question has not been very thoroughly investigated.
We can therefore only treat it in a purely guess-work way, and say that,
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104 CHESS IN ICELAND
if the Spaniards adopted an Arabic name for a certain flat surface to be found
in oil mills, and if they then applied that name to a game played on a flat
surface (perhaps largely on the "flat surfaces" of the oil mills themselves),
it would hardly be considered an invincible argument for the eastern origin
of the game.
If in Italy the m&relles game is not heard of quite so early as in Spain,
yet it is not far behind in point of time; while, on the other hand, it seems
to have been cultivated in the central Mediterranean peninsula to a greater
extent than in the western, and elaborated into a pastime of higher distinc-
tion. Its first mention, so far as we know, is in the works of the pseudon-
ymous "Bonus Socius" and -'Civis Bononiae'*— writings which have been
happily criticised by Van der Linde as the "Academies des jeux" of the
middle ages, since in them are treated the three most esteemed table-games
of that remote day. Nicholas de (Saint) Nicholai, who called himself "Bonus
Socius," if not an Italian, of which there seems to be little doubt, was at
least a resident of Northern Italy ; though it is proper to add that no place
called San Nicola (or Nicholai) has yet been identified as his possible home
within the limits of the Italian territory. If this "Saint" were omitted, Nicola
di Nicola would be simply "Nicholas, the son of Nicholas," or in English
"Nicholson." In his brief general preface to his compilation, he tells us
that his book treats "tarn de ludis scaccorum, alearum, quam ab otiam mar-
rellorum." To be specially noted here is that the last word is not feminine,
but is written as if derived from the singular "marrellus" or "marrellum;"
Von der Lasa, indeed, cites an old plural, mereUiA^ The Ludus alearum
was of course the game of tables. Many transcripts of the Latin text of this
work are in existence, and not a few codices of the French rendering in
Florence, Rome, London, Paris, Brussels and Wolfenbiittel. The German
translations are in the shape of extracts or abstracts.
Not very much later came the second similar production— that of the
"Civis Bononiae," who not only informs us that he is a citizen of the North
Italian Bologna, but also records his name in some enigmatic verses prefaced
to his work, concealed, however, in so clever a way, that none of the many
who have studied the lines have succeeded in drawing aside the veil.*^
Transcripts of this work, also in Latin, are not uncommon, but, unlike its
predecessor, it has never been rendered into any modern tongue. In one of
the later codices we find the title given as "Tractatus partitorum scacchorum,
tabularum et marellorum." Partitorum has the meaning, in all the three
*^ 6vo the "Festfclirifl" of the Aeadexnio Gbeas Clab of Munieh (1896, p. 37), in an
eM&y by Yon der L««& on mediteval oheu, Including au admirable aecount of the early
MSS from that of Alfonso on.
^ For these Latin rhymed stansas, whloh are six In numbor, see Van dvr Lindens
<' Quelle nstudion*' (pp. 18S~184). The lines bearing upon the author*s cognomen and resi-
dence are those of the fifth stansa and the first lino of the sixth :
Ueo halus opaseoH series est tota.
Quls Sim scire poteris tradens tot iguota.
Veraum principils sillabas to nota
Korundem media llttera remota.
Civis sam Bononiae ista qui oollegi.
There are many of these enigmatic utterances in medlnval Latin literature. It would seem
as If one familiar with that field might interpret the sense here ooneaaled.
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STRAY NOTES 106
games, not o( parties but of *'poBition8**— positions, or problems, in chess
coming first in both of these early compositions, followed by like pofiitions
in the games of tables and m^elles. In one of the '* Bonus Socius*' Latin
MSS at Florence, if we understand Van der Linde*s account of it correctly,
C'Qaellenstudien*' p. 184) the author, in addition to his 'Mudus marellorum,*'
enamerates several other names given to the game; tavella^ tria, filetto, Ta-
vella may or may not be a misunderstanding, but the Latin '' tria^'' like
the Qreek xpioStov , is found with this meaning in some dictionaries, while
filetto is in Italian one of the ordinary modern appellations of the game.
The surprising thing is that this last name should go back, seemingly, to the
XlVth century. In that age, to Judge by these illuminated records, our mor-
ris game had a splendour to which in later times it has never attained.
For the codices of these North Italian ''Academies'* are in general hand-
somely, even luxuriously, executed, with miniatures and other brilliant dis-
plays of colour. Those of Italian execution are even outdone in this respect by
some of the French vellums. It is plainly to be seen that they were in-
tended for the use of courtly circles, or for the homes of the nobility— tn^-
relles in the XlVth and XVth centuries, thus sharing the aristocratic asso-
ciations to which chess and tables had long before become accustomed.
When we look, however, at one of the redactions of the "Civis Bononiae,'*—
the remarkable volume belonging to the Victor Emmanuel library at Rome
—we are struck at once by the appearance of the pages devoted to the md-
relles game. The exterior lines of the board are often, by a sort of double
lineation, drawn in two colours. The m^elles pieces, in those days, had
their own peculiar names, something after the manner of those used in chess.
Each player ruled over the movements of "moons," "stars," ""shields,"
"crosses," "squares," and "rounds" (or discs). The moon is designed as
a crescent orb; the star has long, shimmering rays; the shield is triangular;
the cross is of the Greek form ; the squares and rounds are not outlined, but
are solid bits of colour. In Latin these names are luna^ stella, scutum, crux,
quadratus, rotundus. Generally, in these codices, the collection of m^elles
positions begins, without any title, or prefatory remarks, with the condi-
tions of the first problem, as in the Paris Latin MS (National Library 10287 ->-
formerly 73190, pp. 173-184)— one of a very gorgeous character: ^^rubeiprimo
trahunt et rubeus rotundus nunquam movebiter, nisi semel ; et si bene ludaiur
neuter vincit,'" The final position in the volume bears the following inscrip-
tion: "5i aurei trahunt suam crucem^ rubei revertentur cum quadra^ et
capient scutum^ vel e converse ; si trahunt lunam, rubei capient stellam vel e
converso; etposteain omni tractu capiet qitadrus^ et vindent rubei,"" It will
be soon that the players (or their men) are styled red and gold instead of
white and black, as at chess, which increases the magnificence of the dia-
grams, even if it does not add to the dignity of the game.
It is remarkable that a casual examination of several of these MSS, which,
although at first composed in Latin, originated in mediieval Italy, and many
of which were written down by Italian scribes, should yield such a scant
amount of information as to the rules of the game. The names given to the
pieces are, as we have said, six in number. If the names were not dupli-
cated, this would seem to decide in favour of six pieces for each player,
thus not according with any variety of merelles known to us. But some of
these pieces are found occurring twice in a single position, and it looks as
u
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106 CHESS IN ICELAND
if some of them (namely the ''squares** and ''discs**) sometimes occupied
the board even to the number of three or four. So far as we have been
able to ascertain, none of the solutions given help us more than very slightly
as to the character of the play. We are told that the gold takes the moon,
or that the red captures a cross, but by what sort of movement this action
is performed, we cannot always even guess. The same is true of the posi-
tions given at the game of tables, and we may almost say the same of the
chess problems, except that in the last case we are aided by many other old
records relating to the game. Possibly a wider study of this singular pro-
duction, especially of its little known versions in French, might aid us in
ascertaining the number of men and the laws of the game.
After this period of brilliancy, m4reUes^ so far as we can learn, drops
out of literature in Italy, but the game continues to be played by the people
in more than one of its forms. Without recourse to the dialects, we find
the following appellations given to it in the encyclopedias and dictionaries:
gittoco di mulino, tavola di mulino, filo^ filettOy tavoletta^ smerelli^ fllo-mtUino,
scaricalasino^ and mulineUo. Some of these evidently relate only to the
"three men morris,** or the smaller m^relles, such as tavoletta^ scaricalasino,
mulinello, while others, like flletto^ are seemingly used for any of the varie-
ties. Scaricalasino (literally "unload the ass**) may have suggested itself
from the similarity otmolino (mill, mtdino being an alternative orthography)
and mtUino (little mule)— asses and mules being, too, the customary carriers
of corn to the mill. Now-a-days, we believe, scaricalasino is moTB often em-
ployed in the sense of the English "leap-flrog,** Just as m^^^ {m&reUe) in
French has come to be the name for "hop-scotch.** Apparently, too, the
compound fUo-mtUino is the title of a Arequently occurring position in the
game, but has grown to be used occasionally of the game itself. The most
singular word in this list is perhaps smerelli^ which occurs in the XYIIIth
century, and possibly still earlier. Whether it be allied to m4reUes we are
not informed ; even in the pretended etymological dictionaries no derivation
is suggested. It is noteworthy that the appellation nidreUes (" Indus marel-
lorum**), which occurs in the very first writings on the subject composed in
Italy, should not have found its way into the Italian language as well as
into the French. In regard to this, as to other related matters, it is to bo
hoped that some Italian linguistic scholar will be able to carry these hasty
researches to a more satisfactory result.
Giovanni Qherardini, in his "Supplimento a vocabolarj Italiani** (III.,
Milan, 1854), gives the phrase giuocare a filettOy of which he says: "Houdito
dire in Toscana e*giuoca a filetto^ per signiflcaro che parco e stretto vive in
tutte le sue cose con molta economia. Lo scherzo consiste su *1 filare sottile;
o pure d tratto da un giuoco di qucsto nome, dctto altramente giuoco di smereUi
o tavola di molino, e presso i Francesi ''jeu demireUes,'* ** In the " Dizionario
della lingua Italiana** of Tommaseo (1869), the largest work devoted to the
vocabulary of the Italian tongue, we find under flletto: "Chiamasi cosl una
sorta di giuoco detto anche giuoco (lt\sm^&22t**-* citing here as an authority
Fanfani, a contemporary lexicographer. This is followed by a few lines
endorsed by the initials of one of the editors (Meini) explaining "giocare a
flletto:** "il qual giuoco si fa su una tavola simile alia Dama, dove sono se-
gnati dei quadrati sopra alcuni dei quali, chi giuoca cerca di disporre tre
pedine in flla; nel che consiste lavincita. Farfiletio, Ho fatto /Uetto,'' In
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STRA Y NOTES 107
saying that nUreUes is played on a board like a draught-board, the writer
ought to tell us how great is the similarity he wishes to imply. In the case
of these two games, both boards (like all other boards) are flat, and it is
also true that both are quadrilateral in shape. Here certainly their similar-
ity ends.
The modes of playing the various sorts of the morris game now prevalent
in Italy, may be gleaned from a very recent publication of the " Hoyle *' or
"Acad^mie des Jeux" class by J. OoUi, entitled "Come posso divertirmi?*'
(Milan 1900). It includes fox-and-geese in its chapter devoted to "II muli-
nello*' (pp. 226-233, figs. 103-107)— but that game we shall examine in sub-
sequent pages. In the German dictionaries we sometimes find the word
d43ppelmu}de^ or the double-morris game, played on an enlarged board, and
having a greater number of men and "points** than the simpler game. In
the same way, the Italian writer styles his various kinds of m&relles simple
mtUineUo {mulinello semplice)^ double mulineUo^ and so on. The simple sort
is, of course, the three men morris, of which we have the following description
(see fig. 1): "The game of mulinello [literally "little mill**], a diversion for
children when it is simple, for. adults when it is complex, is styled also
{ffiuoco deli /Uetto and igiuoco deUa) tavola^ and is played, in all its varieties,
by two persons. The mulinello semplice board is formed by the sides of a
square, by interior diagonals, and by two medial lines parallel to the sides.
The points at which the lines intersect, or join each other, are nine in
number, and represent the ^squares* (or ^points* occupied by the men). The
board may be drawn on paper, on the ground, or on the flat surface of a
table; the two players furnish themselves each with three pebbles, three
small balls, or three pawns (counters) of different colours, so that those
belonging to the two adversaries be easily distinguishable. The flrst player
is decided by lot, and in successive parties the winner of the preceding
encounter has the opening play. The opening player places a man on one of
the points, the second player one on another, and so on. The first combatant
having entered all his men, when it next becomes his turn, moves one of
them, following always the lines, and going from one of the nine "points**
to an adjoining one. His adversary does the same, and the game continues
until one of the players succeeds in ranging his three men in a line, either
right, horizontal, vertical or diagonal. The game ought to be won by the first
player, provided he places his flrst man at the central point, as it rarely
happens that the flrst pawn or man played by his adversary ever succeeds
in securing that point.
The mulinello doppio has a board with which we have never chanced to
meet in Italy, or, in fact, anywhere else— except in some very recent pub-
lications like the present— although the compiler of the book claims for it
great antiquity. It is composed of two concentric squares (that is, one
within the other). The space between these squares is divided by twelve
right lines into twelve small squares, the points at which the lines join
being twenty-four in number, giving that number of "points** or "houses**
for the men (fig. 3). But we will repeat the author *s description in full:
"The mulinello doppio was a favourite eiijoyment of the ancient Greeks. The
board is composed of two concentric squares, the space between them being
divided into equal quadrangular portions by [twelve] right lines, which join
the other lines at twenty-four points, forming therefore twenty-four * points*
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108
CffESS IN ICELAND
for the men. Of the latter, each player is provided with five of the same
colour (ditrorent, however, from the colour of those of his adversary), which
he arranges on the Ave points of one side of the larger or outer squares (20,
11
f2
15
seo
16
17
21
18
2S
Pig. 8.
23
10
±4:
19
24
21, 22, 23, 24). On the opposite side
of the larger square the adversary
places his (1, 2, 3, 4, 5). Each then
advances his men, alternately, from
point to point, always following the
linos, and when one of the players
has enclosed one or more of his
adversary's pieces (rendering it
impossible to move it farther), the
man is considered captured. The
game is ended when one party—
therefore the winner^- has captu-
red all the men of his opponent.''
The mulinello triple is the mor-
ris board commonly used in Ame-
rica, but which seems to us to be
inflrequent, at the present time, in
Europe, especially on the continent, having not only the right lines which
connect the middle points of the lines forming the squares, but the diagonals
joining the angles. The description is: *'The board is formed of three concen-
tric squares with parallel sides [see fig. 4].
Eight lines unite the angles and the middle-
points of the sides. Once this game enjoyed
an extraordinary popularity— so great that
even now it is found drawn on the opposite
side of many chess boards. Each p"layer has
nine men (in colour unlike those of the other
player) and places, or enters them, alter-
nately with his adversary, upon any of the
twenty- four 'points' formed by the inter-
secting lines. Then, by successive moves,
he tries to form a fUetto^ that is, a line of
three men, of the same colour, arranged
either horizontally, or vertically. This line
is called a /fZo, or fUetto, Every time a player makes a filetto, he can select
and remove from the board one of his opponent's men, respecting, however,
those with which his adversary has already formed a similar ftletto. When a
player has no more than four men left on the board he is declared the loser."
The mulinello quadruplo is, singularly enough, the alquerque of the Span-
ish writer, Brunet y Bellet [see fig. 2]. ''It is formed," says the Italian
compiler, " of four mtUineUi semplici. Each player has five men, and the
game is won by him who places all five in a straight line." The number of
"points" is twenty-flve. The author of this new Italian "Hoyle" commits
an evident blunder or two. In his mulinello doppio he says that the number
of lines forming the small squares is nine, whereas a glance at his board
would have shewn him that they were twelve. He apparently has no knowl-
edge of the board (three concentric squares without tho diagonal lines drawn
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STRA Y NOTES
109
firom the angles), which is the sole one given in the early MSS, and which,
in at least the greater part of Italjr, is the one to be found on the reverse
of the chess boards sold at tho shops [see flg. 5]. We know not, therefore,
how much of his information is to be regarded as trustworthy. Wo fear
that for some of his material he has gone into foreign fields— plainer in-
dications of which we shall soon meet with.^*'
In contrast to the statements of this very recent publication, we find in
another late work, "II libro del giuochi,'* (Florence 1894), no knowledge
either of the so called mtUinello doppio^ the mulin^o triplo (twelve men
morris), nor the mulinello quadruplo {alquerque). The compiler of "II libro'*
treats only of the simple three men morris and the antique large morris
game— as Von dor Lasa styles it,— which appears in the XlVth century MSS,
that is, lacking the diagonal or
comer lines. The writer says that
"on the back of every chess board
is seen inlaid or traced the figure
of the /UettOy a game of great sim-
plicity. It is played with nine
white counters and nine black, by
two players, that one winning the
game who succeeds in first placing
three counters in a row upon one
and the same line. And this is
the way of it Each, at the begin-
ning of the game, has his men
outside of the table ; one of the
players first places a man upon
any one of the twenty-four points
of the board, an advantage which,
in commencing the game, is de- ^^^' *'
cided by lot; at the subsequent games, he who has just lost enters his
counter first. Next,, the other player places ono of his men; then the first
again, and so in sequence until all the nine are entered. Afterwards each
a
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^ At ibe mMiaal Is the freshest, ms well m the most eomplete Ttollan work of its ehar-
aeter, we eopy complete Its section relating to this class of llne-trames: **I1 gfao^« del
mulhullot gfaoco da fanelalll qaand* 6 nempllce, da adRltl so eompleaso, tIoo detto aoebe del
fileUo e della tavola, e si giuooa In doe. 1. II mulimllo ssmpluM 6 formato dal latt di on
quadrate, dalle diagonall e dalle dae llnee medlane, parallele a' latl (flg. 1). I puntli doTe
le Tarie reite si Interseeano, rappresenuno le eeselle, e sono 9. Traociata la flgara sopra un
pesso dl carta, o sopra II terreao, o sopra 11 piano di ana laTola, i doe ginoeatorl si muni-
BCOBO elasenno dl tre saasolini, dl tre pallottole, dl ire bottoni o dl tre pedino dl colore dl-
▼erso, perchd rieeea faelle disilngaere quelll cbe appartengono plnttosto all' ano ehe all'aliro
del dne avrersart. La sorte decide cbl i di wumo al princlpio del gluoco. Nolle sacoesslTe
ha la mono il Tlueitore dell' ultima partita. II primo che gluoea pone ana pedlna sopra una
casella, il secondo sopra uii*altra e cos! dl segulto per turno. Qoando II prime glnoeatore
ha messo tutte e tre le pedlne, quand* 6 dl tnrno, muoTo una dl esse, seguendo sempre nna
delle linee traeoiate, e di casella In casella. L* aTToraarlo ne fa alirettanto, e II ginoco eon-
tlnua flno a tan to che ono del dne ginoeatorl rlesce a dlsporre le sue tre pedino suUa stessa
retta, orlnontalv, Tertteale o diagonale. La partita generalmente A vinta dal prlno glue-
eatore, so coUoea la pedina sella easella eentrale (see ilg. 1), e perold, qnasl sempre reata sta-
blllto ehe la prima pedlna glnocata da elaseuno degll aTTorsail non pad eollooarst al eentro.
8. II muUiftto doppio A rappresentoto dalla flgara 8. Oil antfebl greel vi si dlletta-
▼ano aesal. Bi eompone dl due qaadratl eonoentriei e a latl parallelli eoUegatl tra dl lore da
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no CEBSS IN ICELAND
one moves alternately a counter one step, in whatever direction along the
lines, endeavouring to make a fileito (far fUetto), that is, to place three
counters on one line, and to prevent his adversary from doing the same.
Naturally one player may be able to complete a fileito even before he has
entered all his men, if, by oversight, his adversary does not cover the third
point of a line on which the former has already entered two counters/' The
only error noticeable here is the assertion in the first lines that he who first
places three men on the same line wins the game. But the writer's subse-
quent description shews that this is merely a bit of carelessness. The writer
finally says that there is a more simple fUetto game— and here he gives a
representation of the three men morris board [fig. 1]—*' which is played with
three white and three black men, in an analogous manner, but mostly by
children.'' We must content ourselves with the citations we have made in
reference to the existing state of m&reUes in Italy. Of course our investi-
gation has been in no wise thorough. There is a large literature devoted to
social games; only a few of the works which it embraces having come under
our notice. From many provinces we have been able to gather no reports—
in fact all that we have stated with any definiteness relates principally to
Tuscany and Lombardy. But what we have brought together leads us to
believe* that the ordinary three men morris game, and the ordinary nine
men morris game— the board having no diagonal lines— are pretty certainly
still known in most parts of the peninsula. Some of the other varieties-
treated in the very modern works on games — may be of long standing and
popular in portions of the Italian domain, but we have discovered no certain
evidence of it.
In glancing at the morris play in France, we ought properly to follow
the plan pursued in our remarks on this game in Italy, and begin with the
French version (or ve^fions) of the treatise ascribed to Nicholas de (Saint)
Nicholai ('« Bonus Socius*') which furnish here, as on the Italian side of the
Alps, the earliest information on the subject. The notices relating to the
French codices, however, are very few and very scant. That the compilation
[tt] rette, che •* tiiterteoano In t4 paotl, formando per«t6 S4 catelle. (Haiean gtaoeatore h
proTvlsto di 5 pedlne dl ano steuo colore, ma diverto da quello dello pedioo avTorsarie, cbo
diapono lopra le caaelle dl ano del latl del quadrato grande. 6ul lato opposto 1* aTreraarlo
dlstribalsca ie lae. Dl auMta In auMta, alternandod I gioooaiorl, fanno aTaniare le loro pe-
dine, tegaendo Mmpre le llnee, c qaando ooo ba fatto priglone nna o pib pedlne aTversarle,
eoatrlngendola a aon pIb mnoTenI, se fa preda dl glaoco e la tMngia, La partita h vlnta da
eolut ehe ba wiangiato tatte le pedlne aTverearie.
8. II mift/l^llo Mplo h rappreeenuto dalla flg. 4. Klsnlta formato da tre qnadrati eon-
centriel co* latl parallell. Otto rette eonglnngono g\\ angoll e le meti del lati. Una voUa
queeto ginoeo godeva dl un favore atraordlnarlo, tant' i, ehe pare o^l il trova dltegnato lopra
le tfowe, dalla parte oppoita alia •eaechlara. Claaenn gfnoeatore diepone dl 9 pedlne dl eo-
lore diverse di quelle avrerearle, e le eolloea, alternandosi eon V aTvonarlOi eopra una delle
S4 eaaelle, formate dalT inoontro delle varie rette. Qnlndl, eon moaao euooeuiye eerea dl fare
JiUUo, dl disporle, cloA, In maniera ehe tre pedlne dello tteaso eolore formino una (Mea
Tiaao ntaU o vmfUaU detto filo e fileUo, Ogni toIU ehe un ginocatore fa fiUUOt a ena loelU
prende una pedlna aTverearla dal gluoeo, riepettaado, per6, quelle ehe formano an JUmUq,
Qnando an ginocatore non ha plb ehe quattro pedlne A diehlarato perdeute.
4. II muHtuUo qnadruplo rlsnlta formato da nn qaadrato ehe eomprende quattro mull-
nelll sempllel. Claecnn glnoeatore diipone di elnqoe pedlne e vinee quegll ehe per prime rieoee
a oolloearle d* aeehito o eon moaee eueeeMWei tntte e elnqne In llnea retta, orlssontaloi Terti-
eale o diagonal* (flg. S). The paragraphs whieh follow, relating to foz>and-geese, we elto on
a later page.
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.^._J
STRAY NOTES 111
as rendered into French, was popular, is sliown by the number of transcripU
still existing, but how much of this popularity was due to any one of the
three games therein treated— rather than to any other— it is of course im-
possible to say. The earliest French codices date firom the very first years
of the XlVth century, and none is later than the XVth. Two are preserved
in Paris, one in Montpellier, another in the invaluable collection of books
at Wolfenbiittcl, founded by the duke Augustus of Brunswick-Liineburg, who
himself compiled the library *s first catalogue, and who, under the pseudonym
of** Gustavus Selenus," composed the great folio on chess which was published
in leiCJ** Another of these French codices— all of which are vellums— is
in a private collection in England. So meagre is our information in regard
to them, that we are only certain of one thing, namely, that the rather fan-
tastic names given to the m^relles men in the Latin MSS were retained. This
we learn from a casual citation of two of these pieces' names, estoile and
quaree^ found in the Fountaine MS— the one preserved in England.
And now as to the French appellations given to the game— a matter, the
elucidation of which has its difficulties. The word m^eZte* — the most com-
mon designation— is derived by the French etymologist Scheler from the
Latin — more immediately from the low Latin. He says: **L6 mot mdrelle ou
marelle signifie proprement le palet, le pion ou le Jeton, dont on se sert pour
lo jeu; feminin de niveau (has Lat, Myelins); on le rattache k un type ma-
trellus^ matrella (d'ou mairellus^ marellus)^ qui serait un derivd du Latin
tnatara, mataris^ sorte de Javeline, mot d'origine gauloise, et dont la ra-
cine, k juger du gadl methred, *jaculator,' exprimait Tidde de jetter." The
final portion, especially, of this etymological note can hardly be called
precise in its treatment of the vocable's early history. «• The writer's defi-
nition of the morris game is even more unsatisfactory, since he ignores the
old game, or m^eUes proper, entirely, and mentions only the children's out-
of-door game, which the French style also mdrelle{s), but which is known
in English as ** hop-scotch," an athletic diversion practised in the open air
upon a sort of board outlined on the ground, or fioor. Littrd is more diffuse.
For the sake of exactitude and convenience we copy from his massive dic-
tionary the whole section devoted to mirelles^ including definition, descrip-
tion and etymology. We shall see, in a later page, that definition I refers
to the lesser mireUes^ and definition II to the larger, or double mirelles.
But to proceed with the quotation: **Anciennement, table carrde, sur laquellc
des lignes partant des angles ou du milieu de chaque cdt^ et se r^unissant
au centre, indiquaient la place que devaient occuper, et la route que pou-
vaient suivre ies marolles ou m^raux; jeu qui se jouait sur cette table; nom
des jetons employes k, ce jeu. II. Nom d'un Jeu, qui se joue avec Ies pions
et aussi avec des petits cailloux de diverses couleurs; il consiste d'un figure
form^ d'un grand carr^, plus un carrd plus petit renfermd dans le prdccdent,
itt tiDii, tchaeh- oder Koenig-tpiel. Voit OHstavo Releno. in vier rerachletlcDe bQchvr/*
IjIpslsD 1616. The work i« largely a translation of tbe Italian Tcrtion of the Chens treatise
by th« Spaniard Ray Lopez (1684). Oastavus Selenns Is a pedantically formed ananrram of
th« author's name and title. Compendlnme of this work, andcr a variety of titles (" Pylha-
gorae rythmomaehle," *'Ludus latruuouloram/* " Palamedes redlvUui)/* ** Selfnns contractus"
and the like), formed the principal band-book of chess In Germany daring the 17th and the
first half of tbe IStb eentury.
^** Thia etymology goes back, as wc shall see, to Hyde, the Knglish orientalist, and even
to a p«riod moeh earlier.
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112 CHESS IN ICELAND
plus un petit carp^ qui occupe le centre de ce dernier; une ligne part&nt du
milieu de chacun des c6tds du grand carrd vient se terminer aux c6tds du
troisidme et petit carrd; cette figure est trac^e sur un carton; quelquefois
les enfants la tracent sur le sable 6u sur une pierre. Le jeu de la marelle
consiBte k aligner sur une seule ligne les trois pions. III. Par assimilation
de figure, jeu d^enfants fait en mani&re d*dschellc, avec de la craie, ou les
joueurs, marchant k cloche-pied [= hopping], poussent du pied qui saut un
petit palet dans chaque espace de T^chelle; la figure m^mo qui est trac^e
sur le sol. " The third definition, as will be noted, is the sole one known
to Scheler, — our hop-scotch.
In his supplementary remarks, Littr<^ tell us that, of the two orthograph-
ical forms, merelle and marelle, the former is the older. He has derived
his definition I, and taken the history of the word in French, from an inter-
esting volume by La Borde entitled ^* Notice des ^maux du musee du Louvre"
(Paris, 1853, II, p. 381). We cite La Borders historical note on the name in
full from his own work : '* Ce meme mot avait servi ant^rieurement, c'est k
dire k partir du XIP si^cie, k designer les m^dailles ou la monnaie de con-
vention, de plomb, de cuivre et quelquefois d'argcnt, dont chacun avait droit
de fairc usage; k T^glise, pour constater la prdsence des moincs aux ofiices;
au marchd pour prouvcr Tacquittement d'un droit; dans les travaux et les
ateliers, pour representor, k la fin d*une semaine, les prix des journdcs, et k
autres usages. G'dtait en r^allt^ la suite et Tc^quivalent des tessferos de Tan-
tiquitd, ct ces m^reaux resterent dans la langue et dans 1* usage jusqu'au
XVIIP si6cle. lis dtaient faits en carton, en cire, en plomb, en cuivre; les
marelles k Jouer <^taient le plus souvent dMvoire et d*os; on en a fait aussi
de divers bois.**
As to the etymology, Littrd is very brief; he remarks that the game was
*^ainsi dite de niareau^ ou mireau^ ou merely palet. Dans plusieurs pro-
vinces on dit mardne pour une fausse assimilation avec marraine/* Under the
word mereau^ to which he thus refers us, we find the following still briefer
etymology: "Bas Lat. merellus^ dont Toriginc est inconnue."
In section I of Littr^'s definition he states that the lines described on
the square start des angles ou du milieu de chaque c6t4^ and unite in the
middle. As he speaks of but one square, it is evident that he is speaking
of the little (or three men) morris, and the conjunction ou should therefore
be et. In his section II, the definition is a very clear description of the older,
or most used form of the larger morris (sometimes called the double morris),
for we find in it no mention of diagonal or corner lines. But at the end of
this section comes a striking bit of inaccuracy. The lexicographer states
that the game of mdrclles consisted in placing in a row {aligner) on one and
the same line 'Mes trois pions.'* But for the morris board which he has been
describing, not three men but nine are necessary. He has confVised the nine
men morris with the three men morris explained in the preceding section.
As to section III, relating to "hop-scotch," it is quite certain that the sport
received its name from the resemblance of the design drawn on the ground
in order to play it, to the lines of the morris board. It must be remembered
too, that the morris game was also sometimes playod out of doors, its board
being likewise marked out on the turf or pavement, and perhaps on a
largish scale, so that this fact very likely had its influence in conferring
upon the French "hop-scotch" the name of mSrelle, m^elles. There is
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STRAY NOTES 118
a good deal of irregularity abont it, but it seems as if an effort is made
by the French to use the singular (rn^eile) for '*hop-sootch,*' retaining the
plural {morales) for the table game, although the distinction, if it exist, is
often lost sight of.
One of the most important French and Italian dictionaries (that known
as **Le nouvel Albert!'* 1855, edited by Ambrosoli, Arnaud and other Ital-
ian scholars), informs us that in French 'Me jeu de mdrelle s*appelle aussi
le jeu du moulin.*" This would appear to be confirmed by Von der Lasa in
his *'Zur geschichte und literatur des schachspiels** (in a foot note, p. 145).
He is criticising the French journal, ''Le PalamMe,'* for saying (1837, p. 82)
that the game of mirelles is no longer known or understood. He adds that
the "Complement du dictionnaire de TAcaddmie** (Brussels 1853, p. 648) ^*sagt
ganz richtig: 'Grand jeu de la m^relle; s'appelle aussi le jeu du moulin.* **
It is worthy of note that the dates of "Le nouvel Alberts '' and the Brussels
supplement to the French Academy's dictionary are within two years of each
other. We have never happened to see the morris game styled jeu de mauhn
in any French writing outside of these dictionaries; still Von der Lasa*s asser-
tion may be correct, or he may, possibly, have in mind the Italian name.
The game enters much more into the literature of France than into that
of any other land; historical references to it, too, are more numerous. It has
even been argued that Nicholas de (Saint) Nicholai was of French birth, partly
on account of the way in which his name is given in the French versions of
the "Bonus Sooius'' compilation, but this, as we have stated, is more than
doubtful. We record here all the citations concerning nUreiles in medieval
France, and in the earlier modern period, which we have been able easily to
gather. One of the oldest is f)rom a poem by Eustaohe Deschamps, a rhymer
who was born in the first half of the XI Vth century ; he played a r6le of
some importance during the reign of Charles VI, and died during that of his
successor. He exclaims in one of his compositions:
Oiaox de des et de mer$iU$,
Yooe eoit tondlt de-ve»blee.
Much later is an anonymous "Morality des en&nts de Maintenant,*' which we
cite from VioUet Le Due's "Anclen thdAtre fran^is'* (Paris 1854-57, III., p. 52) :
JouoDs Ml Jen de 1* menUe,
Je rais lae da truao dn earreMi.
JmHm:
C'eet hien dit ; le Jeu da mtnau
Est bien oomman i ei eet 1* chanoo.
A sure sign of the former popularity of the game in France, is the number
of common phrases which have their origin in the practise of the diversion.
There is a proverb, mestraire le merely the sense of which is "to play a
losing game,*' "to meet with a reverse;** we find it in the old rhymed
"Ghroniques des dues de Normandie** by Benoit, which we have already
cited (see p. 72), in which we read :
Sempree i eoil meretm mesiraii,
S ft Oni ten danage llidt,
Qui ne Ant pM dil ao entier
A restorer ■ain ne leger.
16
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1 14 CHESS liV ICELA ND
The proverb is again employed in an old anonymous **Vie de St Oilles:"*-*
Or eu penit Beiu kl lagariMe !
Si ankes pins tost ne sVn reit,
Ja erent U menl mestreit,
and again, about the same time, in the ^^ Miserere** of llenctus de Motions: '^
Yieas ta jeor aa trameral
A mort, ki ae mMtrait mersl.
In addition to this proverbial phrase, mesiraire le merely which refers rather
to the piece than to the game, we have others like traire de bonne mereUe
'^to make a good stroke,'* ^'to withdraw fortunately from an affair;** traire
fausse merelle^ "to play badly;" traire sauve mdrelle, *'to play without
loss;** ne plus traire point ne mirelle^ **to play no longer;** change^' la me-
relle^ '*to change luck,*' ("to alter the face of things'*); avoir la nierelle,
"to have the advantage.'*
It is notable too that only in France do we come across a special word
for the m^relles-board, namely, marellier or wiareh'er— formed like erhi-
quief\ tablier-^ cited in several early poems and prose writings, as, for in-
stance, in a morality styled "Le pelerinage de TAme:** ***
G^ieoB a« tablM et d'eecbiqnlen,
De boalles et de nUrOKen,
In his "Notice des cmaux,*' La Borde thus defines the marelier: "Table
carr^ sur laquelle des lignes partent des angles ou du milieu de chaque
cAtd en 80 rdunissant au centre; elles indiqucnt la place que doivent occuper
et la route que peuvent suiyre ies trois m^reaux ou marelles: le gagnant
doit aligner sur une seule ligne Ies trois jetons; on nomme encore ce Jeu
carr^ ohinois.'* This recalls Hyde's assertion that the three men morris is
a very common game in China. Marelles boards are frequently mentioned
in old inventories and elsewhere, especially in the XVth century. We hear
of one in 1448 which belonged "& M. D. S.** [that is, nian dit seigneur, le
duo d'Orltens] "pour jouer aux mereles dedans le bateau.** The inventory
of the goods of the due de Berry, drawn up in 1416, mentions at least two
mereliers, the first is "Une tr^s belle table, ployant en trois pi^es, en la-
quelle est le merelier, deux jeux de table et I'eschiquier ftiiz de pourflz de
Romme, Jaspre et autres pierres de plusieurs couleurs.** The other seems to
have been of simpler materials: "Une table de bois marquetde de jeu des
eschas et de tables et de mareliers (marelles <) et y sont Ies tresteaux tenant
k la ditte Uble.**
Du Cange (IV, 1845, p. 157) quotes, with the date of 1412, a statement
from which we may infer that the game was once named Itidus sancti Hiederici.
It occurs in a French document existing in the Paris archives, and tells us of
one " Jean Aysmes, qui avait jou^ aux merelles a six tables, appelle le jeu
saint Marry,'* but who St. Medericus (Mederict), or St. Marry was, and why
his name was given to the game, we have been unable to learn; it may
*^ See Ihe editiou by Mlobel (II., Ilnei 866-66).
^ Thit sbeuld be found in Van Hauiers ediiiou, but the reforeucu we have at hand
(iJCX-7) seems to be erroneous or lueonplrte.
^ Edited by J. J. Hltlriioger (1896) : Ite autbor was Gulllannie de UulleTllio (ofteu elted
as ''DegaUevSUe'*)-
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STRAY NOreS 115
perhaps be attributed to the reeemblance of the two names, Itfarry and m^-
relle, since in those devout days every profession and occupation had its
patron saint. In the statutes of several French cities occur mentions of »ta-
drellum, niareUa (ludet^e ad mofeUas)^ one of them bearing tlie date of 1404.
In some of these documents we have the game and the board mentioned
together, as in one dating from the year 1414 : '' Icellui Rstienne priRt lors
toutes marelles et ies getta jus du marellier/*
The little work of Bulenger on games (cited later) has a very brief de-
scription of the simplest marelles. He is writing in Franco in the flrat
quarter of the XVIlth century. He says that the morris was then'a diver-
sion of French boys: **Hodie pueri apud nos ludum Madrellarum usurpant
in quo quatuor linese quadrie foris, quatuor alias lineas includunt. quw me-
dia linea quasi diametro secantur, et tree unus ex collusoribus bacillos to-
tidem alius variis locis coUocant, et id studios^ agunt, ut tros bacillos sues
in eadem linea continuent."
Probably the fullest account of modern mA*eUes in France is found in
a pretentious compilation, issued not very long ago at Paris under the title
of *' Grande encyclopedic des jeux par T. de Moulldars.*' '*LeK marelles ou
m^reUes'* occupies some pages and is, perhaps, the source from which the
editor of the recent Milanese work of a similar character drew his materials.
The arrangement in the two manuals is the same, but the French work is
somewhat more complete in its descriptions, and, at the risk of much repeti-
tion« we shall give the text in full. We liave first the marelle simple (see
fig. 1): ^^Ce jeu enfantin, ancetre probable des dames, est form^ par Ies
quatre cdt^s d*un carr^ et par Ies deux diagonales et Ies deux lignee mMianes
paranoics aux c6tes. Les points d* intersection de ces huit lignes ferment neuf
cases. Cette figure pent etre trac^e sur un papier ou simplement sur le soL Les
joueurs, au nombre de deux, poss^dent chacun trois pions ou trois cailloux
de couleurs difKrents ou d*une forme reconnaissable. Le premier Joueur pose
un pion sur une case, le second sur une autre et ainsi de suite alternative-
ment. Quand un Joueur a pose ses trois pions, il en deplaoe un, pour le
porter sur une case immediatement voisine en suivant Tune des lignes; son
adversaire en &it autant de Tun de ses pions et la partie continue ainsi
Jusqu*& ce que Tun des Joueurs arrive k mettre ses trois pions sur une mdme
ligne droite, horizontale, verticale ou diagonale. Le premier, en se plaint
d*abord au centre de la marelle |that is, at the point of intersection of all
the lines, see fig. 1] ne pent manquer de gagner, s'il joue convenablement ;
et Ton convlent ordinairement quUl n'aura pas le droit de poser, au debut,
sur le centre du jeu.*' There is nothing to object to here, except the phrase
at the beginning, ^'ancetre probable des dames''— a title which, as we have
seen, belongs not to m^reUes^ but to ohess. But writers not overburdened with
erudition cannot forget that the mireUss board is to be often found depicted
on the reverse of the chess-board, and that the chess-board is used for the
game of draughts; so they fiincy that there must be some subtle connection
existing between the morris*game and draughts.
We next have the double mireUes^ with a reproduction of the figures which
we have numbered 3 and 4: ''La marelle double ou pettie des anciens greos
est representee par notre Ag. 3. .Bile se compose de deux oarres conoentriqaes
•t k e6tes paralieies, reunis par neuf [douie] lignes, de mani^re k former 24
[points for the pieces]. Chacun des deux Joueurs poss^ oinq pions
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116 CHESS IN ICELAND
(I'une couleur reconnaissable, et les place sur les cinq cases [or points at
the junctions of the lines] de la ligne sup^rieure ou de la ligne infdrieure.
On pousse alternativement les pions en avant, de case en case, en suivant
les lignes. Quand un Joueur a envelopp^ une ou plusieurs pieces de Tadver-
saire de fa^on k les empdcher de bouger, il les enl6ve du damier; et la partie
continue jusqu*^ ce que Tun des joueurs n'ait plus de pions. II est pro-
bable que la pettie est le veritable Jeu de PalemMe, dans lequel les histo-
riens ont cru voir les ^hecs ou les dames/' The writer then refers to the
triple mdrelles, represented in figure 4: ^'La marelle triple, autrefois si po-
pulaire, est tomb^e dans un ^tat d'oubli qu*elle ne m^rite pas. On la
dessine ordinairement sur le sol et quelquefois sur une table, sur une ar-
doise ou sur un carton. EUe se compose de trois carr^ ayant un centre
commun et les c6t^ parall^les (flg. 4). Des lignes r^unissant les quatre
angles et les quatre c6t^s des carr^s. Chacun des deux Joueurs a 9 pions
d*une couleur ou d'uno forme reconnaissable et les pose alternativement sur
Tun des points de rencontre des lignes, comme k la marelle simple; apr^s quoi,
il les ddplace un k un, en les portant sur une case, imm^iatement voisine
et en suivant Tune des lignes. Son but est d'amener trois de see pions sur
une m§me ligne droite ; quand il y est parvenu, il prend dans le Jeu de son
adversaire, un pion k son choix parmi ceux qui le genent le plus. Quand
un Joueur n*a plus que quatre pions, il n'est plus astreint k marcher de case
en case ; il pent faire flranchir k ses pions une ou plusieurs oases occup^s,
afln de se mettre sur une station inoccup^ quelconque. Le premier qui n*a
plus que deux pions a perdu la partie. On convient quelquefois que pour
former une ligne don nan t droit k une prise, il faut que cette ligne ne soit
pas une diagonale.** ** Therefore,'* continues the writer, ««a line formed by
pieces placed on these diagonals, that is to say, at points of intersection which
are not made by lines meeting each other at right angles, are not regarded
as giving the right to capture an adversary's man." This last feature, as
will be noted, makes the board (flg. 4), for general purposes, a nine man
morris-board, instead of a twelve men morris, as the shape would indicate.
We are thus led to the idea that the latter differs firom the former (the true
old form), in giving the increased chances to each player of using four ad-
ditional (diagonal) lines for the formation of '* mills," but that sometimes, in
order to maintain, to a certain extent, the resemblance to the antique game,
it is agreed that ''mills" may be laid out on those diagonal (or corner) lines,
but that such ''mills," unlike the others, shall give the party making them
no right to capture one of his enemy's men. Nevertheless, as we may un-
derstand it, these additional lines would still be of some advantage for pur-
poses of play. There seem then to be— taking the United States into con-
sideration—two modes of using the twelve men morris board— one being to
play with nine men (as in the old boards without diagonal lines), the other
to increase the number of pieces to twelve.
It is to be observed that this French writer ignores the genuine old
morris-board of the 14th century MSS (our flg. 5), without the diagonals
connecting the angles, evidently knowing as little about it as does his Mi-
lanese imitator. He proceeds, therefore, at once to treat the variety which he
denominates the quadruple game (the aiquerque): "La marelle quadruple
(flg. 2) est formde par la juxtaposition de quatre marelles simples. Chacun
des deux Joueurs possdde cinq pions, qu'il pose successivement sur I'un des
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STRAY NOTES 117
points de rencontre des lignes. Pour gagner la partie, il &at arriver le
premier k placer ses cinq pions en Yigne droite.** It fihoald be observed
that with what appears to be a disproportionate number of men (Ave to a
board four times as large as that for three men morris) there are twelve lines
upon which ^* mills,** or rows of five men each, can be created; the three
men morris players, in the simplest board, have eight lines at their disposal
on which to arrange themselves. From the bareness and brevity of this de-
scription, it seems very evident that the compiler has no very clear idea of the
aiquerque^ of which we have been unable to find any account anywhere else
in a French book. Then follows, as in the Italian manual, the notice of fox-
and-geese, or inareUe quintuple. We cannot help thinking that the editor
of this French manual has been largely influenced by the desire to bring
together all the line-games of the morris kind which he could collect from
similar books in all languages and to classify them, rather than to give us
those must used in France. He has, however, omitted the simplest of all the
forms, the ** noughts and crosses** of English boys (the ''tripp, trapp, trull,**
of the Swedes). Meanwhile the apparent fullness of his hand-book has led
to its translation, as we have already seen, into Italian, and as we shall
hereafter see into Swedish ~ possibly, too, into other tongues.
In England the game of morris must have existed at an early date, since
we have the orthographic form merits from the middle English, but it is
not easy to discover any reference to it before the days of Shakespeare.
The name shows that \X must have come directly from France, or at a very
early date from Italy, since we find no trace of an appellation having any
such meaning as '*mill.** The derivation from the French seems the more
likely, since, if it had come from the Italian, at a time when the Italians
used the I^tin denomination {mer^lus)^ the Icelanders would no doubt have
borrowed both the game and its name, as in the case of chess, from Great
Britain. But the Icelandic denomination belongs to what we may style the
'^mt72-class** of names, showing that the game oame from some other land
than England. It is remarkable that England has produced the only account
of the game which lays claim to any historical, philological, or philosophical
value •» that of Hyde. To that account we shall return, after an examination
of the now adopted etymology of "morris.**
Some of the English etymologists have connected the word with a vo-
cable of the same form found in the English compound *^ morris-dance,**
thus deriving it from the Spanish moro, morisco ("twoor,** ^^ moorish''")^ which
would, if the derivation could be established, go far towards indicating an
Arabo-Spanish origin for the game. Hyde gives a great number of ap-
pellations bestowed in England upon the sport and its varieties, such as
bushels (or bushel), marlin^ three men's morals, nine men's morals: nine
•penny miracle, nine pin miracle; three penny mm-is, five penny maris, nine
penny maris; three pin merells, nine pin mereUs, Some of these names as-
same their special forms from the ftict that the game was frequently played
with pennies, with pins, or with tokens, instead of the usual round coun-
ters or men. It is probable also that the names with the numerals ** three**
and *'five** refer to the simple or other smaller merelles. *' Morals** is, of
course, a closer form of the French m^eUes^ and helps to demonstrate the
more modern theory of the etymology of morris.** '' Bush^ ** and ^* marUn **
do not occur, so far as we know, in any recent literature, and are pretty
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118 GffESS IN ICELAND
certainly not known in America. In England, at present, the most usual
name is *'nine men's morris/* but in America, and particularly in New Eng-
land, it is better known as '* twelve men*s (or men) morris." As to the
latest etymological authorities, the "Century" dictionary, after giving the
variant tnerels, cites the old French ^'m^relle, the game, nine men's morris,
French m^-elle^ niarelle^ hop-scotch ; middle Latin nierellus^ niarallus=coanicT^
token, also a piece in draughts." Then the dictionary quotes fk'om Strutt's
"Sports and pastimes:" *'Marelles, or nine men's morris, as it was for-
merly called in England, is a game of some antiquity." The Century dic-
tionary closes its meagre rubric by describing the game as "played with
eighteen pieces or stones, nijie on each side."
In a late edition (1891) of Webster's dictionary occurs a very concise
description of the game: "The tlgure consists of three central squares with
lines from the angles of the outer one to those of the inner, and from the
middle of each side of the outer square to those of the inner. The game is
played by two persons with nine or twelve pieces each (hence called "nine
men's morris" or " twelve men's morris.") The pieces are placed alternately,
and each player endeavours to prevent his opponent from making a
straight row of three. Should either succeed in making such a row, he
may take up one of his opponent's pieces, and he who takes off all his op-
ponent's pieces wins the game." Here we have almost the only, and cer-
tainly the first mention of the game by its most common New England name,
"twelve men morris," and also the only hint we have found in print that
the more eomplioated of the morris boards— with the diagonal lines (fig. 4)—
is used with twelve men, instead of nine, on each side. Whether this has
ever been the case, with the same board, in Europe, we have no means of
verifying.
The game enjoyed all its old English popularity in New England, although
we have never heard of its practice there as an out-of-door diversion. The
strict religiosity maintained in the British colonies known as New England
long prevented the introduction of card games, while chess seems to have
been almost or quite forgotten by the emigrants and their descendants until
late in the 18th century. For these reasons draughts, morris and fox-and-
geese became the popular amusements in the farm-houses and villages of
the new English-speaking world.
Long before any other European scholar thought it worth his while to
investigate the history of chess and other table-games, appeared the learned
work of Thomes Hyde - a man of exceptional note in his day. He styles
himself "Linguse arables professor publicus in universitate Oxon., pro-
bibliothecarins Bodlejanus." He was really England's earliest oriental
scholar, and in the originality and high character of his researobes has
hardly had an equal in England, except, perhaps, Sir William Jones. His
book is in two volumes, and, like so many of the publications of its time,
abounds in title-pages. The general title, forming a sort of bastard title-
page before the real title-page of volume I, is "De ludis orientalibus librt
duo." The title-page of volume I begins "Mandragorias sen historia shahi-
ludii, viz. ^usdem origo, antiquitas, ususque per totum Orientem celeber-
rimus;" this volume is accordingly devoted to the story of chess among the
Eastern nations. The second volume is styled "Historia nerdiludii, hoo est
dicere, trunculorum. * The second part is therefore oecupied with the games
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STRAY NOTES 119
of '* tables** {nerdUudus^ the Perso- Arabic nard or nerd)^ dice, draughts, and
other table games, among them being our morris-game, which has a chapter
devoted specially to it entitled '^Historia triodii/*^
We shall endeavour to give a sketch of the more important points in
Hyde*s essay, omitting much that refers only to the game in oriental re-
gions. He sets out by telling us that the game was well lenown to the Ro-
mans, but that he has been unable to find out the name by which they dis-
tinguished it. He says that Bulenger, a French scholar, in his boolc on
games, treats of tn^eUes; and that he informs us that it is called madrellcg
because materes signifies pieces of wood (baculi) according to Nonius, whence
to-^day the Gaelic word matras signifies an arrow as being a piece of wood.
The old author Sisenna, Bulenger declares, relates that in Gaul tliey fought
with materes, that is long darts. He tells us, too, that Cyril, in his Greele
glossary, gives the same explanation of the word materes. Caesar also, in
his ^* Commentaries,** notices the materes^ which were used in battle. Thus
far Bulenger.^ Hyde, however, dissents from the derivation and says that
the letter d, upon which the whole Bulenger etymology depends, does not
belong to this root hence the word nvaretl cannot be deduced firom materes.
Moreover, at present an arrow is not called matras^ but ^natias. This sub-
ject is pursued at some length by Hyde in a later note, which takes the
form of a paragraph in the ^^elenchus** prefixed to the volume, in which he
seems to think that the word matras or materes has been introduced as a
military term among the Persians and the Turks. Hyde goes on to say
that the pieces witli which this game is played are called in Prance m^-
relies, ortnarelles as Rabelais writes it, and mareU(e, or, as Bulenger inter-
polating a df, puts it less correctly, madrelUe, Sometimes in Prance these
pieces are made of wood, and sometimes indeed stones are used. Cotgrave
(the author of the dictionary) translates them ^iedito^— stones ; the game is
sometimes played with pebbles. Csesar Ondin (d. 1615), a royal interpreter
in France and compiler of various grammars, tells us, not very properly,
that in Spanish the game is called juego de tablas o piedras, because it is
sometimes played with stones (piedras). Dud in elsewhere reports that some-
^ Tb6 pabliealion of Uyd« \vm iMued at Oxford in 169i, and it r«ally in four |rnrtt.
The first part, of 72 unnnmbercd pagof, eontUu prineipaliy of an cxeur»u» eallod " D«
thabilndio prolegoiuoiia curioaa ; '* followed by a second teetion of 184 pa<us, *'Hlttoria
•babladii; ** then come 71 pages, **8h«hnudiaraVradUum In Tribas Seriptls Ilebraiels," being
the produellons of Abraham Ibn Ksra and Bunsenior ibn Ja'hja, together with the anony>
mwM treatise, **Ma'adanne meleeb " ('*DeHoiap reguni"), in aU of which both texts mud ver-
sions are glveu. This completes the tirst ▼oliime. The second, besides 16 pag«s of prefatory
matter, contains 878 numbered pages, and is deToted to the niluor tabl«> games. The chapter
en the morris game occupies pp. tOS-tU. The rolumes are proftiscty Illustrated with eugrav*
lags and folding plates, and have now become somewhat rare.
*^ The treaUse of J. C. Bulenger (1658.1898}, ^'De ludis prlvatis «c domestlde vete-
rum," was published at Lyons 16i7. We have already extracted from it his brief descrip-
tion of M^rsfles. Here U his philological note In the original : ** ftfadrellas, iuquam, nostrl
vocant, quia materet sunt bacuH, auctore Noiiio, uade ct apud nos hodl^ao vox gallica
mairas sagitlan signlftcat, quasi bacnlom. Sisenua vetus auetor Qallia materibns, id est.
Ulie obloagto pugnat" (pp. 18-14). Balenger taught, at difftrent periods, at Paris, Toulouee
and Pisa* L, Cornelius Sliienua waa a miecellaueous writer of his day, prodaciug works oit
the story of his time and a coraraeutary ou PlanioSy among other thiugs. He died about
A. D. ISO. Nonius Mareellaa was a Latin grammarUn who lived In the 4ih or 3th century
•Aer Cbriet, and the nota on mattrU probably oocars in his traeUte ** l>e proprietate ser-
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120 CHESS IN ICELAND
times in Spain this game bears the name of alquerque (which he afterwards
falsely translates as the French ''esches'' and ''damas''). He adds that it
is '*un jeu qui se fait avec des gettons/' which seems a concise description
' of this game. A similar error is committed by Covarruvias when he re-
stricts this name of alquerque to the game known as las dattuu^ that is
draughts. This Jeu de m^relles is denominated by certain of the Italians
giuoco di stnareUi^ the oldest use of that word which we have noted. But
later on Hyde remarlis that, in the vulgar Italian, the name of marelke is
tatfola da ^nolitto, which accords with its German appellation, mulen (mOhlen)
or ^^dupel -mulen'' that is ''dupla molina,'' perhaps because the lines upon
the board resemble the little grooves which are found upon the upper sur-
faces of mill-stones. Hyde gives this etymological suggestion, but does not
regard it as satisfactory. He says, however, that one of the English names
is busftels, the 'singular of which, he thinks, was applied to the middle or
central part of the board— used perhaps to impound the men captured —
and bushel in Latin is niodius: he seems therefore to believe that there is
a connection between the German 7)ieule (as he writes the word mUhle), the
French milieu, and the Latin medium or medius, and that the latter has been
confounded with the Latin inodiiis, from the signification of which the name
buahels has resulted in English. He dwells on this theme for some time,
and then tells us that the smaller morris game is called by the Dutch
driestricken, and the larger negenstricken, the former signifying three lines
and the latter nine lines. He writes the latter element of these words
sHcken, which we find in no dictionary. Among the Germans the name
ntUochen—9LS he writes it (neun ldcJlerf)^me^mag nine places (noi^m loca) is
applied to the minor morris game, and the name dupel-mulen to the larger
game, as above stated. In his next paragraph, Hyde gives the various Eng-
lish names, stating tliat all the forms, morals, moris, merels, are corrup-
tions of the French appellation, but we have already cited his list in full.
Then at the end he gives us this somewhat remarkable statement about the
game amongst the children of Salisbury: *'Nam hie Indus k pueris Salo-
piensibus exerceri solet, ducto humi schema te, in cujus angulis impact! sunt
tot paacilli lignei ['* wooden pins'"] qui dentibus extrahendi prsescribuntur.
Gumquo in humnm adigi soleant tam alte ut ne vix restet extremitas extra
humum visenda, difficile erit dentibus apprehendere, nisi prius ore applicato
ad instar canum terram rodant eamque rodendo avellant, priusqu&m talem
paxillum dentibus tangere liceat." Among the Greeks, as Golius in his
Arabic lexicon notes, the name of the game was Tpt6Stov. *'I suspect, says
Hyde that the true reading is tpicoicov, that is trivium or triplex via, the
reason of which name will be seen when the board is examined.*' The re-
mainder of the first section in Hyde is devoted to much polyglot informa-
tion about the name of the game in Russia, Armenia, among the Arabs—
which gives him a chance of referring to alquerque once more— the Turks
and the Persians. The second section is wholly occupied with the board,
its character and origin. He also cites various descriptive passages from
oriental writers.
At length the author (p. 210) gives us two drawings of the two best
known forms of the major nUreUes, namely, the one now used in America
(which we are inclined to call, as the New Englanders do, ^'twelve men
morris ") ; and the original m^eUe or marellof of the mediaeval MSS (exdud-
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STRAY NOTES 121
ing the diagonal lines). He says of the former that it consists of twenty-
four lines, a number obtained by counting the divided exterior lines of
the three squares occasioned by the intersections from the sides and an-
gles. He states that the intersections of these lines form the playing
points. Many of the orientals omit some of these lines, which run towards
the centre, especially those leading from the angles— by which he means
that he has not found the twelve men morris in Eastern works. He asserts
that the Armenians, the Arabs of the Holy Land and of Mesopotamia, as he
has been informed by Jeremiah the Qreek priest, all use the board indicated
in our ancient European MSS. He tells us that among the people he has
just mentioned, the board is formed by boys on the soil, either by cutting
the turf, or by drawing lines in the dust. Adults have a board on which
the lines are drawn in chalk, or are marked out on a table, or with ink on
paper. Then follows what we have named the three men morris board, over
which he places its title in Chinese characters. This Chinese game, we are
informed, being the simple morris (fig. 1), is practised in many parts of Europe,
and European names are given to it. Among the Chinese it is called Che-loOy
that is, <*six places.'" The Persians likewise know it, the game in that part
of Asia being played with six pieces, from which it gets its local name. The
Irish call it ^^cashlan gherra,"* which would be in English ** short-castle. "
In Cumberland and Westmoreland the name ''copped-crown'' is common,
and elsewhere in England it is sometimes drawn with a round prison in the
centre ~ a receptacle for captured pieces.
After all this, Hyde begins to tell us about the method of conducting
the game, saying that it is played with coins, beans, pebbles, pegs, dice or
pieces of wood, each player^s men being different in colour. The country
boys play the game on the ground. At first they decide by lot who shall
begin, and he whom fate favours can place his pieces where he pleases, this
being considered a great advantage. The wise ones begin by placing their
men in the centre square, and try to take possession of that portion of the
board; for he who controls that should always win, as those who often play
the game know. Occupying this central place is called by the French mettre
a cuire^ as if they were placing something to be cooked in an oven. When
it has been decided among the players who shall play first, then each one
places his pieces singly and alternately in the angles ; each player at the
same time trying to prevent the other from forming a line with his men,
for whoever obtains such a series can take up a piece from his adversary,
wherever he pleases, and place it in the prison. This throws light upon the
well known passage in Ovid ft'om which it appears that the Romans played
the game each with three men :
PaiTft Ubella oapit ternos nttinqne lupillos,
In qoA TidMe, est continiiAsse raos. ^
Hence, too, among the moderns, this game is called "Lusus Ternarius," a
name thus descriptive of the minor form of the game. If a table of the larger
^ Von der Lwa has a lUMtorfui eu«y *' Ueb«r die cri«ehltoheD und rduilaehen •pl«le,
wtflchis einiffe ihnllohkeit mil deni ■cbaoh faaUeo," wblch wm publlchod in the "Deutoehe
Schachteituug*' (1863, pp. 16t-7S, 1«J8-«J9, S25-S&, X57-64), and whieh well meHU reprinting
in Oerman and trautlatlon into Bngllsh ; but a considerable part of It !• eopied by Van der
Liade ("Oetcblchte,** I., pp. 40>41). It it tbe first time that the thouie is treated by a
Bcbalar perfectly familiar with eheas, and eheas history. In the coorse of the paper he says
16
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122 CHESS IN ICELAND
mdrolle is used, the competitors have nine men or pieces, and these ue
placed, as before, singly and alternately in tho 24 angles or intersections of
lines, leaving vacant six. The author, as it will be seen, is here referring
to the board divided by diagonals as well as by right lines. In placing his
pieces, each one selects at first the central places. Although neither of the
players obtains a line or series of three men, nevertheless the process of
playing is continued, and after all the men have entered the board they begin
that the parva tabtlla of Ovid wu nothing elM than <Uhreo men morrU:'* *'Uater der
kleinen tafel, auf der beideraelta, wie Ovid <Ara amandi * (III. 365, capU Urw>» ufr^M ^'
pilio*) noeh aaadraekllch wlederbolt, mit dnri ateinen geaplelt wflrde, iat wol niehta aaden
sa veratehen, ala die Jedem aohOler heat bekannte kltint mUhU [litilo morria game]. Du
brett hat 9 felder [the anglea and the eentral interaection], and wer aelne atelne daraaf ia
efne rclhe bringt, gewlnnt. In der achwedfaehen 'Huabibliothek Kr aUlakapan^SJen* O'^'
II., 65) iat diea apiel ala trippy trapp, trull beaohrleben." To which Van der Unde adds
that In Holland the amalleat morria la called ttk, tak, toL Aa regarda theae latter aHeillPBa>
It la aeceaaary to aay that both the Swedlah and Dntch terma refer to what the BngUah ttjl*
nought* and crosses — a different diveralon, thongh really a line game of tbe morria order. Tae
literature relating to the table-gamea prevalent In the ancient Mediterranean natiom \* «
large one. Among the more Important treatiaea — besidea that of Boolengvr — are : J. MeoJilBS
(Mercler) — "De India Orneorum" (Leyden 16M) ; P. de Wcoronl — *I Ull ed altri atrumeaij
luaorj degli antichi Roman! " (Rome 1784); J. Averani — '^De ealcnlorum aeo latrnneuloroiB
ludo," publiahed aeparately perhapa, bat certainly to be found in the author'a '^MonumeaU
latina poatuma'* (Florence 1769); Paachalia de Potro ^'Diaaertatlo de alea et alcatoribo^
(Rome 179S). Much Information la to be gleaned firom G. SchOnbardt'a "Alea: fiber die h^
Birafung dea glQckapiela Im alteren rSmlachen recht ** (Stuttgart 1685). A moet important, **
well aa, in Ita way, a most irapretsive gleam of light la cait upon one of the oommoneat tabra
gamea of Rome by B. Comparettra eatay "8a di un antico apecchio con laerisione Ieiln*f
which waa first published In the '<Rendloonti della reale accademia del Uneel*' (17 Feb-
bralo 1880). The mirror has on its reverse, a graceful and attractive deaign of two penon*
agea playing the game of duodscim seripta, the board plainly visible. Above ia the Latin iO'
soriptlon "Opinor devlncam.** The board la not unlike the medisaval " tablea,** of wbfeli tb«
modern repreaentative ia baokgammon— a fact which adds a new dlflSouIty to the qaeatioo et
the origin of that game. The mirror waa found at Paleatrina, and ia In private posacsslou.
Senator Comparetti's treatment of thia singular bit of antiquity la, aa naoal, a perfect pie««
of work. Something on the aabjeet of the gamea of antiquity may be gleaaed from Stewart
Cnlin'a "Cheas and playing carda" (Washington 1898), a profusely III uatrated deacriptive eat|
alogue of games of all agpa and landa exhibited at AUlanta, Georgia, In 1895, by the Vuii^
Stalea national museum. The compiler boldly asserts that ''The game of cteo^etM Mfifttf
'twelve lines,* waa subsUiitially the same aa our backgammon. It waa played npoaa board
with twelve double linea, with fifteen white and fifteen black men ; the throwa were eouatcd
aa we count them ; the ' blots * might be captured ; the pleoea (whether they atarted troai borne
or not) had to be brought home, and the winner was he who firat cleared oflT hla men. Toe
principal variation from the modern game Ilea In three dice being employed Instead of tivo.
Several treatises relating to tho sporto of antiquity will be found in the great '*Thesaa'
rua** of QronoviuB, In which aome we have mentioned, like those of Bouleager and Meursiaii
are likewise printed; worthy of note are those by Calcagnlno— "De talorum ac tesseraroi"
et calculornm ludls,'* and Senftleben "De alea vcterum." Students of chess history are luffi-
cieutly familiar with M. A. Severino— "Deirantica pettia** (Naples 1694); and D. Bouter-'^rala-
roedes, sive de tabula lusorla" (i^eyden 168S) — also one of the Qronovius tracts. J. Chrisl-
ie*s work on the game invented by Palamedes is treated in a later note. Then there U ^
extensive modern work by Becq de Fougi^rea — '* Jeux des anciens" (Paris 1873); bat care
must be taken in aearching thia bibliographical field, for many books nominally relating ^^
gamea have nothing to do with table games. An article on "Latrunculi,*' In a dictionary ol
antlqultiea now publishing, cites K. RIchter — "Die Spielen der Griechon and K6mer" (i^M*'
sic 1888X of which a French version (" Jeux des Qrucs et des Remains par Br6al ot Schwob")
appeared at Paria in 1891, a work devoted almoat exclualvely to athletic aports. A recent
Knglish book of some pretention, R. Falkener "Gamea anolent and oriental" (London 189S)»
la of alight Importance. It may be remarked that the material in museums, particularly that
which has resulted from the excavations of the last quarter of a century, haa not yet bceo
at all adequately treated.
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STRAY NOTES 123
to move reciprocally on the lines between their positions, and in this way
each one tries to destroy his adversary. This among the Turks is called
var u gheU **go and come.*' It is not permitted to either to move at first to
remote parts of the board, but both must proceed thither step by step; each
man occupying, if it be vacant, the angle next to him, although this limitation
is'sometimes removed when one of the players has but four men left. Of
course he who has lost all his men but two, with which he cannot form a
ternary line, in which act the whole ratio hidi consists, must consider him-
self conquered.
Hyde has a final short paragraph devoted to the origin of the game.
We gather from it that **the game is well known both in the east and in the
west, and originated, it seems, among the Arabs or the Persians, whence it
was carried to other nations. Its name is treated as a common and evidently
familiar vocable in Arabic vocabularies composed 700 years ago, in one of
which we find the statement that ^oZ tobna est ludus persice dictus sidere;^
but it was really an every-day amusement among the Romans 1700 years ago,
as we have learned from Ovid, who lived not long before Christ, and if so
familiar then, it must have certainly been much older.** In this last utter-
ance Hyde*s usual wisdom deserts him, and he ventures to indulge in that
mode of writing history by guess-work, in which he has been imitated by
not a few moderns in their treatment of chess.
The sundard authority on popular English diversions is the work of
Joseph Strutt, ^* The sports and pastimes of England,** which first appeared
in London in 1801. It has passed through various editions, and well de-
serves another, with such revisions and additions as recent investiga-
tions can afford. The edition we are using is that of 1830, edited by
William Hone, in his day a great student of the popular archaeology of
England. We reproduce the whole of the brief section entitled "M^relles—
nine men*s morris** (pp. 317-8): "M<5relles, or, as it was formerly called in
England, nine men*s morris, and also five penny morris, is a game of some
antiquity. Cotgravo describes it as a boyish game, and says it was played
here commonly with stones, but in France with pawns, or men, made on
purpose, and they were termed m^relles; hence the pastime itself received
that denomination. It was certainly much used by shepherds formerly,
and continues to be used by them, and other rustics, to the present hour.
But it is very far from being confined to the practice of boys and girls. The
form of the m^relle table, and the lines upon it, as it appeared in the
XlVth century is here represented (see fig. 4). These lines have not been
varied. The black spots at every angle and intersection of the lines are the
places for the men to be laid upon. The men are different in form or colour
for distinction *e sake; and from the moving these men backwards or forwards,
as though they were dancing a morris, I suppose the pastime received the
appellation of nine men*s morris; but why it should have been called five
penny morris, I do not know. The manner of pitying is briefly this : two
persons, having each of them nine pieces, or men, lay them down alternately,
one by one, upon the spots ; and the business of either party is to prevent
his antagonist from placing three of his pieces so as to form a row of three,
without the intervention of an opponent*8 piece. If a row be formed, he that
made it is at liberty to take up one of his competitor*s pieces ft-om any part
he thinks most to his own advantage— except from a completed row, which
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124 CBESS Ii\ IGELA ND
must not be touched if there be hostile piece on the board that is not a com-
ponent part of that row. When all the pieces are laid down, they are played
backwards and forwards, in any direction that the lines run, but can only
go from one spot to another [adjoining?] at one time; he that takes all
his antagonists pieces is the conqueror. The rustics, when they have not
materials at hand to make a table, cut the lines in the same form upon the
ground, and make a small hole for every dot. They then collect, as above
mentioned, stones of different forms or colours for the pieces, and play the
game by depositing them in the holes in the same manner that they are set
over the dots upon the table.** Strutt closes his description with the citation
from Shakespeare » or rather a portion of it— the whole of which is reproduced
on a later page. The fantastic explanation of the word morris, which the
author gives, shows how easy it was to fabricate etymology in those conven-
ient days which preceded the rise of the historic school of philology. As we
have already hinted, his idea was, for a while, the prevalent theory of the
origin of '^morris**— -whether as the name of the social table game, or as the
appellation of a certain sort of dance. Hone— and indeed Strutt as well—
with the word ^^merelles** before their eyes, in the title they gave to the
section of their work which related to the morris game, seem to have haxl no
notion of any connection between the French and English names. Nor have
they any more definite idea of the history of the amusement than that it 'Ms
a game of some antiquity.**
Just prior to the date of Hone*8 edition of Strutt, there was a periodically
published work, in several volumes, entitled, ''The every-day book.** It was
mainly the production of the same William Hone, and may be regarded as
a not unworthy predecessor of the modern '' Notes and Queries,** though its
operations were devoted to a sphere much more limited. It is a vast trea-
sury of notes on the traditional customs and manners, the ancient sites and
edifices, the curiosities and superstitions of England. In one of its volumes
there is a communication under the signature of *'P** and the date of July
1826, addressed to the editor on the subject of a rustic amusement styled
''Ninepenny Marl,** which reads thus: ''There is an ancient game, played
by the shepherds of Salisbury Plain, and village rustics in that part of the
country, called 'Ninepenny Marl.' Not having read any account of it in
print, I hasten to describe it on your historical and curious pages. Decypher-
ing and drawing lines on the sand and ground are of great antiquity ; and
where education has failed to instruct, nature has supplied amusement. The
scheme, which affords the game of 'Ninepenny Marl,* is cut in the clay
(see fig. 5) or it might be drawn upon the crown of a hat with chalk. In
cottages and public houses, it is marked on the side of a pair of bellows, or
upon a table, and, in short, any plain surface. 'Marl* is played, like cards,
by two persons; each person has nine bits of pipe, or wood, so as to distinguish
his from those of the opponent. Each puts the pipe or stick upon one of the
points or corners of the line, alternately, till they are all filled. There is
much caution required in this, or your opponent will avail himself of your
error, by placing his man on the very point which it is necessary you should
occupy; the chief object being to make a perfect line of three, either way,
and also to prevent the other player doing so. Every man that is taken is
put into the square till no further move can be made. But if the vanquished
be reduoed to only three, he can hop and skip into any vacant place, that
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STRAY NOTES 125
he may, if possible, even at the last, form a line, which is sometimes done
by very wary manoeuvres. However simple * Ninepenny Marl* may appear,
much siLill is required, particularly in the choice of the first places, so as
to form the lines as perfectly and quickly as possible. This game, like cards,
has its variations. But the above imperfectly described way is that to which
I was accustomed when a boy. I have no doubt that many of your country
readers are not wholly ignorant of the innocent occupation which 'Nine-
penny Marr has afforded in the retirement of leisure attractions.*'
The correspondent terminates his note with an expression of his own
*' strong recollections of the game.** His letter calls out another dated from
London, '* Ludgate-hill, 10th November 1826," and signed ** T. B." The writer
says to the editor (who publishes the piece under the title of ''Nine Men's
Morris'*): "I was much pleased on reading and being reminded of an an-
cient game in your book, called Ninepenny-Marl; a game I had scarcely
hoard of during the last twenty years, although perfectly familiar to me in
my boyish days, and played exactly the same as described by your corre-
spondent *P.' I have since visited my native county, Norfolk, and find the
game is still played by the rustics, and called, as it always has been there,
'the game of Aforrw,' or 'Nine Men's Morris.' The scheme is frequently
chalked on the ground or barn floors, and the game played with different
coloured stones or beans. I think the name is more appropriate than 'Nine-
penny Marl;' and moreover, we of Norfolk have the authority of our im-
mortal bard in his 'Midsummer Night's Dream,' where the queen of the
fairies, speaking to Oberon, says: 'The Nine Men's Morris is filled up with
mud.' There are some men who are not a little proud at being proficients
at this game. I heard an anecdote at North Walsham of a man named
Mayes, still living in that neighbourhood, who is so great a lover of the
pastime, that a wager was laid by some wags, that they would prevent his
going to church by tempting him to play; and, in order to accomplish
their purpose, they got into a house, building by the road-side, where Mayes
was sure to pass. Being a great psalm-singer, he had a large book under
his arm; they called him in to settle some disputed point about the game, and
he was very soon tempted to play, and continued to do so till church time
was over, and got a good scolding from his wife for being too late for dinner.
I have been led to make these remarks from the pleasure I have derived
from your publication ; and you may excuse me, perhaps, if I add, with a
smile, that I have found some amusement in the game of Morris, by playing
it with my chess men ; it requires more art to play it well than you would
imagine at first sight." Hone comments on the latter letter, but his re-
marks are drawn wholly ftom Strutt's work. The reader will perceive that
neither of the writers of these communications has even the remotest idea
of the connection between the English provincial "marl" and the French
"mirelle"; one of them, if not both, seems to take it for granted that "marl"
has to do with the fact that the morris -figure is cut in the clay.
In that fine protest which Shakespeare, in a "Midsummer Night's Dream "
(11, 2), makes Titania address to Oberon, beginning
These are the forg«riee of Jenlaaey,
there is a noteworthy mention of the morris game as played in rustic Eng-
land. This is really the most striking appearance of the game in English
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126 CHESS IN ICELAND
literature, and shows how common a feature of village life the amusement
must have been in the great dramatist's day. Titania portrays the wild
tricks played by the king of the fairies in order to spoil the sport of others,
and, out of mere whim and jealousy, to summon all disastrous forces of
nature, and turn them capriciously against mortals and immortals. She
speaks of the calamities thus wrought by the watery elements, by contagious
fogs, by rains falling on the land, by every pelting river— disasters which
have made the ox idle, and the ploughman lose his sweat, and the green
corn to rot. Then she goes on, exclaiming that
The fold staods empty in the drowned field,
And erows are fatted with the mnrrion flock ;
The nine men's morris is flU'd np with mnd,
And the quaint maaee in the wanton n^reen
For lack of tread are indistinftniehable.
In the last two verses we see that the ^* quaint mazes'*— the lines of the
morris-board — were cut in the turf of lawns and fields. It is singular that
in all the dictionaries, manuals of sports, and similar works in which the
passage is cited, these — perhaps the most important in the description-
are invariably omitted. But it is, however, not improbable that "the quaint
mazes in the wanton green '' refer to the obliterated tracks of the dancers on
the village green, and. not to the complicated lines of the morris board>— in
which case the punctuation might well be changed. It is notable that Shake-
speare treats the game as if it were an every-day matter— as customary in
a rustic region as oxen and ploughmen and green com.
One commentator of this passage (Alchorne) lets us know that "Nine
men's morris is a game still played by the shepherds, cow-keepers and so
forth, in the midland counties, as follows. The figure (of squares, one within
the other) is made on the ground by cutting out the turf; and two persons
take each nine stones, which they place by turns in the angles, and after-
wards move alternately as in chess and draughts. He who can play three
in a straight line may take off any one of his adversary's men where he
pleases, until one, having lost all his men, loses the game." This is, as will
be plainly seen, the larger morris, but there is nothing to indicate which
of the two boards {^g, 4 or fig. 5) is referred to. The same may be said
of another interesting note, on the same passage, to be found in the glossary
to Mr. John F. Wise's "Shakespeare, his birthplace and its neighbourhood"
(London, 1860, p. 155): "The nine men morris board, instead of being on the
earth, is now more frequently cut on the corn-bins of the stables, at the
Warwickshire farmhouses, and the ploughmen use white and black beans
to distinguish their men; the great object being to get three of them in
a row, or, as it is called to have a 'click-clack, an open row;' in order to do
this you are allowed to take up your adversary's pieces as at draughts, or
else to hem them in until they cannot move. There is also a game called
'three men's morris' which is much simpler." •
To sum up finally— as to the lands of English speech. The morris game
came probably from France into England— a supposition greatly favoured
by the numerous corruptions of the word mSrelles such as merits^ merrels^
morals^ moris^ marl, all settling into the form morris^ which can be traced
back to a very early age. The elementary form of the game— styled "three
men morris" — has, so far as we can judge, always been played by means
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STRA Y NOTES 127
of a board showing a single square, but with transverse lines Joining both
the middle of the four sides and the four angles to each other. The still
simpler form, without the transverse lines uniting the angles, such as we
hear of in Germany, seems to be unknown among the Anglo-Saxon peoples
—its place being perhaps filled by the school-boy *s "noughts and crosses**
(the American "tit- tat- to**) of which we shall hereafter hear in greater detail.
This very elementary morris has been generally used— for some generations
at any rate— only by children. Of the two forms of the larger morris—
the first, three concentric squares with lines connecting the central points
of the lateral lines (fig. 5), and the second, three concentric squares having,
in addition, diagonals uniting their angles (fig. 4)— both seem to have been
known in England before the 17th century, although there are several reasons
for believing that the former is the older design. The most common appel-
lation for it was "nine men morris** (or " nine men*B morris**) from the number
of counters employed by each of the two players. Both the earlier and the
later forms were carried by the colonists to the United States— as doubtless
to other British colonies^but, for some reason, the form having the larger
number of transverse lines became there the generally accepted one— perhaps
because its slightly greater complexity gave more scope to the player and
higher interest to the play. The number of counters or men was increased
in the Western land to twelve for each combatant, and the ordinary appel-
lation given to the game was '* twelve men morris.** Whether this name was
ever used in England or not is unknown, but it seems certain that only
dictionaries of American origin cite it. In rustic England the game appears
to have been even more highly esteemed and widely practiced than in conti-
nental lands, as is indicated by the custom of cutting the design or "scheme**
of the board in the turf— so that observers could better watch the game as
it progressed, or possibly in order to give greater importance to the diver-
sion as one of the elements of a festival.
In German the name of the game of ni^elles is, in its signification, like
one of the more usual Italian appellations. It is called muhlenspieU the word
being one of the compounds of mwA/e, the English "mill.** The Grimm
dictionary copies a definition of the middle High German mifhlenspiel ft*om
Stieler, a dramatist and student of words in the 17th century, which is :
"ludus tesserarum diversicolorum per decussates mandras.*' Under the word
mUMe (section 5) Grimm gives a definition, the first portion of which is
drawn from the "Aramanthes** (3d edition, 1733), a so called " frauen-lcxi-
con'* compiled by Gottlieb Sigmund Corvinus (d, 1746), who himself edited
the first (1715) and second (1739) issues. This note is as follows:
"Muhle ist ein spiel auf dem umgekehrten damenbrete^ welches mit klein-
en weissen und schwarzen damensteinen, wie sie das bretspiel hat, von
zwei personen gespielt wird. Wer die letzten steine auf dem brete beh&It,
hat gewonnen.** From the phrase "auf dem ungekehrten damenbrete'* it is
evident that Corvinus had never seen a morris board except on the reverse
of a draught board, and deemed it impossible to find one designed in any
other position. This is explained by the fact that in Germany, the boards for
table-play sold in Germany, as elsewhere, always had on one side a chess-
board and on the other side the morris-board. If they were made to fold,
like a box, then the interior was a backgammon board, while the upper and
under sides of the board, as folded, were devoted to chess and morris. In Italy
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12J? CHESS I\ ICELAXD
the coiabioatioD of the chess aod morris boards is still very commoD; oor
have tliey gone out of use in Germany and other countries. Another com-
piler of words has the same idea as Steiler about the proper position of the
morris board. Valentine in his "Dizionario iuliano-tedesco*' (1834) puts the
word scaricalasino— one of the Italian names of the morris game — into a
Geruian form as: ^'•das muhlenspiel (hinten auf dem damenbret)/*
The next Grimm citation is from the large dictionary of Adelung— the
best of its day— which appeared between 1774 and 1786, it supplies us with
an explanation of the technical term muhle^ used in the m'ffUenspiel to sig-
nify ''a line of three pieces.'* We quote it: ^'Man hat eine mijhle, wenn
man drei steine in einer gerade linie hat.'' The expression die miihle zu
machen is defined: ^^durch einschiebung des dritten steines eine gerade linie
bekommon;" and the expression seine miihle auf machen is explained "durch
wegnehmung des einen steines seine gerade linie zerreiszen."
A "miihle" was thus the same as a **clicJi-clack, an open row," de-
scribed by a Shakesperian annotator in a previous paragraph; or perhaps an
"open row," in English, may be identical with an "aufgemachte miihle" in
German— as indeed we might infer from the two adjectives; and can it be
that "click-clack," said to be used by the peasants and villagers of War-
wickshire, corresponds to the German "gemachte miihle?" Or is it the "par-
allel mill," of which we shall hear on a later page! The use of technical
terms by untechnical writers, as we have before remarked, is of a very vague
and uncertain character.
The game ought to have accompanied, or speedily followed, chess across
the Alps into the northern parts of the Holy Roman Empire, but we find no
very early dates given in any treatise of German games or elsewhere, the
oldest being, as we shall see, in the early half of the 17th century, although
a diligent investigator would, most likely, be able to trace the game to a
much remoter period. The farther Teutonic regions received the morris
game from Germany. It is known in Dutch as violenspely a rendering of the
German name, as is the Danish inbUe or nioUespil, All these appellations
would seem to indicate that the game came into this portion of the world
from Italy, where, as we have seen, it was for a long time called niolino
(mill). Although the elaborate Italian and French dictionary known as**Le
nouvel Alberti" (18^), in its French portion under merellc, asserts that the
game "s'appelle aussi le jeu du moulin," we have not chanced to find such
a statement in any other lexicographical work. But Von der Lasa's asser-
tion in regard to this point, reported elsewhere, must be taken into ac-
count.
Only one recent German investigator— so far as we are informed— even
alludes to the morris game. This is the just mentioned writer, Tassilo von
der Lasa, the reference occurring in connection with his exhaustive researches
into the treatment of chess, morris, and tables, in so many manuscripts
dating from the two centuries which followed the completion of the first
treatise of this class under the auspices of King Alfonso X. Von der Lasa,
commenting the codices known under the names of "Bonus Socius" and
"Civis Bononiae," says: "Dieso drei spiele scheinen cine allgemein be-
kannte und beliebte trias im 14. Jahrhundert ausgemacht zu haben." It
is well to note that this high authority writes the German name of the game
mWUespiel instead of miihlenspiel^ and twice employs a Teutonized form of
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STRAY NOTES 133
especially Sorokin and Sabelin, are agreed in believing that Russia ob-
tained the game of chess from the Greeks, that is through the Byzantine
empire, and not directly from central or southern Asia, as has been main-
tained by all recent western writers. Mr. Amelung relates that the sixth gen-
eral council of the church —the same which Van der Linde styles the Synod
of Elvira in Spain (''Quollenstndien,*' p. 58)— in one of its ordinances made
games played with dice unlawful. The '^ Nomokanon,*' the Slavic code of
church law, contains this canon, and imposes a penalty of dismissal from
his functions on every bishop, priest, or deacon who does not avoid dice-
play and drunkenness. According to Sorokin, modiflcations of the ''Nomo-
kanon*' were made in Byzantium during the 11th and 12th centuries, and were
sent to Kiev, reaching that place about the year 1270, and formally received
validity. Such a modification of the above-mentioned ordinance 42 of the
council cited, was composed by the famous historian and canonist, John
Zonaras {d, 1118 in the convent at Mount Athos), forbidding all the clergy
to practice dice or chess— this being by no means a solitary instance of cler-
ical ignorance in regard to the real character of the latter game. This forms
the earliest known mention of chess in Russia, and the canonical prohibition
of the game under what may be called the eastern decretals, lasted down to
the beginning of the 18th century. In one of the Russian canonical injunc-
tions against the Indian game pronounced during the 16th century, it is
stated, as an excuse for its inhibition, that it is derived from the '* godless
Chaldeans." Other games, including especially cards, were subsequently
added to the condemnatory list. We learn, however, that at the Russian
court, chess, perhaps by clerical dispensation, or perhaps only by courtly
license, was nevertheless played in this same period, and played so frequently
that an artisan was attached to the court for the turning of chess-men, and
hence bore the title of ^'Shakhmatniki.'* But during all this time there seems
to have been no ecclesiastical opposition to the morris game. The earliest
notice oim^elles is that cited by Sabelin, who delves from the court accounts
in the year 1675, a bill for six sets of ivory chess men, together with boards
for morris and backgammon, ordered of the *' Shakhmatniki.** Mr. Amelung
further reports that, although prohibited, not only the nobility, but also the
burghers of the cities, and even the peasants, knew, and sometimes played,
the prohibited chess, as well as draughts, backgammon, morris, dice and
other games. The name of the morris game in Russia is melnisa^ being the
ordinary word for " mill." In the language of most of the countries which
lie between the Teutonic region and the greatest of the Slavic nations, the
word given by the dictionaries as the name of this game indicates the source
of its introduction. The signification in general is "mill," and we may
therefore reasonably assume that the diversion must have come from Italy,
either through Germany, or by some other route. Thus, in Hungarian, the
word malam signifies "mill," and the word m^eUes is translated malot)iJdtefs^
the latter element signifying ** game; " another compound ofmalom, namely
malmosdiy also has the signification of " morris game." In Bulgarian, the
names for " mill" and mdreUes are likewise identical.
The Dutch term for the morris, as we have previously stated, is ino-
lenspel, that is, literally, the " mill-game." But indigenous appellations for
the morris game likewise exist. We have cited from Hyde the term driestiken
for the lesser morris, and negenstihen for the larger, the first element in each
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134 CffESS TN ICELAND
signifying respectively three {drie) and nine {negen)^ referring evidently to
the three men morris and the nine men morris. The latter element is written
in the modern Dutch dictionaries variously, "5rtA:" and "*te^," ^^strik^* and
^^strek.'' The whole word is usually cited as a synonym of molenspel. The
lexicons also give the verb '* negenstekken, '" meaning '^ to play at nine men
morris."
Notices of the game in Danish are to be found in most of the publica-
tions devoted to the diversions of children, such as ** Spillebog for bdrn ^*
(Copenhagen 1853, pp. 36-37). Here the brief account bears the title of moUe,
and includes a drawing of the board used in the major morris. The narrative
which we quote in the original, gives the ordinary rules, and states that the
game is played with 18 pieces, each player having 9-^ the sets being of differ-
ent colours. It is evident that the game follows the German model. A linQ
of three men is termed a '* mill/* and one of the rules ^ of which the final
clauses are not as clearly phrased as they might be— states that if a player*8
pieces stand in such a manner that by opening one ** mill '* he can make
another, then it is naraM a ^' running mill *' {rendenwlle)^ the whole para-
graph reading as follows: ^*M()Ue spilles med 18 brikker, hvoraf hver af de
spillende har 9, hvorfor de, liegsom i dam, maae vsdre af to couleurer. Brsedtet
er som nedenstaaende tegning [fig. 5]. Den ene af de spillende setter
Rirst en brik paa et af hj^rnerne eller paa de steder, hvor tvperstregorne
skjsere quadraterne ; dernsest ssetter den anden en brik paa, og saalodes vexle
de bestandig, til begge have sat alle 9 brikker paa. Den ene skal sdge at
hindre den anden i at faae tre brikker i een rade, hvilket kaldes en mfffle,
da man, hvergang man gjOr en m(jlle, har lov at fratage modstanderen hvil-
kensomhelst brik, man vil, dog ikke nogen, som staaer i m511e. Staae den enes
brikker saaledes, at man ved at aabne en mOlle strax kan gjiJre en anden,
da kaldes det en rendemoUe. Man er da sikker paa, ved hvert trsek, at kunne
fratage modstanderen en brik, naar denne ikke ved selv at trsokke i maile
kan tage en brik bort fra den aabnede mOlle, hvad man imidlertid i de fleste
tilfseide kan forhindre, naar man borttager de brikker, hvormed han kan
tr»kke i mollo. '' The last sentences, relating to the ** rendemdlle, *' run as
follows: **One player endeavours to prevent the other from arranging three
of his pieces in a row, which is styled a * mill,' since every time a player
completes a * mill * he has the right of removing from his adversary's game
whatever piece he chooses, unless it be one which stands in a completed
'mill.' If a player's pieces are so situated that by opening a 'miir [that
is, by moving one piece out of a completed *miir] he can immediately make
another [that is, by moving, at his next turn, the same piece back, thus re-
forming his row of three], it is called a 'rendemmie' [running mill]. The
player is then sure of being able to capture one of his opponent's pieces at
every move, unless the latter can himself complete a « mill * and by that means
Uke away a piece from the [temporarily] opened *mill,' thus destroying
the troublesome *rendemttlle;' "rendemmie," it would thus seem is the equiv-
alent of the German "zwickmuhle.'* The game is said to be still common
in the Danish country districts.
In a Swedish work, similar to the Danish one Just cited, called '' Ungdom-
e&s bok^' ("Book for youth," 2d ed. Stockholm 1883), edited by Albert
Norman, we find an aooount of the morris game in Sweden. It occurs in the
first volume, which is devoted to the games played by boys (p. 162). Unlike
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8TRA Y NOTES
135
n
f-
\
f
4-
/
71/
i
I
m/
/
\
1
\
Fig. 8.
the boftrd given in the Danish work, this one reproduces what we have styled
the twelve men morris board (having the diagonal lines), but gives no reason
for such a difference in adjoining countries. The game has the usual name
gwfr/MpeZ— "gt?am" (Icelandic Arem, our old English qvuemi) being a purely
Scandanavian term for '^mill/'^^ Having given an account of the game of
"noughts and crosses/' (^ry^p, U^app^ UtUl, fig. 6) — the writer Airnishes no
representation of its board— says:
"For the proper morris game there
is a special board marked with
lines such as are shown by the ac-
companying design (fig. 8). Each
one of the two players has nine
counters (for example, draught-
men); the men are always set upon
the places where two lines cross
each other, or encounter each
other at an angle, and ho who
succeeds in putting three of his
counters in a row has thereby
completed a *miir {qvam) and
gained the right to take away
one of his opponent's men already
on the board, but which is not at
the time standing in a *mill/
The first player usually begins by occupying the angle a, and then sets
his next man on e; if his adversary does not then place his first or second
man on b, the first player enters his third man there, and has therefore made
^ Tbtt Swedish text is c«rtalDly muoh eaperior to thftt of the Danish booklet. Thin is
the paragraph in regard to the simple iripp^ trapp, trull (naughti and croMOs): ** DetU ftr f5r
goatar en myoket vanlig fSrloateUe. De Indela griffelUflan mod It* tvir- ooh Kv& iingd-
•treck I nio qvadrater. De apeUnde iro !▼&. Den ene yVjer o, den andre i till aitt teeken.
Hvar ooh en adker fSrst tk slna tre teoken 1 en rad oeh om mfijligt hindra den andre derl-
fr&n genom inekjatando af ett teekeo, der motapelaren tyekca tI^* hUda llnle. Hvar ooh
eo fdr i Bin tar infOra blott ett teeken. Har ban det redan tre g&oger p& taflaa, atstryker
ban ett oeh flyttar det till den plats ban Onskar. Den, som lyckas fdrst fylla raden, atro-
par: 'Tripp, trapp, tniU, min qvam ir fall.* '* The daialfloallon of the Inliantlle sport re-
ceives a warrant from this ery of the suceeaaful player. This is auceeeded by an aecount of
the proper "mill game** (gvanupsi): "IMIl det egentliga qvarnspelet bar man ett sJlrskildt
bride, beteeknadt mod llnler s&dana nirst&ende afbildnlag vinar (ilg. 8). Hvar oeh en af do
tv4 spelarne har nIo teeken, till exempel damspelsbrlckor. Teeknen utsftttas allUd p& s&dana
atailen, der tv4 linier korsa bvarandra eller sammanstSU i vinkel. Den, som lyeikas stAlia
tre af sina teeken 1 en rad, har derlgenom gjort en qvam oeh ffirvgrfvat rJlttigbet att bort*
taga ett af motst4ndarens teekeu, som redan Jkr med i spelet, men utaa att beteekna n&gon
qvam. llan bSrJar gerna med att besitta eu vinkel, till ezempel a, oeh sitter seJan det
andra tecknat pi « ; sitter d& ieke motapelaren sltt f5rsta eller andra teeken pd 6, sitter
den ntspelande der sltt tredje oeh har birigenom redan fttrvlssat sig om en qvam. Han kan
n&mligen bilda den genom att besitta e eller A ; d& moUtindsren blott kan hindra ett af de
tvi dragen, bllr en qvam siker. S& snart alia teckncn iro auviods, flyttaa de, dock sa,
att blott ett steg tages hvarje gang. Bger en spelare blott tre teekeu qvar, fir ban hoppa,
del vlll siga sUUa sltt teeken pi bvilken ledlg plats ban vill. Den, som blott har tvi teeken
qvar, &r fBrlorad. Btt m&l, (111 hvilket roan b5r atrifva, ir att fd tva qvaruar Jemldpando
med bvarandra till ezempel a, b, c, oeh, d, «, /. FOr att ern& detu kaa dot vara fdrdelak-
tlgt att laU motspelaren beh&lla fyra teeken, p& det ban c*J geuom hoppando med silt tredje
mi hindra planen. Stondom kan ifven motapelaren stingas, sd att ban ej mere kan gQr^
nagot drag,'*
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136 CHESS IN ICELAND
himself sure of a 'mill.' He can form it by occupying c or h, since his
opponent can prevent only one of these two moves, and his 'miir is sure.
As soon as all the men are entered moving begins, but in such a way that
only a step is taken at each time. Whenever a player has only three men
left he can 'Jump/ that is to say he can place his counters upon whatever
em^fty spaces he wishes: the one who has only two counters left has lost
the game. An object for which each player ought to strive is to make two
mills running parallel with each other, for example a, b, c and d, &, f. In
order to attain this, it will be advantageous to allow the adversary to retain
four counters, so that he may not be able to 'jump' with his third one,
and thus hinder the plan in view. Sometimes the adversary can be shut
up or confined, so that he is no longer able to move.''
It will be seen that the game differs from the American game, played
on a similar board, in using only nine men instead of twelve. The advice
given to the player varies also from the usual counsel in indicating, as the
proper first play, the occupation of a point on an external line instead of
one of the central lines. The player is also advised to make parallel "mills,"
but the particular advantage of doing so is not too clearly set forth, nor do we
find the peculiar technical term "running-mill," which appeared in the Danish
description. It is likely that by "parallel mills," he means really a "rende-
mdlle," in which one of the counters closes or completes one "mill" as it
opens the other, the player reversing the operation at his next move, unless
prevented by his adversary— or, in other words, "parallel mills" represent
the German " zwickmiihle."
But we find in Swedish a later and more pretentious treatise on games,
the "Illustrerad Spelbok," issued under the pseudonymous authorship of
"Tom Wilson." It seems to be based upon an early edition of the French
"Encyclop^die des jeux," from which we have already largely quoted, or
upon some very similar French compilation. The section in this volume de-
voted to the morris game (qvarnspel) embraces pages 195-205. The first par-
agraph describes the three men morris {liten qvarti eller trnpp, trapp, truli),
"in which" ho tolls us "the game of draughts is supposed to have had
its origin" ("som aatagligen gifvit upphaf til damspelet")— an error which
he needlessly borrows from some foreignn source. His three-men-morris is,
however, really the same as the already described simplest of the morris
forms. Its board is represented in figure no. 7. It is really the tripp, trapp^
trull, or noughts and crosses, or rather a variety of it, since apparently there
cannot be any diagonal rows of three. His description of this children's sport
may be thus rendered: " In the nine corners a, 6, c, d, d, A g, h, t, counters are
entered, three in a row, for instance, g^hyi, or ft, e, h, being styled a 'mill.' He
who first succeeds in completing a ' mill,' with his three pieces, has won. The
adversary endeavours by all means to prevent this; especially must he not
permit the occupation of such points as enable the player to form a ' mill' in
two ways, for example, 6,a,e or b, «,c, in which case a 'mill' can be completed
by entering a piece, in the first case either at c or /i, and in the second at
a or 7i." Here the writer abandons noughts and crosses, and gradually glides
over into three men morris, for he says: "When the players have entered
their three men, then they begin to move them, according to one way of play-
ing, to whatever points they please, but according to another, only to the
nearest point along the line on which the pieces stand. This last method is
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STRAY NOTES
129
the French appellation, die merellen. In noticing the game, with its prob-
lems, or positions, as they appear in the two early manuscript treatises
which we have mentioned, he speaks of it as das grosse mUhlespiel<t which
can only be in contradistinction to that simpler variety to which we have
so often alluded, and which employs in its board, or playing surface, only
one square instead of three (that Is, one external and two internal).
Perhaps as concise an account of the game as we can quote from any
current German work, is that given in Meyer's '^Konversations-Lexicon**
under the word mUMenspiel (of which the variant mUlchenspiel is cited), where
it is described as a ^^bekanntes spiel, das von zwei personen auf einer aus
drei koncentrisch in der mitte Jeder der vier seiten durch eine linie dnrch-
schnittenen vierecken bestehenden figur, dergleichen sichmeistauf der untern
fl&che des damenbrots befinden, gespielt wird. Jeder der spielenden hat neun
damensteine und sucht, in dem er die steine, einen nach dem andern ent-
weder in die ecken oder in die mitte aufsetzt, eine ^^mUhle'" zu bekommen,
d, h» drei steine neben oinander in einer linie zu erhalten. Dann zieht er
seine miihle auf und schlftgt, wenn er sie wieder zuzieht, einen stein des
gegners, der nicht in einer miihle steht. Man sucht besonders eine zwick-
muhle zu bekommen d, h, eine solche muhlo die auf den einander parallelen
linien steht, und wenn sie aufgezogen wird, zugleich die andore zuzieht, so
dass man bei Jedem zug einen feindlichen stein schlagt. Das spiel hat dor
verloren, welcher alle steine bis auf zwei eingebiisst hat, so dass es ihm
nicht mehr mdglich ist eine miihle zu bekommen. Hat man bloss noch drei
steine, so kann man springen, d. h, die steine nach willkiir setzen, wohin
man will. Unter umstanden kann auoh der eine spieler den andern fest-
Ziehen d, h. ihm Jeden weitern zug versperren. ** One of the rules which
the writer cites is to be noted, namely that **If a player have only three
pieces left he is allowed to *jump/ that is, to move whither he will— accor-
ding to his own pleasure.*'
A much more detailed account of the German morris is found in an
interesting publication, "Archiv der spiele," of which three annual parts
were published in Berlin in 1819-21. The
article is contained in the second volume
issued in 1820 (pp. 21-27), a notable charac*
teristic of the description being that the
^^ three men morris'' board is represented
as a square, with transversal lines running
from the middle of each lateral centre to
the opposite one, but without any diagonal
lines (flg. 6), being, therefore, simpler even
than the form known to exist elsewhere
(fig. 1). This form is the equivalent of the
Swedish tripp^ trapp, trull, and the English
noughts mid crosses. In England this is
made by drawing two horizontal and iwo
perpendicular lines on a school-slate or page of paper, tho outer (quad-
rangular) lines of the figure remaining unexpressed, or represented only by
the frame of the slate or the margin of the paper (fig. 9). The players use
no counters, but write alternately in the spaces an o or a + (or in Sweden
a 1), each endeavouring to form a row of three. Another thing to be noted is
17
rig. 6.
f
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130 CHESS IN ICELAND
that the larger morris board with diagonals is likewise unfamiliar to the
compiler. Although the essay is somewhat long we shall quote the whole
of it, premising that the first section is devoted to the simpler, the second
to the more elaborate game. The general heading is: ^'Das miihlenspiel
(triodium, jeu des mdrelles);" the style will be found to be somewhat anti-
quated, owing, no doubt, to the fact that a part of the matter at least is
borrowed from earlier works: *^Das kleine oder einfoche miihlenspiel (fig. 6),
wird von zwei spielern, jeder mit 3 damsteinen versehen, auf einem brett nach
der folgenden zeichnung gespielt. Auf den neun ecken, a bis t, kdnnen
steine gesetzt werden, und 3 in einer reihe, z. b. ghi^ beh heiszen eine
miihle. Derjenige spieler, dem es zuerst gelingt, mit seinen 3 steinen eine
miihle zu setzen, hat das spiel gewonnen, und den etwa verabredeten elnsatz.
Der gegenspieler sucht ihn daran auf alle m5gliche weise zu hindern, indem
er seine steine dlesem zweck gem&sz anwendet. Besonders darf er ihn nicht
eine stellung nehmen lassen, wo er durch versetzung eines steines auf
zwei punkten eine miihle zusetzen kann, wie z. b. bae oder bce^ wo er an
der vollendung der einen nicht mehr wiirde gehindert werden k($nnen. Unsre
knaben bediirfen zu diesem spiele weder brett, noch damsteine, sondern eine
zeichnung mit kreide oder schieferstift, ein aufrisz auf die erde ist ihnen
hinreichend, so wie zum spielen kirsch- und pflaumenkerne, kleine kiesel,
reohenpfennige etc. Das spiel kiindigt sich zwar durch hohe einfochheit als
ein urspiel an, wie es denn in der that von den griechischen und rdmischen
knaben so gut als von den unsrigen gespielt wurde; aber fiir das reifere
alter hat es kein interesse, well es, mit gehOriger aufmerksamkeit gespielt,
immer rem! [remis] wird, und vom morgen bis zum. abend nicht zu ende
kommt. Dieser umstand hat zur erfindung des weit interessanteren groszen
miihlenspiels, oder doppelmUhle gefiihrt.'* This account of the *' three men
morris ** seems intelligible enough. His statement as to the simple in-
struments of the game which German children are content to employ would
apply to other lands. It will be seen that ho asserts with confidence the
practice of the game, in this form, by the boys of ancient Greece and Rome.
The writer entitles the second part of his article ^*Das doppel-miihlen-
spiel.'' We reproduce his wood-out of the older morris-board, although It
has been given on a previous page (see fig. 5, here fig. 7). From almost his
first phrase it will be understood that he is treating of the mne-men morris:
^^Es wird von zweien auf einem brette gespielt, wie die figur es darstellt.
Ein Jeder hat 9 gewohnliche damsteine von verschiedener farbe, welche aber
keine urspriingliche pl&Ue haben, sondern von den spielecn abwechselnd und
willkiihrlich aufgestellt werden nachdem der erste aufisatz durch das loos
entschieden ist. Der zweck des spielers ist des gegners steine zu schlagen,
und wer zuerst so viel steine verliert, dasz er weniger als 3 behalt, hat das
spiel verloren, well er alsdann keine miihle mehr machen, also den gegner
nicht mehr schlagen kann. Denn nur derjenige kann schlagen, der eineneue
miihle macht, oder eine schon vorhandene zuzieht, und geschieht das schla-
gen dadurch, dasz er dem gegner einen stein wegnimmt, und zwar welchen er
will, sobald er nur nicht zu einer geschlossenen miihle gehdrt. Eine miihle
heiszt aber niohts als drei gleichfarbige steine neben einander auf derselben
aufstellreihe. Das brett ist namlich mit 3 quadraten eins in dem andern
bezeichnet, welche in ihrer mitto durch linien durchschnitten sind. In den
ecken, and da wo sich 2 linien kreuzen, sind die aufstoUpunkte; also auf
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STRAY NOTES
181
a
b
c
A
c d
t
k
1
r
E ]
n
/
P
p
1
•*
s
t
a
V
W
X
Fl«. 7.
dem ganzen brette sind doren 24 vorhanden. Wenn nan steine atif adc,
auf d ef^ auf ghi stehen, bilden sie miihlen, und eben so auf beh. Also
nach horizontaler und verticaler
ricjitung sind miihlen mOglich,
nicht nach der diagonalen richt-
ung, und z. b : c ft ist keine
muhle. Schon beim aufstellen
istder hauptzweck: selbst muhlen
zu machen, und den gegner daran
zu verhindem, und darnach w&hlt
man die aufefellpunkte seiner
steine. Oelingt es z. b: einem
spieler, 3 steine auf chb oder
efn zu bringen, bevor die punkte
d b und d e vom feinde besetzt
sind, so kann ilim dieser eine
mlihie niclit verliindem, well er
nur einen stein auf einmal setzen,
also nur einen der beiden schliesz-
punkte der miihle besetzen kann.
Die aufstellung ist vollendet, wenn jeder seine 9 steine aufgesetzt hat, and
dann beginnt ein abwechselndes Ziehen, d. h. bewegen der aufgestellten
steine von einem auf^tellpunkte zum andem auf den marquirten linlen,
z. b : von d nach e ist ein zug, und von e aus sind, wenn keine stand-
punkte besetzt sind, 4 ziige mdglich, n&mlich nach &, nach h, nach f und
nach d. Von den iibrigen durchschnitts-aufetellpunkten aus, sind nur 3
zUge mflglich, z. b: von h nur nach c, oder nach t, oder nach g; und von
den eckaufstellpunkten nur 2 ziige, z. b: von f aus nur nach n oder nach e,
Daher strebt man immer, sowohl beim aufstellen als beim Ziehen, sich
dieser mittlern punkte zu bemJichtigen. Der zweck des ziehens ist ebenfttlls
mUhlen zu machen, und den gegner am machen oder zuziehen derselbeti zu
hindern. Oeschlagen wird n'slmlich: einmal, wenn eine miihle zuerst ge-
macht wird; dann aber auch, so oft sie zugezogen wird. Daraus werden
sich leicht einige spielregeln ergeben, z. b: dasz man nicht eine miihle auf-
ziehen musz, deren wiederzuziehen der feind hindern kann, z. b : ich woUte
den stein e von der muhio def nach h Ziehen, und der gegner hatte etnen
seiner steine in &, so wlirde er ihn gleich nach e herunter Ziehen, und da-
durch meine miihle unbrauchbar machen, oder gar durch schlagung eines
dazu gehOrigen steins zerstdren, wenn er inzwischen selbst eine miihle zu-
zieht. Ferner: dasz man immer denjenigen der schlagbaren, d. h. nicht in
einer geschlossenen miihle stehenden steine seines gegners schlagen musz,
der ihm die n&chste anwartschaft zu einer miihle giebt, z. b. habe ich die
wahl zwischen bef^ so musz ich e schlagen, weil, wenn ich 2» h: b nMinm,
der gegner vielleicht die miihle in d schlieszen kOnnte, oder WMin ich f
n&hme, in h, Wer seine steine bis auf 3 verloren hat, der f&ngt an zu
springen; d. h. er zieht nicht mehr schrittweise, sondern setzt, wie beim
aufetellen, seine steine beliebig wo er will. Sind beide spteler zum springen
reducirt, so ist das spiel, ohne grobe fehler von einer selte, remi [ranis], d.
h. es kann es keiner gewinnen, es miiszte denn der ftill aeyn, daas der etne
spieler beim ersten sprunge sich efne doppelte mi!ihleaanlagfe vorberel ten kann,
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132 CHESS IN ICELAND
welche doF gegner nicht zu hindern vermag. Eine zwickmiihle nennt man bei
diesem spiele zwei so gelegene miihlen, dasz man mit einem und demselben
zuge die eine (iffnen und die andre schlieszon und so abwechseln kann, z. b.
hhfnu waren mit steinen besetzt, so kann ich dadurch, dasz ich den stein
f nach e ziehe, die miihle h h schlieszen, indem ich n u Offne, welche ich durch
einen rlickschritt auf dem folgenden zuge wieder schlieszen kann. Ich kann
also auf jedem zugo schlagen, so lange diese stellung dauert, welche der
feinde jedoch auf zweierlei weise zerstdren kann. Einmal dadurch, dasz er
den punkt e mit einem seiner steine besetzt; dann auch dadurch, dasz er
einen stein von der gerade geOffneten miihle schlagt, wenn es ihm gelingt,
trotz der zwickmiihle des feindes, eine miihle zuzusetzen. Wir haben in
diesem spiele zu wenig selbsterfahrung, mochten es aber dem damspiele an
interesse gleichsetzen, wo nicht vorziehen; wenn wir gleich glauben, dasz
auch hier, bei gieicher starke, der anziehende gewinnen musz. Man pflegt
hier einen doppelten matsch, einen groszen und einen kleinen zu unterscheiden,
und damit doppelten und dreifachen verlust zu verbindon. Der kleine matsch
heiszt : wenn jemand bis zum springen geschwacht wird, ohne eine miihle
gemacht zu haben ; der grosze matsch : wenn er auch mit dem springen zu
kekior miihle kOmmt, sondern das spiel verliert ohne eine miihle gemacht, ohne
dem gegner einem einzigen stein geschlagen zu haben. Ueber den erfindcr,
ilber ort und zeit der erflndung dieses miihlenspioles, so wenig als des vor-
gehenden damspieles, haben wir bis jetzt etwas sicheres ermittein k3nncn.*'
This is the most complete explanation known to us of the method of playing
the larger morris game, and doubtless most of the features and rules cited
are of much antiquity. It merits an English rendering had we space for it,
and did we not consider a reproduction of the original of more value to those
whose researches lie in this direction. It is proper to say that in the very
last portion of his description the author uses the English word '* match**
in the sense of "variety" or "kind of victory," like our technical terms
"gammon," and "backgammon." A player wins a little "match," when his
opponent has been able to form no " mill " (or line of three men) before he
has reached the "jumping" point (that is, been reduced to only three pieces).
He gains a great "match" when the opposing player has at no time been
able to complete a "mill," nor capture a solitary man.
We have been unable to look through much of the German literature
in search of quotations relating to the game of morris. One poetical pas-
sage was, however, easily discovered. This occurs in a piece by Paul Flem-
ing (1609-1640), the most poetical of all the German 17th century poets. He
says in one of his lyrics :
Oleiohfklla mangelts niolit an spielen,
Yor nns stefat das interim ;
Da die peilke ; hier dnd miUUm.
Of the other games mentioned in the piece other than mUhlen we know
little; peilke (or beilke) was, we believe, played with a ball or balls. The citation
from this poet— -who died while still so young, and who was introduced to the
world of English readers by Longfellow— is also the oldest German mention
of the morris known to us.
Friedrich Amelung, in his invaluable serial, " Baltische Schachbl&tter "
(part 6, 1898), has an essay " Zur geschichte des schachspiels in Russland,"
(p. 139-147), in which he tells us that the later historical writers of Russia,
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STRAY NOTES
137
alwftyB employed when the board has, in addition to the right lines, or lines
Joining the middles of the exterior lines, also diagonals connecting the angles,
and this is certainly the most proper board"— this being, as will be no-
ticed, the real throe men morris. "When a player has a *miir full or com-
plete," he goes on to say, "then he usually cries out to his opponent: *tripp,
trapp, trull, my mill is taW ('min qvarn ar full')"— reminding us of the
"Tit, tat, to, three in a row!" of English and American children unHer like
circumstances. Here there is again a return to naughts and crosses in the
versatile mind of the Swedish writer: "Boys for this game need neither board
nor men; they make a rough sketch on card-board with a pencil, or on the
ground with a stick, and play with pebbles or the like. They are even ac-
customed to draw the following four simple lines
and make use of pencil signs instead of moveable
pieces " — whereupon he presents a sketch of the
two horizontal and two perpendicular lines, as ^_^_^
drawn on a slate or piece of paper in the way
we have mentioned in our note on the English
naughts and crosses. He tells us that in the ^___
North one of the players uses the figure 1 (in-
stead of 0), and the other the figure 2 (instead
of +). This is interesting, since it shows tho
same popular custom prevailing in Sweden and
England. The compiler afterwards says that the
simple morris is a primeval sport, and was played by the boys of Oreece
and Rome just as' it is played to-day. He then repeats himself by saying
that in some places a board is used which has not only the two central
lines (of fig. 6), but two diagonal lines connecting the corners. He finally
occupies himself with the older or larger morris board (fig. 7), which he
styles "double morris" {duhbel'qvam)J^
After this complete description of the nine men morris we are told that
there are also boards provided with diagonal lines connecting the corners
(twelve men morris), and he adds that upon such a board players are some-
Fig. 9.
^ That the ilmpler form of the major morrit (with no dimgonal lines) is, however, used
in Sweden m well at the twelve men morris. Is attested by another book of games, the
<'Hand-BibiiotbelL fSr SAHslLapsnOJen" (Stockholm 1899-0, II., p. 57), already elted in one- of
our notes. It giTes a sketoh of the nine men morris board and accompanies it by a brief descrip-
tion :*< Till qvarnspelot hSrerettbr&de med 3 qvadrater, som p& midten &ro fSrenade, jemte SO
brickor af olika fftrg* Spelame ftro tvenne, som taga i handen hvar sina brickor. Sedan man
Ofvereoskommlt om, hTilken som skall s&tta fOrsCa briokan, uU&ttas brlekorna skiftesvis.
Dervid iakttages : Att Ingen bricka f&r s&ttss utan i hflrn eller Tinkel, och hrllkeu, som
f&r 3 brickor i en rad, vare sig lings qvadraterna eller l&ngs doras midtel, Sger att fr&n
bridet borttaga en af motspelarens brickor, som ban anser farligast, dock icke af motspe-
larens tretal, som kallas $luUn qvam» Det ftr sJlledes angel&get fdr bida spelarne, att vid
utsAttningen p& en gdng s6ka fOrekomma motspelaren, att f& tretal och med det samma be>
reda sig detsamma. Sedan alia brickop ftro utsatta, drages en bricka 1 sftnder frSn hdrn
eller rinkel till bOrn eller vlnkel, allt med berftkniog af tretal, och den, som fSrst icke Ager
mer ftn S brickor qrar, bar fOrlorat partlet." We Intended to copy here, in the original,
the complete account of the m^rello given in the *<Tom Wilson" "spelbok," but we refrain
because we cannot be sure how much of it refers to the actually existing Swedish game and
how much is due to the French work, which is the source of the narrative. The compiler of
this book of games is still living in Stockholm, but the librarians and booksellers do not
agree as to his real name. On our preceding p. 122 (foot-note), in an extract from the " Deutsche
Schaobseitung,'* the Swedish '^Hand-Blbliothek" is erroneously styled '<//uJ-Bibllothek.'*
16
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138 CHESS IN ICELAND
timee accustomed to begin «« Jumping'* when they have but four men left
instead of three. Then follows a brief notice of the mareUe triple found in
the French original (fig. 8), with the important information that some people
believe this to be the game described by Palamedes, ^' which historians have
thought to be chess or draughts/' Next we have a still more concise notice
of the mareUe quadruple (alquerque). The end of the article is the French
compiler's mareUe quintuple, that is to say fox-and^geese, the detailed exposi-
tion of which we shall hereafter translate. Of the history of the morris game
the compilers of these Swedish works tell us nothing; and we have come
across no allusion to it in Swedish general literature, although such refe-
rences probably occur*
And now we come Anally to the Icelandic morris. Fortunately we have
in a late work— from which we shall quote largely farther on in this volume —
a detailed account of the game as it has been played in the northern island
for centuries— for more than two at any rate. The work to which we refer
is called ^'Islenzkar skemtanir" (Copenhagen 1888-92), and is a sort of con-
tinuation of the treatise on riddles by the late distinguished folklorist and
head of the Icelandic national library, J6n Arnason, which is styled" islenz-
kar g&tur, pulur og skemtanir," in the fourth part of which is contained
the skemtanir or ** amusements." The author of this sequel or supplement
is the well-known student, 6lafur DaviOsson, who confesses that he is
himself not very familiar with the table games of which he treats, but we
are bound to acknowledge that he has known not only how to get at those
people who are, but also to study with some care, if not thoroughly, the
immense manuscript treasures relating to similar subjects which are pre-
served in Icelandic libraries and archives. He frequently cites, for instance,
the manuscript vocabulary of great size composed in the early half of the
XVIIIth century by J6n dlafsson of Orunnavlk (so styled from the place of
his residence), ^^ in which much attention was given to games familiar to
the Icelandic people, and the technical words connected with them. Of
what 6lafur DaviOsson says of mylna in Iceland we shall make a rough
summary, afterwards appending the original text. We ought properly to
preface it by the statement that neither here nor elsewhere do we find
any mention of the three men morris as known in the island, nor of any
other variety of the morris game than the older (or mediseval) nine men
morris, (the three quadrangles connected only by right linos). The com-
piler of the *' Skemtanir" begins by saying that '* Mylna is played upon a
board of the character here exhibited (fig. 7). There are two players ; each
of them having nine men, beads or other counters to play with, which
must be of different colors, one set, for instance, being light and the other
dark. Lots are cast as to who shall first play or set his man, and he who
*^ Olafar DaTiSMon deicrlbet the huge dictionary of tbit aathor in Iho introdnotion
(Inngangnr, p. 6) to hia esiay on Icelandio eboM — an OMay whieh owei much to the 18th
century lexleographer. The manutcript, at he layi^ !• ttill preserved in that wonderful
•tore-houee of learning, the Aroa-Magnaean collection at Copenhagen. The words of 6lafur
Davideson are a* follows: " J6u Olafseon fri QrunnaTik [d. VW] samdi hlaa isleniku orH-
bok sine nm miSja 18 Old og skyrir hdn ]>yi eflaust helm fri islenskum lelkjum fri fyrrl
hluta 18 aldar. Annars hl^tur Jon a^ hafa haft >etta rit undir i mOrg 4r, ]>vi )>a( er ekkl
kasta^ hdndnnum a« sllku st6rvirkl. Or9ab6kin er 9 blndl i arkarbroti og er ekkl til noma 4
einum sta^, saful Ama Magndssonar i Kmh. (nr. 438, 1-IX, fol.)." Words relating to gamee
are especially well represented in this inedlted lezleon.
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STRAY NOTES l»
thus has to begin puts a man on some point on tiie board, after which the
other enters one of his, and so alternately until both have used up all
their pieces. Most players endeavour to form a *miir (my/mi), which is
done when one of the contestants arranges his pieces in a straight line
on three adjoining points. He who has made a * mill ' may then capture
one of the pieces of his opponent and put it otf the board, but he is not
allowed to capture from a *miir already completed or closed (lokd^^,
if either, for example, has a *miir on «, I, and m, or A », and i«, tiien he
may capture any one of the opponent's pieces he pleases, except those which
stand in a completed *mill,' but every piece of a player is considered to
be en prise if his opponent can play one of his men upon the point properly
belonging to it. In other respects it is not so easy to set the men rightly
on a morris board, and good players consider it to be more important that
the men stand favourably when they are all placed than to form a *miir
while the process of placing them is going on. Nor is it easy to lay down
rules for the entering of the men, but it may be considered that it is always
good to have men at the central points e, n, k and u When all the men
are placed, then the player who entered the last but one begins to
move, and after that each one moves alternately. The pieces can go to the
nearest point in a right line, both combatants trying to play so that they
can make 'mills' and use them, for it is of little advantage to have a
*miir which is not ready to ^spenna upp' (be opened up) and capture with
afterwards [by reclosing it]. If one player, for instance, possesses a *miir
on (jT, h and i and the other has men on e, I and m, then the 'mill* is useless
for the time being, but if the former can move the piece which stands
on ^ to ; (that is spenna the 'mill') and from I again to g (that is, loka
fienni^ 'close it'), then he has revived his 'mill' and may capture whichever
of his adversary's pieces he wishes, except those which stand in a closed
' mill.' It is, of course, understood that each one tries to move a piece t
l^'apHnn, that is to say, into the vacant spot or point of a 'mill' which his
opponent is opening {spennir), in order to hem in (or shut out) the piece
. which has Just moved off its proper spot, and meanwhile is considered to be
an exposed man. If one for instance has opened his 'mill' d, e and h {mo-
ving his piece from e to f), and the other has a piece at d, then he moves it
to e and thus makes the 'mill' worthless.
Besides the simpler kinds of ' mills,' there are others, such m svikamylna^
krossmylna and rennihestur, Svikamylna is that position in which a player
can make a 'mill' at every play, or close a 'mill' and open another at the
same move. If, for example, he possesses men at «, k and d, and at b and
hy and the point e is vacant, then he can move d to e and e to d, thus mak-
ing a ' mill ' each time he plays. If the other player has a piece at f, then
the maker of the 'mill' must capture it if it be possible to do so, for other-
wise his opponent can spoil (binda) the svikamylna. A krossinylna (a cru-
ciform 'mill') is when one player has pieces on all points on two crossing
lines except the middle one, for example &, d, f, and h. As to the renni-
hestur^ writers do not agree as to its character. J6n 6lafsson says that he
who has a rennihestur can capture many pieces at once. t>orsteinn Erlings*
son explains that rennihestur is a svikamylna and krossmylna combined, for
example the men on a, &, c, d, f and /i. Others say that rennihestur is a
potUien with pieces for example on a, c, d, /; g^ and t, and on one of the
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140 CHESS IN ICELAND
points 6, e, or K A rennihesiur is like a svikaniylna in this respect, that
with it it is easy to capture a piece at every move, but yet it is entirely dif-
ferent in some respects at least. We do not linow," says the writer, "the
rennihestur feature in the north (of Iceland).
When any one has a svikamylna or rennihestur^ it is, so to speak, impos-
sible for the other one to win, but yet the game is not wholly finished before
one of the players has lost so many men that he cannot make a ^miir or, in
other words, seven of his nine pieces. Some say that it is a complete 'win-
ning' at mylna if a player can hem in the pieces of the other so that they
cannot be moved, but others maintain that such a game counts only as a
half. It is thought to be something of an honour to place one*s men so well
at the beginning of a game that the pieces of the other player are hemmed
in before he has captured a man. J6n 6lafsson has a drawing of the mylna
board Just as it is to-day, but gives no detailed explanation of it. He says
that krossmyhia has another name, vcengjamylna, Mylna is in its origin
foreign, just like chess and backgammon, but the author thinks it well to
give a description of it, for it is largely played in Iceland, and various expres-
sions are used in connection with it which are very common and popular.
The Rev. Hallgrimur P6tursson (see p. 37), in his poem on table-games,
mentions neither the morrHs nor fox-and-geese^ and we might infer from
this that neither of these names were used at that period, but this would not
prove that the games themselves were not then practised.'' '33 6lafur DaviSs-
^ It will be loarned from a page Imnedfately following thla that the celebrated bymnol-
ogiat does mention the morris under one of lu rarely need and probably older name*.—
We add here, as usual, the leelaudfe text of 6lafar DaTldtion In f^Il : ^* Mylna er telfd
eptir jMMarl mynd [ag. 7]. Treir tefla. Uvor ]>efrra heflr nd tOflar e&a gler o. •. fk-r. tU
aS tefla meft, og verSa ]>an a9 vera mlelit, hvic t. d. 5drum meglnn, en dOkklelt binum rae-
ginu. Pelr kasta blutkesti um hror fyr tknli setja. S&, aom k ad byrja, aetur tOln i einhvern
relt i tafllnn. I>& aetur hlnn, og avo koll af kolll, ]>anga« tU hTortTeggl heflr sett aliar tttlur
^inar. Fleatir leltaat fVt at koma aftr npp mylnn, en ]iaft er mylna ]>egar annarhror k tSInr
k l^remnr reitnro, sem llggja i beinni Hnu hvor r\t annan. 84 sem heflr felngit mylnu, mk
drepa eina t51a fjrrlr hlnum, og er hda ]>4 dr sOgnnnl. P6 mk bann ekkl drepa dr loka&ri
mylna. Rf annarhvor k t. d. mylnu k $, t og u eda u, n og /, >& mi hann drepa hverja tOlu,
sem hann vlll fyrlr hlnum, nema l>»r sem standa i mylnu, en dnop er brer tafla annars*
hTors, ef mdtstMamatur bans getur leikid einbverrl af tSflum sinnm k relt hennar. Annars
er talsyertnr vandl at setJa tOlumar i mylnutafll, og ]»ykir goftum taflmSnnnm nelra korald
andir ]>▼{, aft tSlurnar standi haganlega, |>egar bdlft er tA setja ]ittr allar, en aft tk mylnu meftan
Terlft er aft aetja ])aDr. Ekkl er bngt aft gefa reglnr fyrlr setnlngunnl, en >6 m& geta )>esa, aft
altaf er gott aft elga tOlnr k miftreltnnnm s, Jt, n og I.
I>egar bdift er aft setJa allar tOlnmar, leikur si, sem setti nasst aelnaat, arc hvor epttr
annan. TOlnraar ganga k nmsta relt Tift ]>«)r, eptIr belnum Hnum. Biftlr leltaat vlft aft lelka
]>annlg, aft >elr f&l mylnur, og getl notaft air ]?»r, ]iTi >aft er til litlis gagna aft elga mylnu, sem
ekkl er bngt aft apenna upp og drepa meft aptnr. Kf annar i t. d. mylnu i ^, A og < en
hlnn tOlur i e, I og m, >i Terftur mylnan aft rolklu leytl dn/t i brift, en ef si f^rrt getur fnrt
tSluna, aem atendnr i g til I, apent hana, og fri I aptur til p, lokaft henni, ]>i heflr hann
yngt mylnu aina upp, og mi drepa brerja tSlu fyrlr hinum aem hann Till, nema >»r sem
sUnda I lokaftrl mylnn. Paft seglr sig >Ti sjilft, aft bvor fyrlr sig reynir til aft tera tSlu I
kjaptlnn i mylnum ]>eim, sem mdtatdftumaftnr bans spennir, efta bin da ]>mr ]iTi )>»r em mitt-
lausar i meftan. Bf annar heflr t. d. spenU mylnu, ft, «, h, og hlnn i tSlu i ii» ^ flnrlr
hann hana i e, og dn^tlr ]»annig mylnnaa.
Auk einfaldrar mylnu er til svOamylRa, fcroMmyrna og rwnihfiwr, Srikamylna er ]»aft,
|»egar annarhvor getur komlft sir upp mylnu vift hvem lelk efta loklft mylnu og spent aftra
i sama leiknum. Bf annarhvor i t. d. tdlur i s, k, og J og fr og i, en reltnrinn • er anftur, >i
getur hann fnrt d, i • og a i d, og fenglft ]iannig royinn { hvert sklptl sem hann leikur. Bf
hinn i tOlu i /, ]>i vttw mylnumafturlnn aft drepa hana, ef mdgulegt er, >▼! annars getur
ndlstSftnmaftur bans bondA STikamylnuna. Kruttmylna er ]iegar annarhTor i tdlur i OUum
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STRAY NOTBS 141
son has & foot-note at the end of his essay stating that the morris game is
played in England exactly as it is played in Iceland, as may be seen in an
account in *'Drengernesegen bog'' (Copenhagen, 1868, pp. 33-34), which is a
translation from the English ''Boy's own book.*' Mylnay he says. Is also
played in Denmark, and is there called nwlle. As to the term krossmylna^
it evidently signifies ''mills" in process of formation on two lines, one of
which runs across the other, or is at right angles to it. This is shown by
the synonymous term vcengjamylna^ in which one of the rows or ^*' mills ^^
stands like a "wing" {voengur) to the other. Svikamylna seems to corre-
spond to the Swedish klappqvam or "parallel mill," while rennihestur^ in
its verbal signification, recalls the retideindlU of the Danes. As to the allu-
sion to the leiktfisa "lay of games," of Hallgrimur P&tursson (1614-74), the
famous author of the "Passion Hymns," it may be stated that table-games
are not referred to in any early existing copies ; but in his other similar
piece of rhyme, the taflvisa, "lay of tables," of which so high an authority
as Glsli Konr&Ssson, the late distinguished occupant of the Icelandic chair
at Copenhagen, deems him to be surely the author, we find backgam-
mon, in several varieties, mentioned, while the morris game is given a place
under the obscurer name of fceritafl. ^^ In another collection of stanzas
on games, called "Ellideilur," which was discovered in 1890 in the Advo-
cates' library at Edinburgh, allusion is made to table games in general, but
only by the introduction of the verb iefla, meaning to "play at Ubles."
reltum ieliibTerjom kroninan, nema mlftrelinniD) t. d. ft,<i, / of A. Aptar ber mSnonm ekkl
•aman nm r«iifi<AM<. J6ii 6lafMon Mglr, ad nk, Mim alsi reuDlhMt, get! drepi) mar gar tftlar
I elaa. Porttelnn Rrllafnon seglr, aA r«uiiihettar lA tTlkainylna of kroMinylaa Mioolnaftar
U d. Mlar a, b, e, d, /, og A. Aftrlr tegja, aft rennlhettur •« tOIor i t. d. a, e, d, /, g og i, og
& elnbTerJum reltanna 6, • e%a h, Renaihestur cr elni og*iTikamylDa aft t>vi leyU, aft ai«ft
bonum er bagt aft drapa tSla { bverjuin lelk, en ])6 er baan talavert Sftruvfal elai og aoftiM er.
Kg ^kki ekkl rennlbeat aft norftan.
Pegar annarbTor b«ar avlkamylnd afta rennibett, er §wq aft Mg|a 4ni(>gulegt fyrlr blnn
aft Tinna, eo ]>6 er Uflift ekki Atkljift fyrir fult og alt, fyr en anaarbTor beflr mlit sto margar
tfllar, aft baou getur ekkl felaglft mylnu, efta aJO toiur meft Qftrum orftuni. Siimlr telja |>aft
lika fullan TlnniDg { mylao, ef anuar getur feat avo tOlur blnai aft ]>elia rerfti ekkl leiklft, eo
aftrir telJa alikt aft eina bilfan vinning. ]>aft ]>ykir ekkl allliill fnagft aft ietja t«nr aiuar avo
Tel i taflbyrjan, aft 191 ar bina featlat, iftar en kemnr til maoadr&pa.
J6n 6lafston beflr mynd af mylnntafll, alveg eIna og |>aft er enn { dag, enn ekkl l/alr
bann ]>▼! aft markt. Haon aeglr aft kroaamylaa hettl vangjamyltta Oftru DaTol. Mylaau er
i&tlead aft upprnna, alna og akakii^fi og itoCra, en mir >6tU |>^ rAttara aft l^aa benni b^r, ]»vi
bafti er bdn tefld mJ5g miklft 4 iaiandl, og avo koma fyrlr i benni yma udtn aan era alreg
]>j6ftleg. Sira Hallgrimar PAtaraaon nefuir bvorkl refakik n6 mylna i UAtUu alnni og miBtti
ef til Till r4fta af ]>vi, aft bvoragt naftilft bafl tiftkaat am ]>»r mandlr, en meft >Ti er ekkl aagt,
aft tSflin bafl ekki rerift tiftkuft ]»i.'* In bit notea 6lafur Daviftaaoa tella na tbat one of bia
autborltieaf P411 Bjarnaaon, baa beard tbe verb <*aft apana** naed for "aft apenna'* or
**ap«nna upp.** He likewiae inforna ua tbat In leeland, aa in atber eoautrloa, flalding boarda
are found eoatalning baekgammon, ebeaa {§kdlUaJi) and morria (mybiutoyf), baving wltbin,
wben tbe two flapa are abut, tbe men aaed for tbe gamea.
*** An aoeount of tbla game, ao far aa anytblng ean be learned about It, will be found
In tbe text on tbe next page. Aa to Hallgrimur Pdtnraaon, we And two Inataneea of tbe nae
of tbe word f^/T— aignlfying, aa muat be borne In mind, eitber ebeaa or aome otber table
game— in tbe aeeond Tolnme of tbe reeent memorial edition of ble poetical worka (**8almar
og kT»ftl/* BeykJaTik, 1890, I., p. 4M),
Treytt el s tre broiina
Tv^i b41fanna ;
and again (p. 4S7):
Opt er anga k iafli,
Bettber of wbieb paaiages tbrowa any apeelal llgbt on oar tbeme.
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142 CBKSa IN ICSLA ND
Dr. J6n f>orkelssoii, archivist of Iceland, regards the author of this to be
J6n Jdnson, who dwelt at Helgavatn, and the date of its composition \o be
between 1630 and 1650. These lines read :
^ul tkein mod fegarft og frjg^,
FargaSi allri maDnslna ^tyg'b^
Seggjam marga Btetieiks dygS
Sagftidt konna ad veiUf
Danaa og Ufla dreiogjam liaiiB,
Dr6s Tar ekki 4 )>a« trand,
Gledinoar eflda allan aa9,
Sem k kann bjartat letta.
The four stanzas which follow enumerate the various athletic, musical and
other sports. There are several allied pieces of verse in Icelandic literature,
some of which are printed or cited by Olafur Davilisson (pp. 361-365). One is
ascribed to the patriotic and warlike last catholic bishop of H61ar, J6n Arason,
in which tables, cards, chess and backgammon, with music, are mentioned:
Til hefl' eg tafi met apilnin,
Tolar aem leggi og vfiliir,
Hkdk met skfifnum hr6kaoi,
Skj6tt og kotrn hornOtta
Hdrpa heldar anarpa,
Hreyata meS girnia nelatmn
F6n mod fSgrnm B6ni,
Feingit til lyUa og atrelngi.
This is said to have been composed about 1530. Allusions to so popular a
game must, as we have said, occur in Icelandic records— old diaries or letters
for instance— of which so many are preserved unpublished both in Iceland
and Denmark. And there is no doubt that in the remoter regions of the
island traditions, phrases and proverbs, relating to mylna^ are still await-
ing the collector. Let us hope that some scholar of the scholarly land
will yet bring all these things together, and throw new light upon the
story of a social diversion which was once so widely spread and practised,
and is still, in its various forms, a source of enjoyment in many lands.
Before taking final leave of the Icelandic morris we ought, however^ in
this connection, to state that some manuscript works, which treat of social
diversions, mention- a game called Freysiafl, which the writer J6n 6lafsson
mistakingly cites from the F16ventsaga, his assumed, or wrongly located
quotation being as follows : '' HeiSingjar s6ttu eptir F16v6nt, en s& er nnstur
var 1 eptirreiSinni t^nir snart lifi shio, og er svo & a9 lita viVskipti peirra,
sem maQur leiki Freystafl og eigi jafna rdS, og leiki ur annari i aOra, og
taki hverju sinni einn senn ; og sem hann snerist i moti, \k hver fallinn, er
f^rir honum varO.*' The same writer says that this Freystafl must be the
same as the game known as fceringartafl (or as Hallgrimur P^tursson calls
it, faritafi). He says that it is played without dice, and that there are tliree
lines in it; (in Latin, ^Uribus ordinibus constans"*). dlafur DaviOsson ob-
serves that both these names may really represent the morris game, the 'Hhree
lines'* describing the parallel lines which form each side of the major mor-
ris. In the passage referring to the Freystafl^ whencever it may be derived,
the expression Jo/hrda^, meaning "even lines" or "full lines," is a proper
enough title for the double or parallel mills {svikamylna)^ of which we have
heard so much, and the phrase "leiki ixv annari i a9ra, og taki hverju siftnl
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STRAY NOTES 143
einn senn ** C* plays out of the ono into the other and takes a man once
every time**)> represents the method of play and capture by means of the
fvikamylna. It should be remarked that QuObrandur Yigfusson explains
this '^game of Frey ** as <* probably what is now called yo^^Ko/K/* citing also
the Floventsaga, having perhaps discovered a passage in another chapter
than that (the Vth) to which it is assigned by Jdn dlafsson. But no great
heed need be given to this opinion, as we have already learned how un&mil-
iar with table games was the Oxford lexicographer. ^
The game of go^atafl is said by some writers to be played with dice and
we are told that no special board is needed for its practice ; others state
that it may be played on a table-board, or back-gammon board ; some again
declare that the proper number of men is twenty, but Konrad Maurer ('*Ger-
mania*' XIV, 1869, p. 108) says that it is played with 32 men. J6n dlafsson
explains that the mea are white and black, and that the white ones are
each as valuable as two black ones ; with this rule, it is said, not so many
men are necessary. The word foeritafl is not cited in the Oxford Icelandic
dictionary. If it be true that besides mylna ('^mulino,'" ^^miihlenspier*)
there are these other names for the Icelandic morris— vernacular names as
it would appear^ the iact places another face, not only upon the date of its
introduction into the country, but also upon the source whence it came. The
Floventsaga, one of the fabulous sagas, was written certainly as iar back
as the earlier half of the XVth century. In fact, a vellum manuscript of it,
in the handwriting of that period, exists in the Arna-Magn»an collection at
Copenhagen. The manuscript was transcribed in Iceland, so that at that
time the Freystafl may have been known (but see above).
There are doubtless various, if not many, allusions to mylna among the
old letters and old note-books, and the collections of inedi|Bd verse and
prose, which the author of the present sketch has flailed to delve out from
those public and private libraries of Iceland to which we Just alluded,
but the search for them must be left to other hands. What we have gleaned
indicates that mylna must have been familiar in Icelandic homes before
the XVIIth century had closed, leaving out the question of its identity with
Freystafl, It also indicates that mylna could have had no connection
with hnefatafl^ or any similar game, existing in the old saga times. The
name of the morris game (if there be in truth no earlier appellation than
mylna) in the Icelandic tongue is evidence enough that it must have
reached the island by way of Germany, Denmark or Norway, and that its
path 'thus diverged from that followed by the game of chess. In other
words, its arrival in Iceland post-dates the appearence of hnefataH in the
sagas. Besides the light which these facts, or inferences, throw upon
the character of the old saga game, they are likewise of some weight in
estimating the real age and source of merelles. Those who argue that
either Greece or Rome was the primary home of this line- game will have
difficulty in showing why it should not have reached France, then England,
and afterwards Iceland at a much earlier dale. Those who attempt, on the
other hand, to prove that it, or at least some variety of it, came into Spain
from the east, must confess that ils arrival took place after the coming of
•• Neither Freyiafi nor fmringartajl Arc found iu Frilxner't **Ordbog" (1886-96), whicli
woald Indicate that the former need not be sought in Floreutaaga ; nor do we remember to
h*Te ■••n it tn the printed text of that anelent work edited by CederechJ61d«
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144 CHESS IN ICELAND
chess, else it ought to have crossed the Pyrenees, the British Channel and
the Icelandic seas in company with the greatest of table games. Our investi-
gations have been too superficial and too restricted to enable us to discuss
this larger question, which, in its character, is not unlike that which makes
the story of tables so obscure.
We have, as a starting point, on the one side, the simple little game
described by Ovid, though too vaguely to make it absolutely certain that it
has anything to do with our theme, but there we lose all trace of what
more than one archaeologist has asserted to be the three men morris of a
later age. To the game of tables we find apparent allusions not long after
the downfall of the Roman empire, but we do not catch a glimpse of any-
thing resembling the morris game during the 1000 years which follow the
age of the Roman poet. On the other side the indefinite character of our
knowledge in regard to the codex of AKonso yields only a slight foot-hold
for the belief that the morris game, like chess, came from Perso- Arabic
regions into the Iberian peninsula. We are only sure that the Escorial Codex
contains an account of a game played upon a design or ^^scheme*' composed
of four ihree-men-morris boards, and that this game bore, and perhaps
still bears, an Arabic name. Whether the forms of the morris game of the
higher class which appeared a little later on the hither side of the Pyrenees
are described in the codex or not we cannot at present say. When Spanish
scholars make up their minds to tell us what the non-chess portions of the
codex really are, we shall very likely be able to advance a step in our re-
searches. Of course it is possible that the Saracens, who imparted so much
to the European world, may themselves have borrowed something from the
declining Latin civilization. The early invaders of Spain and Sicily may
have found t^e smaller morris in vogue among the peoples they had con-
quered, and afterwards developed from it the larger morris, or they may
have discovered the latter already grown to maturity. They may have con-
ferred upon it a name of their own. Just as the Europeans^ supposedly at
least— did in the case of nerd or nard, which we are told originally came
from the Indo- Persic world. These, however, are only conjectures, and it
is not impossible that none of them may ever assume the aspect of cer-
tainties. Still we do not despair of the future efforts of the modern spirit
of research, and the shrewd judgment of modern scholarship.
We conclude this portion of our subject by a hasty summary. There
exists a group of line-games— thus called, as we have explained, because
the men or pieces used in them are entered on the intersections of th^ines
along which they are moyed— this group comprising the following varieties:
the three men morris, the nine men morris, and the twelve men morris,
the basis of all of which are lines united to form one or more quadrangles
—all of which have been largely played, at any rate since the Xllth or
Xlllth century, among both the Latin and Teutonic nations. To these
differing forms must be added certain games of a composite nature, such
as the so called alqtierque^ made up of four three men morris boards, and
* the well known fox-and-geese^ originated by uniting Aye of tlie smaller
morris boards. To these again may be subjoined one or two varieties of
doubtful origin and prevalence, such as the mulinello doppio (or mfh^elle
double) shewn in our fig. 3. This last is perhaps an imitation, or growth
of modern days, but none of these varied diversions help us in determining
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STRAY NOTES
145
bt
fl
the character of the Icelandic hnefaiafl. In none of them is there a chief
figure or piece which is attacked by one section of the men or counters, and
defended by another section. **
The only really scientific treatment of the morris game and its practice
—wholly modern in its methods— is to be found in Alban voh Hahn^s *'Buch
der spiele" (3d ed., Leipsic, 1900, pp. 249-352), a volume which we shall shortly
cite again. It includes both the three men morris and the nine men morris,
and gives the former in two shapes, one a «^ board with 9 points** and one a
'* board with nine squares.** In the illustrative figures of both the minor
morris and the major morris a notation similar to that employed in chess
is made use of. The vertical or per- ^^ ^^
pendicular lines are indicated from
left to right by letters of the alpha-
bet, and the transverse or horizontal
lines, from below, upward, by num-
bers. This enables the compiler to
give examples of games. The *' mill **
or miiMe is indicated by an Ml The
games are naturally divided into two
parts, the first being the entering of
the men, the second, their moves and
final completion of the game. Wo
give a diagram (fig. 10) of the nine
men morris with the notation, and a
specimen of a game with notes and
variations. It must bo remembered
that on the formation of a "mill,** the one who makes it has a right to take
one of his opponent's men from the board. The pariie which we copy from
Hahn is as follows :
eS — U — elB
< b da el l
dl
rig. 10.
a. The men enter :
White.
Black.
1. on a3
on b3
2. . gl
» b2
3. » bl
• d5
4. > f3
> d6
5. w d4
. a2
White.
Black
6, on c2
on c3
7. » fl
» d2
8. » f2 M 1 /
takes d2 i
» d2
9. on g2
* g3
** A tlngalar TOlame — to whiob we hara already referred In oar note npon the literature
of tbe (amet of the andente— relating largely to the InTentlon and eappoeod d«TeIopment of
the mir^Un, or the game of merriUst at the tathor st jlei It, la John ChrUtle*8 ** Enquiry into
the aaelent Qreek game snppoied to have been invented by Palamedee'* (London 1801). The
work Is full of mitapplled erudition. The writer argues that the game of Palamedee was tbe
Qreek p«tteia^ from wbleh is derired the morris game, the ludtts lainmeulorum, and nltf.
mately chess. He crltleises with some severity the writings of Hyde and Sir WiUiam Jones,
and indeed all **the erroneous eoneeptions entertained of this game by the different eom>
meutators upon It, for besides the remarks I have quoted from Bomaise, we find those of
Meurslus, Sonter, Bulengerns and eren the great Casaubon equally contradictory and Ineon-
elusive.'* He finally carries the p9tiHa from Greece to the north of China, where it passes
into "an Intermediate state between the perfect chess and the genuine p*ttHa,** and where
he finds the sacred square or line leg^ yQafAfAfi of Ihe jt^wia represented by tbe three men
19
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146
CHESS IN ICELAND
b. The men move:
10. f2-e2 ab-al 13. f2-e2
d5.b3
11. gl-dl b2-a2 14. f3-d5
White has won, as
12. e2.feMM ^3^^^
Ukes d2 \
black is hemmed in.
But black, just before the beginning of section 6, might have placed his last
man on e2 instead of gS, leading to the following continuation, in which white
obtains, in his 11th and 12th moves, a "double mill" or zwickmuhle:
White.
10. g2-g3
11. f2-g2 M !
takes e2
12. g2-f2 M !
takes el
13. f2-g2 M ! }
takes el )
Black.
d2-d3
d3-el
a2-al
b2-a2
14. bl-b2
a2-al
15. gl-dl
al-a2
16. dl-al
hemmed in.
t)r
16. dl-gl M !
takes a2.
\
hemmed in.
The author states, that, in his opinion, the morris game has a certain but
not very close similarity to the great Japanese go-bang^ whic& makes use of
a square board of 19 vertical and 19 perpendicular lines, on the intersections
of which the game is played, each party having 181 men.*37
Fox-and'Oeese (refek&k). — The second game of a minor character to
which the hnefata/l of the saga period has been referred, is that, which, in
the lands where English speech prevails, is known as fox-and-geese. It has
a not dissimilur title in most of the continental countries, as, for instance, in
Germany, fuchs- und hUhnerspielt "fox-and-hens" (or fuchs im hOhnerJiof)*
As we shall shortly have occasion to see, it stands in an intimate relation to
m^relles— -being of the same class of line games. One of the most notable
authorities on Icelandic antiquities, the present head of the Reykjavik nation-
al museum, following an earlier writer, of whom we shall speak on a later
page, maintains that the game of fox-and-geese is identical with hnefata/L, or,
at least, with one form of that ancient diversion.
It is proper to say at the outset that the fox-and-geese board, in compar-
atively modern times, has begun to be used for games more or less different
morrU board, which he conceive* to be the proper origin of the inner iqaare of the nine men
morrie, really repreeentlng a aheep-fold amonff the Scythian herdemen. Ont of thia inter-
modUt« form in China grew the game of cheee, which eubseqaently spread to India and Ba-
rope. The book it well worthy of eoneultatlon for the take' of ita ingenlooi errore and of
Ita illaetrationc, eapeelally iu faneifol vignette portraying the origin— among ahepherda— of
the morria game.
^ Joat aa the fUlI proofli of thia aeetioa have been read there cornea a valaable referenee
from Mr. John O. White, of Cleveland, United SUtea — whoie familiarity with every portion
of eheas literature la now hardly excelled— which fortunately can be inaerted here. He aaka:
" Have yon not overlooked Yon der Laaa'a auggeation that the different naraea and ahapee
given to the men in the medlieval mirellea manuaeripta were merely devieee to aaebt In
recording the movea? From examination of the gamea recorded, it aeema that all theae
differently shaped and named men had the same movea, the aame powera. Apparently the
thought of numbering the Interaeetlona had hot occurred to the anthora, and hence, the
adoption of theee devleea aa a meaaa of notation merely.** Thia aeema to explain the mat-
ter aatlafaetorily.
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STRAY mTB8
147
in their nature, especialiy for one oalled in England solitaire and in France
''Englisli solitaire"' and for another, known in Spain and Italy as asalto
{assalto)^ in French as assaut, in Danish as belejringsspel. In this game, or
in one of these games, the upper square of the fox-and-geese cross is trans-
formed into a fortress, usually by drawing bastions or a wall around it, which
a portion of the pieces employed are supposed to besiege ; but all such di-
versions are much younger than the board on which they are played, that is
to say much more modern than the original fox-and-geese. It is not easy
however, to cite many early mentions of the game in any literature, since it
has evidently always been, for the most part, limited to the rustic classes*
with which, in English lands at any rate, it is still popular.
V
21
4-
^^
'--%-:-
22
.2
-71
^ "i
<^'
\
^
^^
i& :
N
V jW/
\^/
...1%.
/ ! \
e
\
«l*
-^\
2g| 4r.'
Y.
vt
/
:il jM
80
91 S2 83
Fig. 11.
Pursuing, as nearly as may be, the same geographical order as in treating
m^relles, we find no distinct data as to the age of fox-and-geese in Spain ; indeed
we are left in some doubt by Brunet y Bellet in regard to the mention of this
game in the codex of Alfonso. The modern author gives a drawing of the
board, and some matter relating to the game in the very pages in which he
is treating that manuscript, but he be8tx)ws no Spanish name on the board
other than the recent one of ** asaltp,'* although, as will be remembered,
he quotes the ordinary English title. None of the accessible Spanish lexico-
graphers aid us.
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148 CffESS IN ICELA ND
In Italy, particalarly in its Northern and central parts^ the old style of
board is still frequently seen. ''Le nouvelle Alberti'* (1855) gives first the French
title, making it— as do most of the lexicons— jeu de renard^ and then inter-
prets it in Italian as giuoco delta volpe. As a matter of fact, if it be some
times called volpe (*^ fox "'), it is much more commonly named lupo e pecore
(** wolf and sheep*'). In some of the dictionaries of low Latin is cited a
game called vulpes^ but no date is suggested and no citations are given
for the use of this title. Most of the Italian books on games describe
the method of play. We abridge the rules given by one of these works,
but the full text will be found in the note printed below :«» ^»lt is played
with one piece (volpe) and with 13 pawns {poUi, ** chickens*') which are ar-
ranged (fig. 11) on the 13 points (caselle) of the board numbered from 1-13; the
opposing piece or fox is placed upon whatever vacant point its player may
select.^ The pawns, (that is, geese or chickens) may also be entered on cor-
responding points in the lower portion of the board. The fox may move
forward or backward, to the right or left, or diagonally. The geese are per-
mitted to go only forward and laterally, but cannot move backwards. The
player ought not to leave his geese unprotected, or alone, as may be done
with the men in the game of draughts [since in this game there is no exchang-
ing of men ("polio" for **pollo")]. Skill at this sport consists in pursu-
ing the fox, and in so shutting him in that he cannot move. The fox captures
all the undefended or solitary geese and, in his movements, seeks to impede
them ft*om passing into the court-yard (the uppermost square) amid
their fellows, so that he can take them more easily. Practice counts for
much in this game, as it is only by practice that the player can learn to
imprison the fox. The geese move first. To-day, however, the game is
generally played with 17 geese, the four which are added to the original 13
being placed at the points 14, 20, 21, 27. The fox is allowed to capture two
or more of the geese if, as at draughts, unoccupied points exist behind each
of them, and wins the game, either when ho has taken captive all the geese,
or when he has passed over the points indicated by the numbers 1, 2 and 3;
** Omitting » paragraph eonUintog the Lydian story (reported In the French clutlon,
on a page immediately foUowiog) the text of the Italian *' Gome potao dlTertlrmi ? ** (Milan
1901, pp. 881-2S8) la a« foUowi: **I1 mallnello quintuple 6 dato da cinqae malinelll aem-
pliel dlipotti a forma di croee, eome nella flgura 107. QueaU dlepoalaione d4 la bellesaa di
83 oaselle, aalle quali li giuoea una partita aasal ourtoea addimandaU delta rolpe e de'poUI.
Un reeehio libro franeeae mi acrve dl gal da fedele per deacrivere qnesto paaaatempo. *SI
ginoea eon nn dama (volpe) e eon IS pedine (polli) ehe ai diapongono lu IS eaaelle della t*>
Tola. I polli ai diapongono da una parte (in alto o in bauo) e la volpe a plaeere in una
eaaella della parte oppoata ehe ne eompreude SO vnote. La volpe pu6 mnorerd innansl o
Indletro, a deatra o a liniitra, o diagonal meute. I polli non poaaono andare ehe in aranti •
lateralmente, ma non poaaono, perci6, tornare indletro. II gtuooatore non deve laaeiare 1 polli
•coperti o loli, eome li pratiea per le pedine nel gioco di dama. L*abilit4 di qneato ginoco
conaiate neU' inaeguire la Tolpe e nel ehiaderla di Ul maniera, ehe aon poaaa pit muoTeni.
La volpe mangia tuttl i polli ehe aono teopertl o aoli e qneati devono Impedlrle di paaaare
nel eoriile, in mesao a lore, pereh6 pib faoilmente potrebbo mangiarae. L* eeerolaio eonU
molto in qneato ginoco, e perei6 i tele eon reiercislo ehe ai pu6 faoilmente rieaelre a far
prigionlera la volpe.* I polli muovono per i prlml. Oggi, per6, ai gluooa eon 17 polli, e 1 4 venntl
inaooeorao del 18 vecehi, al oolloeano nelle eaaelle 14, SO, SI, S7. La volpe pud manglare due o
piii polli ae, eome nella dama, treva eaaelle vnote dietro a elaaenno dl eaal, ed h* vinto la par-
tlu o qaando ha divorato tuttl I polli, o quando ^ arrivaU anile eaaelle aegnate eol nnmerl 1,
S e 8,e la perde quando ai laacia chludere in maniera ehe non poaaa pi& andare innansl, tor-
nare Indletro, o fuggire dlagonalmente.**
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STRAY N0TB8 149
and loses it when he has allowed himself to be surrounded in such a manner
that he can no longer go forward, return backward or flee diagonally/* So
far the Italian author. His assertion that the number of the pawns or geese
was formerly 13 possesses some historical value, if it be true. The reader
will notice the different positions, in the Italian and the English games, of
the four additional pieces ; instead of the points 14, 20, 21, 27, they occupy,
on the Anglo-American board, 14, 15, 19, 20.
This modern Italian author, as the reader will soon be able to notice, is
simply a compiler from French sources, not having apparently made any
effort to study either the methods of playing the game or the records of its
story in his own country. As in the case of other similar diversions both the
practice and the history, as well as the name of the game, probably differ in
the various Italian provinces. But only laborious inquiry can determine how
greatly.
As we have already seen, there have been published during recent years,
in France, various hooKa on the games of social life, mostly compiled, unfor-
tunately, by men of little learning, some of whom have allowed their imagi-
nations to play with great freedom whenever they were unable to bring any
actual knowledge to bear upon the subject they chanced to be treating. The
result is that they have thrown a good deal of darkness upon several of these
household diversions. Their evil influence has not only been felt in France,
but, througl^ translators and compilers, in various other countries. The
^* Grande Encyclopedic des Jeux'* ofMoulidars, to which we have more than
once referred in preceding pages, cites a XVIIth century publication of a sim-
ilar character, finding therein a fabulous story of the origin of the game, and
then proceeds to explain its mode of play. He styles it the m^elle quintuple
since its board is made up of five ordinary throe-men-morris boards, combined,
as we have seen, in the shape of a cross. It will be noticed that he employs
the orthography marelle. We insert here the whole original text (p. 101)
relating to fox-and-geese : **0n obtient cette marelle par la Juxtaposition de
cinq marelles simples, comme sur notre fig. [11 J. Cette transformation de la ma-
relle simple pent aussi etre obtenue en se servant d*un solitaire anglais, so-
litaire fran^ais diminud de quatre cases. On a ainsi un Jeu de 33 cases, qui
sort k une partie singuli^re nomm^e ^ le Renard et les poules,* invents par
les Lydiens, s*il faut en croire la 'Maison des Jeux acaddmiques* (Paris 1668),
k laquelle nous empruntons la citation suivante : * Les Lydiens, peuple d^Asie,
entre plusienrs Jeux qu'ils invent^rent, donn^rent Torigine et Tusage k oelui
du renard, non tant pour le ddsir quMls eussent de le Jouer, que pour se fa^on-
ner aux ruses et se garder des surprises que Cyrus, leur ennemi capital, leur
dressait tous les Jours, lequel les appellait poules, k cause quMls aimaient les
d^lices et le repos ; et iceux Lydiens le nomroaient Renard, k cause quMl dtait
sans cesse aux aguets, et qu'il cherchait inccssamnient des finesses pour les
surprendre. Ce Jeu est ing^nieux et r^r^atif, facile k pratiquer. On le Joue
avec des dames ou des Jetons, k faute d'avoir des poules de bois et dUvoire
en nombre de treize, poshes sur treize rosettes ou espaces dont la table est
oomposde. Les poules sent en la partie d*en has et le renard est en la partie
d*en haut, qui consiste en vingt rosettes ou espaces, et vous placez en Tune
d'icelles le renard k discretion, qui pent monter et descendre, aller et venir
au haut et has, k droit et travers. Les poules ne peuvent monter que de has
en haut et ne doivent redescendre. Le Joueur ne doit laisser les poules de-
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150 CHESS IN ICELAND
coQvertes, ou seales, non plus qu*au jeu de dames. La finesse de ce Jeu est
de bien poursuivre le renard, et Tenferroer en telle sorte quMl ne puisse aller
de^ ni del&. Et est k noter que le renard prend toutes les poules qui sont
seules et d^couvcrtes ; enfln, 11 se faut donner garde de laisser venir le re-
nard dans la partie d'en bas parmi les poules, pour autant qu'il les pourrait
plus facilement prendre. L*exercice peut beaucoup en ce jeu, et k force do
Jouer, on s*y rend bien maitre. Les bons Joueurs ddmarent les poules
premier que le renard. Celui qui a les poules ne doit permettre, s*il peut,
qu^on ddmare le renard le premier, car cela ne lui est avantageux.
"Telle est la rfegle de Tancien jeu, tel qu'on le jouait au XVII® sifeclo; on
pla^lt les poules sur les cases 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 et 33 du
solitaire anglais, ct le renard, n'importe sur quelle autre case. Les poules
jouaient les premieres ; elles progressaient en avant, sant pouvoir reculer,
ou horizon talement, k droit et k gauche. Le renard allait dans tous les sens,
en avant, en arri&re, horizontalement et mdme diagonalement. D^s quMl trou-
vait imm<^diatement devant, derri6re lui ou k c6t^ de lui, une poule Isolde, de
rautre c6td de laquelle se trouvait une case vide, il sautait dans cette case,
pardessus la poule, qui 4tait croqu^, c*est-&*dire enlev^ du jeu. 11 pouvait
prendre diagonalement, par ezemple de la case 5 It la case 19. Tant de pr^
rogatives lui assuraient Timpunitd et il pouvait facilement atteindre Tune
des trois cases 31, 32 ou 33, o^l il avait gagnd ; quelquefois il prdlSrait cro-
quer une k une les pauvres volatiles, qui ne rdussissaient pre^ue jamais k
remporter la victoire en Tenfermant de mani^re k le mettre dans rimpossi-
bilitd de bouger.
"Cette r^gle, ou tous les avantages dtaient en favour du renard, a M mo-
difl^. On a fortifld les poules, en portant leur nombre k 17, les quatre autres
se plaint en 7, 13, 14 et 20. II leur devient ainsi beaucoup plus facile de se
protdger. Quelquefois mdme on convient que le renard ne pourra ni prendre
ni marcher en diagonale; mais alors on l*affaiblit au point qu*il ne lui reste
gu6re d^espoir de gagner. La meilleure manifere de Jouer cette partie est de
prendre une tablette de solitaire f^angais dont on annule quatre cases, comme
nous le disons en parlant du solitaire anglais; on se sert de 17 flches ou 17 bou-
les ordinaires ; pour le renard, on prend une flche ou une boule d*une autre
oouleur, par exemple une flche trempde dans Tencre. Le renard se place sur
la case du millieu et les poules jouent les premieres. II est juste que le renard
puisse marcher mais non prendre en diagonale. Quand le renard a n&glig^
de croquer une poule en prise on le dit blessd, et Tadversaire ajoute k son
jeu une nouvelle flche, quMl place en arri^re des autres, sur la mdme ligne
horizontale que la derni^re de ses poules ; dans rimpossibilitd d*agir ainsi,
il attend pour prendre une nouvelle poule quMl y ait une place vacante sur
la derni^re ligne horizontale occupde par ses flches. On peut con venir que le
renard aura le droit de prendre deux ou plusieurs poules k la fois quand deux
ou plusieurs flches ont un intervalle entre elles, comme cela se pratique aux
dames ; mais il est prdfdrable de 8*en tenir k une poule k la fois. Le renard
a gagnd quand il a croqud toutes les poules ou quand il est parvenu sur la
demi^re ligne de leur camp (cases 30, 31, 32 et 33), il a perdu sUl se laisse
envelopper au point de ne pouvoir plus jouer en avant, en arri^re ou en diago-
nale. Ainsi rdgUe, la partie n'est pas sans intdrdt.*' In comparing all this with
the summarized version which we have given of the Italian compiler's work,
we find that the latter has omitted one or two features of what the French
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STRAY NOTES 151
writer tails as is the modern mode of play. Whether he has done this be-
cause the Italian method differs from the French or not, Jt is impossible to
say. These features are the placing of the fox at the middle of the board,
and the law that he is privileged to move, but cannot captare diagonally.
What is here and elsewhere denominated the** English solitaire** board,
consists of points arranged like those of the fox-and-geese board, but not
Joined together by lines, so that the cross form of the group is not so evident
The French solitaire, a similar game, destroys all resemblance to the fox-and-
geese board by adding four more points, two to the second line of the upper
section of the cross and two to the next to the lower line of the lower section.
The French also have the Spanish asaltit, called by them l^saui, played on
the fox-and-geese board, on the old game of which, though differing consid-
erably, it is apparently based. In the upper section of the cross, or fortress,
are placed at will, two men, corresponding to the fox ; while the other sections
of the board are occupied by 24 men of another colour. The 24 besiegers must
always advance either vertically, or obliquely, capturing their adversaries,
however, as does the fox in the original game. The game ends either when
the besiegers have made themselves masters of the nine points of the fortress,
or have captured the besieged, or when the latter have taken all the besiegers.
As to England and America, we know of no other title given to this game,
than the usual one. The oldest literary mention of it is in a play entitled
**A fine Companion'* (1633) by Shackley Marmion, a minor playwright of the
court of Charles I, well known as an imitator of Ben Jonson. It was acted,
we are told, before King Charles and Queen Henrietta Maria. It contains the
passage (II, v) '*Let him sit in the shop and play at fox-and-geese with
the foremen." In the middle of the following century we find a second writer
of somewhat greater note^in his day at least—alluding to the game in his
only romance. This is the Irishman, Henry Brooke, a friend of Pope, who,
in his ** Fool of Quality** (1766-68), makes one of his characters ask (I., p. 367):
**Can you play at no kind of game. Master Harry t'* to which the reply is,
**A little at fox-and-geese, madam,** the inference being, of course, that he
who knows no other game than one so simple and so rustic must indeed be
a fool. The literary reader will remember that Charles Kingsley was so great
an admirer of this eighteenth century novel that he edited a reprint of it
Fox-and-geese is, in fact, one of those games of which there are but few ap-
pearances in general literature ; indeed, the game was even regarded as too
familiar a sport to be treated in such compilations as the **Compleat Game-
ster*' of earlier days, or the "Hoyle** of later times, and as certainly too
rustic to be introduced into the higher fields of literature. In the farm-
houses of America is often to be found a fox-and-geese board of wood,
made with holes into which pegs are inserted, the peg denoting the fox
being always a little higher than the others. In England the fox-and-geese
scheme is, sometimes at least, drawn on a round piece of board, with cir-
cular depressions at the intersections of the lines to receive the marbles with
which the game is played, the fox being usually represented by a blue marble
and the geese by gray ones.
Strutt, in his already cited "Sports and pastimes** (1833, pages 318-319),
has the following account of the game:— *' This is a game somewhat resem-
bling that of mdrelles in the manner in which the pieces are moved; bvt in
other respects, as well as in the form of the table, it differs materially; the
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152
CHESS IN ICELAND
Fig. 12.
intersections and angles are more numeroas, and the points, of course, in-
creased, which adds to the number of moves. To play this game there are
needed seventeen pieces, called geese, which are placed as we see them upon
the engraving {tig. 12), with the fox in
the middle, distinguished, either by his
size or difference of colour, as hero, for
instance, he is black. The business of
the game is to shut the fox up, so that
he cannot move. All the pieces have
the power to move firom one spot to an-
other, in the direction of the right lines,
but cannot pass over two spots at one
time. It is to be observed that this board
is sometimes made with holes bored
through it, where the dots are, and pegs
equal to the number of geese put into
them, and the fox is distinguished by
being larger and taller than the rest. The geese are not permitted to take
the fox, if he stands close to them, but the fox may take the geese, in like
case, if the spot behind them be unoccupied, or not guarded by another goose;
and if all be taken, or the number so reduced that the fox cannot be blocked,
the game is won. The great deficiency of this game is, that the fox must
inevitably be blocked if the game be played by a skilful hand ; for which
reason, I am told, of late some players have added another fox ; but this I
have not seen.** The writer, in his last sentence, is possibly referring to
the French game of assaut which we have just mentioned.
The American mode of play, which differs little or not at all from that
prevalent in England, is thus concisely described in the "Century" dictionary
(sub voce "fox'*): "Fox-and-geese, a game played on across-shaped board
or on a chess-board with pins or checkers [draught-men], one of which is the
fox, the rest the geese. The geese move forward one square at a time, and
win if they can surround the fox or drive him into a corner. The fox can
move forward or backward, captures the geese as men are taken in checkers,
and wins if he capture all the geese.**
In Germany the customary name for fox-and-geese is, as we have noted,
fUcfis und hUhner {or fuchs-und hUhnerspiel); it is said to be styled in South
Germany, or in portions of that region, der fuchs im hUhnerhof (" the fox in
the chicken yard**). But, according to a recent book on games (A. Von Hahn,
"Buch der spiele,** 3d. ed., Leipsic, 1900, pp. 252-3), it is likewise called, as
in England, der fuchs und die gdnse ("fox and geese**). In this late work
the author describes, first, the modern asallo, for which his name is
das festungs' und belagerutigsspiel, he liaving no idea, evidently, that it is the
development of another game, and begins his account with a description of
the board. This he follows with a short paragraph on fox-and-geese, the
text of which we quote in full : "Ahnlich ist das spiel: *der fuchs und die
glinse,* welches auf einem gleichen brett, jedoch ohne festungspl&tze, gespielt
wird. Eine flgur, der fuchs, steht auf dem mittelfeld und hat dieselben rechte
wie die festungssoldaten. Er darf vorwlirts und riickwlirts marschieren,
jedesmal von einem punkt zum nachsten, und darf eine gans nehmen, wenn
das in gerader linie hinter ihr befindliche feld frei ist. Die siebzehn g&nse
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STRA Y NOTES 153
Bind auf der einen halfte aufgestellt, diirfen ntcht schlagen; sie haben
gewonnen, wcnn es ibnen gelingt, den fuohs so einzuschliessen dass er nicht
mehr Ziehen kann. Links und rechts neben dem Aichs ist ein leerer platz.
Der fuchs gewinnt, wenn er letzteren umgeht und jene wegschlagt, "
This attempted notice of the original game displays no very accurate
knowledge of the matter, and is carelessly written. It is enough, however,
to show that the mode of play corresponds with that practiced in other
lands. It is still a common diversion in German rural districts. ^
The game is yet well known and practiced on the Scandinavian mainland,
but exact information about it, in those colintries, is diffloult to procure. The
printed notices of it are unsatisfactory and not infrequently erroneous. The
Swedish ** Hand-bibliothek fOr sallskapsnojen/' heretofore cited, begins
(II., p. 645) with the asalto^ styled belogringsapd, or sometimes, as the
writer states, fastningsspel ("fortress-game"). At the end of the description
we are told that he who plays the defenders in one game, generally directs the
besiegers in the next. This is followed by fox-and-geese, to which the name
rdfspel ("fox-game'*) is assigned (pp. 647-8). It is preceded by a diagram of
the board unlike any other that we have seen. Instead of having 20 squares
with 33 points on the angles, as in the usual cross-shaped board, it has 24
squares with 37 points. The four additional squares are inserted in the
angles made by the outer lines of the two sections of the cross, namely
those formed (see fig. 11) by the figures 4, 9, 8; 6, 11, 12; 22,23, 28, and 30,
25, 26. How much this novel board is used in Sweden and how much the
older one, it is impossible to say. We are told that this scheme is
composed of 26 squares, the writer's own diagram, however, showing, as we
have stated, that there are only 24. He gives the number of the sheep {far)
as 22, an addition of 5 to the game as we practice it in England and America.
The "sheep" occupy the 22 points on the central and all other lines above
it ; the fox is placed on any point below, at the will of its player. The
mode of play and capture is as generally described. We are informed that
the object of the fox is to make his way to the rear of the flock of sheep,
that of the sheep is to shut in the fox. As in the heWgringsspel the opposing
players take the sides of the fox and sheep alternately. It is not impossible
that this form of the game may have superseded the older and usual one in
^ A« a matter of intereat, vre trantlat* the compiler** aceonnt of tho a«aUo, or as be
ealli it *<tho game of fortroM and tiege" (p. 25S): *'Thh game It played on a board, having
the form of a erost and thirty thrre point* united by lines. Nine of these point* represent the
fortress, which is defended by two soldiers. These two men at thu beginning of the game
may be plaoed, at will, on any two point* appertaining to the fortress. The 94 places outaide
of the fortress are oeenpied by the soldier* of the beeieging p«rty. Tbe ta*]c of ihe*o latter
is to occupy ail the nine point* of the fortre**, and for this purpo*e to drive oat, or entice
from it, the garrison of two men. The besieger* must advance on the line* toward the
fortre**, bringing a man, at every move, nearer to the sought for goal. Bvcry besieger can
be eaptored by the defendant which stands In front of him, whenever he is not protected by
a man in the rear. From this it follows that the men mn*t advance maesod togHiher as far
a* po*sible. If one of the defenders neglects to capture, then he can be "blown,** that is to
say, captured. Under certain circumstances the defendant* are allowed to capture one or
two men in order to draw them farther and farther out of the fortress. The defenders also
move one step at a time, but can hop over a* roauy of tbeir opponent* a* are to be found
with a vacant, or undefended point in their rear. When there are no longer enough beaiegers
to fill the nine points of the fortress then the defendant* have won. If, on the other hand,
the eoldlor* are either penned up inside their fortress, or have been expelled In soch a way
that they cannot return to it, the game has been gained by the besiegers."
20
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154 CHESS IN ICELAND
some, if not all of the provinces of Sweden, for wo do not find, in any work
on games, an account of the ordinary board, until we reach the " Illustrerad
spelbok" of "Tom Wilson" (see p. 136 and note 131), and so much of that
work, as previously hinted, is transtated from foreign productions, that we
can hardly trust it as a Swedish authority.***
Fox-and-geese has certainly long been practiced in Iceland, but just how
long it is difficult to say. It is called in that island refshdk (fox-chess); from
the signification of this name we may infer that the game reached the country
after the introduction of chess. The theory has been mooted that it has an
older title {hnottafl or hnettaft)^ and that under this term it is mentioned in
the sagas ; but we shall refer to this supposition in detail hereafter. At
the present time, special boards for refshdk are rarely or never found. It is
oftenest played on a diagram drawn with chalk on a board, or marked on
paper, or on a slate. In the work "fslenzkar gAtur," so often cited, the
game is described as follows (pp. 298-300): "As in so many other sports
refshdk is played, by two persons; one of them has a 'fox' {t6a\ and the
other 13 'lambs* ijionib) [the latter being, of course, the English 'geese*].
Ordinarily the 'lambs* are placed at the points indicated (fig. 11) as 1 to 13
^ The SwediBh text, under the heading <<BelftfriiigMpelot" (p. 645) it «'Till d«tta spel,
•om p& tyaka kallas: da§ belagerung$'tpi«lf p& franska : le jeu d'a^Muty ocb hfir i Bverige
Afven \iB\\aL» : /d4tning$Mpe1, erfordras ett brftde eller en tafla af det utseende motstjlcudc flgnr
utviaar oeh dertlll S:n6 s&rikilt utm&rkta pjeser t]Wr soldater, som Tld »pekta bSrJan hafvit
•ina plataer A flUtningen, taint andra 84 aoldater, Kom plaecrat & bvar tin af mndlarne utom
flUtningen, ocb hvilkat bemSdande b6r vara att iutaga fiittuingen. Llnierna utTita, buru
toldaterna m&tle framrycka, nemligen de angripande endaatpi derOda [lines], ett ttegbvarju
gftng, utan att g& tlUbaka. De torn fSrtvara f&stningen fft Til ej heller ga mer an ett ateg i
tender, men kanna gA pft b&de tTarta ocb r5da linfer fram ocb tillbaka, ocb kuiina ocb m&tte
tl&llkatomi tebaok[?] ocb borttagahvar ocb en bredvid at&ende pjet, d4 nftata rum &r ledigt,
aamt intaget. Detta giller fOr t& m&nga pjeaer, torn dcrtill gifva tillflllle, t&tom i dam. r&
detta t&tt tCka fi>raTararne, att minaka de angripande* antal; men bSra akynda tig till baka
i flUtningen. De angripande kunna deremot Icke «1&, utau m^tte jomt tCka att h&ila tig
tlUbopa ocb bemSda tig att f& fdrtvararne utai&ugda fr&n flUtnlngin. Slir icke en fOrtvarare,
d& dertlll ftr tillf&Ue, &ger den tpelare, torn fOrer de angripande, att likatom t dam htUta bort
den, d. ▼. a. bortUga fOrayararne uUn rubbning i apelet, Hufvudgrundcn f^r apelet Uratl fa
fOrayararne ur fbtningeu, fOr att kunna intaga alia 9 platserna, bvilket ftr enda yilkoretfor
yunnet tpel. Kan det eJ ako, yinner den, torn anfSrer iSrayararne. Den, aom en giog fort
fdrtvararne, fOrer merendelt nftata g&ug angriparne.*' The detcrlption of "r&fspelet** reads
that : " Hirtill nytljat en flgur, tadan tom den motat&ende, med 26 [84] qyadrater, byilka i
bvarje hCrn bar ett h&I, bvari paaaa a& yill den pjea, aom f5reat&ller r&fven, tom de, bvilka
fOrett&lla f&ren, hvilkat antal ftr 88. En apclare forer den fdrra, ocb en annan de s«duare.
Kan den fSrra komma bakom f&ren, ir apelet vunnet, likaaft & andra aidau, om de aednare
kunna inneatHnga r&fvon. Fftrcn uppttilla tig i allab&l p& alia linler frAn ocb med a, [central
line] till oeh med &, [appermoat line] och.rftfven f&r taga ain plata bvar honom bilst synea*
F&ren g& ett ateg hvarju gdng, 8& val IJlngaAt qvadrateruaa sidor, tom deraa korsliiilcr, men
de f& icke aid, hvaremot rafveii, aom bar aamma g'lug, f&r, likaaom i dam, el& hvart oeh ett
f&r, tom bar tomt rum bakom aig, oeh flora p& en g&ng, om tillf&Ile dertlll erbjudia. Faren
f& endatt g& fram&t ocb p& tidorna, men r&fven f&r g& oeh a]& fram orh tlUbaka. U&fven bCr
bemGda aig att borttaga 8& mftnga t&r aom mdjligt, f6r att bana tig yftg bakom f&rakoekvu*
F&ren &ter b6ra adka b&lla aig tlUbopa, att rAfven Icke kan f& tillf&lIe att borttaga n&gotj
bvarigenom do ovllkorligen akola Inat&nga r&fVen. Man brukar, merindelt, att den aom ena
gftngen fSrt r&fven, andra g&ugen forer f&ren." The ezpreaalon d« rCda ('*tbe red**) and
tvarta oeh rUda linUra ("black and red linea ") refer, doubtleta to a diagram printed (In
other imprettiona of the work) In two eolora. Here the diagram ia wholly in black. Prob-
ably it baa been^ In other Inatancea, ao printed that the llnea in the upper tection of the
eroat (the "fortreat") are black and tbo remain log liuea red. Although the board dlffert
from the genuine fcz-and-geeae in having the four additional squarea, the manner of play,
It will be teen , It exactly at In the Englith game.
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STRA Y NOTES 155
—the other op opposing man— the 'fox'— at the central point, 17. It is the
aim OP object of the formep to shut the * fox ' in, that is, to arrange the
'lambs' in such- a manner that the opponent can no longer move, while the
latter seeks to defend himself and capture as many of the 'lambs' as possible.
The player of the * lambs ' endeavours to guard his pieces, of course, as the
more men he retains the easier is it to enclose the 'fox.' A capture takes
place thus : If the ' fox ' stand close to any ' lamb,' that is, if the ' lamb '
stand on the point next to the 'fox,' and there is no piece on the point
behind it in a direct line, the fox is permitted to Jump over his opponent
to the vacant spot. The 'lamb' is then removed. If the 'fox' stand, for
example, on 11 and the 'lamb' on 5 and there is no piece on 1, then the
'fox' jumps over the point 5 to 1 and thus captures the 'lamb.' In other
respects the manner of the moves can be readily seen. The ' lambs' follow
the iines and the 'fox' chases after them. Both may move to any part of
the board on right lines; both, too, go forward and backward (although
some assert that the 'lambs' are allowed to march only in a forward
direction). The 'fox' is in the greatest danger if it move into either of
the four extremities of the cross, as it is more easily surrounded in those
regions, but it sometimes, when hotly pursued, finds it necessary to retreat
to some one of these perilous points. When the 'fox' can no longer move,
it is considered to be shut in, or as it is termed 'burned in,' but to effect
this the 'lambs' must stand on the next two points in every direction in
order to prevent the jumping and capture process. For instance, if the fox
is on 31 then, in order that it be ' burned in', < lambs' must stand on 23, t8, 29,
25, 32 and 33. It is much more easy to play the 'lambs' than to play the 'fox,'
for he who guides the movements of the former, if he has had considerable
practice, is sure to win. There are no counters or men special to refskdk.
Beads or coffee-beans are used for the 'lambs,' and something larger, for
example, a button or thimble, for the fox." The author closes by saying :
^^ Refskdk is the most common board-game which I have met with. J6n
Olafsson remarks that every human being knows it. In his time (1750)
it was played as it is to-day, or, at least, the board used was the same.
SigurQur Ou6mundsson says that refskdk must be the same as hnottafl or
hnettafl, which is supposed to have been practiced in ancient days, and
J6n Olafsson likewise hints at the same thing." ^*^
*** The original leelandie U m follows: <' Treir meDH t&n« refskik, elna eg fle«t Onnur
t6fl. Ann«r beflr l6a, en hinn heflr 18 Idmb. Bg aet a5 hornit 1 inUi tCb lambamanninuni, og
■kipar hann ^eiin k r«itlna 1-13. Hfnn setur aptur t6una k miSreUinu, 17. I>a& er mark og mtS
UmbananiulM a9 brala t6nna lonl, aklpa ISmbunara avo, aA t6an geti ekkert komlst, en hiun
reynir aptur til aA varua ]>Ti, og laatar t6a sina drepa aem fleat 10mb. Lambama^urlnn T«r ^aa
aptur eptlr maattl, >vi epiir >▼{ aem bann boflr fleiri lOmb, eptlr ^vi reitir bonum hiegra tA
braala l6ana Innl. Dr&pi& far l>annlg fram : Kf t6an atendar k einhverju Iambi, >. e. ef Iamb
atendur k reit >eim, aem er onatur t6aniil, en ckkert k )>eim, aem er annar raltttr fr4 henni, i
beina linu, >& mi bda atOkkva yflr lambl9, og jflr & au^a reitloo. Hdn drapur )>& lambid am
MA. fraS ar takt9 & burt, og er dr aSgannl. Ef t6an atendnr t. d. k 11 og lamb 4 6, en ckkert
k 1, >& mk hdn atdkkra 4 1 og drepa Iambic. Q4ngarlnn er annara eMilegur. LOmbin fara
leiftar ainnar og tdan eltir ^an. Baa&i mega fara 4 alia reiti i tafllna, eptlr belnam linom,
bK5i aptar 4 bak og 4rram. Hmttaat er t6annl, ef bdn fer dt i hornln, og format bda >aft
1»t{ etna og heltan eld. Aptar ncy^Iat bda atoudum ti] ^eaa, ef lOmbin reka hart 4 epUr.
Pegar 't<^aii getor ekki komlst aeitt, er bdn brsid e«a bread Innl, en til l>eaa ver^a 16mb
aA atanda 4 tTelmar n»eta reitam tI) hana, i allar 4ttlr, >vi ef a) elna vaari lamb 4 neata
rait, ^ gati t6aa drepl^ >aft og aloppi^ avo. Ef toan atendar t. d. 4 81, >4 er bdn ^yi aft
eiaa braold Inai, a» Idmb atandi 4 88, 88, 88, 86, 88 og 88. Mlkla er aaftveldara $A vera me»
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156 CHESS IN ICELAND
It will thus be seen that the Icelandic refskdk is what has been called,
in a previous page, the older form of fox-and-geese, using only 13 men
instead of the 17 common at the present time in other countries. Olafur
Davilisson adds to his description an account taken from the Danish *'Spil-
lebog for born'' (Copenhagen 1853, pp. 33-36) of asalto^ called, as we have
said, in Danish bel^ringsspil. He gives its method of play exactly as we
have elsewhere portrayed it.
We should not forget to note that QuCbrandur Vigfusson, under the
word ?iali (tail), defines halatafl as **a kind of game used synonymously with
hneftafl, " to which he refers the reader. He furthermore says that the game
was " probably similar to the English *fox and goose' [sic]." Then ho
cites from the Grettis saga (144 A) this sentence, which we quote with his
comments: "Twinn tefldi hnel-tafl, pat var stort hala-tafl (having a fox with
a big tail) hann greip pd upp tofiuna ok setti halann a kinnbein Pcn-Umi
(probably of the brick representing the fo^). " The word "brick" signifies
here " piece " or " man. " The lexicographer then cites the report in regard
to the archaeological museum at Rokjavik by Sigur6ur GuOmundsson (1868),
and likewise refers, for the expression hali d hnefa-toflu^ to the Vilmundar
saga ViOutan (chapter 8). There is no description of the way in which this
hala-tafl (or "tail game") was played; but we shall hear more about it in
the next section.
In looking over what wc have been able to gather in regard to the his-
tory of this simple game, and its practice in various lands, we may, perhaps,
definitely conclude that it cannot be identical with the old saga game to
which we have so frequently referred. Even if it were to be proved to bo
the same as that diversion which was known as Freystafl^ we could hardly
assign it to the earliest period of the saga age. We shall have to look
elsewhere for anything which can throw a gleam of light upon the history
or character of hnetafi or hnefatafl "*.
IfimbiB en t6uDa, og ef i4 er g69ur taflmaftur, tern h«flr |>au, ])4 k hann rlnnioginn viaan.
Ekkl eru nelnlr aSrstaklr taflmenn i refak&k. Gler tt9a kaffibaunir eru haf&ar tyrXv ISmb, en
•UtbTa) atArra, t. d. boappar e&a fingurbJ5rg fyrir t6a. Refak&k er AlgelugaaU t«fl )>ar aem
•g ]>ekkt til. J6n Olafiison aegfr lika, »A brert mannabarD kuiinl hana. Hi&n hefir rerl^ eina
k baua dOgum og hdn er nA, eS« tA niinaU koatl er refakakarmynd %% aem hann heflr dregift
upp, AlTeg elna og ati aem h£r er prontaS. Sigurftor milarl aeglr, «5 rebkik mani Tera aama
aem hnottafi c5a hnett^ft t>«S, aem ti&kadlat i garala daga, og drepor J6n Ol&faaon ^ogar k
^al).*" See Olafar DaTlSaaon'« "Skemtanlr" (tCfl, pp. 198-9). *
*^ The auggoatlon that the early leelandie hiffaiafl and hnotUi^ were two difTerent
gamea, and that one of thorn ia ropreaented by the existing foz-and-geeae, flrat ooeura in an
article pnbliahed by the Copenhagen royal aoeiety of northern antlqaarlea in ita '* Annaler
for nordlak oldkyndigbed*' (Copenhagen 1838-9, pp. 198-lM, the artlele having a large
folding plate). Ita tillo ia "Om Skakiipil i det gamie norden i aulednlng af et rigtigt ftind
paa Hebriderne/' and it is augtreatod by Sir Frederick Madden*a well-known eaaay In the
Bngliah '< ArehaeoIogla'*.of 1832, "Hiatorical remarks on the ancient cheaa>men diaeovered In
the iale of Lewis/* in which Sir Frederick takea the groand that the eheee-roen In queatlon
were fabricated in Iceland — a theory which enables him to cite many of the allnalona to eheaa
in the aneient leelandie writioga. His essay waa separately reprinted with the same date, and
aubaeqnently reprodueed in the flrat volume of the '*Cheaa-Blayer'aehronlole*' (London, 1841).
The name of the author of the Danish artlele ia not givon, but It Is said to be ** red oldaag-
eommitteen " — the aoeiety*a committee on antiqultlea, but in none of the aeeeaaible pabliea-
tiona of the aoeiety of northern antlquariea, Isaued in the years between 1880 and 1845. do
we find the names of the members of this oommlttee. Two men who made part of It were
pretty surely the arehsBologiats, J. J. ▲. Worsaae and 0. J. Thomson. The eharaeter of the
artlele may be judged Arom the faot that Ita compiler la inelioed to eee aome eoaneettoD belweea
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STRAY NOTES 157
What was " Tables.*" >*^ — It is first necessary to consider what the me-
diaeval game of tables really was. English writers, especially the compilers
of lexicons, are all agreed that it was the diversion now known in England as
backgammon^ in France, and in certain other lands, as trictrac {tricktrack)^
sometimes written tictac {ticktack)^ in Germany as pu/f, in Portugal as
labolaSj in Spain as tahlas reales, in Italy as tavola reale. In Arabic lands,
as we have stated (p. 92), or at any rate in Egypt, backgammon is styled
li*b et taula (the '' game of tables '' or the ^* table game '*), which title, if
we coald prove that it had a certain age, would tend to make sure its iden-
tification with the old *' tables, '' but we fear that in the near East, both
the name and the game, as now played, are comparatively modern impor-
tations (within the last two or three centuries) from Italy— like so many
other terms and customs in the Levantine lands. Perhaps the appellations
UwoJa reale, (royal table) in Italy and tablas reales (royal tables) in Spain—
as indicating a court game— may deserve some weight as testimony to the
identity of the old and the new ^ames. Outside of England the identifi-
cation by the lexicographers, of backgammon with tables, is not quite
general; in fact, we recall very few out-and-out statements to that effect
coming from authoritative continental writers, though their silence may be
explained by the fact that they take for granted the continuity of U-
bles-backgammon ; nor, in regard to this matter, does investigation into
the precise significations of the various names bestowed upon the game
help us much. The English lexicologists treat us, as usual, to a liberal
supply of absurd etymologies, the only possible one of those suggested
being bach -^ gammon^ back supposed to arise from the going back or
Bk&k a« th« DAme of a game and the Garman §chdehtr (tee p. 60 lo the present volunte); that
he declarce '*horae " to have been an old Kngllab name for the knight, and that the RogtUh
appellation for ihe bltbop la *<foor*; that hondi <'!• aarely the oldest Northern name for the
pawn,** (p. 157); and that the knight was, in the earliest times, styled In the North r«idArd]cur
— all of which statements lack only tmth to make them Interesting. The foot-note on fox-
and-geese (p. 160) Is as follows: ** Ilnotta/l signifies properly the gamo of 'anU* or a game
played with pleoes of a nut-like form ; a huni 'boar,* or the 'young of a bear,' wai formerly
the chief piece ; later 'fox* as tho only beast of prey In Iceland, took its place, for the game
is now styled r€/»kdk. The remaining pieces represent nheep, or lambs, who are pursued
by ibe fox. This also oocars in that variety of game with which the Laplanders (Finlapper)
amnse themselves, but there the fox pursues the geese, as in the aermans' gdnaetpistf tbo
Rngllshmen*B foote-plajf, the Dutchmen's gansMptelt and the Frenchmen *s Jeu d* oi«.*' This
last phrase constitutes ono of the higher flights of tho lexicographical muse, for whatever
the games therein mentioned may be they are pretty certainly not in any sense fox-and-
geese. The author closes his note by Informing ns that In Denmark it is generally hund^n
(the dog, the hound) — in pronunciation resembling the old Aiini— which in the same game
pursues the hares, benee the Danish name. Whether the Danish hund og har^r eorresponds
to the leelandio- r«/«ibifc or not there Is some doubt; Molbeeh In his "Danik ordbog*' eitos
DO snrh phrase, but hai (sub han) horttavl, explainet^ as "a kind of game with counters,'*
and gives a variant, "harespU.** The compiler Indulges in the usual historieal surmises,
su^ as (p. 154) the opinion that the chess queen may "possibly In old times'* have been
called Freya after the Seandiuavian goddess; that the bishop (p. 156) "in the psgan North,
we think, had the name of hymingur (hornbearlng)," and so on. The artlete enumerates
aeveral finds of ebes«>men In the North, and, besides the large folding plate, has many wood*
cut Illustrations In the text, somtf from Madden and others from various other sources.
^ There Is a close connection between this section and a previous seetlon ('<Tafi,"
pp. 69-98] of thU division of the present volume — so close that even a not very aareftil
reader may drseover some repetitions, and perhaps some contradictions as well. But an
attempt has been made to separate. In some degree, the mediaeval literature and philology
of "Ubies" trmm Ite general history and the accounte of Ite varying methods of play.
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158 CHESS JiV IGELA ND
return of the men from one table to another, and gammon being the
Middle-English gammen, gamen, and early modern English gamen= game
(the final syllable -en having been dropped, in existing English, under the
erroneous belief that it was a suffix). This is all doubtless correct as to the
latter element of the word, but the best authorities confess that the first
element is still an uncertain quantity. Trictrac, iictac, with their different
orthographies, are considered to be variants of an onomatopoetic theme,
having its origin in the rattling sound of the dice. This theory, however,
though so generally accepted, seems more than doubtful. It may be that
the word tricktrack {trictrac) is merely an alliterative reduplication (having
reference to the route taken by the men), signifying a forward and back
movement after the manner of '* zig-zag;'' or it may be the application —
a point we shall treat later — of an onomatopoetic word already existing
(signifying any sharp, clattering sound). As to ticktack {tictac), it can be
regarded as a variant, possibly with a remote reference to the Italian
toccare (to toutfh), which occurs in the name of the variety of tables (back-
gammon) known as toccategli (=" touch itT')— a title, however, which has
been apparently more prevalent abroad than in Italy. The German puff^**
is generally supposed to be identical with our English "puff" in its ety-
mology, but its raison d'etre as the title of a game, despite Grimm's expla-
nation (" Wttrterbuch, " sub voce) — it his remark can be considered an
explanation— it is difficult to comprehend. But there may very well be quite
a different etymology, connected with the Spanish bufa (see p. 88), which
the editors of Grimm would naturally not know. Tavola reale and tdblas
reales^ in the two chief romance idioms of the South, imply simply that this
game is the best or noblest of the varieties of" tables. " There is the usual
confusion, not only of names, but of genera. In the English-speaking world
(at least in the American part of it), for instance, is practiced a sort of
backgammon called " Russian," in which not only is the playing, or move-
ments of the pieces in accordance with the casts of the dice, but the men
are "entered" upon the board by the same method of chance, before the
play proper begins— the former style of setting the men beforehand in their
appointed (place or) places being now esteemed old-fashioned. In the history
of a sport like this, we constantly see changes occurring, new fashions in
the mode of conducting the game, newer varieties of old forms introduced.
The sense and purport of technical terms are frequently altered in different
localities and in different ages. Sometimes we find, for example, tricktrack^
as in Hans Sachs, described as a variety differing from backgammon proper.
*
^** TrUtrae It now the qiore lunal name In most parta of Germany; but pH0^ li older.
It la to be found In German lettera even before tbe day* of Hana Saeha (d. 1576), but the
Nuremberg poet enumerate* some of the varletlea of it played in hia day, Including among
these, trietraCf which he atylea, like some other anthora of hta timOi dieksdaek. He mitlcea
one of hla charaotert sfty :
Dergleich ieh den bretapiel anhang
Ich kan daa hurt und audi daa lang,
Pvf^ g9g9npuff und anch regal
Diokedaok und die Utrtteh sumal.
But far earlier— in the Itth eentnry in fact ~ In the writings bearing the name of tbe
"Schulmeiater of Beallngen*' wo are told that "das drsto apll iat Uif genanni.*'. If the date
be eorreet this would be written about the time Alfonso waa treating of the same game In
Spain. In the eitaftion the word Iwrtteh is, doabtlosa, the Rnglish *< lurch.'*
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STRAY NOTES 159
We have had, too, in England a species of backgammon known as fayles,
defined in the dictionaries as ^' an old game, a kind of backgammon,'* or as
** a complicated kind of backgammon, played both with men and pegs,*' of
which an account, written a century ago, has already been given (see p. 88,
foot-note), in which we are told that the name of this variation of tables
comes from the fact that by some particular throw of the dice, a player
*'was disabled from bearing off any of his men and therefore fayled in
winning tde game ^^— which assertion, we fear, is to be looked at as only
an etymological surmise. '^ We have already cited (p. 79) what seems to
us almost, or quite the latest instances of the use of the word tables in En-
glish literature, namely in 1716 and 1753, but these were apparently isolated
cases; the term really ceased to be in common usage before 1650. The
earliest appearance of ^' backgammon,'* which we can recall, was in the
same century, in a book of great popularity in its day, and still one
of the best collections of epistolary literature in English, the *^ Familiar
Letters ** of the traveller and student, James Howell (1596-1666), quaintly
entitled by the author ♦' Epistolae Ho-Elianae, '* of which the first of
many editions was issued in 1646. Howell writes it baggamon. So we
may say— if further investigations do not contradict us — that as "ta-
bles " went out " backgammon *' came in, which is at least a slight
argument for their identity. The technical term hack-game was in use
at the time of the change, and doubtless before and after. The play-
wright, Colley Gibber, as the reader has been told (p. 79), speaks of " a back-
game at tables. ** It is notable, too, that one section of a work published
about that time, the **Compleat Gamester" (1674), is divided into "games
within the tables ** and those " without the tables. ** It is soon seen that the
former term means games played on the inside of the ordinary table-boards,
for they are all varieties of " tables, ** or " backgammon. '* The names are:
"Irish, hackgammony tables, quater, doubblets**— a list of much historical
interest both because it contains the two names, " backgammon " and " ta-
bles** of the same date, but in other respects — particularly looked at*from
an Icelandic point of view, as regards quater. It will be seen A-om all this
that there are very good reasons for believing that, both in Oreat Brit-
ain and on the continent of Europe, the modern backgammon, as a generic
term for all games played on the trictrac-board, is the proper representative
of the mediaeval tables ; but it must not be forgotten that this name of it, as
the appellation of its principal game or variety, belongs only to the English
lands. On the continent its most common appellation is trictrac (France),
while others are used in other lands, Portugal preserving the old tables
(tabolas), while Spain {tabolas reales) and Italy {tavola reale) use terms de-
scended from the ancient name. The essential features in the old game were:
1. The double table (not meaning that there were actually two boards hinged
or fastened together, such as we do indeed often see nowadays, thus made for
the sake of convenience, but signifying that the board itself was divided into
fl
^^ There is a derivafcion even more ladlcroaa ihao this, given to tbe word tickiack. Id
that once famous book, already kuown to us, the *'Compleat Gameslor,*' — the arst edition
of which bears the date of 1674 — lu which we are informed that the game "is so called
from < touch and take,* fur If you touch a man you must play him, though to your loss " —
the etymological guosser not seeing that takt and ^^lay are words of totally different
meaning.
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160
CHESS IN ICELAND
two parts, both bearing the technical name of "tables," the men moving, in
the course of the game, out of the one into the other) ; 2. The number of the
men— 30 in all, 15 to each player; and 3. The use of dice in deciding how the
men were to be placed or moved. These are likewise the chief features of
backgammon {trictrac^ pufTn tavola reale). Only once, in any land, do we find
an allusion to fewer men than 30, that being, as we shall see, in the work
of a modern Icelandic writer, with whom it is probably the result of an
erroneous assumption. The table-board, or backgammon-board, seems to
have always had, in European usage, for the last six-hundred years, 12
"points" on each board — 24 in all. Thus Tommaseo — as we remember
(p. 86) — in his great Italian dictionary tells us (sub voce "tavola") about
the tavola reale and its *' ventiquattro scacchi [=points]." ^^ In this con-
nection it is well to bear in mind that the *♦ points " in backgammon cor-
respond to the " squares " in chess, and that they are expressed in some
languages by the same word, as for instance, in the Arabic {bit, " house ").
Indeed, if we may give credit to a wood-cut occurring in Van der Linde's
Fig. 13.
account of the Alphonsine manuscript (*' Qliellenstudien," p. 72), the points,
in the first European board, were represented as " houses, " that is, as
quadrangular spaces. As to the little known about the treatment of the
game of tables in this MS, the date
of which is, as the reader will recall,
as early as 1280, see the preceding
section (pp. 87-89).
On the North side of the Apen-
nines, very soon after this time, seve-
ral representations of the table-board
are to be found in manuscripts pre-
served in the public libraries. This
fact, as well as^ the various dates
which we have already given, prove
that even before the days of Alfonso
Fig. u.
a large part of Europe was familiar with the game (see the many citations in
the section " Tafl," pp. 69 fE.). The design showing two players at backgam-
^ TocbnloAlly tho word tavola (iu [tho singular) now means in Italy the ending of *
ebess-game by perpetoal cbeek, or the termination of a game of draughts, which is drawn
because of the lack of a winning force on either side.
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STRAY NOTES
161
mon (fig. 14) ^ is taken ftom a richly illustrated MS now in the British Museum,
which certainly goes back to the very beginning of the XlVth century, or, as
some scholars think, to the century before that. On tlie board between them
will be seen the counters and some of the points, as also the dice, of which
last, as will be noticed, three were used, as was not unusual. The absence
of dice-boxes may likewise be observed, the dice, as we have suggested (pp. 74-5,
note), having, as is evident, been " thrown " by the hand. It is plain that the
partie is about to begin as none of the men have been placed. The next design
(fig. 15) is from a later period, of the XlVth century, and belongs to a MS
in ihe same library, *« being a notable and unedited treatise on the game
Fig. 16.
of tables, to which we refer in detail elsewhere. It shows a board com-
posed of two tables, or four half-tables. Dr. Wright says: *' It was probably
this construction which caused the name to bo used in the plural; and, as,
the Anglo-Saxons always used the word in the singular, as is the case also
with John of Salisbury in the Xllth century, while the plural is always used
'^ Thl* ftnd the foUowtng out we take from the article "On domestic games and amuse-
ments in the Middle Ages,** contributed by the archseologfst and literary historian, Thomas
Wright, to the Ijondon '* Art Journal" (Mos. 49 and 51, January and March 1859). It
afterwards formed chapter X ('* Amusements after dinner— Gambling — The games of chess
— lU History — Dice — Tables — Draughts*') of the author's « History of domestic manners
and sentiments in Europe during the Middle Ages '* (London 1869, pp. 194-255). The essay
still merits separate reprinting, and with a capable editor, might now be easily much en-
larged and made of greater Interest.
*** As this Important codex, though often described, has, as it would appear, nerer yet
been published, we reproduce the text here in full. The transcript was made, necessarily in
some haste, in the summer of 1900 Ly tlio Icelandic scholar, Mr. Sigfds Blondal, now
connected with the royal library at Copenhagen. It will be noticed that the MS is in such a
condition as to present not a few obscurities : —
Ludtu anglieorwn, Multi sunt ludi ad tabulas, quorum primus est longus Indue, et est Indus
Anglioorum, et est communis, et e«t talis naturaj. Hie qui sedet ex parte .am. habeblt.xv.
homines in puneto .^., et ille qui sedot ex parte . n<^.,babebit .xv. homines in punoto .a.
Kt tunc ludunt cum tribus Uxillis vel cum duobus, supposito semper pro tertio taxlllo .ri.
Tunc ille qui est ex parte .am. dueet omnes sues homines, qui sunt in .99. per paglnas ,<pt»
ct . sn. et . m^. usque ad paginam ./a. et Ibi toilet eos. Ille antom qui est ex parte ,ntp. duoet
omnes sues homines qui sunt in .a. per paginas ,a/. .jpn.ns. usque ad paginam ,tq}» etibi
21
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162
CHESS IN ICELAND
by the writers of a later date, we seem Jastified in concluding that the
board used by the Anglo-Saxons and Anglo-Normans consisted of one table,
like that represented in figure 15, and that this was afterwards superseded
toilet •<>•. Ille auteni, qui prior abatalerit hoininet ■ooa, vineet. Kt •eiendam quod Ule qal
•edet ex parte . am. poteat nod«re quodltbet panetam in pegina .mg. et in paglna ./a.
exoepto pancto . a. quain oceupatar per duos homlnet adversarll sal rel plaree, et qttnm non
eet ibi niii nnoe homo, tunc potest capere eum. Bt quleunqae potest inoipere aliqaem homi-
nem adversaril uon uodatum In puncto, ubl termlnatur nonierae omnlam tcI •ingalorum
taxiUoram ettorum, poteet eapore eum, et tuno ille homo captui redibit ad paginam . ^., et
intrabit cum • vi. in . <., et eum . t. In • u., et ouin . Iv. in . sr., et enm . ill. in *y, et earn . II .
in .«., et enm .1. in tp.f et boo si Ilia punota non fuerint oocupata per allqnem de fait pro-
priia nee nodata per advereariam. Bt neque intraverlt illnm hominem eaptum, non potest la-
dore. Notandnm quod muUum expedlt in hoc ludo nodare punctnm , g» et ./• per Jaetnm
Fig. 16.
taxlUi tertii, In qoo supponitur lempor . rl., quod punotnm . g» aodare impedlet egreesnm
adyersaril sui ibidem eum .tI. Bt notandum quod in puncta nodata [ubique?] potes dneere
quos homines rolaerls ; Item ubtcunqao inveneris hominem adrersarii tnl non nodatunii potes
oapere enmi et faeere eum redire ad paginam, ubi prlmo stetlt in initio Indl. Bt eodem
mode ergo ille qui sedet ex parte . nqj. potest nodare quodllbet punctom in paglna . n; et in
pagtna • t<p, exeepto puneto ,tp. quum oecopatur per duos homines adrersarii sal Tel pluresi
ot quum non est ibI nidi unicus homo, tuno oapere potest eum. Kt quicuuque potest Inoipere
aliqnem hominem adyersaril sui uon nodatum in puneto, ubi termluatur uumerus taxiUorum
suorum omnium Tel slugulorum, potest capere eum. Bt tune ilie homo oaptus redibit ad pa*
ginam ./a. et intrabit cum . tI. In ./. et cum . t. in . «. et oum . It. in . d. et cum . iil. in . c.
et cum .ii. in ,b etoum .l.in .a., et hoe si ilia puncta non sunt occupata per aliqnem de suis
proprils nee nodata per advcrsarium ; et usqoe Intrarerit Ilium hominem oaptnm non potest
ludero. Notandum qnod multum expcdit nodare puneta . «. et . <., propter causae quae supra
dixi. Bt non prius quam ille qui sedet ex parte .n(p, duxerlt onines luos homines In psglna .^d.,
toilet eos sub ista forma : 81 allquos homines haboat in puneto . <. IIIos toilet eum .tI. Tel sue
equlTalenti, Tldelieet It. 11. Hi, t. I., homines autem qui suut In puneto . u. tollentur eum • v.,
Tel sue equiyalenti^ ut It. i. ill. 11. tcI earn . Ti. si nollus homo fuerlt in puneto . L; homineii
qui sunt in puneto . x. tollentur cum . It. toI suo oqulvalenti, ut 111. 1. et 11. 11., vel eum .vi.
et . T. si non tuerint homines In ,t, nee in .u.; et sic delneeps si allqui homines Aierint In
puneto .y. tollentur euni .ill. toI suo equlTalenti, ut .11. i., Tel eum .tI., . t., .It., si non lunt
homines in . I. nee in . m. nee In ,x.\ et si allqui homines ftaerint in . s. tollentur eum . 11, Tel
oum .1. .1. Tel oum . tI., . t., . It., . ill., si non fuerint homines In . t, aee in . u. . nee in .«.
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STRAY NOTJSS
by the double board. ** But wo have already suggested that the plural term
may have arisen from the fact that the scheme essential to the game was
composed of two tabular designs, each with twelve points, and that these
ii«« in .y.; ot si allqn! homlnei fteerlnt In . <p, tollentnr per I. Ttl per .vi., .t., It., tit., II. al
non lant homlnei In . L n«e in .«. nee In . x, nee In .y. nee in f. Bodem mode lUe qni le-
det ex parte .am. toilet hominot raos In ptflnn ,/a,, et ille qui prior nbstalerlt homlnee eaoe
de UbttU, nie hnbebit Tietorinm.
Ret et nlla magna et ■ollemnis et mafni mafUlerii, at •! Ille qui ledit es parte tup, poMCt
nodare pancta ». o. p, q. r. Ita quod puQctum t, enet apertuui, et qaod poult eompellere
adTeriarium eaum ducere rill, bomlnee nique in panetum a., et tone facere quod babeat
nnam homlnem in .t, et allum in .«., et allum In »x., et allnm in .y., et allum In .««,
et allum in . <p. et eeptlmnm adbuo irredaotom ; et hise victoria Tooatar lympoldgng. Si
autero tota pagina ,<p. fkiit ooeapata per adTertariom [nee reliquitar?] auum ad lutraudum
[probablj tbe author meant if tbe **punctam «** be not open; compare whet follows] nbl
agat [?] bomlne« luoi, non roeabltur ilia vietorla limpolding aed voeatnr lurching, Cautela
antem in hoc ludo est, at ille qui ledet ex parte ,n4p. babeat lata poocia nodeta .n. o. p,
g, r,, et quod panetum . «. tit apertnm, Ita qaod adversartua eaua poaslt exire oum bomlni>
baa aula naque ad paglnam .mg, Kt eom ibidem doxerit ouam vel duoa de aaia, qaod atatim,
qoam primnm fieri poteet, nodotur panotam . a . Ita quod non poaslt ampllna exIre uaqne
omnee homiaea, quoa daxit In paglna . m^. ponantur in pnneto . a . et quod puneta . t, v, x,
y. «. occupentnr per adversaria u. Bt tune aperietar punetnm .a., at turn poaslt exire earn
aala homlnlbua in pagina . vig. et sio flat usque . vlll. hominee adversarll redduoantur In
pnneto [.a.]. Bt tunc claoao poneto .a. fae adversarium implere cam sais homiolbna puueta
,L ti. X, y. M, et tune remanebnnt dao homines adversarii In . ip, Bt tunc aperlatur pnnetam
.a., et tone semper capias adversarinm tnum In puncto . f. et ipse te reeaplet per . vi., qol
est semper iactns suppoeitus, Itaqne redlbis ad paglnam ,/a. et ibi intrabls, et redibis ad
paglnam .n«. usque Ille babeat onum lactam, per quem oportebit Ipsom evaoaare pnnctum ,tp.
de altero hominnm Ibidem repertorum, ita qaod tantam sit in . <p, anus homo, et rellqnantur
puueta . t. u. SB, y. s, oecapata per earn, et tuno' eaples septimnm aanm homlnem vagantem
et tone erit limpoldatna. Bet et alius modas ludendt mode snpradietua et [boo sine ?] taxillis,
ut cum uterque ludcnllnm possit eligere laetum quem volaerit. Ille tamen, qal habet prnro-
gatlvam ineipiendl, ipse vlneet si bonum ludat ; ipse eliget In primo suum laotnm . vi. vi. v.;
qui tune proprlam laetum ellgit, adversarlus sans si vellt exIre cum duobua homlntbna ex
pagina, in qua altaatur in prime ludi ; in prime iaetu eleeto podeat nodare semper earn, et
eapere eum, ot facere eam redire eum homine eapto et slo perdet laetus duorum taxillorum,
Bst et tertitts modus Indendl nt qoom anus ellgltnr iactua duorum taxillorum, et adver-
aarias anus dat . vi. laetum tertii taxilll, vol si ntraque pars lactet aaoe taxlllos et pars adversa
dat tertlum lactam.
Paumm carU, Bat et alius ludua ad tabulas qui voeatnr paum* earUt et sit late ludna enm
duobua taxlllla et aub hac forma. Nam debent duo ladentea caae ex una parte et duo ex «Ila,
vol trea ex ana parte et posteriuf alii ex alia parte, et slo alterntrum. Flat autem sors qul-
[bus 7] habeant prnrogatlvam Inclpiendl Kt ntraque pars habeblt .xv. homines. TiUdnnt autem
sub hao forma. Com laetn prime ponet nnum homlnem in . a. et eum . II. ponet homlnem in
. A. et eum . ill. ponet homlnem In . e. et cam . Iv . ponit homlnem in . d. et oum . v. ponet
hominem in . « . et com . vi. ponet homlnem In ./. Bt potest uodari quodllbet panetum ;
qunm tamen nnns homo invenltur aolua In puneto potest capl per adversarium, et tuno
oportet ipsnm iterate Intrare at prins. Cum lutraverint homiucA snos In pagina ./a. statim
tollent homines soos per leqnalea Iactua, per quoa eos intraverunt. Tile autem qui prior abatn-
lerit hominea auoa Inclpiet sdjuvare adveraarium auum et toilet homines adversarii anl uaqae
omnes tollantnr. Rt tano quot hominea babul t ab adversario sue, tune cum tot homlnlbua per*
endet palmae adversario rum suorom, et Ideo voeatur paume cati; Notandnm tamen quod in
iato ludo si allqols iacUvIt taxlllos Ullter quod slut nqualea, ut .vi. vl., v. v.,iv. iv., ill. Hi.,
II. II., 1. I., tam enm . vi. vi. ponet . iv. hominea In ./. et eum v. v. ponet Iv. hominea in .«. etale '
deineeps, et ultra hoc Iterate lactabit. Rt per eandem formam quum anfert hominea auoa, al
iaetet taxlllos Ita quod taotna sint leqnales, cam illo iaetu aufert iv. homines si Ibidem totl-
dem reperlantur. Kt quotlescnnque antem homo capitur redlntrabit de novo; Illo antem qni
prior abstulerit homines auoa Ipse vinoet, aive eaplat hominea ab adversario ano, sive non.
Ille antom qui nitlmom homlnee abstulerit, ipse inclpiet laetare In proximo Indo.
Bst etiam allna modus Indendl in hoe ludo ; quum, nt praedletum est, Intrabont In pa«
gina ./«• et prins ducent homines sues per paglnas . my. nt. usque ad paglnam . f^. et Ibl
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164 CffESS IN ICELAND
might have been, really were, and probably still are, in some localities,
painted on a single piece of board. Dr. Wright adds: " It is hardly necessary
to point out to oar readers that these two pictures of the boards show us
eoi tollent, ut prsBdletum est. NoUndom tam«D, qaod in boo Indo poteit quodlibet panoUim
nodari. Slo cum aliquis homo Tonerit in pagloam ,tq>. non potett amovorl do looo asqao lol-
Utur. Bt 8l Aliqutii homo eapUtar ubfoucqae faerit oportet primnm rodire ad paginam ./a. at
ibi intrare at prias, et post reddnot ad paginam . <a. et ibl tollt.
Ludut Lumbardorun. Est et alius Indus qui Tooatar Indus Lnmbardornm, et est talis na-
ture. l\\e qui sedet ex parte . vtp. habebit famlliam tuam in ./., et qol tedit ex parte .om.
habebit famillam in . t. Tune ille qui sedit ex parte . n^. dueet omncs snot homines existen-
tos in ./. per puneta .e. d. e, ft. a. in pagina . tqj. et ibi eos toilet. Cum omnes ibidem
fuerint dacet, [?] et erit qf. primum punotum in ablaiione, et anferat omues homines ibidem
existente« per . vi.; sic qui sunt in . e, auferentur per . r. et .▼! . [thus only, if no man Is
In .go.; compare the rules of ludua Anglieortim] et tie delnceps. Rt si eapiatur aliquis homo
suns, tune redibit intrando In paginam ./a. et redeat ad paginam .q>t,', et notandom qnod
Intrare non potest in ./. cum fnerit oeeupatnra per proprios homines, nee In allqno pnneto
nodato per adversarium. In punctis taroen . e. et . a. intrare potest, licet sunt ocoupata per
proprios homines, ideo mnltum cxpedit ilia puneta nodare, ut habeatnr introltue si neeesae
faerit. Item sa^po expedit nodare puneta . o. et ti, nt iropediatur introitus adveraaril. Bt slo
oodem modo faciet adversarius suns in pnnetts contra se posltis. Victoria autem eat coBimi»-
nls, Tidilieet ut qui prior homines sues abstalerit ipse vincet. Et flet iactns cum duobus
taxlllia tantum et non pluribus.
Imperial. Est et alius Indus qui yocatur imperial et est talis natnras. Ille qui sedit ex
parte . ntp, habebit tertiam partem familin sute, sive . ▼. in . p. et aliam tertlam in . e. et
allam tertiam in »t, Bt qnl sedet ex parte .am. habebit eodem modo famlliam auam In .k*
g. /, Bt si para ,ntp. earn familia tota citius venit ad pnnotam ,<p, qnam adrersarins ad
pnnetum . a. Ipse vincit, si alitor, ylncitur. Bt iict iaetus cum trlbus taxillis.
P[ro]uineial. Est et alius Indus qui Tocatar p[ro]uineial et tantum varlatur ab imperial
in sitnatIonehomlnuin,quam in hoc ludo orones horoinea ex una parte situantur in ponotla. jj/^
BaraUe. Est et alius Indus qui vocator haralie, et est tails naturie. Ille qui aedit ex parte
. am. ai ultimo ftaerit lueratos ludam, vel habcat prnrogatlTam Iactns taxillorum ponet omnes
suos homines in puneto .97. Et dueentur omnes homines utriusqne partia per . a/, usque ad
paginam .gm. et in ilia pagina tollentur. Bt qui prior abatolerlt Ille vincet. Et si aliquia homo
hine inde caplentar flat introitus in pagina . n*. et dueatur per paginam . fg? et . a/, ad pa-
ginam .^m. Bt notandum qnod in quallbet pagina poteat fieri nodna. Bt ait iactns cum duobua
taxillis, ct Bubintelltgitur nnmerns .vi.,pro tertio taxlllo. Si autem pMn. nip. rinoit, tnno ponet
hominea soos In puneto . b» exeepto nno qui erit In .c; et pars alia omnea In puneto .a. et
dueentur omnea homines usque ad paginam . n«. et ibl auferentar, ut prlna fiebat in pagina
^mg.f et In Ilia pagina fiat introitna al aliquia homo eapiatur, et dueantor per ./a. <pU uaqne
ad paginam . m.
Fayly, Est et alius ludna qui voeatur faylye^ et eat tails natnrn. Ille qnl aedit «x parte
. ntp. habebit totam famlliam snam Ip . U exceptis daobos, qui erunt in . a.; et qui sedet ex
parte . am. habebit totam famlliam auam in ./. exeeptia duobus, qnl erunt in .99. Et Indunt
enm tribns UxlUls, ai tot haboant, ai autem tantum babeant duos, tone dnpl[ie]abitur taxilhia
minoria numeri. Bt tune ille qui aedit ex parte . n<p» dueet dnoa snoa hominea In . a. noqne ad
.t, Bt primnm [in] eonaoetun modum omnea toilet. Et nodet omnia pnneta In pagina •<^. al
velit. Et al Qapiatur aliquis homo suua redtblt ad paginam ./a. et ibl Intrabit et redibit ; et
Intrare poteat In quolibet puneto, etlam si fuerlt oecupatnm alio vol allla aula hominlbna : In
pnneto tamon nodato per adveraarlnm non poteat intrare. Eodem modo poteat ille facera ex
parte adveraa, et faoiet cum eodem modo. Victoria autem talia eat. Qui prior abstalerit faml.
llam propriam, ▼Incent ; tcI al adveraarlna anna allqua vice habeat talom i actum qui ludi non
poteat la toto, tune aubito Ille vlncitur qnl talem iaotum habuit, et Ideo vooatur /ayUc.
Bat et aliua ludna qui roeatur [myfi«, a word now Illegible or eraaedi but tbaa given by
Strott earlj In the XIX th eenturyjcnjoe naturas talia oat. Unua eomm habebit dnoa hominea
In .k, et .It. in ./. et ,\v in . «. et .t. In .9), et ilia habebic prnrogatlTam taxillorum. Bt
flat iaetna enm duobus Uxillia et prnsupponentur .vi. pro tartio tazillo. Alia para habebit .iU.
hominea In . f . et .ill. In . d. et . ill. in e. et . Hi. In . 6. et . III. in a. Bt omnee homlnaa
utriuaque partia dueentur ad paginam ,mg, et Ibi auferentur. Bt qui prior abatulerit aiioa Ipaa
Tincet. Bt ai aliquia homo hino Inde eapiatur llet introitna in pagina .na. et dneeator par pa-
flnai% Ap, et . a/, oaqna ad pftgiwtm .ai^. et ibi anferentor eua tanpoa faarlt opporton«n»
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STRA T NOTES 1«
clearly that the mediseval game of Ubles was identical with our modern
backgammon, or rather we should perhaps say, that the game of baeitgamr
mon, as now played, is one of the games played on the tables/'
Sunt et in lusu tabularora qua enoteln aunt proprfse, qaerara printB Mt mx lodo angtle**
ram, et ait sab tazlUls, qnom ana part hababit aapramum laatam . t1. H. vi. at bababM pv**
ragakiTam inolplendl, altera autem para habubit aupremum Ueiom . il. !• I.; tile taineik qfd
habet factum 11. 1. i. lUe irlneet ai bonam ludat ; quia cum luserint omnea poteat habere dnoa
hominea in puneto . fc. al aederlt t-x parte . nip. vel dooa in pnncto . il. at acderit ex parte .aau;
et tunc in proximo Insn eum . f. I. potest nodare pnnctum . «. toI . g. itaqna para adriraa ne*
poterit exire, et tnno faeilltaT peteet ^ncere ai aciat ludere ; tcI al peaait eapere «a»m hemh
n«aa da adveraario auo faeiliter poteat Ytncere, quod iUe homo capUia namqaai» poteet reddael
in pagtnam» nbl debet tolli, aaqae alJoa abstulerit omnca anoa hominea exceptia duobaa qai
stabant in pnneto ubi ille debet Intrare anum eaptuni.
Est et alia fmpertia in luan tabnlamm ; nam lite qvl aodet ex parte . mp, habebit dvea
hominea in puncte ,t. et alioe dnoa in .«. et ille qnl aedet ex parte . em. habebit oanm ho-
ninem In . ip,, quern debet docere per paginam ,Up» an. mg. el aaferre in paglnA ./a. et evit
semper iaetua anua .ir. It. It.; ille autem qui aedet ex parte .n^;. toilet aaoa qaataor hominea
in pagioa ubi atant primum in rommnnem modum, et erit aemper iaetua anua . III.; me antera
viocet ai aciat ludere, qaod enm . i. i. I. unum da aaia qooa babet in . t, ponet In . y. et In
aeenndo lactn capiat bemlnero, qai eat in . ^., et hoe cum .1. i., et com tertlo J. penet te •>•
alternm doarum qoi aunt in .u. Rt tunc ilia qui eat ax parte . a«a. intrabit heminem aoom
cum .It. It. It. et ponet eom in .ti. et tunc ilia qai aedet ex parte .n. [97). homiaem auom
captum In puneto .ae. Intrabit In puneto a. eum .1. et earn .11. ponet hominem auum In . x.
qai prtua ftiit in .i, Rt tune para adreraa cum .«v. <e. to. itemm capiat hominem altertna In
pnncto . a. et tune Iteraio ftUe qai aedet ex parte .n^. intrabit homlaom auam, et euaa . lU
dueet earn In puneto . b. et enm tertlo .1. nodabit puaotnm ,x, itaqne paia adveraa nan po-
terit intrare. Rt tone cam aeptlea . 1. I. i. dueet hominem qui eat in . ft. nsqae ad ponetum .«.
Rt tnne In octavo luau toilet duos hominea qui aunt in . a. et In . <p. et poatea cum trlbua v\-
cibua toilet IDoa hominea qui aunt in . y. et adhno remaneblt homo partia adreraie In . a.;
itaqna vlneatnr. Kt aelal qood alio mode qnam at pnediatum eat non poteat fieri Tietorla.
Kat et alia Impertia almilia priori, at al penantor . ill. homines in . /. ex una parte, et px
parte alia erit anua homo In .x. qnl habebit iaetom nt prluf .iv. iv. It. at alias habebit lao-
turn .1. i. i. Ille antem qui habet hominea anoa In ./. habebit praerogativau inelplendi. Kt
cum . I. i. capiat hominem adrersaril an! In . x. et cum tertlo . i. ponet hominem hi . ». fli
tane adTeraarlaa anna In . n. Bt tnne ille qnl aedet ex parte 4a<p. Intrabit hoalnam aoim
In . a. earn nno . i. et enm . I. !• ponet hominem annm In . as. qnl prioa ftiit In • I. Rt tnne
Ille qui aedit ex parte .ma. Iternm caplet allam In .a.; at tone Hie intrabit In .a. eapleua
adversarlnm anum, ponena iUum hominem eum . I. i. in puneto . h. et tune cum tertlo .1. no-
dabit pnnctum . s., Itaqne para adveraa non poterit Intrare. Rttnne laeraMtnr lodmn ut av
pra In proxlma Impartla.
Rat at alia Impertia, at ai tu qui aadea ex parte ,nfp» habaaa anum homlnam in .n. et .«•
in puneto . t. et aeptimum In pnncto . 97. et In paglna . tq>. tolles hominea tuoa, et habebla
prsBrogatlram Inelplendi ; ille autem, qnl sedet ex parte .ma. habebit tree hominea In pnncto./.
et In paglna ./a. eoa toilet, at ambie partea habebunt mqnalea laetoa; magiatariam aatam eat
tales Imagfaarl laataa ; maglaterinm autam eat talaa Imaginarl laetoa par qnaa potaiia indam
loorari. Rt flat aub haa forma: primua laatna erit .W. W. It. et aacnndua Uctaa .vi. vl . i. at
tertlua . tI. tI. tI.
Rat et alia impertia, similia priori, nt al tu qui aedea ex parte ,n<p. habeaa nnmn hontl-
nem in n. et .t. in puneto .4. et Ille qui aedet ex parte .oat. habebit . ill. hominea te pnaata
./. qui debet tellere hominea taoa In paglna • tq>. habebiaqna prnrogatlTam laelplandl. Rt
ainbo Toa hababia asqaalea lactaa, maglstcrlum antem est talea imaglnarl laetoa per qaoe potea
ludum luorarl, aub lato tamen paeto, qaod nullum hominem toUea In primo laetu. Flat autem
aab hae forma. Primus lactaa erit . Iv. !▼. Hi., aeaandna laetoa erit .tI. vl. I. et tartiaa laetaa
arit . Ti. Ti. Ti.
Rat et alia Impertia, nt ai to aedeas ex parte .no. habeaa trca hominea in . &. e. d. <|a4M
debes duoere per paglnas . m^. et .n«. et toUere oos in pagina .tq>.\ Ille autem qui sedlt ex
parte . ma. habebit unum hominem in . n. quem debet docere ad paglnam .fa. et ibi tellere,
at aril lactaa snua semper . ill. 1., aed Iaetua tnua aeropar erit . tI. tj. et to habebla prmcoffe^
tlram iaoipiendl ; Tal alia de hoe non eat eora ; al antem Telia laatarl ludam opartal te e»
pare an* et Ua ludere^ at ipse ta non eaplat.
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166 CHESS IN ICELAND
About this second British Museum codex (Reg. 13 A xviii), Dr. Wright
has a few words to say, chiefly concerning the opening section. He remarks:
^* In the manuscript last quoted the figure of the board is given to illustrate
a very curious treatise on the game of tables, written in Latin, in the
XlVth, or perhaps even, in the Xlllth, century. The writer begins by
informing us, that ' there are many games at tables with dice, of which the
first is the long game, which is the game of the English ; it is common,
and is played as follows ' {multisunt ludi ad tabtilas cum taxiUis^ quorum
primus est longus ludus, ei est Indus Anglicorum, et est communis, et est
talis natur{B)y meaning, I presume, that it was the game usually played in
England. From the directions given for playing it, this game seems to have
had a close resemblance to backgammon. The writer of the treatise says
that it was played with three dice, or with two dice, in which latter case
they counted six at each throw for the third dice. In some of the other
games described here, two dice only were used. We learn from this treatise
the English terms for two modes of winning at the * long game * of tables
—the one being called ' lympoldyng, ' the other 'lurchyng;' and a person
losing by the former was said to be ' lympolded.' The writer of this tract
gives directions for playing at several other games of tables, and names
some of them — such as 'paume carie,' the Lombard's game {ludus Lombar-
dorum)^ the 'imperial,' the 'provincial,' 'baralie,' ['mylis'], and 'fiiyls.'
Perhaps this " long game " is the same as that variety, which was and
sometimes still is styled in German " der lange Puff." Paume carrde is a
title drawn from a variety of tennis. In the text of this codex throughout,
it is to be observed that the small Roman numerals i to vi (and xv) repre-
sent generally the throws of the dice, but sometimes the numbers of the men;
while the small italicised letters a, &, c, d, e, f^ g^ h^ t, A;, ^ m, n, o, p, 9,
r, ;, t, u, 07, y^ z^ and f refer to the points on the board as given in fig. 16.
In the first game mentioned, known at that time as the "English game*'
{ludus Anglicorum), the player sitting on the am side of the board places his
fifteen men at f ; his opponent, seated on the tif side, enters all his at a. The
men at f are moved through the tables ft^sn and mg into fa, where they
are thrown off. His opponent moves his pieces from a through the tables
af, gm, ns, into tf , whence they are thrown off. He whose men are first
thrown off wins the game. Either two or three dice may be used, but, with
only two, a third is supposed, its imagined throw being at each cast, 6.
The men are doubled on the points, and blots are hit very much as in the
modem game, but there are many minor details. In the description of this
game *' limpolding," or "lympoldyng," and ''lurching" seem to be somewhat
like the simpler jon^ in the modern French game, being applied. to certain
positions of the men. In the paume caree four players take part, either
two against two, or three against one. Two dice are employed, and appar-
ently only six men. In the "Lombard game" the tif player places his
fifteen men on f while the am player sets his on t. In the so-called "Im-
perial" game the tif player has, at the outset, five men on p, five on s and
the remainder on t ; his opponent divides his men between A;, p, and f. If
the fif player brings all his men to the f-point before those of his adver-
sary reach the a-point the former wins.' In the "Provincial" variety the
method of play is the same as in the "Imperial," except that the men of
one side are all placed on the points g and f (and, supposedly, those of the
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STRAY NOTES 167
other side on s and f). ''Baralie'* is a game in which the am player sets
his men on f and leads them through af to gm where they are thrown out.
The subsequent details differ from those of any previously-named variety. In
'^faylys*' (which we have heard of before under the name of fayles), the nf
player places his men on t except two, which are on a ; while his opponent
has all his pieces on f, except two pieces, which are on f.' As in most of
the other varieties, captured men must return to their original table, and
again begin their rounds. Three dice are used, but if only two are at hand,
then, at each throw, the smaller number is regarded as doubled. Appar-
ently the variety styled ''mylis'' most resembles the modem English back-
gammon, since the men are divided on each side among four or five points,
one player having two on ft, four on f, four on e and five on f ; while the
other has three men on ^, three on d, three on c, three on b and three
on a. Following these named varieties half a dozen other games are des-
cribed by the author of the codex in closing, but without names. A com-
parison of this with similar codices in continental libraries is greatly to be
desired.
In Spain, if not elsewhere, we hear of table-boards made of precious
materials and with great artistic skill, chiefly to be found, at a very early
date, among the treasures of royal and princely palaces (see pp. 89-90). We
have not been able to discover any such preciously adorned relics North of
the Apennines, of a date earlier than the 15th century, but not a few, made
in the two following centuries, are preserved in the great museums of Eu-
rope, notably at Nuremburg, Munich, Paris and London — one specimen, of
some little interest, from South Germany, existing in the archsBological
museum of Iceland. They are not, however, as common as the costly early
boards used for the game of chess, and when found are generally united
with a chess-board. Their scarcity may be explained in various ways, the
most plausible being the probable simplicity and cheapness of the boards
used in early times. The game of tables, though often mentioned with chess,
seems not to have been looked upon, either as so serious, so refined, or so
courtly a diversion, and neither the material nor the workmanship of its
implements would be so ornamental or so solid as in the higher class of
chess-boards. Nor do the ''points" of the backgammon- board yield them-
selves to the art of decoration as do the squares of the chess-board— so
striking in their outlines and in their coAJ unction as to have been adopted as
a decorative feature in all times — even in lands like Egypt where chess was
unknown — in all branches of art, and in every material. The very earliest
board for ''tables'' consisted doubtless of a simple design painted or drawn
on a flat piece of wood, or perhaps canvas, with no costly adornments, no pan-
nelling, no inlaid work, no colours — just as we find so many schemes, em-
ployed for the various line-games of the ancient world, scratched on the
stone steps of public buildings, or on pavements of courts and terraces in
Rome and elsewhere. Moreover it must be remembered that we have no ar-
tistic chess-boards until after the custom of distinguishing the squares by the
different colours came in, and it is almost certain that the backgammon
"poltats" were until a later period only outlined.
In regard to the mode of playing the game of tables we have no precise
information earlier than the XlVth century, since we have no access to the text
of the Escurial MS prepared by order of King Alfonso in the Xlllth. There were
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168 CHBSS IN ICELAND
at that time, as in later periods, . many games differiog, in more or less im-
portant ways, from each other. This was doubtless the case ev^ in much
earlier ages. Alfonso enumerates some fourteen or fifteen such varieties,
while another MS, of English origin, gives eight ; just as a recent French pub-
lication treats of eleven. Some of these games, like the various games of
cards, doubtless had their periods of popularity and oblivion. Perhaps, as
now with the different sorts of backgammon, some were more common in
one land, whil« others were more played in other countries. This is one of
the marked differences between tables (nard, backgammon) and chess. There
is only one kind of chess, and all efforts made, in older and later times, to
introduce varieties, have been failures. They have scarcely been proposed,
perhaps propounded and explained in a whole printed volume, when they are
forgotten. Another thing to be noted, in this regard, is the fact that the im-
portant element of tables is the board. Dice are used in other games than
those practiced on the table-board, and may be even used for purposes of
diversion, by th^oiselves ; while the counters, or men, belong to draughts,
merelles, and other sports as much as they belong to backgammon. The board
therefore is the only unique implement. Chess, on the other hand, possesses
a board used in no other noteworthy game except in draughts, which is merely
a derived and simplified form of chess, and the only enduring one which
can claim such ancestry. The men employed on the chess-board are even
mor6 sui generis. There is nothing like them in any other sport possessing
either age or importance. They have doubtless been imitated in cards, but
cards go back only to a date comparatively modefn. It is largely to this
fact, namely, the exceptional character of the men, to which chess chiefly
owes its individuality, and the slight modifications it has undergone through
its long history. It is to the opposite characteristic that tables is indebted
for its many varieties, so that, unlike chess, it even now bears different
names in different countries.
Now we must go back to an older epoch and to lands outside of Europe.
Although there is no doubt that chess originated in India, and grew to a
high degree of perfection there long before it reached Arabia, yet the early
Indian chess literature, which has come down to us, is insignificant indeed,
when we compare it with the numerous treatises still existing in early Arabic.
It was in foot in Arabia that the practical and analytic side of the game, no
less than its history, really began to be seriously investigated. It is, there-
fore, perhaps not surprising that the oldest known allusion to chess in
Sanskrit literature should be only a century earlier than the oldest known
mention of it in Arabic letters. The name of the first Sanskrit writer is Rat-
nakara, an inhabitant of Cashmere, author of an important poem called '^Ha-
ravgaya'' in which the names of the chess- pieces are cited. His date is per-
fectly well known, as he was a subject and prot^4 of a king of Cashmere,
who reigned from A. D. 835 to 847.*« But it is noteworthy that the first known
allusion to chess, as well as the first attempt to recount the origin of both
chess and nard, belongs neither to Sanskrit nor Arabic literature, but to a
peculiar period of what is customarily styled Middle-Persian literature, of
which the written medium is known as Pahlavi. In 1878 the noted Semltist,
*^ See the ftdinir«ble esiay of the dUUuguUhed SaDtkrit seboUr HermAaii Jaeobi, "Uber
kwel &Uere erwl^hnungen des lehaclfipiels in der Sanakrit-liUeratur*' in the *'Zeit8obrift der
deitUehen nior(|[enl|lndiBehen feBe11§cb«ft ** (1896, pp. 2S7-S93).
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STBA Y NOTES 160
Professor Theodor Naideke of Strassburg, published a Qerman translation of
the '' KarnamaJ^/' a fkncifal account of the education and adventures of a
Persian Prince, greatly resembling, in manner and matter, those prose and
metrical tales, which abounded in the European literatures, during the Xllth
and on to the XlVth centuries, from Italy to Iceland. In this ^' Story of Ar-
dachshir,'' we are told that among the accomplishments which that prince
acquired was catrang (as the word is now transliterated), a vocable represent-
ing the Sanskrit caiuranga (pronounced tchaturanga), that is to say chess.
This work was produced between the years 590 and 628 — let us say about
the beginning of the Vlth century — and is the earliest yet ascertained au-
thentic mention of the old Indian game in history or literature. In 1885 there
were edited at Bombay by a native Parsi scholar, four other Pahlavi writings
accompanied by a translation into Qi^yarati and a less well executed English
version. At least one of these stories — and perhaps others — was printed
in the original text, with a German rendering, at St. Petersburg by Dr. K.
O. Salemann, director of the Asiatic museum in that city, in a volume en-
titled *'Mittel-persische studien'* (1887)« This was an account of the inven-
tion of nard and chess, being possibly the first allusion to the former game
in any now extant work. The same tract was again fully described in 1892
by Professor N61deke, in his *'Persische studien II,'* contained in the pro-
ceedings of the Vienna imperial academy of sciences (philosophical and
historical section). He speaks of it as** Das Pehlewi-buch vom schach-
spiel,*' and places its date in the first century of Islam, that is between 622
and 722. •
The following is the tale in outline: '* A king of India sends the learned
and sagacious Tachtaritus to king Chosrau Anosharvan with the game of
chess, which had been invented by this sage — half the pieces thus trans-
mitted being of emerald and the other half of ruby. If the Iranians, writes
the Indian king, could divine the mode and manner of this game, thus showing
that their wise men were not excelled by their contemporaries of India, then
the Indians were to pay tribute to the Persians. If not, then tribute was to
be paid by the Persians. At the end of the third day the Persian vizier,
Vazurjmihr explained the new game of chess, and at once won twelve games
against Tachtaritus. He followed this up by producing, himself, a second
new game, to which he had given the name of the new Ardachshlr [that is,
the "excellent"— or as some say "new"— Artaxerxes"], because Artaxerxes
had been the wisest monarch who had existed during the last thousand years.
This game was nard. The vizier declared that it represented human life and
action, in their dependence on the course of the planets and zodiacal signs.
The board signified the earth ; the 30 men the 30 civic days of the month,
that is to say, the 15 white ones, the days, and the 15 black ones, the nights;
the moving to and fro of the pieces portrayed the courses of the constella-
tions ; the ace of the dice corresponded to the unity of the creator, the deuce
to the duality of heaven and earth, the trey to the trinity of thought, word
and deed, the quatre to the four primal elements of nature (dryness, damp-
ness, warmth, .cold), as well as to the four points of the compass, the cinq to
the five lights, namely the sun, moon, stars, fire and twilight; the size, to
the gahanbar(8), or the six days in which God created the world. King Chosrau
now sends the new game under strong escort to the Indian monarch. As no
one is able to elucidate it, the escort returns with a double tribute. The nar-
22
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170 CHESS IN ICELAND
ration ends by asserting, however, that in chess, reason and intelligence alone
decide the contest.^
Next in time comes the Arabic writer, Jaq'ubi, who, about 880, relates
the same story, ascribing, however, the invention of both games to an Indian
sage at the instance of an Indian king. He adds^o the allegory of the Pah-
lavi author that the twelve houses ("points") represent the twelve months
and the twelve zodiacal signs; "das steht in Pehlewi-buche nicht," says
Ndldelte. Then follows one of the most famous of the early figures in Arabic
literature, Mas<u(ti, who, in his historical cyclopaedia entitled, after the
fantastic manner of the Easterns, "Meadows of Gold," declares, 947 years after
Christ, that nard was the invention of king Ardachsher Babakan (Artaxerxes,
the son of Papak), who was, by the way, the very hero of the "Karnamak,"
in which occurs the oldest mention of chess. The allegorical description of
the game by Mas»udi was the same, in all its features, as that given by
Jaq*ubi.
Finally the Persian poet, Firdausi, author of the greatest Asiatic epic, the
Shahnamo" (the composition of which was finished in 1011), reproduces the
principal incidents relating to nardy as they stand in the "Karnamak," chang-
ing slightly the name of the vizier to Buzurgmihr, omitting some of the alle-
gorical details and altering others. Dr. N5ldeke asserts that the Pahlavi nar-
rative, without doubt, was the source from which Firdausi drew, unless the
two authors availed themselves of a still earlier common source now lost.
What the Persian poet says of nard — as is well known — is only a prelimin-
ary, or an adjunct to his highly poetical narrative of the introauction of
Indian chess into Persia. It seems to be generally regarded that fi'om the
name given to the new game by the old Persian sage, pronounced nevoar-
dasher, came ultimately the word 7mrd, and its other Eastern name nerdshir.
We perhaps ought to state, before leaving this topic, that what is called the
Pahlavi language is really the Persian of a certain period (which coincides
with the dominance of the Sassanian dynasty, that is from the Hid to the
Vllth century), mixed with some foreign, chiefly Semitic elements, and hav-
ing a peculiar sort of half- cryptographic alphabet, which renders the read-
ing of the texts a most difficult task ; indeed, as it seems, it may be taken
as a rule that in this singular mode of graphic expression, all words are
pronounced exactly as they are not written.
In the matter of tiard — if the reader will excuse s brief excursus — the
student will do well to consult, with the greatest care, the work of Hyde,
the early date of which (1694) makes it of high importance, even in regard
to* the European forms of this diversion. We are able to give here only a
hasty and inadequate summary of his treatment of the subject, merely by
way of reference to the student. The title given to the second volume of his
"De ludis Orientali bus "— which is dedicated to John Hampden, the younger
— is " Historia Nerdiludii," as the li^rger part of it is devoted to the his-
tory of nard and other ancient games played with dice. He cites — we
retain, for the most part, his transliterations — most of the technical terms
in various Oriental languages, as well as in Latin and Greek, many of which
we have already given from other sources. He states that in a large part
^ For » more c*r«fttl Dotiee of oae of the booki horo etted, see a letter, by the preaeat
writer, la the «*N«Uon" of New York, LXXI, 1900, pp. ISS-lM.
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STRAY NOTES Vn
of the East the Persian word nard has been adopted, with some changes of
form, as the title of the game; he likewise mentions nerd ardeshir (derived,
he says, from the name of the inventor, Ardesher Babakan), which became
nard8?ier^ and remarks that a Hebrew lexicologist errs when he makes the
last word signify ** dade al-nerd^ i. e. tesseras nerdicas,'' the dice used at
nard. He goes on to state that the Hebrews formed from the Greek the word
^*knbia'* (from xo^o^) as the name of the game; and that this word was also
received into Arabic in almost the same form, a Turkish writer declaring that
*'el-quba" is the game which is called nard, Hyde makes the game identical
with the ^^scripta duodecim'' of the Latins, quoting many passages trom
classic authors. Of English names given to various games played on the
table-board he enumerates "tric-trac" ("in Anglia vocamus <ic-toc"), Irish,
"back-garaon," "doublets" or "queens -game'* (the last being in French, he
says, " Uibles rabbaiues or dames rabbatues, or dames avaUdes"'), He derives
back-gamon, [sic] in the etymological manner of his age, from back-game-
ofi, which he declares to be the same as "back again and then game on,'*
referring to the forward and return movement of the men. The French title
of a variety of tables, verquier^ he tells us is in Flemish verkeer ; in Danish
forkeering and in German, verkehrung.
"The points of the tables*' as he styles them in English, are called in
French rayons; in Italian, case; in Arabic, haijut (sing, bit); in Persian kha-
naha (sing, khana)^ signifying, in the last two languages named, "house."
He records the appellations given to the die and dice in different tongues
(writing erroneously in Danish, terming instead of teming)^ as Latin, tesserae
(giving the derivation), and aleae ; old Greek, xu^o^ but called in the dic-
tionary of Hesychius f^^XXo^; in modern Greek C^pi^ aCapi and td Cdpia;
in Turkish, ^or, the writer taking care to assert that he does not know
whether the Turkish comes from the modern Greek, or the modern Greek
from the Turkish. He explains correctly the low Latin dadus and its modern
derivatives; then follows a chapter on the terms purgos, turricula SkXid fritillus
illustrated by many classical passages. It is in his chapter "Detesserarum
jactibus, etde lusibus," that Hyde cites the writer Cardanus, an Italian math-
ematical and miscellaneous author of the XVIth century : " In our age the
best known games of the table are with three dice, spercunum^ sperdii and
sperdionum, whence the board itself is called sperdinum. In the vulgar
tongue of Italy they call them sbardinum^ dc." Calcagninus seems to de-
rive the name from sperandOy but in Italian sbaraiare signifies to ^scatter'
and sbarainum what is scattered. Other three noted games with two dice are:
docadiglium^ which is of two kinds, the small and great [the long] ; also canis
martius, which demands much more ingenuity; and another game called
minoretta, also of two sorts, major and minor." Hyde then informs us that
Bernardo da Parigi says that sbaraglino or sbaraglio [see a later page], is
the game which is called in Turkish tauli or tawulL Hyde then continues,
saying that the Orientals have a peculiar kind of game at tables, which is
generally known as tawla or tavola; another, more intricate, is called in
Arabic muroOi, which has been explained as signifying speratum or res
speraH^ because in it victory is often hoped for but not obUined ; it is the
tome as the above named Flemish or Dutch verkeer ; another is called tukati
or taukati, perhaps the same as the English tic-tac. Then he mentions a
game of the Persians, styled fertd meaning "simple." The general name for
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172 CHESS IN TCSLAND
nard in Sanskrit is duiu and a particular kind of it, oshkaka-kurido (t). He
learns that the board is used in India for a game called tchupur; further on
he gives extracts from the Greek (Agathias Scholasticus) reciting the playing
of tables by the emperor Zeno [d.491] ; and from the Persian, Firdaun, and
the Arab, Ibn Kalikan — all in the original as well as Latin translations.
Subsequently he tells the various stories of the invention of nard by Pala-
medes, Ardesher Babakan and others.
So much for Hyde, of whose heaped>up erudition on this theme it is dif-
ficult to give any adequate idea; his chapters relating to the game, before
he begins to treat of the pure dice games, are entitled: I. De nerdiludii
nominibus; H. De nerdiludii tabella; HI. De tesseris seu aleis; IV. De
frustulis seu trunculis lusoriis ; V. De turricula, fritillo, Ac; VI. De tessera-
rum jactibus et de lusibus et de aliquot vocabulis lusoriis ; VII. De primario
nerdiludii scope; VIII. De nerdiludii antiquitate et prime auctore, including a
section styled "De nerdiludio chinensium." It will be noticed, however,
that the author is not very full or precise about the method of playing
the various games or varieties which he names, but this is doubtless the
result of the vagueness characterizing his Oriental and other sources.
The impressions then, which we get from these narratives relating to
nard are, firstly, that its origin, if we may regard the mythical accounts
as of any historical value, is to be assigned to Persia rather than to India,
although chess and nard apparently make their earliest historical appearance
in contiguous regions of those two lands ; secondly, that among the Arabic
peoples, at all events, nard preceded chess, or was at least as early as it. The
Mohammedan legal traditions, as Dr. Van der Linde points out (^'Quellen-
studien,'* p. 7), allude to nard as existing in the Prophet*s life-time, but
make no mention of chess before his death. The first clear contemporary
utterance in regard to Arabic chess is in a letter (780) written by the Caliph
Mahdi, rebuking the people of Mecca for their loose habits, among them
being the practice of playing both nard and chess; and in the so-called
"Kitab el-ghani,"— apparently a poetical miscellany — the compiler of which
died in 967, we find mention of nard, chess and of a game which resembled
morris as well. The first Arabic author of a practical work on chess is stated
to be el-^Adli, a noted player (the date of whose treatise is uncertain, but is
seemingly to be placed before 862) who is reported to have likewise composed
a book on nard (*'Kitab el-nard''). The two games long continued to exist
beside each other, and to be contrasted with each other, in the Arabic world,
for in the XVIth century Muhamracd Sukaiker, of Damascus (Hyde, II, p. 54,
cited also by V. d. Linde, "Quellenstudien," p. 24) wrote a work to prove
the superiority of chess to nard. In the Oamara, or Babylonian Talmud,
appears, in a Hebrew form from the Persian, the word t^erdshJr, that is, the
game of nard, in which place it can certainly not be much later than the
Vlth century. If its insertion in that production, as seems undeniable, took
place in Syria, it would be surely earlier than we could expect. to encounter
any allusion to chess in that part of Asia. This Talmudio title of the game
(nerdshir) is explained by various early European Hebrew philologers, such
as Nathan ben Jechiel (Rome 1103), Kalonymos ben Kalonymos (1322), and
others, all agreeing in the opinion that it signifies a game either identical
with, or similar to nard. The word is also cited by Prophiat Duran (known
as Bphodseus), a Hebrew from Northern Spain, in 1403— its latest appearance
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STRAY NOTES TJd
in Europe according to Dr. M. Steinschneider^s exhaustive '^Schach bei den
Juden*' (see V. d. Lindens '^Geschichte/* I., p. 157). No reference to chess
occurs in the Talmud. It is historically significant that the Byzantine Greeks
did not receive the word nard from Arabic, or Persian, or Hebrew sources.
They only knew the game by its Latin title, which they adopted, and from
which they made several derivatives (see p. 81), proving that the diversion
came to the Greek world from the West, that is by way of Italy. On the
other hand Byzantium, as the reader will remember, first obtained the game
of chess and its name (Catpixiov) from the Arabs, at a time when its people
had already come into contact with their subsequent conquerors. Nard, then,
must have already had time to assume its European appellation (tables) be-
fore it reached the Bosphorus — an important consideration. ^
Nearly all English writers — firom Hyde in 1694 to Wright 1859— just as
they make '"tables" the same as backgammon, also regard backgammon as
the modern representative of ''nard.** All that we have written makes us
therefore ready— after the style of so many chess historians— for a series
of conjectures, which is as follows: The existence of the game we are inves-
tigating may be divided into three stages; 1. The period of nard, from Its
invention or earliest appearance in Southwestern Asia — according to one
tradition in Persia ^ before A. D. 800, to its arrival in Europe (shall we say
in Spain, or in Italy during the Arabic occupation of Sicily I) during which
period, so far as we can learn, it was always played with thirty men, whose
movements were made in accordance with the casting of dice on a board of
twice twelve "points"; 2. The period of tables, from its arrival in Spain or
Itoly, coming from the Arabic world, to the XVIth century. In Europe It
would find a more, or less corrupted Latin tongue still in use in Italy, and,
possibly existing there and elsewhere, the traditions of an old Latin game
called tabida or tabulae (mentioned under bn'e of those names by Justinian in
the Vlth century, and by Isidore of Seville in the Vlllh century. Perhaps the
old native game itself was still lingering, being possibly the Roman duode-
cini scripta. Because, in this newly -landed game, each player had really
his own "table," with its twelve points, it took the name of tabulae {ludtis
tabularum) whence "tavole" and "tables," the dice used being called by a
low Latin name, dadi. Unfortunately, during the early half of this period,
beyond the facts that the game was played on a fiat table (somehow divided
inlo two parts), and that the throw of the dice directed the movements of
the pieces, we cannot, at present, give any deuiled account of its method
of play ; in the latter part of the period we know much more about it. 3,
The period of backgammon^ (trictrac) from the XVIth century until the pre-
sent time, played, like the ancient nard, with thirty men on twelve points,
with the essential assistance of dice, and, like the medissval tables, on a
board divided into two parts, each with its two subdivisions. The change
of name was not unlikely owing to the predominating popularity of a single
variety of the game styled backgammon (or, on the continent, trictrac) aided
by the fact that " tables " began to be regarded as a generic term for all
diversions whose movements were carried on upon a fiat surftuM, or table,
*"* Chaii CAB hArdlj be regwded m a caim of fraaC popalMrlty in the new Greece,
although the eonntry*« later literature potaetaei a manual of iu practice, but among tboie
' who do play it the eld Arable-Bysantlne term ii cUlI employed, alt«rnattfig with ffxaxi, one
of the ttnmerene lean-worde from the Italiaa {scaechi) In dally oae In all the Qreek tewae.
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174
CHESS IN ICELAND
and was no longer suitable for a special *' table-game/' After the comple-
tion of the* change from the Asiatic-European to the better developed and
more attractive modern chess— a process virtually ended, say in 1475— ta-
bles was less and less practiced, and was nearly superseded, in higher cir-
cles, by its revised and perfected rival Indian game. But the former was
in time again revived, perhaps with prettier and more decorative boards —
generally united with chessboards— with more neatly made dice-boxes and
other attractive changes in the apparatus or in the mode of play, after
which its new n.ames— ftocA^amniot}, trictrac, pu/f— -quite superseded its old
one — only a shadowy form of which was left in the languages of the two
Southern European peninsulas. It need not be said that to make all these
hypotheses absolute certainties, a good deal of extended and careful research
is needed. But on the whole w^ think that, after all the statements made,
there is no longer much doubt that we may fairly be allowed to consider
nard-tables-backgammon as one continuous development, constituting the
story of a single intellectual outgrowth during some 1300 or 1400 years of
existence.
The variation of the problem which remains unsolved and possibly un-
solvable, is the light in which we are to consider \he old Roman game, duo-
decim scripta, the twelve-line diversion, which so many investigators have
declared to be identical with the modern backgammon. Is there really, any
historical connection between the twot
Did nard reach Rome at a very early
day by some mysterious route — by
means of traders, or wanderers, or by
the slow process of tribal contact, and
taking a new name become natural-
ized f Or did an original Latin or
Etruscan or Pelasgic game make its
way to the lands beyond the Tigris,
and be there re-christened nard\ Or
did the duodecim scripta die with impe-
rial Rome, or slumber, half- forgotten,
until its Oriental congener reached the Italic shores— so like in form to the
Roman amusement that its arrival was virtually a revival of itt We have
spoken (p. 122, note) of a remarkable publication by one of the most remark-
able scholars of our day, Domenico Comparetti, being an essay upon an
ancient Roman mirror, having on its reverse the graceful figures of two
youths engaged at the game of duodecim scripta. We reproduce here (fig. 17)
the table as there represented, but without the figures beside it. We have
already noticed that no men are visible on the table. In the complete design
the male figure at the left has his left arm raised with the hand extended,
palm upwards, and nearly open, but as if it held some small object, or
objects, not quite visible. The right hand points to the lines on the board
and is resting just above them. Ck>mpar6tti seems to think that the eleva-
ted hand holds the dice preparatory to throwing them, while the lower one
indicates to the &ir player opposite that the game is about to begin. It
will be seen that the board has twelve lines, with an open space around
them Just inside the board's margin, that is to say that the scheme is not
unlike that of tables-backgammon, except that here the twelve points formed
Fig. 17.
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STRAY NOTES 175
by the ends of the lines on each side begin at the centre of the board
and run towards the margin, whereas in backgammon they start ft'om the
enter margin of the board, on either side, and run toward the centre. Compa-
retti likewise suggests that the men are absent because the game has not yet
commenced. Whatever may be the interpretation of this noteworthy relic
of antiquity, it is satisfactory that we have at length some trustworthy testi-
mony as to the exact shape of the apparatus used in this old Roman game.
Whether it helps to establish any real relation to the game we have been
treating of at such length, is another matter— one to be decided hereafter.
An event which was not without its influence upon the old '* tables,'* as
upon some other games of its period, particularly those into which chance
largely entered, was the introduction into use of playing-cards, a form of
gaming in many respects both more convenient and more attractive than
that afforded by dice. This new medium of diversion contributed, doubtless,
on the one hand, to the decadence of "tables,'* and on the other, perhaps,
led to the modification of the principal form of the ancient table-game, and
especially to its change of name— until it finally assumed the title, in En-
gland, of "backgammon"' and, in France, of "trictrac." Nor is it impossi-
ble that the same incident had something to do with the debasement of the
morris game, and its banishment from court circles to become the amuse-
ment of rude rustics. Cards, manufactured ft'om cotton, were pretty surely
known in Spain as early as the last quarter of the Xlllth century, and very
soon thereafter in Italy ; their use had already spread to France, Germany
and Holland in the latter half of the XlVth ; and in 1403 their introduction,
as well as that of chessmen, into England was forbidden (act 4. Edward IV,
IV, 1) for the benefit of the home-made articles ; and a play of 1400 has the
phrase, " Using cardes, dice and cupes smalle." Chess, as a game of pure
skill, suffered less from the popularity of cards, in spite of the fact that the
new mode of diversion owed many of its features to the Indian game, hav-
ing to do, like that, with kings, and queens and knights (knaves), and
having both its figures of high degree (the court cards, or, more properly,
the "coat cards") and its pawn-like forges of low degree (the spot-cards).
Allusions to the mediaeval game of tables are perhaps more frequent
in the old French than in any other early literature. In looking at the
practical side of modern backgammon, its assumed successor, we shall
therefore begin with France. We give, in a foot-note, a brief account of an
interesting and elaborate French XVIIIth century manual of the game by
Soumille, in which we find how little is the difference between the trictrac
of then and now.*M The most pretentious modern treatment of the game, in
^ OoG of th« DoUble booki la the ■eanty Iltoratnro of baekgammon Is ifaal of the abbd
Sonmillo, " Le grand Trletrao," the leeond edition of which was published at Avignon 1756
<BOy pp. 488). Both Its sober style and Its neat typography make It an attraetWo volome.
It eontahis many scores of positions on diagrams, which oeenr between two players, classic-
ally denominated Gloria and Damon. The latter has the lower part of the board (or that
nearest the reader), eqoiTalent to the position given to <* white" In chess treatises, whllo
Olorls is supposed to sit opposite, or at the upper side of the board (like "black"). The
teehnioal terms are very fiiUy ezplaloed, though no allusion to the history of the game is
anywhere made. Each of tha four divisions, having six poInU, into which the board Is
divided. Is ealled % jau ; each player thns has twojans; the one in which the men are pilrd
np at the eommenoement of the game l« called the petit-jatif the other the grand-jan. Va-
rioDfl positions brought about by different throws of the dice are likewise styled y«n« — the
jam 40 rmemUnf for instance, being two exactly similar (or equal) first throws by the two
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^76 CHESS IN ICELAND
all its varieties, with which we are familiar, is to be found in a French
work, the ''Grande encyclopddie des jeux** edited by Monlidare — a book
already cited— in its chapter, "Le trictrac" (I., pp. 142-189). This treatise
attempts to portray and explain no fewer than eleven games played, with
greater or less divergencies, on the backgammon-board. At the outset, its
compiler indulges in a little philology, literature and philosophy of a char-
acter not very profound, but which we will cite in its entirety : " TriOrae
would appear to have been known to the ancients, if it be true that its name,
instead of being derived onomatopoetically (rom the noise made by the dice
pUjert, wbilu tjbere ar« tlio Jan qui tup9ul,Jan de d4ux UhUt,J<» d* mMaa and amif-iM
dt miziaM. The point*, alterDately bUck and white, of the board are atyled flSehM or UmMi
the holea In the frarao of the board for marking gamea aro trout, and the moTable p«gi «"•*
in theio, Jtohett, The men or pleeea are known oa damet, or, aceordlog to thia author, aoma-
tlB«a aa tabUt, the board being the tablUr. A point on which two men are auudlng It »
cage (eaa«=hottae)» and one on whieh there ia only one, a demi-case; the aame term ia •f-
plied to certain poaltiona. and we hare the com du dia&la, cage de VieolUr, cat* du ei*q And
ao on ; eaM« aUernt (or rateau) la a title given to a poaition in which erery alternate point
of the board la void of men. A fatuse e€Ute ia a position brought about by erroneona or Ir-
regular play, and has Ita penaltiea, aa do auch errora at eheaa. jSleoU ia a negleet to make
or mark pointi, and to aend one & VieoU ia when the opponent, obaerriag the omiailon,
add* the unoounted pointa to hia own aeore. The notation employed ia baaed on the indica-
tion of the 24 fihch— of tho board by the 84 characters of the alphabet aoeh aa ia shown
in flg. 16. Doublets, in throwing the dice, have the enatomary apeclal titlea aa : two aeas,
aaifr«s-aa, or hna* ; two deueea, tout Ut dtux (aportively tout let diaux) ; two treys, UrMt
(JMtingly, lanttmet) ; two fours, carmtt ; two Htcs, quintt ; double alxea, •onnit. The per***
ma/ be either a jtu ordinairtj In which eaeh pUyer la limited to hia own aide of the board,
moTiag hia men only from m to a, or from ip to n ; or a ^cn do retour (a true ** baekgao-
mon,** that is the gamo and hack). In which Gloria continues to more until the eonntezs are
puahcd f^om m (by way of I, k, i, &c) dear to tp, or through both tablea ; whila Danoa
playa hia from n (by way of o, p, q) to n. In beginning a game eaeh player plaeea his
15 men in 8 or 4 piles on the point in one of the ontaide extreme eoruera of hia aide of the
board ; the point then reoeivea the name of the talon, and the jan in whieh the talon Is
beeomea the potit-jan ; the talon and potU-jan of the adveraariea are exaotly opposite each
other ; for InsUnce, if tho eoontera of Gloria are placed on m, that point ia the fafoa and
poUt'jan of Damon. The throws of the dice may be utilised to mere either one or two man;
thas, with tiie throw deuce-trey, one man may be moved to a second point and another to a
third, or a single counter may be moved to a fifth point. At the end of tho volame are
many positions similar in character to problems at eheaa, intended to Indicate the proper
method of play under certain cireumstaaoea. The book baa, in all, nearly three bandrad
diagrama, llluatrative of games or exoeptional poaitiona. Theae are apparently not engraved
but made up of backgammon type, compoaed of pieoea repreaentlog the four aides or rioM of
the board (having the trout or holea, white on black); black and white pointa having one
to three white or black men on them, or each supporting one of the dice to be placed where
no pointa with men are needed, in order to abow the throw Jnst mado and now to be playod;
and little eirdea to be placed noar the amall en da of the pointa to repreaent the eeore^pointst
and so on. The eopperplate frontispiece of the volame pictures a game of backgammon on
a very large board, placed on a handaome table in a fine apartmenti the playera bdof *
gentleman and lady, with a second gentleman aa a apeotator. It is not known whether
Bourn lUe waa the flrat to giro the namea of Gloria and Damon to the two auppoaed players
in troatlaea on trictrac, but the tradition ia atill ao far powerful that Moulidara beatows on hli
imaginary eombaUnta their inltlala (G and D). The author givea a brief deacrlptioa (pp. 891'')
of trictrac d dcrire and (pp. 81^2-3) of a much alropler variety to be played by fonr or A^
playera, styled eourir la poulc. Some apace ia devoted to a diaouaaion of the poaalble eom-
binaUona of the dice (pp. 806-816). There are aome aingular teehnieal terma, IndieaAiof
phases of tho game, and which are now disused, such aa Margot la fondao and patoaf ^
pont, Aa a speelmen of Soomille'a atyle we cite hia notice of a method of vFinning sliU la
vogue (pp. 890-891): '*Gagner noe par tie grandcbredoUillt c'est marqner 18 trona do aalM*
tandla que I'autre JoUeur n*en marque aucun. Le premier qui commence 4 marqner •• <>"
plualenra trona, n*ejclut paa Tantre du droit de gagner grandO'brodoiUHe, poarv6 qjoo ce
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STRAY NOTES
„athe counter., had '*» jrig'n in thej^ Ore^^. w a.^^. ^^^^^^^^ .„
hi, .voyage d'Anacharsie.- cla.m, lb" 't^^j^ ,j»*'j^l^ ,ori,.«. or ««<««*
proved that the Romans Knew '\ J^\'^^^^^*^ 'Salmaeiu*. 158«-10r.«]. In
Mr«^P»or«m. a. is demonatrated by 'f'""'';^; ^^j,,, ^ho modern ««v«r«..
aspecial treatise, in which he compares the ancient ^^ ^^^^^^^ ^.
BuHn it. progre« this game ^-^--^^ZM mLu probahiy it. do-
fore arriring at the point where ^l^rd^ZsraUUtues, which i. of great
votees played the kind which we call dames ra^i
..fri. h..ldl.«., .. «.«»•" t*;"^" *„*,;".?0».n* Trier.." «- « ',^,"5 ' „4 p.rb.p. b,
W« .v.. «pt dfa." *''»»" "".dluJof tW. b, . t""",'' ."J ,"«*:.r. bl..r.pb.,«.
«tk*n. A .k»Ub of 8o«mme'» Mf« *"' " ^, „ uk.ly »lw.y« «• .. u Jeu
dX^Um..td. T....«." <<'"|:'irwM ..-»"•' >"•""' "V7" .«. -«i:.d. tr*.-
(»"». pp. IM + >"• '""' f" "ecd «rl.. of "» P**"' • . ,u J.« da ,.T«rltor, da WuU-
.b. .-PP'«-«»'("«r8l?Jd* .rUU-e. .....»■" '«• "X* "..f 0.n.». .. •« J..« [.<«!
Ubl«, du lo»nie-cM«, *•' " cbarpenUor, •••"•"•„ .auioB. but It ""> •>• —"
from tb. d.t. tb.t tb. .OPP ^_,n,.. c««Ul». «J. . |_^ j^, „,,„ „„k,
tb« «meord.r (PP- "'"'*, to io: «Wl« tb. ln.port.Bt P"\" "* . , ,. ,,„,,n, th»t the
oId-f«Wo«.a B«.1IA b..M.» 1^ '"»»'"'* '",v«r*Ttid. c. J.«. •» J« «••"-
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I'W CHESS IN ICELAND
simplicity, offering little scope for combinations ; next cAme jacquet^ scarcely
more complex. We may regard as somewhat later garanguei^ and the game
of Umte-table or gamon; and as coming last of all trictrac, made up from
all the different table games, the invention of which appears to date from
the XVth century. This last game has itself undergone modifications ; and
its rules were not definitely established until about the commencement of
the reign of Louis XIV, at which Ume it was enthusiastically cultivated by
persons of quality. Regnard presents us a player possessed of the demon
of trictrac and makes him say : (a. 1, sc. IV) :
Une ieoU maadite
He codte en un momeiit doQze trout tout de saite ;
Qoe Je snis an grand chlen ! Parblea, J« te sanrai,
Mandit Jen de trictrac ! on bien Jo ne poarrai.
A little further on (a. l;sc. X) the poet puis these lines into the mouth of
a certain chevalier (Tindustrie:
Jo Boia pour youb aervir, gentilbonune auvergnAc,
Docteur dana tone lea Joax et luaitre de trictrac ;
Mon nom eat Tout-d-Ba», yicomte do La Case,
Et Totre aervltenr, pour terminer ma pbraae.
Jo eaia dana un trictrac, quand il faut nn tonnez,
Gliaser des d6a lieurenx on cbargds on plp6B;
i£t quand mon plein eat fait, gardaut mea avantagea,
J 'en aubatitae auaai d'aatrea prudenta et aagea,
Qni n*offhuit k mon gr6 quo dca aa k iona coape,
Me font en un instant enfller douze trout.
Je vexuL, par mon aayoir extreme,
Que vons eaoamottez un d6 comiue moi-m6me.
The italicised words in these citations are terms use<l at backgammon. The
poet, Jean Francois Regnard, lived between the years 1655 and 1709. The
editor of the **Encyclop(idie" thus continues: **The changes which su-
pervened in court manners at the end of the reign of Louis XIV led
gradually to less practice of trictrac, which nevertheless still remains a
favourite household game, and, in its modified form, known as trie trac d
dcrire, is yet held in honour in many drawing-rooms. The Greek etymology
of the word trictrac, if it were authentic, would not signify that the game is
extremely complicated in its method of play ; it would mean only that, to
be played well, it demands much presence of mind and quiet calculation.'*
Mr. Moulidars is evidently no very profound QraMsist. The huge Larousse
cyclopaedic dictionary also has a historical reference to the game. After
mentioning its invention by the Persians it goes on to say ^'Mais il est certain
que les anciens connaissaient des Jeux analogues ou le trictrac lui-mdme;
tels dtaient, entre autres, le diagramismos des Qrecs et le duodena agripta
des Remains. On le trouve d^sign^, dans les auteurs du moyen &ge, sous
le nom du Jeu de tables , qu*il porte encore aujourd'hui en ^lemand {brett-
spiel), et en Portugais {jogo de tabolas)/' The last statement is not wholly ac-
curate so far as the modern German is concerned, brettspiel being generally
employed as a generic term for all games played on a board.
Not infrequent are the appearances of backgammon in the literature o^
the French lands. As wo shall see, when treating of the technical vocabu
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STRAY NOTES Vig
Ury of trictrac, the game was known to Rabelais in the XVIth century. A
passage ascribed to the poet Villon in the same century, to which we shall
also refer later on, contains the word trictrac, but not as the denomination
of a game. Francois de Bonnivard (b. 1496)— the original hero of Byron*s
"Prisoner of Chillon '* — in his ''Chronique de Geneve** (IV, 4), says that
before the battle of Pavia (1^5) the Spanish and the French ''se pour-
menoient par sur le Piedmont et y Jouoient au trique trac."' Nearly of the
same time is the occurrence of the word in Etienne Pasquier^s '^Recherches**
(1560) in a passage soon to be cited. The word Is found in several early
Latin treatises on games. Salmasius tells us that '^prseter trictracum quern
vocamus, alinm etiam ludum cum tesseris et caiculis in tabulA lusitare con-
suevimus;** he speaks also of what both French and English authors long
called the ^^ grand trictrac,'^ saying "hodie in eo trictraci genere quern
magnum vulgo vocant;'* while Bulenger (1626) informs us that '*apud nos
hodie 12 linesB, 24 [tj calculi, vocamus nu^jarem trictracum,'* In the same
way, many years before, Hyde shows himself familiar with the vord, with-
out giving it a Latin form, as when he comments on the extremely com-
plicated character of French trictrac ; *' Inter lusus ad tabulam, omnium dif-
ficillimus est Qallorum trictrac^ quern modo sibi peculiar! exercent.** The
essayist. La Bruy^re (1646-1696), in his ''Caract^res'* (1688), has an amusing
description of a distracted backgammon player: ''II Joue au trie trac; il de-
mande & boire, on lui en apporte : c*est & lui di jouer, il tient le cornet d'une
main et un verre de Tautre, et, comme il a une grande soif, il avale les
d^s et presque le cornet, Jette le verre d*eau dans le trictrac et inonde celui
centre qui il Joue.** In a private letter Madame de Maintenon, the consort
of Louis XIV, says ''Mme. de Dangeau demandera, en bftillant, un tric-trac.,».
voila comme on vit it la cour.'* This is in a communication to the due de
Noailles, dated January 7, 1700. Some years before, Madame Dei^ardins,
better known as Madame de Villedieu (1631-1683), allows us to catch a
cirliropse of the game in two countries as it were. She says, late in the
XVIIth century, writing about Holland: ''Nous Jouions ensemble au rever-
quier, qui est le trie trac de ce pays-lli.** In a previous generation we find
a minor writer (Etienne Tabourot, known as the seigneur des Accords, whose
book was published in 1648) employing the word triquetraquer in the sense
of a player of trictrac, reminding us of the Dutch tiktakker. Voltaire says,
in a latter dated December 8, 1767 : " J*avance que ce peuple [les Indiens]
dont nous tenons les tehees, le trictrac... est malheuresement d'une super-
stition qui eflnraie la nature.**
If we mistake not it was the Swiss litterateur Bonstetten, who said about
the beginning of the XlXth century :
Mala lora qoa aoixante ana nooa vimdront renfenner,
Jl faat le tri<i%ulrae et les eartea aimer.
Another and a greater writer, who died nearly two generations since, Balxae,
the admired of Thackeray, spoke of backgammon in less pleasant terms :
" Le bruit du trictrac est insupportable & ceux qui ne savent pas oe Jeu, un
des plus difficiles qui existent.** The game has produced in France one or
two singular phrases, such as that which characterizes an able player at
backgammon as one who is able to abbatre bien du bois-^ihe bais reforring
to the wooden men. We must leave other passages containing direct or
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180 CHESS IN ICELAND
remote references to the game, or to the terms and phrases used by its play-
ers, until we have given.some account of the game itself as practiced by the
French.
The Moulidars manual describes, first of all, trictrac^ to which, as the
principal form of backgammon, in France, it devotes no fewer than thirty-five
pages. This section is occupied first with the apparatus employed, then with
the general method of play; afterwards follow sections on the dice and their
possible combinations, on Vdcole, on the Jans, on the bredouWe^ on privileges
allowed under certain circumstances to the players, on the methods of count-
ing and marking, on the value of the different coups; to these succeed a
vocabulary of terms, the laws of the game, advice to the players, and there-
after a complete game, recorded in detail and illustrated with notes and
diagrams of positions. The apparatus of the game, we are told, consists of
the board, the fifteen black and fifteen white men, the three bredouUles for
marking the minor points, the two ficfiets, or pegs of ivory or wood, for
marking the game points, and the two dice.
Each player begins by placing his fifteen pieces in three piles, of five
men each, on the tcUan, which is the first or starting point. The writer ob-
serves that almost all the rules published at the present time state that the
tcUon is the point on the board at the extreme left of each player. This is
a grave error. It is the extreme left point for one player, and the extreme
right point for his adversary, since it is necessary that the two talons should
be 'opposite each other. If the play take place during the day, the board is
to be opened near a window and the men are to be piled and placed on the
side which is more remote from the light. That is to say, if the window bo
at the left of one player and at the right of another, the first places his
pieces on the first point to the right and the second on his first point to
the left, in such a manner that the men of both parties are opposite the light.
The pieces of one color are .then moved in a direction opposite to that taken
by the pieces of the other color; while, if the two players place their taion,
both either at their right hand or their left, as other contemporary manuals
explain, the pieces of both would move in the same direction, which would
not produce the result desired, since each player is to make with his men
the tour of the table, starting from his talon^ and finishing at the point op-
posite to it, that is at the taUm of his opponent. If a game be played at
night, then the talons are at the end of the board farthest from the lamp, or
other principal light in the apartment. By agreement, however, the talons
can be fixed, and the game begun at the other extremity of the board. Each
player plays, in any case, through his own side of the board and then around
into the side of his opponent. It will bo seen (fig. 18) that the quarter of the
board from 1 to 6, is called the petit Jan, and that from 7 to 12 the grand Jan,
In moving, according to the numbers thrown with the dice, the talon is not
counted, so that if a six-throw is to be played it would go to the point
marked 7. In deciding upon first moves, each player throws one die, and
the player having the larger number of pips opens the game. The names
given to the doublets by Moulidars are: double aco, ambesas, beset, or tous
les as; and then in their order, double deuoc; teme or toumes; quateme or
carme; quine; and sonnejs. If a player feil to mark his points before again
touching his men, his adversary adds the points to his own score, which
action is called, as in Soumille*s time, envoyer son adversaire a Vicole,
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STRAY NOTES 181
We are farthermore told, as an etymological guess, that the word Jan
comes from Jamis, **a Roman divinity having many faces, thereby symbol-
ically designating the divers aspects in which trictrac may be viewed— the
jan being a coup which may result to the advantage or the disadvantage of
either side** (another writer— it may be stated in passing— suggests its
derivation from the proper name Jean, perhaps in its sense of ^* Jack**).
These coups are eleven in number: the Jon de six tables ou de trots coups;
the Jan de deux tables ; the contre-Jan de detta* tables ; the jan de nUs^as or
M4s^as (written both with and without a capital initial); the contre-jan de
m^^as; the petit Jan ; the grand Jan ; the Jan de retour ; the jan de recom-
pense ; the Jan qui ne peut ; the Jan de rencontre. Most of these ^an-f count
in favor of the player, who, by the throw of the dice either may or must
effectuate them (that is, bring about the positions indicated by their names);
in some other cases they count in favor of his adversary. In order to under-
stand what a Jan of this sort is, we translate the descriptions of two : '*The
'Jan of six tables,* or ^of three moves,* is when, at the beginning of a game,
a player is able to move six of his pieces by three casts of the dice, five to
points 2-6 and one to point 7, called the sonnet point. It counts for four
(minor) points for the player making it. The •jan de retour* is when one
has occupied, by more than a single piece, each point in the adversary's
first quarter of the board, called the petit Jan.'"* Again, we learn that a
player is said to be en bredouille when he makes twelve points before his -^'l
adversary has made a single point. La grande bredouille is when the player
has made two game-points {trous), his opponent having scored none (the
bredouilles^ as the reader will recall, also signify the three round counters
mentioned above, used to score the minor points as they are made); when
twelve such minor or playing points have been made, the player scores
them as one game-point, with his fichet in the holes on the rim -of his side
of the board.
We group together, without attempting to class them in their proper
order, some other notable rules and particularities of trictrac. The player
winning the first twelve points, or, which amounts to the same thing, scor-
ing his first game-point {trou\ is entitled to say whether he will "go off**
(s'en aller)^ or whether he will "hold on'* (tenir)^ that is, continue to play
the game as it stands. In the former case, the points made by his opponent
are wiped out (as are his own surplus points above the twelve demanded
for his game-point), and the pieces of both parties are re- entered, as before,
on the talon of each player in three piles. A renewal {reprise)^ that is, a
second section of the partie, is then begun. If the winner of the first section
does not declare his intention to "go off,** then the play, after he has marked
his trou, goes on, as previously, the defeated player keeping the points he
has already gained, and the winner marking those remaining, if any, after
he has used twelve to make his own trou. It is often difficult to determine
whether the winner of the trou shall insist upon commencing anew, or
whether he shall risk a continuation of the game flrom its existing position.
If he consider the state of the game so favorable for himself that it outweighs
the minor points already secured by the loser, and with which he will begin
his scoring in the reprise, then he will decide to go on. Otherwise, he
"goes off.** As the game progresses, each combatant— a matter to which
we allude elsewhere- must carefully watch the play of the other, since each
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reckons not only the points he himself makes, but also those which his
opponent through carelessness flails to score. If a player declare himself in
a position to make a •*hif' (a situation in which he might, by the rules of
English backgammon, capture a man), his opponent must see that it would
not be a false "hit" (a case of battre d faux). Such a false "hit" would be
when his throw, say 6 and 3, might "hit the blot," if the numbers of the
dice were played in combination (as 9), but which could not do so when
played singly (as 6 and then 3), because both the third and the sixth point
from the man to be moved are covered— that is to say, are each occupied
by more than one hostile man, thus barring the removal of an adversary's
man to either. Another peculiarity of scoring is that when a block of six
covered points exists, and one player, being unable to pass it, cannot play any
of his men, his opponent scores two minor points for each successive cast of
the dice which cannot be utilized.
We add the briefest possible definitions of the games, other than trictrac^
which are played in France on the backgammon-board. The trictrac d ^crire
is a game composed of a large number of points, so that the points cannot
bo marked by the pegs and trous^ and must therefore be written. Its rules
differ very slightly from those of the ordinary trictrac. A modification of
it is the trictrac a la chouette^ played by two persons against one, the one
who is alone moving continuously to the end of the game, the other two alter-
nately after having scored twice; another modification is the trictrac d toumer^
the players being likewise three, each playing for himself. In the beginning
two combine against one, but the first one of the two who loses a point, that
is makes an error, goes out, but apparently resumes his place, when one of
the actual players loses two points. The one of the three first obtaining the
score agreed upon, wins the game. A second prominent variety, garanguet^
is played with three dice. The men are entered at the beginning as in tric-
trac. When two of the dice thrown are alike, (that is, form a doublet) they
are played doubly (that is, as if they had been four dice, each with the same
number of points); if all three dice at one throw are alike, that is, if they
form a triplet, they are played three times. The jeu du toe is the tokkategli
or tokkadille of the Germans. The pieces are placed as at trictrac; they move
in the same manner. The marking is, in general, the same, but the game
is only a short one— he who scores first twelve minor points winning it.
The movements of the men appear to be limited to the petit Jan, that is to
securing the six points of that quarter of the board. T\iBjeti duplein is a
variety of trictrac in which a player scores the game, having made a plein
("full"), that is, having secured, by at least two pieces on each, every point
in that division of the board known as the grand Jan. In the jeu du toe doub-
lets do not count double, which they do in the jeu du plein. We ace told
that the title of the variety denominated revertier is derived from the Latin
revertere meaning to turn, because the player causes his men to make the tour
of the table, returning them into the division from which they started. Here
the two players set the three piles of their men each on the extreme comer
point at the left of his adversary. Their march is at first from the opponent's
left to his right; having reached the extreme right comer of the opponent
they pass on to and through the extreme left point of the pla^'er, and continue
from his left to his right. One or two new terms are used in this game, but
the rules, except as they concern the original placing of the men and the
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STRA Y NOTES 183
course of their march, are very much the same as in trictrac. The next
variety is known hajacquet. We must first observe that, contrary to the
statement of Moulidars, Littrd makes this to be the same as the ordinary
English backgammon. ''C*68t le m^me/' he says ''que les Anglais nom-
ment backgammon, et qu*en France on appelait autrefois tautes-tables^ parce
que les Jouevrs placent, en commen^nt, leurs dames sur toutes les tables
du trictrac/' It may be that jacquet was once styled toutes-tables (lotUe-
table)j but there is no doubt that the variety now so called is nearly or quite
identical with our usual game. But to return to Moulidars. The men in
jacquet are set as at revertier, A peculiar feature is that the men cannot
be doubled upon any point until one of them has been made to pass through
all four divisions of the board— this advanced piece receiving the name of
the courier. To take him to his destination the player usually avails him-
self of his first doublet. Having thus pushed forward his courier the player
may then proceed by advancing the others, by establishing cases (that is,
by securing points through placing at least two men upon them), or by
barring the passage of his adversary. The men who are not able to reach
the fourth division receive the name of cochonnets ; and a player left with
a single cocfionnet on his hands loses the game. The doublets are quad-
ruplets (that is, double fives, for instance, count as twenty). A variety of
jacquet is styled the jacquet de Versailles, and was invented to accelerate the
game. Here, instead of multiplying the doublets by four, each number of the
doublets thrown is multiplied by itself, thus double ace (one by one) is reckoned
as only one; double two (two by two) gives to the player the right to play four
points ; while double six (six by six) permits him to play thirty-six. There
are one or two minor changes in the rules, otherwise the game resembles
the VLBUhl jacquet. The wordjacquet may, or may not be connected with the
Spanish name of backgammon, chaquete^in regard to which question see
the pages which follow. The next game, jeu de lotUe-table, differs essentially
from trictrac, being the ordinary, old-fashioned English game of backgam-
mon, as it has been played by the Anglo-Saxon race for the last three or
four centuries— the men, of course, placed in the beginning as in the figure
given later on, in the section relating to the game in England. Moulidars
says : '' Le jeu de toute-tabla est k pen pres oublid en France ; mais ii est
encore tr^s r^pandu en Angleterre, sous le nom de backgaimnoti."' The Jeu
de toume-casCy says the compiler, "is an original variant of trictrac^ in which
each of the two players has only three men which are to be moved until
they are united on the last corner point, hence the name of the game —
tourne [terne f] having signified three as an old technical term in games.'*
The men are first placed outside of the board — the three of one player at his
left, as they are to be moved [after duly entering each at the first point
of the player's table?] one after the other to the cornor of the second table
which is at his right; the other player puts his pieces at his right and has
to play them to the corner at his left. In this way the men of the two
players start from the same side and move in the same direction on opposite
tables. If either player throws a doublet, it is counted only as one, that is
a double six is treated as six. A singular law is that each player must
advance his men in order, as they are not permitted to pass each other. If, for
instance, a player's first move is three points, and at the second he has the
right to play four points, he must move the same counter, since the second
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184 CHESS IN ICELAND
cannot go beyond the first, nor the third beyond the second. Nor can they
he placedPon the same point, except at the .twelfth or final point (the coin de
repos). The course of the men is thus one of peril, since they are frequently
captured by the enemy. A piece is captured \^hen a piece of the adversary
can be placed upon the point in the opposite board occupying the same po-
sition and bearing the same number. To give an example, suppose that a
player has a man on his seventh point, and that the adversary puts one of
his men on his seventh point, exactly opposite that of the first player; the
piece of the first player is captured, and the player must remove it from the
board, putting it in its original position, from which it must recommence its
march. He who first unites his three men on the twelfth point gains the
pariie. If he do this before his opponent has brought a single man to the
coin de repos he wins a par tie double.
The final variety described in this French treatise is styled les dames
rabattues, that is to say, the game of the "unpiled men." It is one of the
simplest of table-games, being one of pure chance. Its name comes from
the fact that its players are obliged to ** bring down" {rabaUre), from the
piles in which they lie, one of their men after the other. Each player puts
his fifteen men in the side of his board nearest the light, in six piles thus :
two on each of the three points less lighted and three on each of the three
points nearest to the separating bar (or the hinges) of the board. There are
then three piles of two each, and three piles of three each. A throw which
cannot be played by a player may be played by his opponent, and he who has
thrown a doublet retains the dice until he has thrown two differing ones.
The first player casting the dice ** brings down" two men from those on the
point indicated by the dice. This he does by lifting the top piece from the
pile and placing it in advance of the pile on the same point, that is nearer
the pointed end. Having thus **fiattened out," or placed all his men singly
on the points, he then proceeds to repile them again, in accordance with the
casts of the dice, as they were before. He who succeeds in first doing this
is the winner in this very artless game.
The summarized account which we have given of the methods employed
in trictrac^ the principal form of backgammon in France, shows that the game
has undergone little change in that country during the last two centuries.
It is, in every important respect, identical with the description which wo find in
the abbd Soumille*8 treatise ^* Le grand trictrac," the first edition of which
appeared in 1738. The older work, however, not only presents us a picture
of the game in far greater detail, but is much more systematic in its ar-
rangement and clearer in its language. The volume, except in its utter lack
of historical information, is, in fact, one of the most comprehensive and in-
teresting productions ever devoted to any game or sport. Its pages are almost
wholly occupied with the single game called trictrac, although it describes
briefly the trictrac a icrire, and a very simple diversion on the backgammon-
board styled courir la poule, in which four or five players may take part
(pp. .^1-2). How far back this trictrac game goes, and how far it represents
the most common variety of the medi»val "Ubles" it is, of course, not easy
to decide.
Three things will strike the English observer, as he becomes fiimiliar
with the French trictrac, namely, that, in several characteristics, it difl'ers
widely from any kind of backgammon known to the Anglo-saxon world. In
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STRAY NOTES 185
the first place, its method of counting consists in points gained by bring-
ing about, with the help of the dice, certain particular positions; by pen-
alties imposed on the adversary for errors and omissions, and by ability
to attack (*^hit'') the weaic points of the opponent. In the second place—
and this has to do with the final peculiarity just mentioned— the French
game admits of no captures. A player is not allowed to really **hit a blot/*
but only to put himself in the position of ^'hitting a blot.** In other words,
he receives a certain number of points when he is able to capture an enemy *s
man standing alone on one of the points of the board, but he cannot proceed
to actually effect the capture. In the third place, the points to be scored, to
which we have hitherto alluded, and which we have ventured to call minor
points, are marked by three tally -men, of which one is in use by one player
and two by the other at different periods of the game. Moves, positions,
threats to capture and the like sometimes count more, when they are, or
might be effected as a result of having thrown doublets. When these mi-
nor playing-points amount to twelve or more, they form a miOo't or game-
point, which is scored by means of a peg in one of the holes on the rim of
the board, as we have previously explained. In the fourth place, a final no-
ticeable dissimilarity between this French variety and the older English
one consists in the fact that in the former the men are never ^Uhrown out**
of the board, or in any way removed from it. When the peg, scoring the
major points, has been advanced through a certain number of holes agreed
upon, or through all the twelve holes on the one or the other side of the
board, the game is ended, leaving all the men in the board. It will be seen
from what we have said, that trictrac is an amusement demanding much
closer attention than either of the usual English games. This partly arises
from the necessity of keeping the score as the game proceeds, partly from
the number of possible positions, through the attainment of which the score
may be increased, and partly trom the necessity of attending not only to
the points made by one*s own play, but to the points which one*s opponent
omits to make.
To understand completely the philological character and relations of the
word trictrac much further investigation is necessary. The word has more
meanings than one, and it is difficult to say which is the original sense.
In old French it signified, we are told by one authority, both the noise of
dice — for that reason becoming the name of a game played with dice— and
the noise made by hunters to frighten up ducks and other birds. It was
also employed in the sense of the French train^ that is ** suite,** ^^attend-
ants,*' "equipage,** "movement,** and so on— Littr^ citing the following
as an illustration of this last signification: "Mdditer la patience de Dieu
sur les p^h^s des hommes, et consid^rer le trictrac du monde d*aujourd*hui,
qui est autant fou que jamais.** This is from the letters (tome II., p. 421)
of Qui Patin (1602-1672), and the word has here apparently the sense of
"goings-on ** or "march** (possibly resulting from its use to imply noise or
conAision). Trictrac also means what in French Is called quinconce^ a word
which comes from the Latin quincunx {quinque unciae)^ and which in the
Roman tongue means a copper coin marked by (five) points, or small balls,
to represent its value, being five-twelfths of the as. The French word quin*
conce however denotes— more definitely speaking— an arrangement of ob-
jects in relation to each other like the points, or circular "eyes,** on the
24
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186 CHESS IN ICELAND
dice used in playing backgammon. It occurs in the technical phrase en
trictrac, applied to a plantation of trees, or other plants arranged in straight
lines, but why such a phrase is used in arboriculture no French dictionary-
maker has apparently been able to comprehend or ascertain. It comes,
without doubt, from the resemblance of rows of plants, so arranged, to the
lines of points on a backgammon-board. A similar phrase, en ^cAsgut^, is
likewise employed by writers on the culture of trees^implying a distribution
of plants in transverse lines like the squares of a chess-board. Another techni-
cal meaning of trictrac, used among hunters, is defined by Larousse, in his
'* Grand diotionnaire universer' {sub voce), as a *^ bruit fait par des chasseurs
pour affaroucher les oiseaux aquatiques lorsqu*ils veulent les fairs tomber
dans leurs pi^ges.*' Still another is as a name applied to an **Ancien moulin
k tabac manoeuvre k bras," or, as it is defined, at greater length, by Littrd,
as the **Noms de certains moulins pour le tabac, k vis de serrage et bride
sup^rieure, qui ^talent manoeuvres par les hommes agissant directement k
Teztremite de leviers fix^s au sommet de Tarbre vertical de la noix.*' Fi-
nally it serves as the vulgar name of two birds, better known in French
as the '^draine" and the 'Hraquet." But all these last definitions have
nothing to do with the game of backgammon; they only serve to show
that the word trictrac, as the representative of a peculiar sound, is of wide
extent and great age. As we have elsewhere remarked, a very early occurrence
of trictrac (in the writings of Villon, or, one of his contemporaries, in the
XVth century) seems to be in the sense of ** noisily.** From this, and other
instances near that date, it would appear as if the word were already in use
before its application to the game of backgammon, that is to say while the
word ^* tables** was still the general term to denote the game, or an old form
of the game. Originally, then, as we feel authorized to assume, trictrac was
one of a class of vocables formed by duplication, either through rhyme, with
a differing initial, like "hurly-burly,** or through a change of vowel in
the two elements, as "knick-knack** and "zig-zag.** This class of words
is a very large one, and has not yet been adequately nor very scientifically
studied. Not all of them are onomatopoetic. Moreover, such words are
often formed in conversation, and do not always find their way into the
dictionaries, Just as one might say, in a rapid description, "mish-mash,**
thereby meaning a confused mixture, or ^'crish-crash,** as describing a
confused breaking. In this view it might be more proper to say that, in
one or more of the Romance languages, a word already in existence, in
other senses, was applied to the game of "tables** when its old name fell
into desuetude. Meanwhile all the linguistic authorities, copying the
French etymologists, insist upon the fact that the word trictrac origi-
nated as an imitation of the noise made in shaking the dice and casting
them; one dictionary, that of Hatzfeld and Darmesteter (1900), goes even
ftirther, and includes in this assertion also the noise of the pieces as
they are moved IVom one point to another, or piled upon each other
on the same point (des dames qu'on case)* It is to be noted, on the
other hand, that in the medisaval game the dice were not shaken, but
thrown from the hand, a fact already hinted at, and also that the noise
made by placing the counters on a point or upon each other is certainly
very slight. £arlier in these pages, too, we have suggested that the com-
ing into use of new-fashioned dice-boxes, making the noise of the dioe
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STRAY NOTES 1«7
more observable, may have had something to do with the modem French
name of the game. It is not unliJiely that the first statement, asserting the
ODomatopoetic origin of the word trictrac^ is that found in the following
passage from the '«Rteherohes de la France*' (1560, YIII, p. 671) of Pasqniers
^*I1 ne fikot pas obmettre nostre Jen de trie et trac; car, sMl nous plaist
considerer le son que rapportent les dez estans Jettez dans le tablier, 11 n'est
autre que le trie et trac;'' but this implies the previous use of the word in
its literal sense. Nor is the meaning of ^^noise*" or ^'oonfiision,'* pure and
simple, as an interpretation of the word trictrac uncommon. Moli^re says
in his eomedy of *'L*Etourdi'' (1658, iv, 5):
Puis, outre tont oelsy roos fidales aoiu it table
Un bruit, nn triquetrOG de pieds insupportable.
The phrase, '*I1 alloft son beau pas trictrac,'^ credited, as we havesatd,
either rightly or wrongly, to Villon, the XVth century poet, is another in-
stance. We also find the same signifleation in Italian at an early date. The
dictionary of Tommaseo so explains it, and presents us with the differing
ftmns trie trae^ trich trach and trieche tracche^ but states that the two lAtter
forms are provinelally applied to an irresolute person (ehi turn conclude mat
nuUa); while Alessandro Piccolomini (1508* 1578), in his manual of advice as
to the proper conduct of young ladies in love, styled '* La Raffaella, owero
della creanza delle donne'' (Yenezia 1574), says of certain persons that they
^^vanno per la strada con una certa fbria, eon un trich (rack di piiinellette,
che par ch'elle abbiano il diavolo fra le gam be.'' There is an old Italian
conversational adage, now or never used, which was applied to persons of
undecided character: **8iamo sempre sul trieche tracche^ e non si sa che par-
tito prendere.** On the other hand, the valuable '* Supplemento a*vocabolarJ
italiani'* (1857) of Oherardinl treats us to a passage in which several games
are ennmerated; **Abbiasi la ericca, li sblrri.... il flusso, ed fl trentono, le
donne, 11 tricchetraeehe o il dormiesti " drawn firom the humorous prodcwtlort,
'^Capitolo del gloco della primiera, coM commento di messer Pietropanio da
9an Chirleo** (Roma 1526), the real authorship of which is uncertain. In cit-
ing this, Oherardini condemns the Italian orthography tric-trac^ styling tt
^^pessima lessigrafia. '*
The recent '^Diccionario etymologico da lingua Portuguezt,'' by Adolpho
Coelho, has triqnetraque In a new sense; explaining it flrsl as *• backgammon'*
(o jogo do gamao), he afterwards says that an old signification of the word
was what the Americans call •♦squib" or ••fire-cracker." This meaning occurs
likewise in Spanish. The lexicon of Delfin Donadlu y Puignau— a work
entering under each vocable the Catalan form— first givea the literal mean-
ing of triqtistraque (or trichtrach, as written in Catalan) ae a noise like that
of repeated irregular blows, as well as the blows themselves (''ruido eomo
de golpes repetides y desordenados, 6 los mismos golpes*'), and then follows
it wfth the secondary sense of •• fire-eracker," describing that article f^Uyr
•*Pap^ con pdhrora, liado y atado en vario« dobleces, de eada lino de Vm
* cuales resulta un tirillo, pegindole fuego por la meeka fue tlmi€ en Qao> de'
tnm extremes " (but in Catalan this has another name). There la a Spaniaki
phrase derived from the expression ot suddennese of wcmnd-^m ctida Priqui*
traqne ('^at every moment"). The lexieograpbleal work mentlooed does not
cHe the word as hartng the signification ef **'haekgammon."'
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188 CHESS IN ICELAND
As to tictac^ Littrd explains this to be an onomatopoetic expression for
a snapping noise resulting from a regulated movement, citing the phrase,
"Le tictac du moulin" and the following quotation A>om the ^* Baron d'Al-
bikir " of Corneille (iii. 5) : ^*Sans cesse aupr^s de vous lecoeur me fait iietac:'
Scheler, treating trictrac as a *'mot de fantasie/* regards tictac as a more
ancient form, and follows this assertion with the usual explanation, ^^ono-
matop^ tir^e du bruit que font les d^s lancto sur le damier/* But Littr^
has .nothing to say in regard to tictac as a game. Whether it be a corrupt
abbreviation of trictrac^ or whether it be older than that word, it is certain
that it was used to express backgammon, or a form of it, in many languages
— in some even more ft-equently than its longer congener. This was the esse
especially in Dutch. The orthography differs, as does that of its variant, bo
that we have ticktach, tiktak and, in Portuguese, tiquetaque. The Centary
dictionary looks upon Hck-tack as the legitimate English form, and adds
"honce by variation trick-track/" In general, tictac and trictrac are to be
regarded as having, so (kr as backgammon is concerned, the same signi^-
cation.
Of varieties of the game other than trictrac at present played in France,
one of the most notable is that called the (Jeu de) Umte-tablef equivalent to
our most common and oldest existing English form of backgammon proper,
which in German, in later treatises, is known as gammon. This, as the
reader will remember, is believed to be the table-game appearing in King
Alfonso's list as todas tablas. For some reason it has been for many centuries
the favorite variety in all English lands. A differing sort, entitled revertier,
is also a wide-spread variety. In the XVIIth century " Compleat Gamester"
it is styled verquere, and is there said to be "originally of Dutch extraction,
and one of the most noted diversions among the Hollanders.'* The former
German title was verkehren^ but in modem treatises the French name Is
employed. There is in the French a second name, now generally disused,
reverquier^ probably an echo- word from the German verkehren. In Holland
the name is verkeer. As to the Scandinavian languages, the German term,
or a corruption of it, is used in all the older manuals, but forkcering occurs
in Danish. The name of one French variety, garanguet^ is found, separately
entered, in no French dictionary, etymological or otherwise. The word has
been transferred to German by later writers on games. The simple game of
les dames rahhatttes has long been known in England, occurring not only in
the "Compleat Gamester,'' but even in Hyde (II, pp. 36-37). It, or some form
nearly identical, seems to have been likewise known in Prance in old times
as renette^ the early dictionary of Cotgrave (1611) translating it "a game like
doublets or queen's game." Hyde considers that the word is properly rei-
nette, since Salmasius makes note of a game which he calls ^^reginula vulgo
regineta,^^
The lexicographers who treat the word Jacquet (rarely written jaquet)
unite in deriving it as a diminutive from the proper noun Jacques, in its
meaning of " lackey " (French laquais)^ from which comes likewise the English
"jockey" with a similar sense. They do not however assert, although they
imply it, that in the meaning of a "jeu analogue de trictrac," as Hatzfeld
and Darmesteter define it, its etymological origin is the same. The word
has been introduced into Italian as giacchetto. It would seem that it must
have a connection with the Spanish chaquete (backgammon) alluded to here-
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STRAY NOTES 189
after, the orthography of which is sometimes given in the dictionaries as
Jaquet, which according to Donadiu y Puignau is the Catalan form ; both
are used by Brunet y Bellet (see in '♦£! ajadrez," pp. 143, 254), but that may
arise from the fl&ct that the learned author is a Catalan. It is possible that
the word, and the game which it represents, may go much further back in
Spanish. In the list of games treated by King Alfonso, under the general
heading of ** tables,*' there is one variety styled laquet. The list is accessible
only in the pages of Van der Linde, in which there is at least one slight
error. Why may not laquet be an erroneous transcription of an old form
representing chaquete or Jaquet f No Spanish etymologist suggests any
etymology for chaquete. Another of the different kinds of trictrac mentioned
by Moulidars is the *^jeu de toe." This may or may not be the same as
toccadiglio. Scheler gives the word toe as a verbal substantive from toquer^
an older form of toucher, Littrd cites toe as an ^^onomatop^ d*nn bruit,
d*un choc sourd,'* and shows that it is used, as a reduplication, toe toe, by
Perrault, Madame de Qenlis and others, in an effort to express repetition
of sound.
There is, as the reader will already have perceived, much confusion in
the names given to the many varieties of backgammon. Nor is a variety in
one language always represented by the proper and equivalent name in
another. With his usual acumen Hyde (II, p. 35) notices this fact when he
remarks: **sed iste non est unus idemque lusus apud omnes gentes;** and
even finds divergencies in different parts of the same country, saying that
''apud noR nomen eundem lusum notat secundum diversas Angli» provin-
cias rerum denominationes aliquantulum variantes.**
A whole chapter might be written on the French technical terms used
in playing trictrac. Of jan we have already said something. It has been
transferred to other languages, although sometimes with a somewhat dif-
ferent signification. It is remarkable that the " Compleat Gamester,*' early
in the XVIllth century, in its account of " Verquere," which represents the
French variety of backgammon, revertier^ Kas the technical word " John,"
which is even used as a verb, "to John" one's opponent, while in its no-
tice of the " grand tricktrack " game it talks of " Gens de retour, or Back-
Game." Whether these citations throw any li^ht on the origin or general
use of Jan is questionable; they may merely result, the first from' a desire
to anglicise the word, or both that and the second from ignorance of
French orthography. The late French dictionary of Hatzfeld and Darme-
steter says that the etymology of Jan is uncertain, but that it is '* peut-etre
du nom propre Jean"— abandoning the Janus hypothesis as evidently of no
value. Jan occurs as early as the time of Rabelais (d. 1553), for he says :
" L'on diet que le jan en vault deux." The definition of the lexicographers
Just cited is a "coup par lequel un joueur perd des points, ou en ttAt perdre
& Tautre," which is concise enough. The etymologist Scheler omits the
word. Littr^ enumerates all the Jans and contreJanB^ (1-10), as we have
seen, and then notes the broader technical meaning of the word: "Par
extension, on a donn^ le nom de Jan aux parties de trictrac ou ces Jans ont
lieu : on dit * le petit Jan,' ' le grand Jan,' ' le Jan de retour,' pour la pre-
miere partie [of the tables], la seconde, et enfin la premiere de I'adversaire."
The best French-English lexicon, that of Fleming and Tibbins, translates
Jan by itself, thus showing that the term must have been in use in Eng-
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190 CHS88 IN ICELAND
land, and reopen petit Jan by 'Meft hand table/* grand Jan hy *' right hand
table" and ^'an de retour by '* outer table/' No dictionary endeavors to
explain the derivation of M4s^as {m^sdas) in the name of the Jan de m^zdas.
The £act that it is frequently written with a capital M would seem to indi-
cate that it is a proper name; but the termination ~c» (meaning ^^ace *') leads
us to believe that it is a compound, and the definition of the term appar-
ently supports this idea: Le jan de m^s^as **a lieu quand, au d^but d'une
partie, on a pris son coin de repos, sans avoir auoune autre dame abattue
dans tout son jeu, et quand on amene ensuite un ou deux cu/' Perhaps it
is a corruption of '* le jan d'ambesas,"" signifying the **Jan of two aces.**
' Talon is the ordinary French word for ^^heel" or '^heel-piece;'* hence it
signifies the extreme point of the board. The term bredouille, is generally
confined to trictrac. It has been formed from the verb bredouiUer, to ** pro-
nounce rapidly/* to '^sputter/* It is defined by Littrd thus: ^^ Marque in-
diquant qu*on a pris de suite tous les points qui ferment un trou on tons les
trotts qui font la partie, sans que Tadversaire ait marqu^ ou des points on des
trous. La hredouille des points se marque avec un double jeton, .quand
Tadversaire a pris quelques trous au commen^nt de la partie. 2^ Tavan-
tage qui en resulte, qui est que les trous ou la partie sont gagn^s doubles.**
The following phrases are cited: Petite, grande bredouiUe; avoir la bredoutUe;
Stre en bredauille; perdre la partie bredouiUe, Cotgrave renders bredonUle
into English as *' lurch.** As to the term plein at trictrac^ Littr^ defines
the phrase '^faire son plein** as signifying amvrir de deux dames lea mx
fleches d'une des tables^ and cites ^'Le Joueur ** (1. 10) of Regnard: *'Et quand
mon plein est fait, gardant mes avantages.** Other phrases are; ^'conserver
son plein/* *^'tenir son plein,** '^rompre son plein.**
We have enumerated elsewhere (see p. 180) the modern French forms of
the names given to the dice doublets. From the old French forms the Eng-
lish names are derived, as well as those in some other tongues. This
seems to indicate a peculiar and long prevalent taste for dice-games in the
QaUic race. An^bes as is Xllth century French^ remotely from the Greek
£(fcf <» and directly from the Latin ambo (old French arnbef even in its earliest
age a term of play)— om^o meaning '*two,** ^*both,** "double,** **dual.**
In Bngiish the term likewise occurs in the Xllth century. We have it in
the old production, ''The Harrowing of Hell** (1300) in the lines:
Stni be thoa. Satbuns !
The js fldkn wmibm mat.
The lexicographer and grammarian, Robert Sherwood, has in 1650 " to cast
anibes ace;'' and the philosopher Hobbes, a contemporary of Sherwood, has
(1656) " casting ambs-ace.'* Another word for " double ace " is beset (some-
times beset, and not unusually besas), which Littr^ defines as ** deux as
amends d*un coup de d^.** Its etymology js bis (two) and ox, bis being a
Latin corrupt form otduis (twice). Temes, generally in the plural, is firom
the Latin temus (triple). It occurs in a poet as early as Yillon:
AbQa6 m*% et fiiiot oatflBdre
D'ambeMS qno oe ftiasent tomM.
The word is used (tema) both in SpaiihA and Provencal. Double fonts in
Preach is carmm, fomerly written in the plural canmes^ and stiU so cited in
tbe dielioMry of the French academy. It is a cemiptioa ef oasnms^ nstd
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STRAY NOTES 191
ia the time of Mtoage (1613-ie92), and is l^om the Latin quaiemus ('' by
foars/* from the Latin quatuar). Quine^ according to Littr^, is a trictrac
term signifying a '* coup de dds qui amtoe deux cinq/' It is as old as the
Xllth century, occurring in the ''Brut** (see the present volume, p. 76), a
French poem of that period:
Et deas et d«iix giettant et mhum
Et ambM m et le tiers temdt,
A 1» foite gi«tUBt qwinet
Et $$nn$i ; et eo ftwt gnnt aignee ....
a passage of interest from the number of dice-terms employed. Very pecul-
iar is the term for double sixes, sannes (pronounced in one syllable san,
but written also sonnes and sonnet). It is from the Latin seni^ an adjective
meaning '* six by six,** '' which are six.** It is employed in an ingenious
passage of ''La flUe capitaine** (1. 9), a poem by Antoine Jacob called
Montfleury (1640-1695):
De cat gneox fkiutentt,
Dont le lort ett terlt snr lee m d'an comet
Dont lee commAndeare eout lee tmrmM et lee tansitft
Et qui font ohes Frldor tontee lean caravenee.
It is needless to say that "les os d*un cornet** are the dice; Fridor was
the proprietor of a " maison de Jeu ** at Paris about 1671. It is interesting
to compare with these the Italian names of the doublets. They are cmibasH
(more modern, ham}nni)\ duini (dUetti); temi; quademi; quini (singular
sometimes china); and sena (also dodici).
In the Iberian peninsula the story of tables-backgammon begins with
the extraordinary codex, still preserved in the Escurial near Madrid, which
was compiled at the instance of the Spanish kiog Alfonso X, during the
latter half of the Xlllth century. This still partly inedited manuscript treats
of chess, of pure dice-games, of " tables ** in its many varieties, of some
abnormal table-games, and, if we may believe Van der Linde (" Quellenstu-
dien,** pp. 277-8), also of several different forms of the morris game. The
dozen or more various sorts of " tables ** form the third book| or division,
of this comprehensive treatise. Many of these diverse kinds of backgammon
have come down to our own times, and not a few of them have even preserved
the names given to them in that early age. Indeed, if we wish to assure
ourselves of the vitality of human amusements, we have but to compare the
later manuals of games " played within the tables,** with this treatise of Al-
fonso, and with such codices as that "De ludis tabularum** now in the British
Museum, which was composed less than a hundred years after the work of the
Spanish monarch, and which we have printed at length in preceding pages.
We must repeat that our knowledge of every portion of the old manuscript
so long and so carefully guarded in the Escurial library, except of its early
sections relating to chess, is very slight indeed. A transcript of the unknown
portions is, of course, essential to a knowledge of our game in old Spain.
Nor have we been able to obtain information much more full in regard to
the later practice of the game in the peninsula. There may possibly be
modern Spanish manuals of games, such as exist in great numbers,in other
lands, in which they are known under the title of '* Academies des jeux ** and
the like; but we have been unable to discover any publication of this class
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192 CHESS IN IGKLAND
in the Castilian tongue. Dictionaries and cyclopedias have been our only
sources; and these are, naturally, of the most unsatisfactory character. ^
We find in Spanish two words representing the French trictrac and the
English backgammon. These are tablas reales and chaquete. In some of the
lexicons, if we search for the former term, we are told that it is '* a game
similar to chaquete; " if we look for the latter, we are informed that it is '*a
game resembling tdbUis reaJLesJ*" The former denomination is, of course, the
tabulcB of the early middle ages, still keeping its plural form, and with the
addition of the adjective reales^ which may signify either that it was considered
to be a court game par excellence^ or that it was the principal, most important
and best of the varieties of backgammon. Just as the French speak, with a
similar significance, of '^ le grand tricirac,^^ The exact origin and meaning
of the other name {chaqxiete) is, as has been hinted, at present very much
of a puzzle. In the province of Catalonia, especially noted for its early lite-
rature having reference to games, chaquete becomes jaquet, reminding us of
the French J acquet; while among the varieties of tables enumerated by Al-
fonso we have laquet^ in which the initial letter may or may not be, in Van
der Linde's list, a misprint for j or ch. But this suggestion can scarcely be
regarded as assuming even the doubtful dignity of a surmise, and can be
verified only by an examination of the manuscript. In addition to the repe-
titions, in which we have already indulged, we must again state that in
Spanish no congener of trictrac is employed as the title of a game. The
word triquilraque signifies in Spain either a certain kind of noise, or a ^' fire-
cracker'' (French, pStard). In both meanings this word occurs in modern
Spanish literature. Thus Jos^ Francisco de la Isla, a noted Jesuit miscellaneous
prose writer (1703-1781), speaks of *' esos retruecanilloses, ese paloteo de
voces, y ese triquitraque de palabras con que usted propone casi todos los
asuntos des sus sermones es cosa que me embelosa.'' In the other sense,
we find it in the works of the fertile and popular comic and dramatic poet,
Manuel Breton de los Horreros (1796-1873), as is shown by these lines:
Si ya DO ha reventado
Lo mismo qne an triquelraque,
No ea soya la oalpai do,
Porqao le tiene nn oon^fe
A la vida ....
From the huge "Diccionario enciclopedico Hispano-americano," issued
in late years at Barcelona, we take this definition of chaquete: "Especie de
Juego de tablas reales en el cual se van pasando alrededor todas las piezas
por las casas desocupadas, y el que mas presto las reduce al extremo del
lado contrario y las saca, gana el Juego." This is followed by a single citation
taken from the poet and essayist, Gaspar Melchior de Jovellanos (1744-I81I):
« At this point of our writing wo learn that the vatt collection of chois work* belong-
Ing to Mr. White of Cleveland (Ohlo)» to which allusion haa ao often been made, Inelodee
careful coplei of all the known medieval MBS relating to the Indian game - among them
the famoui one in the BK'urial. Tbeae tranacrlpU embraco also the aeotlona treating of other
table-gamea than ebeaa, whenever anch occur. Mr. White diaplaya a liberality not alwaya
exbibited by book-owaera In placing hia copiea, which mnat often have been obtained under
great diffleultlea, at the aervlce of inveatigatora on both aide* of the Atlaatlo. Availing
ouraelvea of this generosity we may be able, In the errata-aupplement attached to thla vol-
ume, to dlaperae some of the clouds which have hitherto obeeured thoae chapiera of the
CastUlan king'a codex having to do with the garoea of morrU and tables.
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STRAY N0TB8 193
^* .... con enouadernacion de libros, siesta, chaqueie.... y una partida de ba-
ciga o malilla, tiene nsted el compendio de la vida interior y esterior que
hago, etc.'* The same encyclopedic work gives this description of the game
of ehaquete^ which, it will be seen, is too brief to be of much interest; but
such as it is, we copy it: ** A este juego se juega con dos dados, y segdn
los puntos que se marquen al tirar los, se colocan quince tantos 6 damas en
varias cassillas 6 puntos marcados en el tablero especial de este juego. Para
jugar al chaquete es preciso que cada jugador tenga quince damas 6 peones,
como se les quiera llamar, tres tantos y dos fichas que son las senales que
se ponen en cada punto, segun los que se ganen. El chaquete se juega entre
dos personas: al empezar el juego se hacen dos 6 tres montones con las damas
que se colocan en la primera casilla o flecha del chaquete; k esto se le da el
nombro de monte 6 fondo. No hay regla que flje la cabecera, y es indife-
rente que el monte 6 fondo de damas se coloque en uno u otro lado. Para
jugar con orden es preciso, si al principio se empareja, jugar dos damas del
monte y colocarlas en el as, que es la flecha sobre la queestan amontonadas
las damas. Se puede jugar todo de una vez colocando una sola dama en la
segunda flecha. Lo mismo sucede en las dem&s combinaciones, que pueden
verificarse o jugarse k la vez, si se quiere exceptuando, no obstante, los nu-
meros cinco y seis, que deben jugarse precisamente cuando salen en la pri-
mera jugada, porque las reglas del juego no permiten que quede una dama
sola en la casilla llamada de reposo. De la habilidad, 6 mejor, de la prudencia
del jugador, dependeponer dos damas juntas en la flecha en que esta el monte
de las damas, que por lo regular es la primera. Se pasa luego k la~ casilla
del reposo, la cual se efectua colocando en ^1 juntas dos damas, algunas
veces en las de su lado cuando lo exigen las lances del juego. En cuanto
se tiran los dados, y segun las puntas que se hay an sacado, debe verse la
ganancia 6 p^rdida que se haya hecho antes de tocar las damas, porque es
regla del juego que dama tocada dama jugada, k menos que la dama 6 pe6n to-
cadono pueda jugarse, case que ocurre cuando nnjugador puede colocarse en
una casilla de esquina no ocupada, de donde otra dama no podria entrar ni
salir sola 6 bien que trdpiece con el juego del contrario, antes de que se le
haya abierto brecha. Segiin las reglas del chaquete^ cuando se ganan dos
puntos deben marcarse en el extreme delantero de la flecha segunda; los
cuatro puntos delante de la flecha cuarta; los seis puntos en la linea
de separaci6n; los echo puntos al otro lado del la linea de separacion
delante de la flecha seis; los diez puntos so marcan en la ultima linea;
los doce que constituyen la partida doble se marcan con una flcha. £1 que
tira los dados tiene siempre el derecho de marcar el punto que gana antes
que su contrario sefialc el que pierde. Hay que advertir tambi^n que, cuando
uno de los jugadores se ha apoderado de una de las casillas de esquina y
el contrario no lo ha efectuado aun en la suya, cada vez que se tiran los
dados vale cuatro 6 seis puntos, si con dos damas se combate el rincon
vacio del adversario, es decir, seis por doble y cuatro por sencillo. Segun
el ^Diccionario de la lengua Castellana' por la Real academia espaliola, *
*el antico juego llamado de tablas reales era muy parecido al moderno
chaquete.' "
The description here given is too obscure, and is characterised by too
many omissions of essential features, to make a translation of it either feasible
or useful. Its rule that two men must be placed simultaneously on the
36
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194 CHESS IN ICELAND
** corner of repose '* (the extreme point in each player^s table) seems to ally
it with the French trictrac^ but, on the other hand, many important character-
istics of that principal French variety are not mentioned by the evidently
ignorant Spanish compiler. It would be satisfactory to find that there was
a real relationship ^ as well as a resemblance of name — between chaquete
and the French jacquet^ but the reader, on examining the few lines which
we have devoted to the latter (p. 182), will notice that no mention is made
in the Spanish account of the avant-courier, or single piece sent forward in
the French game to the final board. Nor are we told, either by the writer
cited, or in any other accessible publication, what the real difference is
between tablas reales and chaquete^ the dictionaries even, as we have stated,
onl^ vaguely informing us that they resemble each other. It is not at all
impossible that at present in Spain they are two names for one and the same
thing. As to the Spanish dictionaries, they are all worse than useless so
for as our purpose is concerned. The most noted one, that of the Spanish
academy, has for the most part been superseded by newer works. But the
best of its successors, the *' Diccionario de la lengua castellana ** of Donadiu
y Puignau does little more than to copy the very brief description of his
predecessor (under chaquete) : ^' Especie de juego de tablas reales, eh el cual se
van pasando alrededor todas las piezas por las casas desocupadas, y el que
mis presto las reduce al extremo del lado contrario y las saca, gana el juego **
— just as it has likewise been reproduced, as a definition, by the compiler
of the ** Diccionario enciclopedico.*' Donadiu y Puignau adds nothing to this
except to give the corresponding Catalan form Mjaquet. 0{c?iaquetehe sug-
gests an etymology, which certainly has a dubious look; he says that it is
derived flrom the old-French eschac, signifying "booty" (butin), "capture''
or "prey'* ipresa), and so "game" U^ego)—9, derivation which has been
copied and tacitly endorsed by other Danish compilers. The early French
word he cites has to do with our Oermanic friend, which we treated some
pages back, from which, in its Old High German form {scdhhdri), is descended
the modern German vocable scMcher ("robber"), and which has been used
in attempting to ascribe to chess a European origin." Under triquitraque the
same lexicographer has the two usual meanings, telling us that in the sense
of a repeated noise the Catalan orthography is irichtrach, while for " cracker"
or "squib" it employs quite another term (carretiUa, piule). The French-
Spanish dictionary of Salv& (1876', 6th ed.), the compiler of which was a scholar
of high reputation, translates "trictrac" by chaquete, and "revertier" as
Juego de chaquete, while the French "jacquet" is defined 9^8 Juego de tablas
reaZes — than which nothing could be more indefinite. Other definitions
relating to backgammon are; "jan," las dos tablas del Juego del chaquete o
de tablas reales ; " faire sa jan de retour," volver a su propria Juego, des-
pties de haber pasado todas sus damas al Juego del cotitrario ; "Contre jan,"
cotttraenvite, Uamada falsa en aXgunos Juegos. These explanations are all
inexact, to say the least. The following are more correct, and relate to the
names of the doublets : " ambesas," ases, voz que usan losjugadores de chaquete
cuando sale el as en dos dados, o en los tres; "ternes," tetmas o treses, pa-
r^'as de tres puntos en el Juego de dados ; "carmes," cuadernas o cuatros, las
parkas de cucdro en el Juego de tablas o del chaquete; "quine," quina, par^a
de cinco en el Juego del chaquete. We find no rendering of the French "san-
nes" (double sixes). It is worth noting that the Spanish and Italian words
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STRAY NOTES 195
for ''die*' {dado) are identical, and that por^'a, in the former tongue, Bignifles,
"doublet."
As to Portugal the lack of information is still greater than in the case
of its peninsular companion, and we are obliged to depend almost wholly
upon the makers of dictionaries. We discover from them that there are four
expressions used as names of games played on the backgammon board :
1. [jogo de] iabulas; 2. tiquetaque; 3. [jogo do] gamao;And 4. tocadilho. In
regard to the first we learn that the orthography of this derivative of the
Latin tabula vacillates (in the singular) between tahola, tabula and taboa.
Tdbola is also given with the signification of "pawn'' or "man;" while
Adolpho Coelho's " Diccionario etymologico da lingua portugueza " states
that it not only has this meaning (p^pa redonda para o jogo de gam&o) but
also signifies the board {e ouiros de taboleiro). Tiquetaque is said by the
" Century dictionary " to be the Portuguese for backgammon or tricktrack,
and is indeed found in most of the Portuguese vocabularies in that sense.
Coelho does not cite this form, but in his definition of tocadilho he refers to
triquetraque {J^tfo ^^ tabulas similhante ao triquetraque\ but when you look
up his rubric of triquetraque^ you can discover no mention of it as the name
of a game, but only as a " fogo de artiflcio que da estalos"— evidently the
" fire-cracker." Coelho declares that it is an ancient term. The most interest-
ing of the denominations in our list is, however, ^{7mdo, the more interesting
that its origin seems to be still a mystery. It is also, we believe, the most
common of the Portuguese terms. Coelho speaks of " o jogo do gamSo," and
of " taboleiro de Jogo do garo&o; " and tells us that it is the same as the
Spanish triquitraque (which, as we have already learned, does not to seem
to be known to Spanish lexicography as the name of a game) and the French
trictrac or tHquetrac, Elsewhere he defines gamSo as a "jogo de azar e cal-
ctilo," adding that it likewise means " o taboleiro [board] sobre que so Joga."
Other Portuguese dictionaries describe gamHo as sbaraglino (an Italian name
for a variety of backgammon); one renders the word trictrac Ksjogo de ia-
boUis^ gamfto; and the Italian sbaraglio (of which we shall hear soon) is
translated by gamBo de tres dados. Whether gamSo be the English "gammon ; "
which it resembles in pronunciation ^received into the language possibly
through the French— it is altogether impossible to decide except after more
thorough investigation. Our fourth term, tocadilho (which,as wehaveobserved,
does not seem to be Spanish), is found in the vocabulary of Coelho, as well as
in those of other lexicographers, btit without any suggested etymology. In
one dictionary it is rendered by the Italian tavola reale. In an English and
Portuguese dictionary by Lacerda (1866), our "trictrac" is rendered by io^o
de tabulas^ and our "backgammon" by gam&o; but in the Portuguese-Eng-
lish part (1871) of the same work we have Jogo das tabulas interpreted as
"the game called tables or draughts"— an ordinary instance of lexicological
fallibility. All this is very meagre. There ought (as we have said in regard
to Spain) to be some treatise on games, published either in the mother country
or in Brazil, which would enhance our scanty information, but we have failed
to find any which presents any features of much value. The fourth edition
of an anonymous "Manual dos jogos" was indeed issued at Lisbon in one
of the last years of the century Just closed. It is printed in large type,
treats 46 games of cards ; 14 "jogos dilTerentes," among them the usual table
games (except morris); 4 "jogos de sport;" and a multitude of social or draw-
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196 CHESS IN ICELAND
jng-room amusements. ^ To each game are assigned certain very brief
numbered paragraphs. Thus, billiards is taught in 25 such paragraphs, the
longest extending to fewer than six lines; draughts is presented in 17 para-
graphs; and chess in 34, that is in fewer than 88 of the large-type lines.
GamcU) (trictrac) has also its place (pp. 150-153), embracing 26 numbered
paragraphs, the longest of 8 lines. A few unimportant illustrations adorn
the volume, one being a vignette on the cover title-page, repeated on p. 139,
representing the assalto board, that is the English fox-and-geese board hav-
ing the upper arm of the cross transformed into a fortress; while others
exhibit the method of laying out a croquet field (p. 173) and a tennis court
(p. 189).
In treating all the table-games there is a general lack of precision,
which can only arise from lack of knowledge. In draughts {damas), for in-
stance, we are told that " ordinarily the men (pet^s) are placed on the white
squares'' but that ^Hhis, however, is of no importance since they may be
placed indifferently on those, or on the black ones"— without any allusion
to the fact that the squares must be those in the diagonal lines. Nor is either
the number of squares or the number of men necessary to the game stat-
ed, the compiler having, perhaps, heard vaguely of "Polish draughts" and
not wishing to betray, unnecessarily, his ignorance. At the end of some of
the sections, forming the final rule or paragraph, is a general apology declar-
ing that the game under notice is of such a complicated character that it
is impossible to treat it in detail. In reference to chess (ocadrejt) we are
' told (pp. 162-166) that the men are called peSo (plural, peZes); and the pie-
ces ret, rainha, roqtie (plural, roques), cavallo (plural, cavallos) and delphin
(plural, delphins). By the 22d rule we are advised that '^when a king is se-
parated from the hostile king by only a single square it is said to be in op-
position " {quando um ret estd tmicamente separado do rei inimigo por uma
casa^ diz-se em opposifao). A similar dubious definition is that given in the
25th paragraph: '^To sacrifice a piece [pegcC^ to the enemy in order to secure
a more open {niais desafogada) position is to play a gambit {jo9(iT um gam-
bitoy Castling, according to the meaning given to it in rule 27, is a mat-
ter of great simplicity: ''To play two pieces at once is called castling
{chama-se rocar).'^ We enumerate these naive definitions merely to give an
idea of the character of -the work. We find cited only a few technical chess
terms. Among them are: cJieque ao rei; cheque a descoherto; cheque do-
brado; cheque perpetuo; mate abafado.
And now we come to gamBo^ which is subdivided into 26 brief para-
graphs. We note, as we run our eye over the three pages, that the men
are called damcis ; and the points to be counted pontes. The 15 damas of
one player are white, those of his opponent either black or green. The
game requires likewise 2 dice {dados), three markers {tentos) and two pegs,
{pregos^ in French fiches) of bone or ivory. The dice are placed in a copo
de couro (literally *'cup of leather"). The men, at the beginning of the
1*4 Tb« title of the book In full is : '* Manual doa jogos — Jogoa de Cartaa peqaenos Jogos
de eala e Jogoa direnos — 4* ediffto Interaiuente refundlda o augmentada eom todof oa Jogos
modernos uaadoa nos elubs e na boa soeledade taea eomo Bluff, Wblat, Boston, Baeearat,
BMqne, Piquet, Lawn-tennia, Foot-ball, Croquet, Cricket, etc., etc. Llsboa •»< 1899 editor
^ Arnaldo Bordado. 49 Kua da Victoria — 1**' —B* pp. »62. — which we gWe with Ita peeoliar
psBotnatlon.
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STRAY NOTES 197
game, are piled in three lieaps on, the first point (here fiecha^ ttom the
French) marked on the backgammon -board {gam^). The white men are
considered to be the *' pieces of honor** {damas de honor). Casar means to
establish a cas<iy that is to make a point safe by '^doabling** a man on it;
at (plural, azes) is ace; lanfo is a ^'move;** componho corresponds to the
FvencYi yadoube 9X chess. The author*s final paragraph reads thas: ^Hhere
- are many and good treatises on the game of backgammon. They are all,
moreover, books containing abundant matter {livros de copiosa mcUeria)^
some of them exceeding, in the number of their pages, the present manual.
Amateurs will consult those works.** In the preceding paragraph (25th) he
had given his customary apologetical utterance about the deficiencies of his
book: ^^N*um pequeno resume de J6gos como o nosso, comprehende-se a im-
possibilidlide que ha em desenvolver aquelles que, como o gamSo, obedecem
a complicadissimas regras.**
It would be difiicult for the tyro, even with the closest study, to learn
to play the game by the sole aid of the meagre instructions thus given. Nor
can one easily decide what variety of the game is here described, but it
seems to correspond more nearly to the ordinary French irictrac than to
any other. We are first informed that each player has *^15 men which lie
disposes artistically on the points indicated in the board** {quinze damas^
as dispJie artisticamente sobre os pantos marcados no taboleiro)^ and then that
the game is begun by entering the 15 men, in 2 or 3 piles, on the first
point designed on the board (gam^). Rule 12 tells us that no isolated or
single man can be placed on the ''point of repose** (casa de descangoy which
is immediately afterwards styled casa de repotiso)^ and the inhibition is re-
peated, in another form, by the statement that a casa can be made on that
point by placing on it, conjointly, two men (collocando n'ella, cot^unctamente,
duos danuzs). The rule for reckoning the minor points, as well as the game-
points, are virtually those which we find laid down in the treatise of Mou-
lidars for trictrac. If we may draw any conclusion flrom this work it is that
the modern Portuguese game is that most taught and practised in France.
The only name given in the ''Manual** to backgammon is gamdo.
If we regard the identity of the Roman duodecim scripta with nard-
tables-backgammon, or with some form of it, as not yet determined, then
we must assume that the oldest historical monuments connected with the
history of our game in the Italic peninsula are those remarkable manuscripts,
of which the earliest extant texts are to be found in Florence and Rome,
and which treat of what has been characterised as the triad of mediaeval
diversions— the games of chess, morrjs and tables. These ancient codices,
in their existing shape, all date f^om a period between the XlVth and the
XVIth centuries. They were originally written in Latin, and, therefore, it
is not impossible that there may have been texts, now lost, going back to
a somewhat earlier date. The portions relating to the morris game and to
tables have not been, so far as is known to us, subjected to an accurate
comparison with the Alfonsine MS, and hence we can form no trustworthy
judgment of the relations they may, or may not bear to the Spanish text.
We only know that certain methods of playing tables are indicated by the
same, or very similar names, tn both. That Latin is the language of the
early North-Italian documents and Spanish of that of Alfonso might indicate
the greater age of the former, but this difference may well be owing to other
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198 CHESS IN ICELAND
circa mstances than age. The development of vernacular literatures in both
lands was nearly contemporaneous. While the wise Alfonso, to whom the
Escurial MS owes its being, was writing his famous code and his chronicle
at Seville, the emperor of the Holy Roman empire, Frederick II, was inditing
Italian verses at Palermo, and Guide Guinicelli was composing the earliest
sonnets, canzoni andballate at Bologna— works which made him, in Dante*8
opinion,
11 padre
Mio e degli altri miei migUor, ohe mai
Rime d' amore nsar dolci e leggladre.
But Alfonso "first made the Castilian a national language," as the chief
historian of Spanish letters tells us— and, singularly enough, by the same
means employed by Luther, long afterwards, to give vitality to thb German,
namely by translating the Bible into it — and would naturally see that his
book of games, like nearly everything else with which he had to do, was in
the vulgar speech. Political relations did not exist between North Italy and
Spain until almost three centuries later, when, under Charles V, they be-
came intimate enough; for the struggles between the other Spanish Alfonsos,
Alfonso V and VI of Arragon, and the republic of Genoa were mainly
confined to the sea, although the latter monarch, after the disastrous naval
battle oflf Ponza in 1435, was, for a brief period, a prisoner-guest in the
hands of the last Viscontr duke of Milan, to whose custody he had been
consigned by the victorious Genoese. No doubt there was, in those days,
a fairly close ecclesiastical connection between the two prominent Latin
nationalities, so that, through the convents, or through various channels
meeting each other at Rome, an author of any production in one country,
would be pretty apt to hear of and to get sight of any preceding work on
his theme written in the other. It is not unlikely, however, that the strong-
est link uniting the two peninsulas, just at the time in which we are in-
terested, would be the great university of Bologna, which was at its highest
point of fame and frequency between Irnerlus in the Xllth century and
Mondino in the XlVth; one of its earliest foundations — still to be seen—
is the *» Collegio di Spagna,'* anciently thronged with students f^om beyond
the Pyrenees, Very notable certainly is the similarity of the Spanish and
Italian MSS, both principally devoted as they are to three amusements, chess,
morris, tables. Did the authors of both independently select these three
subjects, because in both lands they were the most notable table-games?
Did those of Italy imitate the Spanish production, or did the Castilian mon-
arch get the idea of his compilation f^om or through Romet Or did both
follow in the path of earlier compilers ? In one respect they are understood
to differ :— the Italians pay no heed to games of pure chance, in which dice
only are used without board or men, while a certain number of such
games appear to be described in the Escurial codex. Was this because the
North-Italian compilations were for use in school and cloister, and the other
was prepared for the diversion of a court? The testimony of age, proving
what it may, so far as we are now in a position to gather and appreciate
it, is assuredly in favor of Spain. We know that the compilation which
bears the name of Alfonso was completed before 1285; we cannot, taking
the most favourable view, ascribe so high a date, by at least a half century,
to any of the venerable works which we are about to describe. But, as has
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STRAY NOTES 199
been said by others, there may have been older texts, which have disap-
peared.
The original and oldest forms of these works are to be found chiedy
in three collections, namely, the great Victor Emanuel or government H*
brary at Rome, in the library belonging to Prince Barberini in the same
city, and in the National library — the largest in Italy — at Florence. It is
possible, though not probable, that one or two of these codices go back to
the xrvth century, but the others, as we have just said, are to be referred to
the XVth and XVIth. Though not all contain positions in chess, merelles
and backgammon, most of them include problems in all three, generally with
an explanatory note attached to each, showing how it is to bo played and
resolved. The chess problems always come first, are much the most numerous,
and are followed in varying order by those at morris or tables. It is in our own
times that attention was first called to the texts in Italy —a little subsequent to
the middle of the XlXth century— after they had, for a long while, vanished
from the knowledge of the general public — hidden away, in the unsatisfac-
torily catalogued MSS rooms of the vast Italian book-collections we have
mentioned, as securely as if they had been sunk to the bottom of the river
Lethe. Tor subject-lists of collections of codices and of archives are almost
non-existent on the continent of Europe, and in ordinary alphabetical author-
catalogues, anonymous and pseudonymous producUons, if entered at all, arc
generally so entered as to be almost hitrouvables, unless the searcher be
not only an expert, but an inspired expert. The story of their refinding,
which was given to the public by the London Illustrated News in 1854,^ re-
minds one of the rediscovery by Pierre de Nolhac of the precious Potrarch
autograph MSS, belonging, in the XVIth century, to the Fulvio Orsini col-
lection, but which, for several generations, had been concealed from human
ken, their very existence forgotten, in the rarely-opened presses of the Vat-
ican treasure-house. That event was almost like the reappearance of the
Italian poet himself, pen in hand, among the raqks of the living. In the
other case, the little world of chess was astounded to learn what stores of
the chess wisdom of our ancestors had been almost unwittingly preserved
for our delectation. So far as their chess contents are concerned the newly-
^ The aiiAouiiecmont of iLo diacuvery of tbcto UBS wan made Ib tho London lUu»traUd
lf9W9 (tbo ohvss-eolumn of wblcb was tben edited by Howard Staunton) of July 1, 185i
(page-number 6S2) In an article entitled *' Bemarkable disccvury of valuable MSB on cbees.**
Tbe diioovery wat laid to bave been made in tbc two moRt Important libraries of Florence
(probably ibe Maglabeecblan and the Palatine, since tbat time united aa tbe National library)
by a tignor Fantacci, wbose conmunleation was written from tbe Tuaean ministry of tbe
Interior (Hlnlstero dell* interne). Tbe article states tbat Mr. FanUcel bad procured eopiee
of tbo eblef works wbleb be bad found, and bad sent tbese transcripU to Mr. Stonntou.
Tb«n follows a brief list of seven MSS, of wbicb tbe first four, two on vellam and two on
paper, are among tbose wbleb we have treated in tbe preseut section. The first of tbese Is
tbe oldest, *' Bonus Sodas*' — this anonym is bcre seen for tbe first time In print— wbleb
is said by Mr. FanUeel to be of tbo latter end of tbe Xlllth or the beginning of tbe XlVih
century ; the other vellum Is assigned to tbe XVth century ; tbe third eodex is a Latin paper
MS, and the fourth an Italian paper MB, both Ultewiee of the XVth century. The last three
MSS consist of au anonymous paper codi-x of the XVIih century entitled ; " L* eleganala, sot-
tiliU e verriti [tie] delta virtuosisslma professlone degli seacchl ; ** an Itatlan vellnm eontalo'
Ing a work by Lnigi Gnleclardini, being a " comparaaione del'giuoco degli seacchl all* arte
milllare, " without date; and a parchment MS of Greco *s " Noblllssimo giuoco de scaechl**
with the date of 16S1. The account of tbese MSS Is copied word for word Into the Chtu
Player** ChronicU (new series II, pp. SSO-ISl), likewise then edited by Mr. Btaanton. Short
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200 CHESS IN ICELAND
found MSS have been studied with much care and judgment by Van der
Linde and Von der Lasa, but the portions of them which are devoted to the
other mediaBval games still await an editor. He should not much longer be
lacking, for it is easy to understand that no history of tables- backgammon,
in its European period, can be written without a previous minute study of
all these manuscript sources. In such days as ours, when so many scholars
are crowding each other in their efforts to delve among the literary and
other treasures of the past, it is rare to find so much unwrought material,
on any subject, so easily accessible to the student.
These documents of Italian origin fall into two families or groups, one
(believed to be the earlier) having for its compiler a writer who styles
himself "Bonus Socius." This signifies literally a "good companion" or
"good fellow,'* but has also been interpreted to mean "teacher," "tutor,"
** instructor," " decent " — from an alleged mediaeval use of the term in uni-
versities ; but why should it not be regarded as signifying a man fond of
company and pleasures — and pastimes, in fact a "boon companion," for
"bonus" is "boon." In some of the texts or versions the compiler's or
editor's name is given as Nicholas de St. Nicholai, and he is said to be of
Lombardy. If "St. Nicholai" or "S. Nicolii" represent his natal pflaoe the
matter is not thereby much helped, for there are numerous communities so
called in Italy— especially in the Southern provinces, where the cult of the
patron saint of Bari once greatly prevailed — to say nothing of others in
other lands. There seems to be no such locality well or widely known in
Lombardy, but there is one just over the border in Venetia. Von der Lasa
suggests that the real "Bonus Socius'* may have been born in any country,
and have lived in Northern Italy as a member of a monastery, which makes
the effort to identify his birthplace well nigh a hopeless task. The MS of
his work which furnishes the earliest known text is found in the National
library at Florence— a handsome vellum codex (B. A. 6 — p.2.-no. 1.); while
others, complete or incomplete, in the original, or in French or other render-
ings, are preserved in the libraries of France (at Paris and Montpellier) ; of
England (at London and in the possession of the Fountaine family, Narford
Hall, Swaffham, Norfolk— but see a later page of this section, where it will
be noted that this rare and beautiful volume has ceased to be the property
of the Fountaines); in cities east of the Rhine (Prague, Munich, Wol-
fenbijttel) ; and even in the United States (at Clevelan'd, Ohio). The last men-
M the arUdd Is It i» not without blunders, and ulUmately gave rise to other misstatcmenU.
The titles of the fifth and the sixth MSS are erroneonsly copied, and we do not Tooeh for
their correctness In the forms in which we have cited them ; Mr. SUnnton apparently and
Van dor Linde certainly (<* Gesehlohte " I, pag. S84), in their ignorance of Italian, mistook
the word mini9t€ro for minisirOf so that the latter plainly spealis of '< den wlohtigan fend
des tosltaDlschen ministers.** In the Jlluttrated 2iew* of July St (pag. 67) the editor, in
reply to a inpposititlons correspondent, says that although tbe Guicciardini MS Is not dated,
it Is qalte easy to ascertain its age approximately, since It is dedicated to the lUnstrious
Cosimo de' Mcdiei who died 1464, not notielng that tbe list of MSS in his own article states
that it was dedicated to Cosimo, the second duke of Florence (dnca S<>), who died not In 1464
but in 1574. As Lulgl Guicciardini, who was the nephew of the historian, was born Id i&SS
and died in 16S9, he could not well have dedleated his work to Cosimo tho older. Y. d.
Linde seems to have rcoelTcd a much later note f^om Fantacoi, dated at Rome, December IS,
187S. It is proper to observe that Fantaeei*s list does not include the 1464 Civls Bononiss
codes, which the grand-duke of Tuscany is supposed to have carried away from Florenoe a
few years later*
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STRAT NOTES 201
tioned is in the collection of Mr. John G. White, being a codex formerly in
the possession of Mr. Robert Franz of Berlin, containing chess positions
extracted from "Bonus Socius** by an editor, Paulus Guarinus (Guarino),
of Forll, a town just below the Southern boundary of Lombardy. ^
The other (presumably somewhat later) family of these early manuscripts
has for its compiler a scholar styled by himself a citizen of Bologna, "Civis
Bononiae," whose identity has not even been surmised. The pseudonym,
however, strengthens, although perhaps slightly, what we have ventured to
hint concerning the possible relation of the most venerable of the learned
institutions of Europe to these Italian treatises. Copies of this " Civis Bo-
nonise** compilation are not so common as those of its predecessor; nor are
there any known translations of it into modern languages except in* the case
of a few of the backgammon positions. Among the two oldest existing texts,
as Von der Lasa tells us, are those of the Victor Emanuel library at Rome
(MSS Vitt. Em. 273), and the one belonging to Prince Barberini, also in the
Italian capital. ^^^ He states that they are ascribed to the Xlllth or XlVth
^ It is flaguUr, thoDKh by no meaus flattortag to the Italiao and Auglo-Baxon nalloo-
alltief, that thit Italian field hat beoo tilled only by German seholart. The eame may he
UkewiM said of tbe most momorable and most veuorable of all writing! doTotcd to medisTal
games, th« Alfonelue oodex ; for, althongh Brunet y Bellet baa indeed given a Taluable deeerip>
tlon and reprodaetion of tbe introduetory portiona of th« acaeebio part of tbat MS. be doea
not pretend to treat tbe pcaltfone of aren tbat aeetion, and baa llltle or notbiog to aay aboat
tbe pAgea filled witb cxamplea of other gamea. Tbe dUition (abtchniU) of Von der Laaa*a
admirable treatiae, '*Zur geacblcbte nnd llteratur dea tcbacbapiela*' (1897), devoted to ibeae and
otber MSS of a practical character (that la, relating to tbe movementa of pleeea) la tbe alxtb
(pp. llS-168), divided into two ebaptera. Tbe beadinga to these in tbe table of oontenta are:
** VI. I. — Altea problemweaen : Spaniaeber codex dea Alfonao. — Gruppirung der ftbrlgen band*
acbriften. ~ FransOalaehe MSB. CoUon Cl*op, nnd Bibl, R*g, su London. — Die engllaeben
bandacbrifton Porter nnd Atbmole (Hartwell). — VI. S. — Altea problem weien : Bonu» Sociut
MS, nebat Fountalne, nnd Parle (alte aig. 73900), Pieard (alt 7S91), V^olfeubtlttel extrav., "MSB
liobkowits and Kottmaaner. -^ CivU Bon^nia* MS. — Dreaden MS. ~ Floreni XIX. 11, 87.—
Bicardiana MS nnd Alia rahio$a. — Gaarinua. — BibL Caaanafaiija." Van der Linde, if loaa
oritioal, la, eo far aa ebeaa goea, more nearly complete, endeavouring to reprodnee tbe prob*
lema and end-gamea ft-om tbe moat Important compUatlona of tbe middle agea. In bla
** Qoellenatadlen ** (1881) *'Daa aebaebwerk Alfonao*a X*' forma the third chapter of tbe firat
diviaion (pp. Tt-lte), the few Unea which be devotee to tbe "Libro de laa Ublaa" of the
royal MS oeonrrlng on pp. 7S-S. Tbe following (foortb) chapter treata of the "Bonoa Boeiua**
MSS under tbe title '*Daa latelnlacb-pikardlacbe aebaebwerk dea Micbolaua von S. Nlcbolai
(am 1850-1513),** extending throogb pp. Itl-lSft, there being aome alight allaaiona to tablea,
aa on p. 184. Tbe eubject ia completed In tbe aabaequent (flflb) chapter, ** Ueberaetsnngon
nnd frei bearbeituagen (am 180O-1660),'* pp. 186-S80. Van der Llnde, in bi« work here elted,
doea not mention tbe paendvnym "Clvla Bononlie," apparently inclading all the problem eom*
pilationa of Northern Italian origin under tbe name of tbe otbor and probably aomewhat
earlier collector, " Bonua Sociua,*' whom both be and Yon der Laaa concur in identifying as
Nieholaa de S. Nlcbolai, and to whom Italy, France and Germany lay claim. Nor doea
** Clvla Bononin** occur in tbe index to Van der Llnde'a larger work, tbe "Geaehlohte and
llteratur" (1874).
^"^ Of thla vellum <'Civia Bononln'* codex in tbe Barberini palace (preaa-mark, X. 78),
wo are able to give a few general particulars. It ia somewhat smaller than tbe codex Vitt.
Km. 87S, meaauring 81 eentimetera by 15 aa agaiuat tbe latter's 88 Va by 17, but this dif-
ference la largely dae to tbe binder'e knife. The Barberini manuecript logins, like the
other, with tbe prologue In aix rhymed veraea, but the opening initial (U) lacks tbe group
of flgurrs, being executed In aimple blue. YTblltt tbe Viotor Rmanuel codox la apparently
the work of two dllTerent banda (cbeae by one and tbe two otber gamea by a aeeond),-tbe
Barberini, on tbe other band, exbibita tbe aame chirography from beginning to end. The
number of backgammon poaltlone in both ia tbe aame, bat we are told by a aebolar whoae
examination haa evidently not been very complete that no worda almilar to «6ara<U or tba-
26
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CHESS IN ICELAND
century, but seems to doubt the former ascription; indeed he himself, later
on, in his last great work (p. 153), speaks of them as "' MSS aus dem 15
Jahrhunderte. " They are in fact, as it would seem, of about the middle of
the XVth, and are admirable specimens of the book-art of the period, both
as to the vellum, the chirography and the illuminations. A third copy, also
on vellum, which bears marks of a somewhat greater age than these, was
acquired by Von der Lasa himself at Rome, and still— it is to be supposed
— forms a part of the noble library he left behind him. A fourth vellum
codex is reported to have existed, until a recent period, in Florence, but has
now disappeared, carried off, according to a theory of Von der Lasa, by the
last grand-duke of Tuscany, whose personal property it is supposed to have
been. It is said to have borne the date of 1454. The fourth text is a paper
codex in the Florentine National library (XIX. 7. 37), judged, from internal
evidence, to be considerably later than the foregoing, but to have had an
editor of more than usual ability, a fact which gives it importance. The
chess portions show a knowledge of various preceding texts; certainly, so far
as that game is concerned, it is, in many respects, the most valuable, flrom
a textual point of view, of all the " Civis Bononise'' MSS, though inferior to
all in its external execution. Besides these manuscripts Von der Lasa cites
another belonging to tlie British Museum, of the year 1466, which is less
complete than the Italian examples. This exhausts the list of these codices.
We shall now endeavour to give some brief notes on most of those still to
be found in Italy, and therefore pretty certain of Italian origin.
Undoubtedly the oldest of the "Bonus Socius" family is the vellum of
the National library at Florence (B. A. 6-p. 2-no. 1). It begins, as Von der
Lasa has already told us, with a much impaired illuminated frontispiece of
a crowned king (at the left), apparently engaged at chess with a Moor or
other personage (at the right)— hardly a cardinal as suggested by Von der
Lasa—in a red, hood-like cap and robe; two female figures are standing in
the background, not, however, gazing at the board. The prefatory matter
is on the obverse of the next folio, facing the frontispiece. This is the sole
text of the ** Bonus Socius" group, of any approach to completeness, now in
Italian libraries.
The finest as well as one of the earliest of the '^ Civis Bononia) ** codices
in the Italian book-collections is that of the Victor Emanuel library (273) at
Rome. It is a fair sized quarto of 213 vellum folios, of wich the first 3 are
blank, as is the obverse of 4. The reverse of 4 contains six rhymed stanzas
by the compiler, each beginning with an illuminated initial, the first at the
top of the page being a large U, enclosing a perfectly preserved design of a
youngish personage in green garments (left), engaged at chess with a bearded
man in lilac robe and hood (right) ; close by, in the central background, sits
a figure in scarlet dress and hood, gazing at the board, with his finger on
his lips, indicating, perhaps, the silence necessary to be maintained by a
spectator at chess; the feet of this person are visible under the table. This
railUn sMm to occur Aoywbcro. Tbe texts of the tlx prefatory veraos are identieal in tlio
two codices. There la nothlog lu Barberiui X. 7S. to throw any further light on the queation
of the compiler** personality. The name, in a hand comparatively recent, on the margin of
the first written page, Una [GiovaontV] Domenleo Rinaldi, Is most likely that of a former
owner of the volume. A polyglot title to the Tolome, given on the preceding blank loaf,
*' Liber Tarforam ladornu vldellct^t di scaochi^ abaraglino ete.,*' is likewise modern.
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STRAY NOTES 203
is all of fine execution. An excellent water-colour of this illuminated front-
ispiece—the only exact reproduction of it ever made— is preserved in the
Reykjavik National Library. The stanzas which fill this initial page have
been cited in full by Van der Linde (*' Quellenstudien/* pp. 183-4) but, as it
fioems, his transcript is from the missing 1454 Florentine manuscript. We
shall, therefore, copy them from the Roman (Vitt. Em.) codex; the variants,
however, are few:
Ubicumqae facris nt kb gntiosas
Keo te Bnbdes otiis nam Tir otiMcn
Sire ■!( ignobilis Bive generoras
Ut testatnr lapieiia erlt TltioiiDs.
Ut a te remoyeas ritiom prefifttam
Legaa et intelligaa hnnc menm trnotatmn
Efc sic earn nobllibiu cordis adoptatnm
Certoa Bom qcot poteris inreDlre atatnm*
Statim ad scacarij me toIto partita
lo qao maltipliciter flnnt'lniliiita
Qaorum hie sunt plarima laealeiitor icita
Ke forte mens labilis qvloquam sit obUta.
Hie semel positam nnmqaam iterator
Pi/stea de tabalis certam dogma datnr.
Tone merelloe doeeo qniboe plebs ioeator
Et sio sab compendio liber terminatar.
Heo hnins opnsoali series eat tota.
Qais aim scire poteris tradens tot ignota.
Verium prineipiU aillaboM tu iwta
Earundem media liUera rtmota.
CfivU mm b&nonie iHa qui ^llegi,
Qoi sab breviloqaio varia eompegi,
Disponente domino opaa qood peregi
PresentaTl prineipi poosit dve regi.
Like Van der Linde we have italicised the three enigmatical lines which are
supposed to give a clue to the compiler's name. Like Von der Lasa we
regard the puzzle as virtually insoluble. The verses, as Von der Lasa has
remarked ( '< Oeschichte und literatur,*' pp. 153 and 155), are lacking in the
very notable Florentine paper codex; he notices the fact thus: "da aber in
der handschrift ersichtlich ein paar der ersten blatter fehlen, so kdnnten die
verse mit diesen verloren sein, was mir nicht warscheinlich vorkommt. " It
is needless to say that in the opinion last expressed, after a most careful
examination of the manuscript, we coincide. In the Florentine codex (XIX.
7. 37.) has been substituted for the verses an extract, sliglitly altered, from
the *' Vetula," a Latin poem once believed to be by Ovid. As this substituted
^ citation contains no allusion to tables or merelles we pass it by. <^ The other
^ Of the psendo-Ovidian poem, ** Uber de VetuU,*' a considerable number of mann-
•eripta exlit in the libraries of Europe (see Van der Linde, ^'Oeschichte,** II„ pp. 149-156,
where the aeconnt of the work, so far as the chess portlona are concerned, and of its va-
rious editions, is eommendably fall). It was long eitad as a genuine production of Ovid, as
far back as by that dear-headed scholar, Richard de Bury (1286). Its oldest manaseript, a
quarto vellum at Moatpelier (n^ 866), is certainly nearly or quite contemporary with iU
author, now identified, with tolerable certainty, as a famons romanHer of the Xlllth century,
Richard de Fonrnival (Fournlvalle, FoumlTanx), who held a eananiaate at Amiens, France,
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204 CHESS IN ICELAND
Roman codex (Barberini) we have not examined. There is a fairly good
transcript of it in the National Library of Iceland.
After these prefatory remarks we shall now turn to the oldest of the
''Bonus Socius" MSS (Florence B, A. 6-p. 2-no. 1). Its contents may be thus
enumerated: folio fl], obverse blank ; reverse, injured illuminated frontispiece;
f. j. obverse, preface; ff. j reverse-^98a, chess; 98b-112a, merelles; 112a-118a,
tables; 118b-119a, blank; 119b, note in finer writing by a later hand. There
are 24 merelles positions and 11 at tables— all on diagrams. In ''Bonus
Socius" the tables diagrams are drawn perpendicularly as to the length (or
longer extent); in "Civis Bononise" they are perpendicular as to the height
(or shorter extent). In this manuscript the descriptions or solutions of the
positions are on the opposite page (the left-hand page of the "open," as
the Icelanders style it). Therefore the positions are at the right, as the book
is held open. Two problems are given on a page, one above the other,
except in the case of the ninth, which, owing to the length of the opposite
and !• Inde«d tomewrhero ftyled efa«ncellor of that city (<<e&nce11«rliu ambUnentia "). Several
of his amatory romances are preserved In a manascript form at the French National library.
The earliest printed edition of the "Vetala** is that of Coloffno, having neither date, plaee,
printer's name nor signatures, of about the year 1470, which bears the title of "Pnblii Ovidti
Nasonis liber de Vetnla.** A later edition was Issued in the same city in 1479. We elte the
edition of Wol fen battel 1668, a volume In which it appears with the "Speenlom stnltorum"
of another writer, under the common title of "Opuseula duo aoctorum ineertoram." The
**VetuIa" closes the volame, and Is separately paged (forming 96 pacres) : It Is divided into
numbered sections, that relating to tables beginning (p. 21) with seotlon XXVIII of book first
as follows :
Excasare tamen speclem Ludi deeiorum
Nituntur, cum qu& deducitur alea pernlz :
Ipsam, dieentes, paueo discrimlne rernm
Pasei posse din tanta eat dilatio ludi,
Tanti Inorl damnive mora est : saeoeaaio oujns
Tot parit eventus, quot Jaetus eontlnet In ae,
Fine tenns, Indus, nee solA aorte, sed arte
Prooedunt acies, & inest industria mira.
PrsBserUm oum multimodd mutatio Ludi
Qnolibet In Jactu dlaponl posalt, e6qaod,
Sleut prsseessit Jaetus, diversificantnr
In punctatura propria : quia schema eadendi
Nil operatar In hoc, sed punctatura docet quid
Lnsoris faciat vtao aolertia Jaotu.
By a eareftil axamln^tion of the whole of the matter relating to baekgammon it would not
be dlfflcnlt to obtain a definite Idea of the method of play which prevailed in Kranee aoma
aiz hundred years ago. This remarkable poem was rendered into French by Jean Ijefevre,
born at Resaona sur Mats (near Compline), acttording to some critics between 1815 and iS80,
according to othera In the laat yeara of the XlVth century. Hia version, or perhapa U should
rathar be atyled a paraphrase, waa only printed in 1861 the text being drawn from two
early mannaeripU in the Paris National library, edited 1^ HIppolyte Goeberis. The Inta^
resting opening lines are copied by Van der Linde (op. clt., p. 164). The chapters have
headings, that ooncerning tables being: '^Dn Jen des tables et comment Ovide dit qn'lls ne
sont point mains dommagablea que les des," the opening lines (p. 66) being
Ancnns ae veulent exenaer
Dn gleu dea des, ponr amnaer
Au glan qui eat de trente tablea [men] ;
Ne aoBt gatrea malna dommagablea,
O'eat an glen da gnerre partie,
Qnittse en a de ebaaenne partie.
81 dleat quant a lenr oppoee,
Qa*oa palat la glen be pou da ohoae,
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8TRA Y NOTES 205
solution, is alone in tho centre of its page. On ttie inside of the manuscript's
first cover is a note by a former owner recording the fact in regard to the
codex, that it ^^^ molto tempo che si trova in casa nostra de Baldouinattj/'
The work has, of course, no proper title, but, in his preface, the author,
after some philosophising, and not a few moral reflections, says: O'Idcirco
ego bonus socius, sociorum meorum precibus acquiescens, partita que uide-
ram...,")—** Therefore I, a good companion, yielding to the prayers of my
companions, have edited in this little book those positions which I had seen,
as well as those which I have made by my own study, in the games of chess
and tables as well as in that of merelles (**de ludvs scaccorum alearumque
ctiam marellorum in hoc libello**), thus reversing the order in which, in
the text, merelles and backgammon actually occur. There are, later on, in
the opening of the description or solution of the first tables (backgammon)
problem, a few special preliminary words, in which the reader is told that
theso problems {isia partita) are of tables, that some are played out with
Car g**lDg nt vient pM en Teure,
Rt la dommalga atMi demeare.
Par la longoa dllaoion
Dn giea par Tarlaeion ;
Gar aatant 7 a d'aTeDtar«s
Comme oa 7 fcecte de polntores.
Le glea ne ee fait point par aort,
Mais par art aaaa^olr plaf fort.
De deax eoulonrt qnl lea ehamplaaeat,
De deoz ohaateaala en nn ehamp yaaent.
Dont nKirreilleuae eat rindoatrle,
Rt soutille en eat la malairle,
Ponr ee qn'on paet multiplier
Son glen, par aea tablea Her,
Belon lea polna de la eheaooe,
Qui enaelgnent quelle ordonance
Le Joneor pent de aea gena faire,
Rt eommeunt doit aea tablea traire
Par devera ao7, et eomblner
81 a peril an ehemtner.
Tbeae foriOt reekoning a repeated eouplet wbieb we have omitted, llnea 1M9-1>98, but tbe
wbole tablea aectlon la continued to line 1416 (p. 66-78). Free aa la the veraion, or perhapa
beeanae of ita freenea% tbe French poem greatly faolUtatea tho nnderatanding of the Latin
original. We add likewSae tbe opening llnea of tbe brief merellea aeotlon (p. 86), wbieb
bare the deaeriptWe beading: **CI parle du glea dea merelles anqnel aoulolent anelonnement
jouer lea pucellea.** They begin:
Autrea gleaa aont que lea pneellea
Seevent, mala petltea nonToIlea
Sent dn dire et du raconter
Choae qui a pon pent mooter.
Gea gieax aont nommea aux merellea,
Dont joTenceaulz et Jnvenoellea
So jeneut deatna une table.
Douse oa nenf font le glea eatable,
llaia a douse prent aana falUir
Oelle qui pnet oultre aallltr
Deeaua 1' autre par advanture.
The whole aeetlon forma llnea 1785-1764. The worda " donee on neuf *' look like a relatlenablp
to the '* twelve men roorria" and ** nine men morrla** of Rngland and Amerlea, altbongh a
mneb later maauaerlpt (1660) of the poem ipeaka of tbe game aa one *<qui ae fait par nenf
on par dix merellea,*' where <'dix** may poaalbly be an error for ** donee.'*
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206 CHESS IN ICELAND
two dice {cum duobus taxillis) and some with three, and that some are
optative games (Itidi op totmi)— ending with the phrase which we copy lite-
rally; '* ut ho sine taxillis optet qd' uelit/' Thereafter follows the descriptive
solation beginning: '^Et est iste primus Indus huffa in duobus taxillis/*
Here we have again the hufa of king Alfonso, the remotest form of the
present German name of backgammon {puff). These solutions generally
record, at their very beginning, the number of dice employed at each throw,
or otherwise comment on the nature of the problem, as, for instance, (117a).
" Istud partitum optimum sed difficilimum ad plenum " {ad plenum being,
perhaps, the modern French "plein"); (115bl) "Iste Indus est ualdedecep-
torius;** (115b2) "Ludus iste est optatiuus in tribus taxillis.'' The positions
mostly demand three dice, which, for various reasons, seems to us the
older method, at any rate in European tables. Among the technical words
occurring we notice cfoww* (home-board), albe (plural, white), Tieprt, (black),
a.?, deus^ trai, quater^ cine, sis, amesas {ambas as)^ temes, sines. The eleven
positions at tables to be found in this volume all appear again in the incom-
plete Italian codex (XIX. 7. 51) in the same Florentine library.
We come now to the Roman vellum codex (Vitt. Em. 273) of the " Civis
Bononise** redaction, certainly, in its execution and in its present well-
preserved condition, the most splendid of them all. It starts with blank
folios numbered (numbering modern) 1,2, 3, followed by 4, of which the
obverse is blank, while the reverse begins with a very ornate initial U,
enclosing the illuminated group of three figures already described (a youngish
personage in green garments seated at chess against a bearded man in lilac
robe and hood, with a third person in scarlet vestments sitting in the central
background, looking on); then come the prefatory verses we have cited,
written as prose, each stanza forming a paragraph commencing with a fine
initial in* two colours; to the first of the stanzas appertains the much larger
initial U at the head of the page. After these follows the chess text, the
first position on f. 5a, the last on f. 148b. all the diagrams filled. The 76
partita at tables occupy ff. 149a- I86b, and are followed by 4 unused or vacant
diagrams on ff. 187a-188b. The volume ends with the 48 merelles problems,
ff. 189a-212b, concluding with an unused morris diagram on the last folio
(213a). Throughout this beautiful vellum every page opens with an illuminated
initial letter in two colours. The design of the diagram for tables represents
(for the first time?) the one (half) table joined to the other by hinges, so
that the two can be shut together like a modern backgammon (and chess)
board; the table has, however, as usual at this early period, houses instead
of points. Each one of the positions, chess, tables or morris, is placed in the
centre of the page, having the descriptive text around It on the three exterior
margins, the brilliant initials (blue and red, or red and violet) being uniformly
in the upper left-hand corner. The diagrams are in blue, having the space
between the external lines in faint olive green; the men are in red (=light
or white) and blue (= black). In these backgammon diagrams every man is
figured by a coloured disc (never by numbers, showing how many stand on a
certain point).
It is impossible, within our limits, to copy much of the text of this mon-
umental codex. We give, therefore, only the opening lines of some of the
descriptions of the partitaj premising that we have not often ventured to
change the orthography, and that we have underscored the names of the
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STRAY NOTES
207
various modes of play: (151b) ^'Istud partitum est de testa optatiuum de tribas
taxillis;*' (152b) ''Iste ludus est optatiuus in tribus Uxillis;'' (156b) ''Istud
partitum est de sharail cum duobus taxillis;'* (163a) ^'Istud partitum est de
sbarail optativum;*' (163b) ^^Istud partitum est partitum optatiuum... et est
de minoret;'^ (167b) " Istud partitum est de minoret in uno taxillo et uocatur
le merlin;*'' (168a) *'Albe [usually written instead of aZ5^] primo trahunt et
Fig. 18.
faciunt minoret et negre maioret; " (168b) "In isto partite de minoret trahunt
primo nigre ; '' (175b) " Istud t>artitum est de la hiif in duobus taxillis et
stant omnes in dome;*' (178a) '* Istud partitum est de sbarail;"" (178b) *'0mne8
utriusque partis suntaffidate, et est partitum del sbarail in tribus taxiliis;"
(181a) '^In isto partite tam nigre quam albe stant in domo ad eleuandum, et
est de sharail in tribus taxillis;'' (182b) '* Istud partitum est de bethelas in
tribus taxillis;'' (183a) "Istud partitum est de ludo qui dicitur baldrac, qui
est ludus subtilis et non multum usitatus;'' (183b) "Istud partitum est de
limperial in duobus taxillis et sex semper in terno;" (184a) "Istud partitum
est de limperial in duobus taxillis et sex pro terno;" (184b) "Istud partitum
sic precedens est de limperial in duobus taxillis et sex in tertio, et habent
nigra uoltam;'* (185b) "In isto partite omnes sunt affidate." The text in-
troducing the first tables position (149a) begins with the general statement:
"tsta sunt partita tabularum/' where we find the name given as iabulce {in
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208 CHESS IN ICELAND
genitive, iabularum). It will be observed that we have here many of the
Alfonsine names of the varying methods of play (varieties), like buf (Spanish
*'bufa'*), imperial (very likely '*emperador'*), haldrac ("la bufa de baldrac"),
as well as an early form of the Italian "sbaraglio" {sbaraiC), hereafter to be
treated; likewise certain of the varieties cited in the British Museum codex
(MSS reg. 13. A. XVIII), the text of which we have reproduced (pp. 161-165),
such as imperial and sbarail (**baralie"). Very likely other coincidences
between the manuscripts of Madrid, Florence (and Rome) and London might
be discovered by a capable investigator.
The last of these codices of Italian origin on which we shall bestow
more than a cursory notice, is the paper **Civis Bononias" one of Florence
(XIX. 7. 37) *se. The folios of this manuscript have been neatly numbered
by means of printing-type (stamped by hand), and the positions, as usual,
are in colours. The anonymous editor has an introduction, which Von der
Lasa ("Geschichte und literatur," pp. 154-155) has reproduced in the original
Latin. It seems to be his opinion that this editor prepared the exemplar for
the use of teachers, or perhaps for those whom we now style *' professional
players.*' The chess positions, as in general, come first, and are directly
followed by those at tables (72 in number), occupying ff. 157a to 192b, when
they are succeeded by the 44 at morris (merelles) ; there are then added se-
veral supplementary chess problems; the inserted ten MS folios by Von der
Lasa finally complete the volume. The diagrams are drawn at the bottom,
or on the lower half of each page, the upper portion containing the descrip-
tion or solution of the position. The three colours used ape yellow for the
board, and red and black for the men. In the backgammon partita the men are
sometimes represented by small discs (red and black), sometimes by num-
bers (red and black), defining the number of pieces occupying the points on
which the numbers are marked. The points to which the pieces are to be
^ In this codex, XIX 7. 87, are to be fonud do taoh beauilfal chirograpby, do each
brilliant illnminationi aa are to be teen Id tbe earlier ones of which we have been writing,
but it !• a piece of work of no little elegancci and, ai has been stated In the text, of exoel-
lent editorehip. It will always, In the shape In which we now see It, be of high interest to
the stadent of chess literature because of the ** Complemeuto al codlce classe XIX. 7. 87
della R. Biblioleea Nasionale Gentrale di Firenso,** as he styles it, thoughtfully appended to
it by Yon der Lasa, after one of his visits of research to Italy. It opens with a prefatory
note written in exoellent Italian by himself, as follows: ** II eodiee chart. XIX. 7. 87 t
alquanto incompleto. Dope la carta 46 Terso trovasi maneante on intlero quinterno, e la
nnmerHslone riprcndo colla carta 55 recto. Maneano anche due psgino lutorno la 108^ earta.
La Biblloteca Nasionale Centrale Vittorio Emannele ^i Roma possitde un codlee membr.
n* S73 eompleto e quasi eguale al flortntluo. Questo manoscritto S7S eontlene 286 poslstoai
del giuoco dl scacchi ed altre figure *' tabularnm et merellorum." Le poslsionl sono le
stesM come quelle sulle carte 8-151 terxo del codlce di Firenxe, e possono supplirue i nu-
uieri mancauti. Per altro 1 partlti florentini dalla carta 15£» alia 167& rerso, slccome 232
rrcto-259 recto, uon eslstono ncl manoscritto della Biblloteca Naaionalo dl Roma, nh pure
in un codico membr. della roia biblloteca propria, csclnsivamento dentlnata al giuoco degli
scaeclil. 11 cod ice XIX. 7. 37, dunqae, comprende pid degli altri.** This is followed by 18
cliess-positlons, with explanatory texts, on 9 folios — the diagrams In blue and the Indications
of the pieoes iu red and black. The wholo is a notable piece of work, carried out with all
tbe writer *8 known lucidity and cxaetncfs. At bottom of the reverse of the final folio it his
attestation and signature as well as the date : '* Pro vera copla : Wiesbaden 18 Maggio 1891.
Heydebraud nd Lasa." 1 he abbreviation after " Heydebrand '* may be either ud (and der),
or vd (von der), both of which, as the reader is aware would be proper and both of which
he used. It need not bo said that this " complemento '* will greatly lighten the laboar of
future Investigators.
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STRA Y N0TB8 809
moved are often indicated, on the diagrams and in the descriptions, by let-
ters as a, 6, c, (black and red), generally of a Gothic (black-letter) form.
We shall now again quote the opening lines of several of these solutions,
to show their similiarity to those previously cited, and shall then call atten-
tion to some of the technical words and phrases employed. The first problem
(157a) begins with a brief introduction to the backgammon collection: 'Msta
sunt partita tabularum,*' and so on. In some, if not all of the descriptions,
the player of the white ((m cum albis) is addressed. The text to the eighth
position (160b) commences: 'Mste ludus est optatiuus in tribus taxillis et
quicquid facient albe facient et nigre, et albe stant quinque in domo sua,
nigre in sua tres et vincunt albe. Primo de albis fac buf de quatorn de
tabula eztrinseca...; ** then (163b) "Istud partitum est in sbaraille cum duo^
bus taxillis et sex semper pro tertio, et primo trahunt albe et sunt omnes
affldate et nigre non sunt affidate;'* (164a) ''Hie ludus est de ntenaret in
duobus taxillis;'' (170a) ^'Istud partitum est de sbaraiU^^ (the word texta
having been erased and sharaill inserted in its place by a later hand); (I74a)
''Istud partitum est de menorel in uno taxillo tantum et uocatur le nierliti]*'
(176a) ''Istud partitum est de testa in tribus taxillis;'' (178b) " Istud parti-
tum est de testa et luditur in tribus taxillis et est domus albarum vbi stant
12 albe et domus nigre ubi stat sola alba et habent albe tractum et perdit
nigra (t) ad fallum." (Now begins the play proper) *'Tu cum albis lude et
denuda tot quot potes... ; " (180a) '' In isto ludo trahunt nigre primo et est
de testa cum tribus taxillis et veniet ilia extrinseca ut eleuentur;" (180b)
"Istud partitum est de testa et luditur cum tribus taxillis et habent nigre
uioem et stant ad eleuandum et alba habet circuire tabulerium et eleuare
sicut moris est. Vnde si non percutiet aliquam de nigris perdis sed nigre
sunt priores quia ut plurimum accedit duo autas...;" (181b) ^Mstud partitum
est de la buf in duobus taxillis et est domus in punctis et introitus vbi sunt
albe;" (182b) '^Istud partitum est de la buf in duobus taxillis. Ponetes tres
pro uno et pone unum pro tribus;" (183b) *' Istud partitum est de sbarail in
duobus taxillis;" (184b) *' Istud partitum est de sbaraillin in duobus taxillis
et 6 semper pro 3^ et habent nigre tractum;" (184b) '' Omnius utriusque sunt
affldate et est partitum de sbarail in tribus taxillis; " (185b) *' Istud partitum
est de sbaril in tribus taxillis;" (188a) *' Istud partitum est delimperial in
duobus taxillis et sex pro tertio;" (189b) ^' Istud partitum est de beihelas in
tribus taxillis;" (190a) '' Istud partitum est ludo qui dicitur baldrac, qui est
ludus subtilis et non multum vsitatus" (the third letter in baldrac having
been inserted by way of correction; (190b) "Istud partitum est de limperial;""
(192b) "Istud partitum est optatiuum et in tribus taxillis et luditur ad modum
mtnoreti et nigre habent tractum."
Much of this is repetition but it serves to show how similar are the two
" Civis Bononisa " manuscripts, the Roman and the Florentine. The follow-
ing names given to varieties will be observed: sbarail (sbaraill, sbaril),
coincident with the '•^baralie*' of the British Museum manuscript and the
later Italian "*6ara^/io; " 56araiWm (probably the Italian ^'sbaraglino"');
testa {teccta) merlin {le merlin); imperial {jLimperial) — reminding us of "empe-
rador " and " imperial " in foreign codices; beihelas; baldrac (occurring among
the Alfonsine names); minot^etus {mifioretum ?), the minoretto " of a sub-
sequent period in north Italy); buf (la buf, to which we have frequently
alluded). It is also to be noted that several of those names are preceded
27
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210 CHESS IN IGSLA ND
by a modern Romance article, as la buf, limperial, le merlin, perhaps show-
ing them to have originated in the vulgar speech. As to technical words
in general we have gathered, in our hasty study, a good many which we
give, wherever possible and necessary, with interpretations. We draw from
all the Latin manuscripts here examined : affidatus, affldati; alios (the white);
amb as, ambas, amesas (double aces) ; as (ace) ; avantagium (advantage, better
position); baldrac (a variety at backgammon) ; bethelas (a variety at backgam-
mon) ; buf, la buf (a variety of backgammon), used also as a technical term
in such phrases as buf de as, buf de du, buf de cine, buf de terne, buf de
quateme, buf de sin (sine), as facer e buf de as; cine, cinque, cinques (five
or fives); deus, du, duos (deuce, deuces); domus (home-board), as in domo (in
the home board); elevare, ad elevandum; adfallum, hs in perdere ad fallum;
imperial (a variety of backgammon) ; introiius ; merlin, le merlin (a variety
of backgammon); mc^oret, used technically as a contrast to minoret, as fa-
cere minoret, facere mc^'orct; minoret, menoret (a variety of backgammon,,
but used technically in facere minoret ; nigroe (the black) ; optativus; ad plenum;
quater, quatre^ quatema, quaiemes (four, fours); quines, quinques (see cine);
sbarail, sbaraill, sbaraiUd (a variety of backgammon); sbaraillin (a variety
of backgammon played with two dice); sines^ sanas; si, sex (six, see also
tertium); tabula (man, piece) ; tabtU&tnum (board) ; taxillus (die) ; tertiuni in
the phrases sex pro tertio, sex semper pro tertio, meaning that six or sixes
are to be counted for a third (imaginary) die, when only two dice are
actually used, as in (cum) duobus taxillis etsex pro tertio; texta, testa, (a
special form of backgammon) ; tres, terz, terne, ternes (three, threes). Some
of these words are cited from imperfect copies of extracts from the manu-
scripts and are doubtless more or less inexact.
In addition to the codices to be found in Italy Arom which we have
already quoted, we ought to mention here the paper manuscript preserved
in the great Florentine library, where it bears the press-mark XIX. 7. 51.
It is a compilation in Italian, and can hardly be said to belong either to
the " Bonus Socius " or the ** Civis Bononise " family. The most interesting
description of its chess portion is that given by Von der Lasa (*' Geschichte
und literatur," pp. 163-165), who ascribes it to the beginning of the XVIth
century, " oder mag ein wenig <er sein.'* He likewise, from the occurrence
of certain vocables, believes it to be of Tuscan origin. This codex is imperfect.
It has chess diagrams on ff. 1 a — 149ab, with Italian descriptions below
most of them, but the diagrams on ff. 25b-27b, 30a-50b are blank, and the
problems ff. 146a, 147b, 148a-149b lack the descriptive solutions; f. 149 is
followed by many unnumbered folios with blank chess diagrams. There-
after come a numbered folio, 186a, with a 7>knights puzzle limited to the 9
squares in a corner of the chessboard, and 186b with a 16-pawns problem;
next we have 24 merelles positions with descriptions.; and finally 10 (or lit)
problems at tables, only one accompanied by a descriptive solution, which
is to be regretted because of the Italian technical terms thus missing. Von
der Lasa specially mentions an example of the chess puzzle known as the
"Knight*s tour'* on f. 28b as ''das <este beispiel eines vollkommenen r5s-
selsprunges.*' The single problem in the section devoted to tables, which
has an explanatory solution attached, has over the diagram a title which
seems to read: ''L'abbaco de fuorj.'' Copied as accurately as may be, the
description is as follows ; '' Li bianchi sono in casa per leuarsi, et cosl li
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STRAY NOTES 211
sej neri et hassi a rimetter quella che sta fuorj. Oiuocasi con tre dadj et
hanno il tratto li neri, et ci6 che fanno li neri hanno a feir li bianchi '' (a
very common phrase this last in the Latin codices) **et vincere li neri per
leuarsi prima che H bianchi et fa cosK Con li neri chi hanno 11 tratto farai
.6. et .2. rimettendo quelle che h fUora, et .2. leua quella che k in suldua,
li bianchi faranno duino et cinque et non potranno leuare nulla. Le neri di
poi facciano terno et cinque levandoni 3. Li bianchi faranno il medesimo,
et leueranno dna, et riferanno una, tu poi fa con le neri cinquino et sqj, et
leuansi tutti/' This is probably the oldest bit of Italian, having to do with
backgammon, to be found in Italy, but may be exceeded in age by the Italian
passage now to be noticed. ^
*"* Very little ba» hitherto b««n knowa of Paolo Ouarino (as the nania lUada In the Tor-
naenlar, a Tarlant belug **Gu«rinl**), althoufh be haa lonff bven reeognited by tba hiatoriana
of cheiB letters a^ the editor of ao important and well-made eullectlon of aeTenty-slz poaitioB«
•elected In 1511 from the Florentine manuteripta (seo Von der Ijaaa*a "2ar tM^lkl«^^''»"
p. 166, and more partlcalarly Van der Liude*t '^Getehlcbte,** II., pp. W5*7). Tbauka,
for the moat part, to the reaearehea of the learned lullan palsographer, Dr. Giuaeppe Maa-
satlntl, profeaaor In the royal lyceum at Forll and librarian of the rbrllToae eomnnnal library,
we are now, howoTer, more or Icaa familiar with aome of the prominent Incldenta of Qua-
rino*a life. He waa a man of more than uanal mark in hla day and lu the ancient provincial
rity in which he waa born and reaided, thoufh deaeended from Bologncae aneeatora. Beaidea
being a eultlrator of general llteratare, he waa an arehlteet by prof«aaion, and, m aneh, In
a period of atreaa (1508), waa one of the eommlaalon which anperintended the t4ak of atrength*
enlng and otherwise improTlug the castle, or rocea, of Forli, which waa, at the aaue time,
the chief feature in the worka defending the city, and the abode of ita princea. He afler-
warda (1517) furniahed a plan for the erection of a notable chureh (S. Uickele de' Battoti
Koaai) in hla native city. Gaarino alao underatood and praetiaed the art of printing — not
an ordinary aecompliahmeut In that remote trana-apennlno region In the rloalng yeara of
the XVth century. To him la owing the laane of the flrat book printed at Forll, a work of
unique typographical Intereat, the aingalar aiory of which can be told here only In the barest
onUine. It aeema that Nicola Ferettl (NIoholaa Ferrettua), a pupil of thoae ihreo great human-
Isu, Valla, Fllelfo and Laaearla — hiroaelf , later, the head of a widely-renowned aehool of
grammar at Venice — reaided for a while at Forll, and there eomposcti a treatise, "De ele-
gantia lluf^aae latinae,'* aubaequently publlahed both at Paria (without date) and at Venice
(1507). But ita eariieat edition aaw the light at Forll, being, aa we have hinted, the flrat
production of the then comparatively new art in that town. It la a thin quarto, printed on
rather heavy paper, eonalating of SO unnumbered folloa, the expressed signatnrea extending
from a ti to a Mi, having a page cvmpoaed of 40 to it linea (usually not exceeding the former
number), and eloaiug with a printer*a mark occupying nearly all the available apaee of the
final page. Thla last, like ao many of the kind In that and the following age In Italy, waa
made up of a double erosa aurmounting a elreular deaign, wltn the inltlala P [= Paolo
(iuarino] above the cirelea on the left aide, and I I B [s Joaunea Jaoobua do ncnediciia] in
the aamo poaitlon at the right. Below, In the cornera, arc the Initials C O [CaB«ar Ociavia*
nua?]. In Uie colophon, on the obverse of the final folio, the book is said to be issued
'* Opera & impSaa Panll guarini de gnarinis ForollulSais " [that is, in the vulgar, Paolo
Ouarino de*Oaarin{ of Forll — the form of the name indicating the nobility of the bearer]
**& lo&nia laeobi de Benedletia Bononienaia Impreaaoria : et aocli : boo opua eat Imprea*
auw Forli uil : emendatum uero perHpaum auctorem : ut apparet In eiuadem epistula: in fine
aecundl llbrl: Anno ildel ohriatlane, M . COCC . L xxxx V . xvl klSdaa Mall.** From all thla
we deduce that Paolo Goarini waa the publlaher, at whoae expcnae tbo work waa done by
the printer (iaipraaaor) from Bologna, Giovanni Jacopo de Bencdlctis (or du* Beuudettl), with
other aaaoelatea («l aoei<=**attd company**); that the prosa waa at Forli (f^orllvit); that
Feretii'a manoacript had been corrected by. hia own baud, " aa appeara f^om hla letter at
the end of the aecond book " (the treaUae being In thr«e booka); and that tbe printing waa
completed Hay 16, 1405. So far there la nothing extraordinary in the matter. Ouarino hud
evidently Induced a Bolognese printer to come and eatablish hlmaelf at Forli, had united
^Ith othera In an attempt to mako the novel undertaking aucceaaful, and had aaaumed the
general direction of the a0Ur. For lU flrat work the new prlutlng-olBce had received from
aome aource (apparently from the author himaelO the manuaeript of Ferettl, and had entered
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212 CHESS IN ICBLA ND
We return to our consideration of the "Civis Bononise'' collection; and
this is, therefore, the place to mention another fragment of an Italian Yersion
of this second great compilation (or, as Van der Linde will have it, of tlie
" second edition " of the ** Bonus Socius " work). In the British Museum
there is a quarto manuscript volume containing three very different treatises,
the second one being a transcript of the Latin '' Civis Bononiae '* (AdditioDal
MSS 9351, lettered on the back: "Tractatus varii de ludis etc."). There is
little that is attractive about the transcript. Its chirograpby is poor and
its paper of a very ordinary sort. The diagrammed positions of the three
in good earDett npon the Usk of making iu czlRUnoe felL Now eomea tlM remarkable part
of tbe Ule. A very few dajt after the appearanee of the Inne of the "De elegnntla" bear-
iof the name of Guarlao lu Ito Imprint, another edition of the tame trcatlee cones oatflron
another preas In the vtrj tame town, bat differlnff freatly from the precedfar on% is io
typography. It waa likewise In quarto, in tbe Latin type, embracing t9 onBambered foUot,
tbe printed tlgnatarei mnnfug from a << to e iij each page having IU 40 to 49 Hnea (ordlaar
lily limited to the former number); bat it waa printed in type of a notably different face,
and bad at the end no veritable printer's mark. Unlike the Isaae of Onarfno It la aderoed
with two very striking cuts, taken f^m Tenetlan worka of a little earlier date, one en its
Hr^t, the other on I to last page. The first represents a proffssaor seated. In the niddls
backgroand, on hia cathedra, a large book resting on a table In fk-ont of hfm, engaged ia
instrootlng a body of stodeato in hoods and robes, which is divided into two groups, aeale'
on benches on either hand, before each gronp being a low deak, on whieh booka rest, whlla
two boys, holding books, are placed on stools In tbe foregronnd, with a dog (eat?) seatsd
between them ; the other eat, on the reverse of the final folio — possibly It may be Intended
to serve as a printer's mark— precedes the eolophon and deplets, in the central baekgrooad,
a hill, surmounted by a temple or other structure, at the left of the anmmlt a gronp of thrse
standing female flgares, one erowned, on tbe right a greop of three cattle, while in the mid-
die foreground Is Uking place a combat between a maa and a cenUnr. Furthermore, this
edition Is dissimilar to the elder one in having many Florentine chapter>iniUaU Instead of
the small spaces left for the inserMon of hand-made (iUnmlnated) Initiala as in ito predeces-
sor, In Its namcrous printed marginal references, and In ito ftvqaent employment of ths
paragraph-sign (Q). The newer edition haa one considerable onlaslon. Thla fa in the se-
cond epistle to Octavlan, ruler of ForJl, plaoed at the end of the second book, nearly twe
pages of matter falling out (between the words Ci naldc ptecefrtl and P«Ux Hm opt» PrUetp*)
— an exclusion which seems to indicate that the author had llUle (or at any rate less) to do
with the issue coming trom tbe more reeent and rival esubliahment. Tbe eolophon of tbis
edition reads thus : *< C, ^^ C'pvs eat impressnm Forlivll per me Bleronymnm Medesanam
Parmensem : noulter^ p Ipsum Anctorem eorreptnm aditam h emendatum Anno domlai
. M . ocoCLZxzxT. die iiero .xxv. Mai Regnanie Illnstrlssfmo Priolpi nostro domino Oetaoiaao
de RIarlo: ae Inrllio dt mluo Tacobo Pheo gohematorl dignftisatmo.** — the governor Gia
eomo Feo here eltrd, it may be well enough to say, was slain this very same year (Idt^f
on account of a false simplclon of treason. It will thus be seen that the printer ef this
edition Ih from Parma, lits name. In Ito vernacular form, being, perhaps, GIroIamo MedC'
sano; and that the date, " . xxr . Val,'* Is here substituted for '* xYi k1«das Mai,'* of the
other Issues, the month and year being the aame In both editions. Tbe explanation of this
singnlar typographical puiale mast be left to tbe ftarther revearohes 5f Italian bibliogra*
phers. The sole library, so far as we know, in whIeh both of these rare impreeaioos are
to be found Is that of tbe BritiKb Museum. The only other printed work with whIeh the
name of Paolo Ouarlno It In any way associated, Is an Importont document (** diploma**)
executed by him In an imprcMion of 300 coplea for the dissolnto Cesar Borgia, whose out
redeeming quality, as In the case of his even more infamous alster, was a willing patro-
nage of letters and lettered men. This bore, aa there is reason to believe, tbe name or
other sign-manual of Guarino, and was dated at Forll, December 81, 1600, Indieating the
continued existence, five years later than tbe appearance of FeretU*s tractate, of Goarino's
ForliTose press, whether meanwhile active or not. No copy is now known, bat an aeoooat
of it is given by the chronicler Bernardi (I. f. 85S a). In tbe prevlooa year another
striking cTent in the life of Goarino oceorred. Tbe real ruling power in Forll, at thet
date, was the celebrated Caterina Sforxa -> whose eareer is the theme of one of the ablaft
of reeent Italian biographies — a natural daughter of Oalear.co, duke of Milan; she had
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STRAY NOTES 213
^ames are in black and faded red, occupying the lower halves of the pages,
having the explanatory solutions above them. Each page contains two prob-
lems side by side, and, of course, two paragraphs of descriptive text. Folios
8-10, 17-35 (according to the numeration, which is very recent, ff. 11-16 are
lacking, but thdre is nothing to show that the numeration itself is not er-
roneous) are occupied by the tables positions; ff. 36-48 by those at merelles,
and ff. 49-69 by those at chess. At the beginning of this last section, in a
comparatively modern hand, is written a date which Von der Lasa gives as
1466, but which, whatever it may be, seems to be of little value. The binding
MpooMd GlrolaiDo Riario, lord of Korli and Imola — nominally a nephtw bat really a ton
of tba ararielova and wealthy pope, flixtua IV— and waa married later In life to OtoTanoi
de* Medlol. By Girolano Btae had six children, the eldeat of whom, OeUTfan, had, In name
at leant, saeeeeded to hit father*a principality. The teeond, Cotare, throngh the peraaaalve
ellbrto of hie mother, was dealgnated In Jannary 1490 by that wlekcdeat of all the popet,
Alexander YI, to the eloTated office of archbishop of Pita, and Paolo Ouarino waa telected
to accompany the new prelate to hit tee In the high oapacity of teueichal. Cetare waa only
nineteen yeara of age and could therefore hardly be regard* d at a venerable eedeelaatieal
dignitary, bat Caterlna, In her letter to the head of the chareh, had commended him at
** pieno dl ogni rlrtik e modettla.** He ultimately received the title of bishop of Malaga
(IS 18) and eloied a peaceable life tome yeart later at Padova. Ouarino toon returned to
his home. In 1609 he waa aent by the magistracy of Forii on a mission to the cardinal
leitate, or papal gorernor of Romagna — the holder of an office which, some months laUr,
waa conferred on cardinal de* Medlol, afterwards the brilliant pope Leo X — *' d* onde tornard
eon patenti favoreuoll." ' In 1618 -- the very year In which Guarlno was at work at hit
'' Liber de partitia scacoornm ** — the horrors of real war were raging in hit native region,
in which French and Spanlah, papal and other Italian troops were taking part. The French,
who had followed to luly that renowned general, Gaaton de Folx, duke of Keroonrs, had,
by their threatened movements, led to the flight of a large portion of the wealthier Inhabi-
tants of Forll. But a few of the patriotic leaders of the people remained. A French com-
misloner suddenly viaited the city and demanded an immediate supply of stores, for the use
of the not very distant French camp, from the already impoverished citlcens. The few no*
table ilenlsens atlll within the walls, among them •' Ser Paolo Guerrlnl," aa he ia styled by
the narrator of the event, assembled for deliberation, but were xoon satisfied that the sup-
plies asked for most be forthcoming in order to avoid the destruction of their homes. Qua-
rino was appointed a commissioner to arrange, with the aid of another memtier of the
small company, the difflcolt affair, which he did with ao much energy and tact that the
town was finally saved from the menaced danger. Thia good cltlsen was blessed, we are
told with an amiable and Intelligent wife, Maddalena, daughter of Antonio Ostoli, who bore
him two sons and three daughters. He was an Intimate friend of the chronicler, Andrea
BernardI, (called "Novacola** after the manner of his day), whose *' Cronaehe forlivesl **
flnaliy became aceeesible to the reading world, edited by G. Mauatinti, In the edltloo of
Bologna 1896-6 (In three, or, titularly, two volumes). Not a few mentions of hia friend occur
In Its pagea. Bernardi left a number of volumes by will to Ouarino, who, as we shall see,
was a great colleetor of whatever bore upon the history of Forll. Ouarino muat have been
likewise known to I^andro Albert!, author of the *< Der erittione dl tutU Italia," the firat
edition of which la of Bologna 1&60, but which remained, for more than a century, the chief
authority on Italian topography. In that earliest impression Albert! gives us the date of
Guarino's demise, with a pleasant charactarisatlon of his character and pursuits (f. S8(f, obv.):
** Paas6 nelP anno 1690 4 mcgllor ulta Panolo Gulrlno p snol autenati Bologneae, huomo dl
dolciaeimo Ingegno h uiolto nrbano k eiuile. Kt benebo non hauesse gran eonoacenea dl
lettare latlne, nondlmeno riport6 assal lodo de i nerai uoliarl, do 11 quail molto se delattaua
e6 Maddalena sua amatlsslmo cSsorto. Molto a* alfatic6 in raccogliere le cose memorablll dl
Fori! c6e dalll librl da lui tcritti, conoscere al pu6. ** Of bit Italian poetry (If any) and of the
hietorical works of Guarino, here recorded, we have no nearer knowledge. Some of them
may still exitt, hidden away in one or more of the old libraries or archlvea of Romagna.
Another hiatorleal work, the '< Svpplemento Ittorleo dell' antiea cltt4 dl Fori! ** of Slgl-
tmondo Maroheal (Fori! 1978), alto containa allntlont to Ouarino, of which we have already
availed onraelvet. The volume givet a repretentation of the Gnarino armt (p. 98f), which
are desoHbed aa "eampo d*oro, aqulla nera, [8] fheele nere. "
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214 CHESS IN ICELAND
of the treatise on games has pretty certainly left its three divisions wrongly
placed. This is shown not only by the position of the above-mentioned date,
but also by the circumstance that the six Latin ** Civis Bononise '* verses,
containing the enigmatical lines referring to the author's name, are on f.
49a, the first chess page. Evidently the order should be: chess, backgammon,
morelles. The tables or backgammon subdivision starts with '' [IJsta sunt
partita tabularum/' and includes 44 positions. Turning over the leaves
we observe the names of the varieties of the game with no marked diver-
gencies from those to be found in the Florence and Roman exemplars. The
descriptions begin as usual: ^Mste Indus est de testa'' (in one place *^de la
texta''); ^Mstud partitum est de sbarelte"' (elsewhere written sharaUe and
sharaUl)\ ** Istud partitum est de minoret;"' "Istud partitum est de buff'"
(elsewhere '' de la huff" ); and thereafter occur likewise beihelas and limperial.
On f. 31b the opening of the text is: "Istud Indus est partitum qui dicitur
baldrac,'' and on f. 23a : '' Iste Indus est ualde deceptorius.,' The familiar
phrases recur: '' facient albe buff," "buff das" (deas), "buffdedu," "buff
de teme," " buff de quaterne," "buff desinne," "optativus;" "sex semper
pro tertio;" "perdere ad fallum," and so on. But the main feature of this
manuscript to us is that the final ten descriptive solutions (ff. 33a-35b) are
in Italian ; thoy are most likely added to this manuscript by later hands, and
go far to prove that it is a copy (of an early " Civis Bononise" manuscript)
made in Italy. The first of these texts commences: "Li rossi sono octo el
nigri sono tre aminoreto [a minorretto] curto cum [sic] tre dac[j ; " another
one opens thua: *' Questo e un partita da tauole che se fa aminoret da tre
dadj ;" and we likewise have: "Questo fe giocho de sbaraino," The expression
minoreto curto has, very likely, the signification of the German " das kurze
puff," of which we shall read hereafter. Among the technical terms are "buff
d'assi," "ambassi," duino,'* etc.^ The last two Italian descriptions are in a
hand differing from any found elsewhere in the manuscript. Von der Lasa
merely alludes to this paper codex (p. 152), and Van der Linde (" Quellenstu-
dien," pp. 180-181) has a somewhat longer report of it, reproducing (pp. 181-
182) seven of its chess positions.
Just as the writing of this portion of the present work is in progress,
another venerable literary monument devoted to the triad of mediaeval games
has been passing through a London auction chamber— certainly one of the most
beautiftil of these old codices on vellum. Aside flrom the worth of its contents
it possesses a high value as a specimen of the art of the XlVth century, a
fact shown by the great price given for it. It was sold, concurrently with
the rest of the library formerly belonging to Sir Andrew Fountaine of Narford
Hall, in the English county of Norfolk, by whom it was brought together
during the reigns of queen Anne and king George II. Even the chess portion
of this magnificent production has never been adequately described. Van
der Lindens description (" Quellenstudien," p. 186) hardly covers fifteen lines,
and is accompanied by references to two of the positions included in its
pages; Von der Lasa's account ("Zur geschichte," pp. 141-2) is no longer,
although he cites one problem, the common possession of this and two other
early authorities (p. 149). Von der Lasa had especial opportunity for its
study by means of Mr. John G. White's transcript. He considers its language
to be a dialect similar to those prevalent in Normandy and Picardy in the
Old-French period. The palaeographers speak of it, with some vagueness, as
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STRAY NOTES 215
Anglo-Norman work. Von der Lasa states that it belongs to the ^* Bonus
Socius '* group, but is in error when he says that '^ Im Fountaine MS fehlt
der Anfang.** He derived this impression Arom the fact that the beautiful
large illuminated initial, with which its text begins, occupies an unusual
position above the text, the letter proper being indeed at the upper right
hand corner; it is a C, noticeable enough when regarded with care, but con-
cealed by its unusual position and by the fashion of the marginal arabesques
connected with and springing out of it, similar to those which adorn very
many of the subsequent (chess) paginal margins. Van der Linde apparently
understood this matter rightly, for he gives the opening lines of the manu-
script, initial and all: ^^ Chil dor traient primiers & uellent matter (mate)
les rouges a deus traits ne plus ne moins, preng les ruges a deffendre car 11
ne le puent fair/' The chess descriptive text begins (after the first page) on
the right margin of the page close beside the problem, and runs down below
it on the lower portion of the page. The backgammon position is always at
the top of the page and the whole of the descriptive solution below it— no
part of the text being marginal. The exterior lines ^ or frames of all the
diagrams are in gold, the men in red and gold. Sach description commences
with a handsome two-coloured (blue and red, or gold and pale blue or lilac)
illuminated initials —some of them quite large — while the ground tone both
of the backgammon and morris boards is a deep blue. The chess portion
extends from f. la to 144b, while f. 145a has an incomplete blank diagram
and f. 146b a complete vacant one. These leaves are followed by the 22
folios of the backgammon division, comprising 44 positions, the volume ending
with 14 folios devoted to the morris game, the text of this latter beginning
on the reverse of the first morris folio, the problems filling ff. 2a-14a, the
final page being wholly blank; Jthus the morris positions number 25 in all.
The text of the initial backgammon position is (except where errors
occur in the present copy) as follows: ''Cis gius est de letiest [testa or textd]
et souhaidans en iii des [dicej et dient celles dor, [= d'or, of goldj q elles
leueront toutes de uant che qles rouges soient hors cest en atiauent chelles
dor pmers et les rouges seront che meisme q celles dor et se les rouges
le perdent aucti point quelles ne puissent toudis faire tout le giu al dor le
uollent perdre tu auoec celles dor le fai .du. et as. et leaieme de un quaerne
il fera un quaerne deus et as et tu deus et ambes .as. enferant les sienes
atout le trait et il cecemeisme. hoste lune en fierant lune des sienes et fai
deus et ambes . as . et il ce meisme tu feras le siene par deus et laut e fcras
en fasant ambes as et en desleueras une et en uiant ensl tu Iporas ueoir
coument tu les elleueras toutes deuant que nulles des rouges pinstissir et
leuenteras.'* As the reader will see, the copy of the text here made is more
or less defective; nor have we attempted to supply punctuation. ** Celles
d'or*' and *'ies rouges" indicate the men of the two different colours—
"gold" and *'red" being equivalent to the. "black" and "white" of our
less resplendent days. The text of the second position commences: "Ciste
[elsewhere written ceste] parti ure est de la tieste asouha idler et celles dor
et les rouges sunt e leur masons cest leur sunt esleuees et ont primiers
celles dor .ii. trais en souhaidans;" this same paragraph of the text con-
cludes : " fera buffe de as ensi quil viut et tu enco buffe de as et il ausi . . . et
elleueras buffe de sinnes et le uenkeras." The description of the course
of play in the fourth position opens with; "Cis gius est sanlaules" [this
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216 CHR88 IN ICELAND
word occurs elsewhere, is it the name of a variety 1J, that of the flflh prob-
lem thus: ^'Celles dor sunt en leur maison et traient primiers et ne feront
onkes fors buffe de as en .iii. dee et 11 ronge ne fera onXes fors baffe de
quaernes;" of the eleventh: "Ciste partiure est de bariil en ii des et vi pour
le tieir;'* of the twelfth: ^^Cis gius est de minoret en ij des soahaidaiu,''
and later on i% found the translation of the Latin perdere ad falsum^ ''et li
taule dor ne le piert une ale faUe tii prenderas ies rouges/" and still further
in the same description we read: '^tu endescouueras .iij. per ambes as et
le tierc et feras...;'* of the thirty- fourth: ''Chi commencent Ies partures
agieter Ies des et gieton trois des en ceste parture et uollent celles dor pas-
ser et alle toutentour le taulier et reuenir en .a.;" of the forty-third: '*Ce-
ste parture est sanlaule (?) a deus deuant le dairaine et est dele tiest." As
to the signification of the verb souJiaider (or souTieidier) occurring here,
Littr^ hardly defines it very clearly in its backgammon sense. He cites the
following early illustration: "On en puet juer [du Jeu des tables] en deax
mani^res, c'est a savoir por souhaidier de la langue, et par gieter Ies des."
It is to be noted that the Fountaino Manuscript gives us few names of back-
gammon varieties, the principal, if not only ones being bariU (that is ^'sba-
raill, *' "baraiie'* or " sbaraglio *'), and menoret. Among the technical terms
are the usual buffe des as, buffe de deus^ buffe de Hemes, buffe de qtuUemes'
buffe de sines {sinnes); mosons {maisons); ambes as; taule; taulier; pei'due
afalle; cine; quines; elleuer; buffer (verb) and others.
Here we finish our lamentably insufiicient notes on the backgammon
portions of some of these remarkable manuscripts, which, with the other
analogous ones, not noticed in these pages, form the most splendid literary
productions having to do with the history and practice of social games. It
is to be hoped that they may all speedily pass through the hands of some
investigator having the intelligence and the leisure to thoroughly examine
what we have treated so hastily, so scantily and so superficially, and who
wiU be in a position to compare with care each one with every other. Vt'e
have glanced merely at a few of them, not even including all which are
preserved in the libraries of Italy and England, and leaving those contained in
the book-collections of Franco, Spain and Germany virtually unnoticed. It
must likewise be remembered that we have given little attention to the parts
of these codices devoted to the morris game; that wide field is still unexplored.
Even the philological results of systematic researches among these singular
memorials of an earlier age would amply repay the student for his labor;
and a not unimportant chapter might thereby be added also to the story of
mediesval art.
Between the latest of these vellum codices, preserved in the great central
libraries of the peninsula, and the earliest printed Italian work relating
exclusively or principally to backgammon, we have a period of at least three
centuries. The early issue of the peninsular press referred to is a little
book, which, although it went through four editions— perhaps more ^ has
now become so rare, in the country which produced it, that scarcely one
of the book-collections of Italy possesses a copy. The little work comes
from the land's northern provinces, and was written, if we are to judge
by the date attached to its preface, in or before the year 1604. It is en-
titled : " 11 nobile et dilettevol givoco del sbaraglino. Date in luce da M.
Mauritio Bartinelli Cittadino da Nouarra, Con alcune nuove regole. Q In
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STRA Y NOTES 217
Venetia/M. DC. LXIX. Presso Gio. Pietro Bigonci. — Con licenza de' Su-
periori, e Priuilegio. Si vende k San Lio." Because of the oxcessive rarity
of the volume, and because there is no adequate description of it in any of
the bibliographies, we have transcribed its title-page in full. The edition
before us is perhaps the latest one. The vignette after the line Can alcvne
nvove regole, which is all in capitals, is one of those hard, conventionalized
vases of flowers, containing an equally conventionalized rose-bush bearing
five blossoms of varying sizes, such as are common enough in Venetian XVIIth
century typography. The signatures of tho duodecimo volume are two com-
plete ones (A, B), and the numbered pages 41, followed by six unnumbered
ones. The reverse of the title-folio is blank, and on the next (third) page
begins the '* proemio,** which is a preliminary and somewhat ornate bit of
philosophization on games in general and backgammon in particular, in the
course of which, in accordance with the habit of the age, several of the Latin
poets are cited, one of them being the " poeta Veronese ** (Catullus), to
say nothing of Galen and Aristotle. The author* s comparison between the
game he is writing about and other social sports is diverting : we reproduce
it in full, forming, as it does, the larger part of the ** proemio " (pp. 4-6) :
'' Uk si come ^ differenza irk huomini nobili, e ignobili, cosl anco deue
esscr distintione de' giuochi k loro quasi appropriati, e piu a quelli, che k
questi congruenti, & anco vn giuoco per sua natura deue maggiore, e minor
lode meritare. Qaleno prencipe dc* Medici lod6 assai il giuoco della palla,
riguardando al beneficio corporale, che da esse ne segue, A veramente il
giuoco di palla ^ da csser lodato, bench^ adesso per la gran poltroneria
nata per V otlo ne gli huomini sij questo giuoco non molto in vso, perch^ ^
laborioso, ma perch^ non conuiene in ogni tempo, come subito dopo il
cibo, n^ k donne, n^ k vecchi, che pur lor anco hanno bisogno di trastullo
honorato, e perch^ 6 commune k ftinciulli, e serui, bisogna vedere, se vi 6
altro giuoco piu lodeuole. Place k molti il giuoco de gli Scacchi, ma contro
ogni ragione, essendo qnello troppo occupatiuo della mente, e ricercando
grandissimo studio, & attentione, talche non merita dl essere annouerato
tr^ giuochi, ma piu presto frk V alte occnpationi <& imbrogli di ceruello. II
giuoco delle carte b strapacciato insino da famigli di stalle, e da ciabatini.
Quello de* dadi similmente ; ed* ^ di sola fortuna, n^ ha virtu seco mista,
laonde non conuiene, n6 k nobili, nc k Religiosi, i quali in ogni loro attione
deuono hauere la virtu compagna. Gli altri giuochi sono piu presto 6 pue-
rili, 6 donneschi, che altramente ; siche vengo a concludere, che solo il
giuoco detto Sbaraglino sij perfetto giuoco, e conueniente ad ogni nobile
intelletto, primieramente perch^ non b giuoco troppo occupatiuo, ma allegro,
vario, e pieno di trastullo ; dipoi perchd non fe di mera fortuna, mk misto
d' ingegno, e d'arte, e la fortuna v'fe solamente come materia del giuoco,
r arte, & il discorso come forma, e perchfe ben disse Aristotile Filosofo, che,
d forma demoniari vnnniquodqne iustwtn est ; perci6 non si deue questo
giuoco dimandar di fortuna, ma d' ingegno, e quindi si pu6 permettere anco
a* Religiosi, perche i dadi, che in esRO si trouano, e che sono prohibiti
da' Sacri Canoni non sono puri dadi, ma solamente come dicono i Logici,
materialiter^ e perch^ dalla materia non si giudica assolutamente tale, ma
dalla forma piu presto come per auttoritA d* Aristotile, pur hora abbiamo
di sopra accennato, percid non si deue dire, che quel giuoco sij giuoco de' dadi
mk d' arte di condurre in campo aperto vna quantitit di tauole, e flnalmente
28
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218 CHESS IN ICELAND
di cauarle innanzi, che V auuersario caui le sue. Non ^ anco questo giaoco
punto laborioso, perch^ s' esercita sedendo, e non ^ giuoco, con che si possi
facilmente ingannare il compagno, perch^ e apertissimo, b sbarrato, e perci6
81 chiama Sbaraglino da quattro campi sbarrati, ch' in esse sono. Si che
da tutti questi capi da noi commemorati si pu6 raccorre la dignity, T hone-
st^, e nobilU di questo giuoco, dalla quale io sono state sospinto k fare gli
seguenti trattati, e dalla beneuolenza de galanV huomini sarii cortesemente
riceuuto il tutto/' It will be seen that the condemned games are ball, chess,
cards and dice — by the last being meant the casting of dice (" mains "),
an affair of pure chance, unmixed with any element of skill. Notable is
the statement that *'*• chess pleases many, but without any reason; since it
keeps the mind too much occupied, and demands the greatest study and
attention, so that it is really not to be reckoned among games but among
elevated exercises and bewilderments of the brain/*
It is worth while, here, to observe in what ways the writer's favorite
game excels all others. After telling us that cards are played by only the
lower conditions of men (''by households inhabiting stables and by cob-
blers'"), while the game of dice is not fitting either for the noble or the
clerical classes, the author asserts that "Other games" than those he has
mentioned ''are mostly either puerile or effeminate; therefore I conclude
that only the game called Sbaraglino is a perfect diversion, adapted to every
lofty intellect, firstly because it is not a sport which strains the mental
powers, but is cheerful, varied, diverting; nor is it a mere game of chance,
but is blended with ingenuity and skill, its turns of fortune to be regarded
solely as incentives to play.'' Then he introduces a bit of ratiocination
from Aristotle, aided by which he endeavors to ai;gue that as *'this game
does not depend so much on chance as cleverness, it may, therefore, be per-
mitted to clerics, because the dice, which are a part of it, are not purely
and really dice, such as are prohibited by the sacred canons, but only dice,
as the logicians say, materialiter, and one does not judge, as Aristotle
authoritatively declares, by the mere material form, but by the actual na-
ture. Thus we ought not to say that this is a dice game, but a diversion
consisting in the art of conducting into an open field a quantity of men
{tauole)^ and finally of pushing them forward {cauarle innatiJti) as the advers-
ary pushes his. Nor is this game at all laborious, since it is played sitting;
and it is not one at which a player easily deceives his opponent, since every-
thing is open and above board {apertissimo) and in no wise barred, sealed
or concealed {sbarrato); hence it is styled sbaraglino from the four unbarred
or tree fields, into which the board is divided. From the arguments which
we have thus put forward may be deduced the dignity, nobility and honesty
of this diversion, by which qualities I have been impelled to compose these
essays, and on account of which this book will be kindly and courteously
received by all worthy and gentle men." Then follows the date of compo-
sition, as we have said, namely, "L'anno 1604, il dl ultimo d'ottobre."
. The recorded editions— there may have been more— have the dates of Ber-
gamo 1607, Milano 1619, Venetia 1631, all preceding the one lying before us.
The public library of Novara possesses that of 1619, but we know not where
copies of those of 1607 and 1631 are to be found. Bartinelli was a surgeon
of repute, and left behind him a manuscript work containing acute obser-
vations on matters connected with his profession, and on certain natural
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STRAY NOTES m
curiosities. A very brief notice of him is inserted in Lazzaro Agostino
Cotta*8 ''Museo novarese'' (Milano 1701, p. 232, no. 462).
After the "proemio" succeeds the "trattato primo," commencing with
"regola prima*' and concluding with regola IX (pp. 7-12). This division
embraces little relating to actual play, but much good advice, in a general
way, set off by many references to old and modern writers such as
Probus, the "poeta Ferrarese," the *• poeta Venusino " and others. The
player is counselled, first of all, to see that the instruments with which he
plays are solid and proper. In *'regola Iir' the writer shows us that he is
not altogether in favor of the modern custom of using diceboxes, for which
there would seem, as yet, to have been no very distinctive technical term,
but inclines to the old method of casting the dice iVom the hand as morei
fair^a point to which we have already briefly alluded elsewhere. He treats
the subject thus: '^E opinione de* modern! giuocatori, che sij cosa sicura
in questo ^iuoco lo adoprare non le semplici mani, ma certi vasetti di legno
che chiamano canelli. Questa opinione h& bisogno di correttione, dico adun-
que, che i canelli hanno da essere larghi nel fondo, accioche i dadi si pos-
sino iui bene riuolgersi, altramente con quelle aspetto, cho vi si metteranno
dentro in quelle usciranno, e scoprirassi il punto, e cosl V astuto, e seal-
trito auuersario si seruir& della sua malitia contro di te; Bisogna anco fare,
che r auuersario scuota, e dimeni i detti canelli, perche alcuni no hd visti
de* giuocatori con destrezza metter i dadi ne* i canelli con ftirgli pianamente
scorrere, 6 sdrucciolare giu per il legno, e mostrando di scuotergli non gli
scuotere, e cosl tirare il punto disegnato con riuersare i canelli destra-
mente. '* In subsequent ^* rules** we learn that no one should engage in the
game ** except with a mind calm, serene and cheerAil;** that he should never
move hastily; that he must have abundance of patience; that he should
practice a moderate boldness ; and that a roan of melancholic or mercurial
temperament should never play in the presence of many spectators. He
ends with the malicious advice that players giving odds should endeavour
to complicate the game, so that they may win of their inexpert opponents
(^^Chi giuocasse con vno inesperto, dandogli auantaggio, se vorrk plu si-
euro, che sia possibile, vincer, cerchi di intorbidare, intricare, A imbrogliare
il giuoco, perch^ k ridurre in termini il giuoco trauagliato si ricerca gran
maestria, e methodo, che non ha T inesperto**).
The "trattato secondo** (pp. 13-28) offers us 26 "regole.** These are
intended to be practical counsels, but are often somewhat vague, since they
are not illustrated by diagrams. In the first rule, which we translate en-
tire, we have a description of the board, some elementary instruction, and
a few lines bearing upon the history of the game: "It being our task to
lay down the necessary rules of this game, called Sbaraglino, we will first
explain its nature. It is practiced, then, usually, upon two attached squares
of wood, which may be opened and closed, and these are subdivided into
four fields {campi), each field having six white points (segni) drawn in the
shape of half rapiers. There are employed in the game thirty men, fifteen
black and fifteen white, placed on the two penultimate points of the second
field towards (verso) the third, and he who has the move, or as the Bre-
scians say *'the hand** {la mono), that is, he who is to play first, has his
men on the anterior point; he will also keep one of them on his fourth,
with which he can afterwards cover one of the others, jplaced singly, and
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220 CJTESS IN ICKLAND
establish a point (fa cfisa) in the third field; casa means nothing else than
two men, at least, covered or doubled or united on one of the points (segni)
described. When the men are exposed, that is, when they stand alone — not
doubled {copinati) and united— they can be hit by the adversary (possono toe-
care delle picchiate dalV auuersario) ; then, by the laws of the game, the
pieces which have been hit are replaced in the first field, and must thus
return afterwards towards the fourth. The game which the Spanish play
on the same board {in questo tauogliero) is, in form, distinct from this,
although the same pieces are used and the same dice; it is called toccadi-
glio. Difl'erent also is that in use in the Romagna, which is there styled
minoreito. But that which is known as sbaraglio [sic] is in no other
wise different from sbaraglino except that in the latter two dice are cast,
and a supposed third die is always added to the throw, counting six; but
in the former three dice are employed, and no six is computed unless it
is included in the throw. The victory in this game consists in having first
thrown off (leuato) the men from the fourth field after all shall have been
brought therein in accordance with the points shown in throwing the dice.
To introduce them into the fourth field, passing them through the third, the
first rule demanded by the game, and which is always to be observed, even
until the game has progressed to its end, is (unless it be contravened by
some of the rules hereinafter noted down) that everything shall be covered
as far as possible, and that the men shall be guarded from ''hits,'* because,
when hit, they are obliged to go back and undertake again a long journey,
thus retarding their entrance into the fourth field, and therefore their
throwing off— whence may proceed the loss of the game. It is seen from
experience that a player with two protected points— not liable to be hit—
but hitting the blots of his adversary, having men on four points, will
enter first into the fourth field and win the game; therefore everjrthing de-
pends on keeping the points protected. ** It is from this paragraph that the
older Italian lexicographers have drawn their statement that toccadigUo is
Spanish, when it pretty surely is not, and their explanations of the words
minaretto, sbaraglio and sbaraglino. The distinction in the meaning of the
two last vocables appears to go back to the XlVth century manuscripts.
We have not been able to find that the word mano is used at the present
time in the district of Brescia in the sense of ''move.** But there is no
doubt that many a ray of light could be thrown on the history of table-
games by a careful study of tie Italian dialects. It would be interesting
for instance, to be able to confirm the Romagna origin of minoretto, so
often used by the "Civis Bononise,** himself a citizen of that province.
We will also render literally a portion of " regola II,'* to give a further
idea of the style; " At the beginning of the game one ought to seek to
establish some points {far delle case)^ and there should be at least three such
protected points, so that then the wider extension of your men may be con-
veniently carried out. lU therefore, you have the move and throw at the
first cast {di prima lancio) a three and an ace, you will advance into the
third field two men— one to the sixth point, the other to be placed on the
corresponding three point. This the ignorant do not do, but hasten to push
a single man into the fourth field; this rule is to be observed when you
cannot, by your throw, double any of your men. And if, by so extending
your men no further than to the third field, you are hit by your adversary,
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STRAY NOTES 221
this matters little at the outset of the game, because the men hit, as they
come back, will serve you in doubling or establishing points, and enable
you, in return, to hit the blots of your opponent, or to make the top-point
{testa)^ called by the Tuscans capocchia (the " head" or "top"), being the
sixth of the first field, which is a position of much importance in the game,
as we state below." We discover another Tuscan term in " regola VII,"
which says: "If you have the move, and throw, at the first cast, three and
two, you should establish the first point in the third field, which is your
second, having then the advantage of a man in the rear, rather than seek
to establish a point on your fifth, for you would in that case send forward
one man less; this first point, as established, is entitled by the Tuscans
procaccina ( " courier," ** runner," ** carrier"), because it serves as a precursor
or aid, to the introduction of men into the fourth field, and lifcewise helps
in the establishment (doubling-up) of points." Again we are told in ** re-
gola XX" that <'Two men doubled up on the sixth point of the first field
are called by some testa, by others capocchia, as we have remarked above,
and form a useful position in the beginning of the game." In the applica-
tion of these " rules " it must be remembered that, at each throw of the two
dice in sbaraglmo, you are to suppose a third die which always turns up a
six; this imagined third die is referred to more than once, as stando che il
set si computa in ogni tiro (" seeing that six is to be added to every cast ").
We encounter, here and there, various striking words and phrases, technical
and otherwise: pariglia ("doublet"); di posta; dibellaposta;farun balestro
("cio6 metterne un*altra scoperta su '1 sei tuo del terzo campo, e Taltra
dentro contigua, quasi nel quarto campo, e primo segno. Questo si chiama
far balestro, perch^ si mette dirimpeto vna tauola k Taltra"); far montedi
tauole (placing several men on one point); cost anco guardati iion meitere
moltitudine di tauole in falso "perche cosi potrai vincer ii giuoco marcio, per
la difficolt^ ch* hauerib Tauuersario nel scaricare quel monte"); giocare per
Vadietro, giuoco marcio; vincere marcio (the latter perhaps something like
the English " to backgammon "); non solo e necessario il saper entrare, ma
il saper leuar; tauola scoperta; and many others of frequent occurrence.
After these twenty six rules for the advance (p^r Vinnansi), as the author
styles them, meaning the style of play when the person addressed is in
advance, pushing his men on towards the final " field " or table, we have
" regola IX " per Vadieiro (pp. 29-33), that is, adapted to the player whose
men aro mostly behind or in the rear, and who must watch very closely
the movement of his adversary in the hope of snatching victory from the
Jaws of defeat. The second of these rules opens thus: "Chi giuoca per
Tadietro questo giuoco, e non serra il terzo campo compitamente, perderli il
giuoco marcio, per ci6 bisogna tener cura d*hauer in modo collocate le tauole,
che si possi serrare il detto campo, e fr^tanto trattenere tauole deirauuer-
sario che sono fuori. Sar& anco bene far prima (se sar& possibile) la serrata
nel secondo campo, perchc, 6 ritardandosi il giuoco, ouero non hauendo
tanto campo da mouersi con le tauole fuori, Tauuersario sar^ maggiormente
constretto & rompere le case dentro nel quarto campo." To these rules
succeed eight others being the " trattato quarto," comprising "regole otto
del leuare," thatlis to say for throwing off one's men (pp. 36-39). Interesting
is the second of these rules because it alludes to a Latin saying customary
among players: "Nel progresso del leuare k molto necessario, che le tauole
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222 CHESS IN ICELAND
non sijno inquartate nolle tre vltime case del quarto campo, che manco h ne-
cessario nelle tre superior!, e massime nella prima, perch^ tu pel far tauola
scoperta, se non tirando doi sei [*^ two sixes '*], ouero hauendo da mandar
giu di U vna tauola, e tirando un solo sei, anzi si suol dire da* giuocatorl,
Quarta super quartam^ e tan to piu super quintam, <& super sextam. Ma
questa regola della quarta, fallisce spesso su la quarta, meno su la quinta,
e rarissime volte su la sesta.** The end proper of this backgammon treatise
is formed by a *' complimento deiravttore '* (pp. 40-41), in which we are told
that he who wishes to win and not lose his adversary's friendship must not
play with friends; and that he who wishes to play without using profane
language, or showing brutal behaviour, should be free from avarice and from
a too eager desire to conquer, which excellent sentiments are enforced by
passages from the Latin poets. The writer concludes by saying: " E queste
poche regole habbiamo poste insicme, e distinte con quella breuit&, e facility,
che ogn' vno pu6 vedere, perch6 il fine nostro 6 stato di giuocare, e non d'ac-
quistarsi nome di dotto, che se questo fine fusse stato in noi, haueressimo
affettata la oscurit^ del dire, secondo la sentenza diLucretio,
Omnia enim Btolidi magis adniiraitar, amantqae,
Innneris, qnsD sab rerbis latlnantla oornnnt."
Below comes 'Ml fine,*' showing that the work, in earlier editions, ended
here. But now we have an additional section : ** Avisi per diffendersi da
gV inganni, che vsano gli cattiui giocatori,'' filling the last six unnumbered
pages. These counsels relate first to methods of deception employed in games
of cards; then to modes of cheating in casting dice O'divcrsi inganni, che
fanno con li dadi ''), and finally to tricks at the game of mora, so common
in Italy ('*gr inganni de'giocatori da mora'*). The second section of this
supplementary chapter— relating to dice — is the only one that can be con-
sidered as having any relation to backgammon, and that hardly a direct one.
The sketch given of this almost forgotten tractate is necessarily very
imperfect. If the game it treats of ever find a proper historian it will become
a source of much information, although it is a matter of some disappointment
not to observe more traces of a connection between it and the early Italian
manuscripts. Of the names mentioned in those, as applied to various forms
of the game, we find only sbaraglio (the old sbarail)^ sbaraglino {sbarailin)
and minareito. Some technical terms have apparently been lost, but Barti-
nelli makes no reference to any preceding treatises. Perhaps the descriptions
of positions which he gives in his ** regole '' may, in some Instances, cor-
respond to. the partita of the manuscripts, but' to ascertain this would require
much careful comparison. The quaint orthography, the simple, honest
manner, the carefully classified matter, the general good sense, set off by
some fanciAilness, give that charm to the work which so much of the
Italian writing of the author's age possesses.
Before coming to the present standing and character of this game in
Italy we will take note of some of its appearances in the literature of the
peninsula during the last two or three centuries. In the course of the XVIth
century we find the word sbaraglio (describing the three-dice form) in leas
common use by general writers than its derivative sbaraglino (the title of the
variety in which only two dice are employed), showing that a decline of the
former method of play had set in, and that the imagined third die, so familiar
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STHA Y NOTES 223
in the period covered by the manuscripts, was rapidly going out of Aushion.
Alessandro Citolini, called '*di Seravalle/' in bis little known work, **Lati-
pocosmia'' (Venetia 1561, p. 484), towards the end of the fifth of his seven
days (sette giomi del rnondo)^ after enumerating various sports, has a follow-
ing paragraph on dice games. The reader must bear in mind that the author
endeavours to cite in his volume the titles of ail trades, professions, arts,
sciences, philosophies, with the terms appertaining to each of them. He
says : ** Segvono poi i Qivochi di dadi : doue saranno le pise, i dadi, da fa-
rina, da tauolc, e in essi il 6, il 5, il 4, ii 3, il 2, V asso [the dice numbers],
e poi il tauoliere, e i segni svoi, e le tauole ; e cosl givcar a tauole, tirar 1
dadi, far ambassi, dvini, terni, qvadcrni, qvini, dodici [the dice doublets],
menar le tauole, far case, lasciar tauole scoperte, dar a le tauole, tornar in-
dietro, givcar di dietro, uincere, dar il givoco marzo [marcioj, perdere, git-
tar uia le tauole, romper il tauoliere; e se uolete le maniere de givochl,
uedrete scarcaV asino^ toccadilo, e corto, e Ivngo, sbaraglio, sbaraglino^ ca-
marzo, minorettOy a tre dadi, a sanzo.** In the list here given we have both
sharaglio and sharaglino. As most of the other games mentioned in the
sentence are forms of backgammon it would be interesting to know what
the writer means by camarzo; scarcaV asino^ as we have already noted, is
an appellation applied to one of the simpler forms of merelles ; and as for
sanzo^ it may or may not be an older form of senza^ referring to varieties
played "without'' the three dice. Sharaglino we find both in theXVthand
XVIth centuries. One of the earliest citations is in a poem by Bronzino
(probably identical with the painter, Angelo Allori, called Bronzino, born at
Florence 1501). It is in the thirteenth chapter of his "Capitoli faceti "' (Ve-
nezia 1822) :
Come aare' far rassi e aohioppetini
O giaoar da so steaao a ttburagHno
Per nou aTor a dar DOja a vloinl.
A more famous comic lyrist, Francesco Berni (b. 1536)— who gave his name
to a sort of playful, ludicrous, satirical, flexible, but somewhat licentious
verse at one time much read — alludes to the game in the first book ("In
lode della primiora"' — the last word being apparently the same as "primero,''
the name of an old English card game), of his "Opcre burlesche (Florence
1552-55) :
8' io perdeaal a primiera il langDe e gU occhi
Non me no oaro, done a tbaraglmo
Riniego'l del, s' io pcnio tro baiocchi.
The word is also used by the Catholic historian of the council of Trent,
Cardinal Pietro Sforza Pallavioino (b. Rome 1607), in his treatise "Del Bene''
(Rome 1644, p. 261) ; " Non prouiamo noi, che chi giuoca a sharaglino^ quando
il giuoco h a segno, che non possa egli perdere, se non iscoprendosi due
assi ne' dadi, ci6 k vna, non d' innumcrabili ; ma di trentasei congiunzioni
possibili, canta gi& nel cuor suo il trionfo del giuoco T' It is employed, too,
by another native of the Italian capital, the litterateur Lorenzo Magalotti
(b. 1637), in his "Lettere familiari" (Vonezia 1719, I., p. 598)— compared by
Hallam to those of Redi — wliere he gives us a technical term in use at his
time: "0 non or' egli meglio tirar a vincer il giuoco per 1' innanzi (per ser-
virmi d' un termine dello sharaglino) che rimanere apposta in dietro per vin-
cerlo per la cavata, e star a tocca, e non tocca di perderlo marciol" The
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224 CHESS IN ICELAND
word sbaraglino lasted until the end of the XVIIIth century ; the poet Bar-
tolommeoCorsini, writing ahout 1790, gives this counsel in his heroic-comic
poem, **I1 Torrachione desolato" (Leida= Firenze 1822, 1., p. 104, canto IV., 64):
Qaaoil' eoco il Cootfe (ch'a temprar V amare
Paaiiooi d* amore a on tarolino
So no 0tava io paJagio aUor ool fare
CoU'ajo Betto CioUi a AarmgUno)
Foori ae n'eaoe....
Another poet, once eminent but now hardly read, of a somewhat earlier
date, either the father, ^acopo Cicognini, or the son, Andrea Giacinto Cico-
gnini— our authority leaves us in doubt which, but both were writers of
verse— wrote :
Lo' mpersdor co 1' ha pogpate socio
£ uou a fatto o dama o ibartujlino.
We have commented elsewhere (sec p. 187) on the Italian employment of
trictrac^ which, compared with other appellations of the game, may be
considered rare. As to the many and variously different significations of
the word triclrac, we are here not concerned; the poets continued to be
familiar with many of them and to use them, as, for instance, Giovanni Ba-
tista Fagiuoli (b. 1(>30), in his "Rime piacevoli '' (Florence and Lucca 1729-45,
7 vols):
II trieehe traeche allora si sentiva;
Ma non h pia qaol tempo.
No less a personage than Niccol6 Machiavelli, the famous secretary of the
Florentine commonwealth, confessed to his overweening fondness for back-
gammon in one of his "Letterefamiliari" ("Opere complete," Florence 1833,
p. 827, col. 2), addressed to the ambassador, Francesco Vettori, dated 1513;
he says: **Con questi io m' ingaglioffo per tutto dl glocando a cricca, a trtc-
irac^"" the former word, which we have seen before (p. 187), being the title
of a game at cards. We have already mentioned an Italian instance of the
use of trictrac to indicate a variety of backgammon, as early as 1526 (see
the phrase Just alluded to on p. 187). Toccadiglio, as a backgammon ap-
pellation, is a word, both as to its origin and exact signification, of the most
evasive character. It is said by the German lexicographers to be Italian,
and by the Italian to be Spanish. In Italy it is very seldom found in literature,
and not very often in the dictionaries. It is, however, at least as old as the
early years of the XVIth century. Giovanni Mauro, whose few poetical
"Capitoli" are usually published with those of Berni, and who died in 1536,
a few days after his friend and compatriot (for both were Tuscans), in his
"Capitolo a Ottaviano Solis" (see Berni, edition of Florence, 1552, f. 154 b),
inquires of the acquaintance whom he addresses '^hat common friends arc
doing:
Clie A meiwer Glooau, che A 1' abate,
Che A YergUio caoalier adoroof
Bagi^ier oomo disponsa le giomate ?
Come fk il maggiordoino a toeeadiglio /
II oonte legao aochor le traooie nsate i
while in the same century Francesco Bracciolini (b. 1566), in his "Scherno
degll Dei,'* styled by the author in its first issue, 1618, a **poema eroico-
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STRAY NOTES 225
giocoso, " has both toccadiglio and sbaraglino in his lines (edition of Milan,
1804, p. 76, cant. 5., xxviii):
.... Teugono e vauDo
lovisibUl tatti, e qai Tioino
Giooano a toeeadiglio o ilmragUno,
Baretti, the Anglo-Italian lexicographer of the XVlIIth century, renders
both sbaraglio and sbaraglino by calling each " a kind of play at backgam-
mon,'* explaining the former. as a game '' che si fa con tre dadi,** and the
latter as one *^ che si fa con due dadi. '' In the various editions of his dic-
tionary neither toccadiglio nor trictrac is treated as an Italian word. The
former we have not seen in any Italian lexicological work except Giovanni
Gherardini's *^ Si\pplemento a* vocabularj italiani,'' which was not issaed
until the middle of the century just closed (Milan 1852-57, 6 vols) ; it explains
toccadiglio as a ^^giuoco spagnuolesco da tavoliere; forse lo stesso che sbar-
raglino [sicj,*' and goes on to remark that it is the French ^*' toute-taJble o
toutes-tables ; *' but this same dictionary nowhere cites either sbaraglio or
sbaraglino^ and the Spanish dictionaries do not give us toccadiglio in any
orthography. The term toccadiglio (or toccadeglio) is not at present, we be-
lieve, infuse anywhere on Italian ground. One verbal definition given by
Tommaseo and Bellini may be noted. The French probably acquired from
the Italian casa their technical word case, the former being yet in use in
the more Southern land, both for a " point '* on the board and for a '* point"
having on it *^ doubled '' men ; as may be seen in the dictionary of the wri-
ters just cited, casa is said to signify ''ciascuno scompartimento del giuoco
chiamato sbaraglino o trictrac ^^^ while ^^ fare una casa''' is given as mean-
ing to *^ raddoppiare le girelle o tavole, ** the compilers adding that **adesso
il giuoco dello sbaraglio si chiama tavola reale^ Many derivations of sba-
raglino, all equally improbable, are to be found in the older dictionaries;
Gherardini, by his orthography of the word {sbarraglino), apparently wishes
to imply that it comes ft-om sbarrare (itself from barrare, to '* bar), " mean-
ing to *' disbar, " " surmount barriers, " to ** pass bars, " referring possibly
to the movements of the pieces from one '* bar " or point to another, by
which we shall be reminded of the English technical term, *^ bar-point. ''
Even more completely out of use than any of the names of varieties of back-
gammon we have mentioned is minoretto; so common in the period of the
early manuscripts, and even at a much later time so well known to Bar-
tinelli.
But backgammon was, at a subsequent day, to find its way to a much
more important place in Italian letters. It was to be the subject of a pro-
minent episode in the best known work of the greatest Italian poet of the
eighteenth century, for his only possible rival to such a claim, Metastasio,
is to be considered rather a dramatist than a lyrist. Giuseppe Parini died
almost with the century (1799). He was the first Italian poetical writer who
came under that English inlluence which had so eflectivcly reached Germany
through Lessing. In 1763 Italy, then lying in a drowsy slumber, was startled
from its languor by the appearance of the first part of Giuseppe Parini's poem
**ll giorno, " the scheme of which, we are told by an English critic, was
drawn from Thomson, while its spirit was the spirit of Pope, the result be-
ing a production such as Cowper might have composed had he been born
an Italian. It is a masterpiece of delicate and pointed irony. It describes
29
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226 CHESS IN ICELA ND
the dawdling, dilettante lire of higher Italian society in that dull age, when
there was neither political, commercial, military nor literary activity, when
no national feeling existed and when even the church slept. It portrays the
events of a day in the fruitless life of a young man of the gentry, and is
divided into four parts: 'Ml mattino'* (morning), ''II moriggio'' (noon),
" U vespro " (evening), and *' La notte " (night). The second part (" II me-
riggio " or " II mezzogiorno ") was published in^ 1765. At its end was a de-
scription of a contest at backgammon, which at once became the classical
utterance concerning the game. The guests at a country-house, the noon-
meal finished, retired to the drawing-room for coffee, after which some of
the party went out driving, and, as Carducci in his summary of the poem
expresses it: "Oli altri giuocano a diversi giuochi, essi a sbaraglino, "^
Then follows a detailed description of the sbaraglino game, the original of
which we quote in full. The reader will notice the introduction, still com-
mon in Parini's day, of the old mythological machinery, and will see from
the last lines that the author shared the belief in the derivation of the word
trictrac from the noise made by the shaken dice. The text given is the care-
fully revised one of the historian and critic Cesare Cantu, in his admirable
work, "L' abate Parini o la Lombardia nel secolo passato (Milan 1854,
pp. 405-408). The passage embraces lines 1103-1190 of the poem:
Cotk a qaeate, o SIgiiore Ulustre, loxanno
Ore lento 8i taccia. £ a* altri aocora
Yaole Amor che 8' ingaoui, altrovc pagni
La turba oonTicata : e tu da tin lato
Sol oon la Dama tua quel gioco eleggi
Che doe soltauto a an taToliere auimctte.
Gij^ per ninfa geotll tacito ardea
D' inaoffribile ardor niisero amaDte,
Col nair altra eloqaonza usar con lei,
Faor die qnella degli occhi/ era ooncosso;
Poichd il rozso marito, ad Argo egaalo,
Yigilava mai sempre ; e qaasi biacia
Ora piegando, or allangando il oollo,
Ad ogni verbo con gli orocchi acuti
Bra preaento. Oioio! come con coiini,
O oon notato t'lTole glammai,
O con servi aedottt a la ana bella
Chiedor pace ed aita ? Ogni d* amoro
Stratogemma finiaaimo vincea
La goloaia del rnstico marito.
Che pib lice aperare f Al tompio oi viouo
Del nume accorto clio le aorpi lutiTccia
All'aurea Tcrga, e il enpo e la calnt^na
D' all forni8c<>. A lui «i proatra nniilo
£ in qneati dottl, la^rimando, il prcga :
" O piopizio a gli Hmanii, o bnon figliuolo
*' De la Candida Afa.ja, o tii cbo d'Argu
'* Dplndeati i ceut' ooclii, o :i lui lapisti
" La gnardata Kioveiicn, I picgbl accogli
" D' an ainante iofttlice, e ii lui conccdi,
" Se non gli occbi, iugaunar ^M orecohi alnicuo
'* D' importnno maiito. " Eoto. ai aooto
II divin aimnlacro, a lui ai cliiim,
Con la vcr^a paoiflca la fronto
Gli percote tro volte; e il lieto amanto
Sonte d«ttarai ue la nicnte nii gioco
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STRAY NOTES 227
Cho i mariti asuordisoe. A lai diresti
Che Tall dol nun pi^ coneesse anoora
II sappllcato Dio; ootanto ei vola
VelociMlnuiineiite a la sua donna.
La bipartita tavola prepara,
Ov' obaiio od avorio intarsiati
liognan buI piano ; e partono altornando
In dne volto sei caae ambe le sponde.
Qnindicl uero d' ebauo rotolle,
E d' aTorlo bianchissimo altrottante
Stan diviso in dne pnrti, e rooto e norma
Da duo dadi gettati attcndon, pronte
Qli spazj ad ocotipar, e qninci • qniiidt
lognar oontraric. Oh cara a la Fortana
Qnella ohe corre innanzl air altre, e seco
Trae la oorapajpia, onde il nemico aaaalto
Forte aostenga ! Oh giocator felice
Chi pria l* eatrema oaaa oooapa ; o I' altro
I)e gli apaaj a sd dati ordin rlcmpie
Cull doppio segno ! £i trionfiuite allora
Da la falange 11 aao rival combatte ;
E in proprio ben rivolge i colpi ostill.
Al tavolior s* aasidono arabidne,
L' ainante onpidiasimo e la ninfa :
Quella nna apondu ingoinbra e qneati V alti-a.
II raarito col goinito a' appoggiir
All' un de' latL : ambo gU oreochl tende ;
S aotto al tavoliec di quando in qnando
Gaata oon gli oocbi. Or 1' agitar de i dadi
Rntro a aonanti boaaoli coininoia ;
Ora il piccfaiar de' boaaoli anl piano;
Ora il Tibrar, lo aparpagliar, 1' artaro,
n cozcar de 1 dno dadi • or de le moaae
Pcdine il inartellar. Torceai e fronie
Sbalortlito il geloao : a fngglr ponaa,
Ma r.ittionlo il eo8])etto. II frajjor creeco,
II roDibasso, il fraatono, il rovinio.
Si pih regger non puotc; in piedi balxa,
E con anibe le man inra gli oricchi.
Tn vinceati, o Merenrio : il canto aniante
Foco diaae, e la bella inteae aaaai.
Tal no la ferrea et4, qnando gU apoai
Folle anperatizion ohiaroara all' arme,
Giocato fa. >Ia poi ohe I'anreo anrae
Secol di novo, o che del prisco errore
Si apogliaro i mariti, al aol dilotto
La dama o 11 cavalier Tolaero il gioco,
Clio la neoeaaitA trovato avoa.
Fn Bnp<^rllao il ronior : di moUo panno
La tavola veatiaai, e do' patenti
Boaaoli *l aen : lo achiamazaio nioloato
Tal rintosxoaai ; e dnra al gioco il nomo
Cho anoor 1' antioo atropito dinota.
Cantu*8 principal note (pp. 106-107) is of interest, because it is the
earliest and fullest attempt at a historical sketch of backgammon, written
in Italian, down to the middle of the XlXth century — and it has not been
greatly improved on since —although it naturally leaves much to be desired.
The chess anecdote of Saccheri at its end is, of course, out of place, but in
Parini's time people still fancied that all table games must be more or less
related to each other: "E lo sparaglino [sic], uno dei diversi giuochi delle
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228 CffESS IN ICELAND
tavole. II tavoliere b doppio, compartito in piramidi bianche e nere, e vi si
ginoca con quindici pedino nere, e quindici bianche, due dadi, due bossoli.
Ciascun giocatore impila le sue pedine al vertice della prima piramidc : in
uno dei bossoli scuote i due dadi, e li lancia contro la sponda deiravversa-
rio: secondo che i dadi fanno pariglio o no, si regola la mossa della pedina.
I numeri eguali fanno andare da freccia bianca in bianca; o da nera in
nera: i caQi da freccia nera in bianca o viceversa. LMntento ^ di occupar
Testremit^, ove si fa damare [!] la propria pedina, per poter poi assalire
ravversario nelle sue case. Dal fracasso che doveano fare pedine, bossoli,
dadi fu questo giuoco chiamato il Trictrac; da.1 quale poco differisce il Tac.
N^ voglio n^ devo insegnarvi a giocare; e molti ponno- aver veduto a gio-
carlo ; giacch^, sebben raro, non ^ disusato, singolarmente in Francia, ove
un proverbio dice che il trictrac non imparano le donne che dai loro ^manti,
n6 gli uomini che dalle amiche. Chi ne volesse conoscere le teoriche, guardi
V Encyclopidie methodique^ jeucr^ trictrac. Prosper© Merimee, uno dei roman-
zieri piu rinomati di Francia, pubblic6 un racconto La partita di trictrac,
Delille, neW Homme des cfiamps, ha una lunga dcscrizione d'una partita a
trictrac, Platone diceva che il mondo e simile alio sbaraglino: si comincia
dal gettar casuale del dado; poi il giudizio dispone le mossc. Tutto questo
brano sembra al De Coureil una puerility, una pcdanteria, un'affettata eru-
dizione di scolastiche cognizioni, e trova singolarmente ridicolo che un mo-
derno Zerbino ricorra a Mercurio per ajoto. Ma chi gli ha detto che questo
trovato fosse moderno? Platone attribuisce 1' invenzione de'giuochi di zara
appunto a Mercurio Trismegisto. I Greci avevano il diagrammismo o i Ro-
mani le duodena scripta^ che somigliava ben bene al nostro trictrac. Gli An-
nali persiani lo fanno antico quanto gli scacchi. Perocchd raccontano che,
'durata lunga guerra fra Belagi, re d* India, e Nuscirvan re di Persia, quegli
per flnirla alia quieta mand6 al Persiano un giuoco di scacchi, promettendo
pagar un tributo se i Persiani, nessuno insegnandolo, scoprissero Parte di
questo giuoco. Raccolgonsi i sapient! del regno: Bonzurgemhir [Burzurgmihr]
arriva a discoprire i misteri degli scacchi ; e per mostrar che i Persiani non
solo ne sapevano del pari ma piu che glllndiani, invent6 il trictrac: inviato
dal suo re, porta air Indiano si la spiegazione degli scacchi, si la sflda a
conoscere il nuovo giuoco. La sapienza di tutti i dotti deir India riuBcl vana,
e Belagi pag6 il tributo {Annates de la literature et des arts, torn. IX, pag. 84).
II padre Girolamo Saccheri, gesuita, professore di matematica a Pavia, fra
altri ammirati esercizj di memoria, faceva questo di giocare a tre scacchieri
contemporaneamente e senza vederli; e il piu delle volte vinceva: poi, se
piacesse, ritesseva a memoria tutte le mosse. " What Cantu calls " il Tac"
is, doubtless, toccadiglio ; tac, however, is not discoverable, so far as we
know« in any Italian dictionary, at any rate not as a name of a game. In
more than one place, in his note, Cantu makes evident his ignorance of
table-games ; the word damare (to '' queen ''), for instance, is not appro-
priate in connection with backgammon, but is used only in relation to chess
and draughts.
There is a more recent edition of "II giorno e le odi" of Parini (Tu-
rin, 1899) by Luigi Valmaggi, a Turinese university professor. We copy his
longer note (pp. 136-139) on the same passage of Parini's poem, in spite of
the fact that its matter is largely drawn partly from Cantu and partly from
the cyclopedias. Some portions of it, nevertheless, will be new to many
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STRAY NOTES 229
readers; this is especially true of the concluding linos, It is a pity that the
compiler of the note could not have given us a trustworthy account of the
present state of backgammon and its varieties in the different provinces of
Italy, together with some notices of the terminology of the game now or
lately in vogue in the extensive field which stretches between Southwestern
Sicily and Friuli : **Descriziono del tric-trac; e il nome, che 'ancor I'antico
strepito dinota,* a punto venne dal rumore che facevano, nel giuoco, bossoli,
dadi e pedine. Ma, buon documento della ciarlataneria etimologica d* una
erudizione che oramai dovrebb' essere vecchia, non manc6 chi s" avvisasse
di nobilitarne Torigino rccapitando la derivaziono del nome al greco Tpt<;
Tpaxo?, che vorrebbe dire *'trois fois diflQcile k joucr et k comprendre'* (I),
com* 6 riferito da Giovanni Quinola nella sua Nouvelle Acad^mie dcs jeux
(Parigi, 1883, p. 284). II tric-trac si giuoca (in Francia 6 in uso anche oggi)
sopra un tavoliere, diviso longitudinalmente in due campi, o compartito da
ventiquattro frecco a duo colori, dodici per parte, parallelo alia divisione
longitudinale dello scacchiere (partono altemando in dodici magioni amhe le
spo7ide, V. 1149 sg.). De* due giuocatori ciascuno dispone di quindici girelle^
pedine, o rotelle^ com'^ corrctto nolle varianti di mano del P., rispettiva-
mente bianche o nere, ammassate da principio in tre pile su la prima freccia
di destra.. Dal getto dei dadi, che devono essere lanciati contro la sponda
{bande nella nomenclatura franceso tuttavia in corso) avversaria, dipendono
tanto la quality della mossa, di una o due pedine o su Tuna o Taltra frec-
cia, secondo la combinazione dei punti format! dai dadi, quanto la diresione
di essa, secondo il numero totale h pari {simpLes\ di freccia bianca in bianca,
o dispari {doublets)^ di bianca in nera e viceversa. Ordine e fondamento al
giuoco i *piani* U<^n$) otto in tutto, conformo al diverse modo come le
pedine si movono e sono abbattues; e segnano i punti vinti, che si notano
sino a dodici, con due gettoni variamente disposti intorno alio frecce (due
punti avanti la prima freccia di destra; quattro tra la terza e la quarta, ecc).
Dodici punti d&nno un trou^ che si rappresenta infilando progressivamente
una stecca nei buchi onde son fornite le sponde del tavoliere; dodici traus'
dlinno la partita. -^ II giuoco 6 antichissimo, e lo troviamo gik in Persia
descritto nel IXbro dei re di Firdusi (vol. VII, pp. 228-237 della traduz. ita-
liana di I. Pizzi, Torino, 1888), il quale ne attribuisce V invenzione al savio
Buzurcmlhr. Lo vediam poi diffusissimo neir antichitd. classica : probabil-
mente 6 la icsirtia dei Qreci (cfr. Esichio, II, p. 945), sonza dubbio il Indus
duodecim scriptorum dei Romani, che si giocava sopra un tavoliere {alveus
tabula) sul quale erano tracciate dodici linee {scripta, di qui il nome) ta-
gliate da una perpendicolare in modo di formare 24 compartimenti. Su queste
linee si movevano lo pedine {calculi) a due colori, secondo il punto formate
dai dadi, lanciati sul tavoliere mediante un bossolo {pyrgus o fritiUus)^ con
tutte le regole del tric-trac. • Oltre due epigram me deWAntologia laiina
(192-193, Riese) e qualche altro cenno di scrittori latini (v. Ter. Adelph^ 739 sg. ;
Cic. in Non. s. v. scriptat, p. 170, 28; Ov. TrisU^ II., 476; Ars. am,, II., 204,
Quint., XL, 2,28; Plin., N, fT., XXXVIL, 6, 2), h importantissimo documento
del giuoco il celebre epigramma di Agathias (AnL Or., III., 62, Jacobs), dove
si descrive una partita deir imperatore Zenone (Marquardt, PrivaU, d, Rom,,
2^ ed., 834 sgg.) ; i material! per6 son poco su poco giu quell i stessi raccolti,
e discassi giji dal Salmasio (in Script, hist. Atig., e dal De Paw, De alea '
veter. ad epigr, Agath,, Traj, ad Rhen., 1726). Dal Salmasio (p. 467), dal
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230 CHESS IN ICELAND
Jacobs (p. 101) e ancora dal Becq de Fouquiferes {Les J etuc des anciens^ 2^ od.
(Parigi, 1873), p. 372) fu riprodotta di su la silloge di Grutero {Liscript anU^
II., 1049) una tavola rappresentante il giuoco ; ma h apocrifa, come provd
chiaramente gii il Ficoroni (J tali ed altri strumenii lusori degli antichi ro-
mani descriti (Roma, 1734) p. 102 sg.). Ancora ritroviamo il tric-trac nel
medio evo, ov' era designato col nome di alea^ divenuto sinonimo di ialmla^
la qual parola non 8igniflc6 piii lo scacchiere, bensi la pedina, e lo scacchiere
si chiam6 invece tabolerium (L. Zdekauer, H giuoco in Italia nei secoli XIII
e XIV, in Arch, stor. itaL, s. 4% XVIII. (1886), p. 20 segg.). Non e rara ncgli
statuti la disposizione che si debba giuocare con trenta tavole, e ci6 affine
d' impcdire * che le pedine si mettessero in apparenza air orlo del tavoliere,
per gettare i dadi, in mezzo di loro a zara' (Zdekauer, 1. cit., p. 27, n. 1.).
Quanto alia confusione de* termini, essa perdurd sino alia fine del medio evo
(ancora 6 nel Petrarca: v. il XXVI ragionamento De ludo aleae et calculorum
del De remediis utriusque fortunae), e piu in qua, sino al Rinascimento ; il
merito d^averla tolta di mezzo spetta per prime a Celio Calcagnini, nella dis-
sertazione De talorum, tesserarum et calculorum ludis (in 0pp. (Basilca, 1544),
pp. 286-301). Ma non mai forse il giuoco ebbe cosl grande diffusione e voga
come nella seconda meti del socolo scorso. Nella Nouvelle Acad^tnie desjeux,
ristarapata ad Amsterdam nel 1773, fe detto in proposito che ' rexcollence, la
beauts et la sincerity qui se rencontrent dans ce jeu, font que le beau monde
qui a de la politesse s'y applique avocbeaucoup de soin, en fait son jeu favori,
et le prdfere aux autres jeux. En effet, ce beau jeu a tant de noblesse et de '
distinction, que nous voyons quMl est plus k la mode que jamais; les dames
principalement y pnt une trds grande attache* (IL, 31 sg). Non 6 a meravigliare
perci6 se nella teoria del giuoco troviamo che hanno luogo Joile regole galanti
di .questa fatta: *L'on pratique... k present que celui qui joue centre les
dames, leur donnc les tables ou dames noires, parce que le noir de Tebeno
releve et fait paroUre davantage la blancheur de Icurs mains, ce que leur fait
plaisir (ib. p. 33).* Dairanonimo autore della stessa opera e anche referita
•certa Chanson du trictrac, nella quale la scurrility. 6 si grande e il doppio
sense si grossolano, che non si potr& riprodurne altro che i primi vers! :
Galans, Je Teas vons appreodns
Sana Livro et aana Alroanach,
Uii jea facile a ooraprendre,
Un noarean Jen de Trictrac :
II faat, en sniyaut la ohanoe,
Mettre les Dames ....
II Cfantii] ricorda un prove rbio francese, secondo il quale il tric-trac non
inipararono le donne se non dagli amanti, nb gli uomini se non dalle amiche.
Neir//omm^ de Ville [Champs] del Delille (1738-1813) 6 una lunga descrizione
d*una partita a tric-trac; '^^ e un romanzo sullo stesso argomento scrisse
** This mstrieal description of a partU of backgammon Is like that of Parinl, and pos-
sibly suggested by It, and Is the moat notable which occurs In French literature. It Is to
be found lu *^ L*Horaiue des champs ** by the abbi Jaequea Delille (see hfs works, Parlfi 18S4,
VIT.f pp. S80-S2I) and is very brief. Valmaggi, as ibe reader will notice, makes the singular
blandur of stylUi;; this once widely-read poem ** L*Homme de vlUe " — an inexplicable lapse
of the pen. We cite the passage in its completeness:
Le del devlent-11 sombre? Bb bieni dans ce salon,
Pr&s d*un obfine brulant JMnsulte k raqutiou;
Dans oette ohaude euoelute, avee gout eclalrie,
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STRAY NOTES 231
Prosper Mcrim^e (1803-1870); entrambi anche citato dal C[antu]." Much of
this will be found, in a somewhat fuller shape, in other pages of the present
work. The citations in regard to the line-games of the ancients show that the
commentator did not know the little publication of Professor Comparetti, of
Alille heureuz pane-temps abrcgont la lolrde.
J^entcDclfl e« Jeu bruyaut ou, lu cornet eu main,
L*adroit Jouour ealcule uu hasard Inccrtain,
Chaccu iiur le damicr flxo il'un osil avido
Les casus, let couieurs, el le pluin ct le Wde:
Les disquL's Doini et blauei voleat du blano au noir; *
Lear pile croft, decroit. \Ur la cralnie «t I'vHpolr
Battu, chanai, reprU do «a prison sonore
Le dd, uon sans fracas, part, rentre, part encore ;
11 court, roule, s*abat; le uumbre a prououc6.
Ill tbo poem frum which we are quoting, th««c lines aro iiumediately succeeded by a duscrip-
tlou, of equal leii;rth, of a game ofobess. The abbe Dulllle published " L* Huinme d«s champs"
in 1800. He, like Pariui, was greatly luflucucod by his fanilllarily with Koglish letters.
Kusiding for the better part of two years In Kugland, ho translated into Freuefa Mlltou*i
**I>aradise LoKt," I*op«*s ** Rssay on Man*' and soveral shorter pleeos. He somewhat re-
suiubled the Italian lyrist in eapril, and in the ca<>e and harmony of his verse, bu( ho has
lung ceased (o enjoy the popularity and vogue which were once his. It is proper to mention
that Parinl's poem has bee i^ rendered in Its cumpleto form Into French undur the titlo of
*' Le jour, poCuic eii (|uatru parties, tradult en vers francals iiar 1. L. A. IU*yinond '* (Pa-
ris 1826). — The scurriluuB piece of verse, of which the firnt lines are reproduced by Valmaggi,
has boon set to music, and is inserted in many collections of French songs.— The other French
production which has to do with our game, Hktwiito mentioned hy the Italian comnienlatofs,
is the story by Prosper Merlmde, ^* Le partie dc trictrac*' (1830), contained In bis often re*
printed and widely translated coUectiou of tales eutitled '*Colomba.'* The edition we have
used is that of Paris 1889, in which the narrative flUs pp. 31S-SS0. It Is the tale of a young
French lieutenant of the navy, who, after losing a good deal of money in gaming, yields,
in his despair, to the temptation of cheating, at trlotrao, his opponent, a lieutenant in the
Dutch service. Of the two it is said: " Bref, pendant pluaieurs Jours ils so donnftrent ron-
desvons, soit au cafd, soit a bord, essayanl toutes sortes do Jeuz, surtout le irlctrao, et aug-
mentant toujours leurs parin, si blen qu*lls en viurent a Jouor vtngt-cinq napoleons la par*
tie." The Frenchman is finally reduced to his last twenty-five napol6ons. The eoneiso
description of the eulminating point of the oonlest i« as follows: — *' Bient6t Roger fut rednii
k Jouer les dernlers vingt-oinq napolions. II s'appliquait horriblement ; aussi la partie fnt-
elle league et disputSc. 11 vint uu moment ou Roger, tenant lo comet, u*avait plus qu'une
ehance pour gagner: Je erols quMl Ini fallait six-quatre. La nuit etait avancde. Un oflleler
qui les avait longtcmps regardSs Jouer avail fini par s'codormlr sur an fauteuil. Le Hel-
landals 4tait fatigu6 et assonpl ; en outre, 11 avait bu bcauooop de punch. Roger eeul
6tait Men £veiI16, et en prole au plus violent desespoir. Ce fut en fremissant qu'il jeta
les din. II les Jeta si rudement sur le damier, que dc la cecousse uno bougie tomba sur le
pianchcr. Le Hollandais tourna la tete d'abord vers la bougie, qui vwnalt de eouvrir de
oire sou pantalon neuf, puis il regarda les d6s. — lis marqualent six et quatre. Roger, p&le
eommo la mort, re^ut les vlngt-clnq napol6ouo. lis coutlnuerent a jouer. La ehance devlnt
favorable a mon malheureox ami, qui pour taut faisalt dcoles sur 6eoles, el qui casait comme
sMl avait veulot perdre. Le lieutenant hollandais s*ent«ta, doubla, decoapla les enjeux: il
perdik toojours. Je crois le voir encore, c*6tait un grand blond, flegmatiquei dont la figure
semblait fitre de cire. II se leva enfiu, ayant perdu quaraute mille fraucs, qu'll paya sans
que sa physiononiio dteelat la moiudre Amotion. Roger lui dit: " Ce que nous avons fait co
soir no signifle rien, vous dormioz 4 inoiti^; Je ne veux pas do votre argent."— '* Voas plai*
sanlez," repondit le flegmatique Hollandais; ** J'ai tres-bion jou^ mais les d6s out 6t6 centre
moi. Je suls sur de pouvoir toujours vous gagner en vous rcndaut quatre trous. Bonsoir!"
et il le qnitta. Le leudemain nous spprimes que, d£sesp6i6 de sa porte, il s*4tait br&l6 la
eervellc dans sa chambre aprds avoir bu uu bol de punch." Siruok with horror at the sui-
olde of his opponent, Roger is maddened by remorse, tells his two most intimate friends that
bo had won by cheating, and prepares to pot an end to his owu life likewise. They per.
suade him to live, but soon afterwards, in a naval combat, his purposed foolhardiness results
in bis death.
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232 CHESS IN ICELAND
which we have given an account (sec pp. 122 and 174-5). Unsatisfactory as it
is, Professor Valmaggi's note is still useful for its references to authorities,
and makes an addition or two to our bibliographical note on Greek and
Latin games (pp. 121<2).
There is an English prose rendering, or rather paraphrase of "Ilgiorno,*'
published anonymously, but really the work of Lady Elisabeth Berkeley,
who became by her first marriage Lady Craven, and by her second Margra-
vine of Anspach (1750-1828), a figure of European note in her day. She was
a woman of considerable learning, and printed privately some poems of
Petrarch besides other compositions of her own, and was the patron and
fViend of Ugo Foscolo, whose English " Essays on Petrarch " she issued in
a handsome but very limited edition (sixteen copies) before it was given to
the general public. Her version of Parini's poem is entitled "A fashionable
day" (London 1780), and was dedicated to the translator's brother. It gives
but a faint idea of the beauty of its original. We cite the portion describing
the game (pp. 105-113) :** It only now remains to perform the sacred rites
of the god of gaming, who is always ready to cheat his votaries of their
money and their time. The god himself provides the combatants with arms,
and arranges them in different parties of foot and of horse. Propitious ever
to thy prayers, for thee he orders to be set apart a table, whose narrow
lists will admit but two warriors. Love smiles with triumph as he explains
to thee the most ingenious stratagem which was ever practised by any of
his subjects in all his wars with Hymen. Long had an unsuccessful soldier
of Love been the prey of a consuming fire lighted in his bosom by the hand
of a child of Beauty and of Hymen. The languishing looks of Tenderness
were the sole interpreters of his passion. With difficulty could they deceive
the vigilance of a husband, who never closed his eyes, and who, at the
smallest noise, erected the long cars of attention. Alas! not a slave could
the unhappy lover gain over to his interest, not the smallest billet could
his despair convey to her. Wherever he goes, this monster blasts his sight.
At last he files to the altar of that benevolent god, whose hand is armed
with a caduceus, whose head and feet are ornamented with wings. To his
holy statue he does the lowest homage. With streaming eyes and upheld
hands, *0h thou son of Maia,' he exclaims, 'thou deignest to listen to the
prayers of Love— thou who deceivedst Argus with his hundred eyes— teach
me to deceive, if not the eyes of this too watchful husband, at least his
ears!* The statue smiles on his request. He perceives the magic caduceus
three times touch his forehead. In an instant his inspired Fancy distinctly
represents to him the mystery of this new game so calculated to stun and
weary out the most attentive husbands. The happy lover darts away, as
if Mercury had lent him his wings. Already he is at the side of his
mistress. —Mindful of the oornmands of the Deity, he procures a board of
scented wood, whereof he raises the sides, and which he divides by a wall
into two equal plains. The colour of these plains is black. Like the bat-
talions of the red rose and the white rose, fifteen dames assembled on either
side, these of a splendid whiteness, those black as ebony, wait, in order to
begin their march, until two dice shall issue from a box of thunder. Happy
she, who has not, by advancing alone, exposed herself to the danger of
being cut off and taken prisoner! A companion is hero of service, in order
to assist in supporting the enemy's shock. The busy dice soon increase the
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STRA Y NOTES 233
number of the combatants. Already I behold the milk-white amazons form-
ing, two by two, the close-wedged phalanx, and boldly charging the adverse
army. The adverse army advances with a more confused march; while they
who expose themselves to imprudent dangers, experience ditferent checks
which Victory is careful to record. Sometimes an ill-aimed stroke recoils upon
her who too inconsiderately pursued her adversary.— Fortune favours the white
warriors, of whom the enemy of Hymen is generalissimo. It should seem that
their adversaries, commanded by the queen of Hymen, desired to be defeated.
The astonished husband attentively observes this new-invented just [joust].
It strikes him that it is not without its danger, between two warriors who
approach to too close quarters. Sometimes, his elbow rested on the field of
battle, he listens with the ear of attention — sometimes, he rolls the eyes of
jealousy over the plains of combat— each time the martial throats pf the
tubes thunder with double fury. Fear obliges him to retreat, Huspicion
again brings him back to his stand of observation. The combat rages, the
din of the battle brays. Victory hangs upon the next stroke. The conquer-
ing tube redoubles its thunder and thinks it can never make sufficient noise.
Its adversary, mad at the scorns of fortune, vomits out the dice with a
noise which disturbs the pleasures of Jupiter, and makes old Pluto tremble.
The jealous husband, at length subdued, is driven from the plain, stopping
his ears, and cursing such a noisy game.— Mercury, the day is thine. The
disciple whispers half a word to his mistress, who comprehends his mean-
ing. Such was this game in the days of barbarity, when false ideas of
honour continually disturbed suspicious husbands. But, since the Golden
Age is again returned upon earth, since husbands are become officious and
convenient friends, the lover and his mistress have only applied to this game
for an agreeable amusement. In order to prevent that noise, which is now
no longer useful, the peaceable tubes are form'd of silent leather, and the
dice dispose themselves without tumult upon the down-soft green. The
game has preserved nothing noisy but its name, which still continues
TriC'trac.''
Of the printed works which have succeeded to that of Bartinelli, the
first one foimiiiar to us— though there are doubtless some intervening ones—
is the anonymous: ^^Trattato teorico-pratico dei giuochi'' (Macerata 1832), a
small volume of 164 pages, with a single copperplate, representing the
backgammon-board and men. The game is here called giacchetto^ which is
doubtless the French jacquet Italianized. But the method of play, as
described, corresponds to the French revertier rather than to jacquet. The
section devoted to this form of trictrac occupies pp. 139-164, closing the
work. It opens with a brief introduction (pp. 139-143) giving the compiler's
summary of the game's history, which, despite the repetitions involved, we
liere transcribe, inserting the few foot-notes in the text in their proper
places: ''II giachetto k una sorta di giuoco di commercio piu prossima a
quelli di azzardo, che si effettua sopra un tavoliere, per cui ^ della specie
dei giuochi di tavola, e ha luogo fra due persone le quali si situano rap-
porto al detto tavoliere Tuna incontro airaltra in A ed in B [referring to
the copperplate at the end of the book]. Questo giuoco considerate come
trictrac {sbaragUno^ col qual nome si esprime il sue antico e piu bel mode
80
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234 CffESS IN ICELAND
di giuocarlo) ha secondo alcuni la sua etimologia nelle parole greche xplq
xpaxo^) tre volte difficile^ e secondo altri per onomatopea nella imitazione
dello strepito che produce quando si giuoca, e di questa opinione furono
Egidio Menagio (* Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue fran^aise/ art.
trictrac), de Faretiere ('Dictionnaire fran^ois*), de Pasquier, Parini (*I1
giorno '), Antonini (' Dictionnaire fran^ois, latin et italien/ art. onoma-
top^)y ed altri. Le ricerche che si sono fatte intorno airantichit^ di questo
giuoco non sono molto precise; ma almeno se ne pu6 concludere che la data
della sua origine si perde nel buio de' tempi. Ci6 viene anche confermato
dalla cbnsiderazione che i giuochi di azzardo in genere sono antichissimi,
mentre la loro invenzione b da Platone attribuita ad una divinitii egizia per
nome Theuth (Platone nel 'Fedro' torn. III., p. 274). [Alcuni suir autoritii di
lui r attribuiscono al famoso Ermete ossia Mercurio Trismegisto, filosofo
egizio, il quale floriva verso Tanno 1900 avanti Tera cristiana; noi peraltro
non abbiamo potuto veriflcare un tal passo, il quale sarebbe in contradizione
con quello da noi riportato (' Encyclopedic/ p, 102)], e dairaltra considera-
ziono che la maggior parte di tali giuochi si effettuava con i dadi, [L' origine
de*dadi k antichissima, ma essi da principio erano segnati in quattro superfi-
cie soltanto, essendo le altre due ritondate in cono, ^Dizionario de'costumi/
art. dadOy e Facciolati, * Calepinus/ art. tessera. Omero medesimo, *• Odis-
sea' lib. I., ne famenzione; e Sofocle nel ^Palamede;' Pausania, 'Descriptio
Qraeciae, ' lib. II., cap. XX., e lib. X., cap. XXXI.; Suida, 'Lexicon Graecum,'
art. naXaiirfifi^, e Isacio Porflrogeneta, richiamo le sue stesse parole: o Ila-
Xa(jLY]SY)g (ppovifJLo^, svKOLi^toxo^j TcoXo^ooXo^i {isYaXotJ/oxo^, (ott iipwxov TO xaoXt*
Cetv Tjtot xoP«v8tv eSeopfjtat {dob Palaniede provvido, hen erudito, di grati con-
siglio, magnanimo, cost per il primo trovo il tavoliere o sia il giuocare a dadi)
ne attribuiscono T invenzione a Palamede. Erodoto, 'Historiarum,' lib. I.,
cap. 94, la riferisce ai Lidii che egli fa autori di tutti 1 giuochi di azzardo;
e con esso concordano Virgilio Polidoro, *Derer. invent.,' lib. II., cap. XIII.;
il 'Breviario storico," pag. 34; ed Alessandro Sardo, 'De rer. invent/ lib. II.,
p. 734, ma quest' ultimo altrove, lib. I., p. 714, Tattribuisce a Palamede, se-
condo r opinione del primi che abbiamo nominate. Final mente Platone ne
fa inventore il sopradetto Theuth (loc. cit.)], dei quali si servono i Oreci e
1 Romani per indovinare, ovvero per Bemplice divertimento. [Gli uomini
stessi giuocavano qualche volta perflno cogli Dei : ed b curioso ci6 che Plu-
tarco riferisce nella vita di Romolo, che il custode del tempio di Ercole prese
i dadi e giuoc6 con lo Dio, a condizione^che se egli vinceva ne avrebbe otte-
nuto qualche segnalato favore, e se egli perdeva avrebbe donate al flglio
d'Alcmena una bella ragazza]. Ora il trictrac nella sua prima maniera di
giuocarsi apparteneva ai giuochi di azzardo, e siccome di quelli effettuati
CO' dadi b quasi 1' unlco che noi conosciamo, pu6 congetturarsi che esso
abbia avuto origine in quel remotissimi tempi. Anzi secondo il Barbeyirac
('Traits du jeu,' lib. III., chap. VIII. & VI.). Platone stesso sembra che parli
di esso quando ci dh, la descrizione di un giuoco degli antichi che ne ha tutte
le apparenze (*De Repub.,' lib. II., pag. 374, c, tom. II., ed. Steph.). Per
altro questo giuoco apparir^ sempre molto antico quando anche si vogliano
soltanto considerare le conoscenze piu sicjure che si abbiano intorno ad esso.
L'ab. Barthelemy, nel suo viaggio di Anacarsi, dice che era noto in Atene; ed
Agathia lo descrive nel suo epigramma sopra il re Zenone che trovasi nell'An-
tologia. Yi hanno tuttavia di colore che dubitano se Agathia abbia voluto
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STRAY NOTES 236
parlare del trictrac c credono che gli antichi lo abbi^no ignorato: ma qaesta
opinione viene contradetta dal testimonio dei romani i quali certamente lo
conoBcevano; e sapendosi che essi tenevkno quasi tutti i loro usi dai greci, b
pressoch^ indubitato che questo giuoco era cognitissimo id Orecia, dove fa
recato probabilmente dai Fenicii. Questi ultimi pcrtanto, come pensa Tau-
tore del 'Dictionnaire des jeux,' art. trictrac^ ne furono forse grinventori,
a meno che lo avcssero ricevato ancora da piu lungi, sia dair Egltto o dal-
rindia. Non dobbiamo peraltro omettere T opinione deH'Arabo, al-Safadi,
il quale ne fa inventore un re di Persia ('Encyclopedic amusem/ art. aritme-
tique e 'Dizionario della ricreazione,' torn. II., p. 94), e noteremo ancora in
conferma di questa opinione che i Persi mandarono il giuoco del trictrac
agli Indian! avendone ricevuto in contracambio quelle degli soacchi: il che
pu6 vedersi in Hyde (^ Mandragoras/ p. 42), in Menocchio ('Le stuore,'
torn. III., cap. 84), ed in Verci, 'Lettere sui scacchi,* p. 26. [I Prancesi e gli
Aiemanni si disputarono un tempo la gloria deir invenzione di questo giuoco,
'Academic des jeuz,' ediz. II., art. trictrac, ma ci6 al piu si pu6 intendere di
qualche sua ultima modiflcazione fra le tante che ha sublto. Infatti i Fran-
cesi hanno il trictrac^ revertier, toutes-tables, toumecase, dames rabattues,
ptein^ toe, gammon^ Jacquet^ garanguet ('Dictionnaire des Jeux*), gritaliani
lo sbaraglino^ il giacchetto a due ed a ire dadi^ ed in partioolare i Roma-
gnoli il minoretto; gli Spagnuoli il toccadigliOy ecc. ecc., Bartinelli nel suo
Sbaraglino], Ma Tantico giuoco del trictrac venne in seguito variato in piu
maniere, e quella sua modiflcazione che oggi ^ piu in uso ed ha preso il
nome di giacchetto^ deve annoverarsi fra i giuochi di commercio, come di
gi& abbiamo awertito. [II sig. Barbeyrac, loc. cit., pag. 121, dice che il
trictrac & giuoco di comraercio; sebbene noi lo vediamo sempre espressa-
mente proibito fra i giuochi di azzardo, come pu6 vedersi neirordinanza
del 1319 di Carlo IV., detto it Bello, ed in altre successive]. Non tralasceremo
qui di ricordarne la poetica origine descritta con molta eleganza dal Parini
(loc. cit.), il quale attribuisce la sua invenzione ad un accorto amaate, che
cerc6 con lo strepito di questo giuoco di deludere la gelosia di un marito.*^
The subsequent text of the section on giacchetto is in three chapters
(pp. 144<161) ending with a very short glossary or '' Dizionario che spiega i
termini usati nel giacchetto,'' (pp. 162-164). The table, we are told, is
divided into four parts, "che diremo tavole contenenti ciascuna sei case o
frezze/' The sixth paragraph informs us that ''I numeri dissimili^ come due
e assoy quattro e tre^ ecc, sono chiamati seynplici, Quelli che sono eguali
come due 3, due 4, ecc, sono chiamati doppietti. Nel leggere i numeri sem-
plici bisogna sempre nominare il piu gran numero per il prime; cosi sei e
quattro^ e non quattro e sei, dovrd, pubblicarsi il tiro nel quale un dado pre-
senta 4, e V altro 6.'' The list of terms given to the doublets differs slightly
from that we have already presented to the reader: *'Ogni doppietto ha la
sua denominazione particolare: i due assi si chiamano ambi gli assi o as-
sissimi; i due 2 duetta; i due 3 terni; i due 4 quatema; i due 5 cinquina;
e i due 6 seoni o sei ttuti."' The writer cites from Bartinelli the Brescian
phrase, aver la ?>iano, ''che signiflca essere il prime a giuocare.'* Restates
that double five is the best cast for the first one; ''ed il peggiore, esduso
due e asso, h quelle degli assissimi [double aces] per cui si dice : assissimi
in primis sunt signum perditionis,'* an adage which we have not found
elsewhere. Two others are given afterwards: "pedtna toccata deve esser
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236 . CHESS IN ICELAND
giiwcata"' and ^^pedina lasciata e pedina giuocata."" A series of doubled
points and therefore impassible is called legatura^ the verb legare being
used in the same sense. As to the rules, we glean the following principal
points. Your adversary's men are placed at the beginning of the game on
the first point at your left, that is to say, on the first point of the first
table, while your own are placed on the first point at your adversary's left.
In moving the men, the starting point is not counted, but the finishing
point is. In playing, the points or pips of the two dice are to be considered
separately, never unitedly. Men can only be placed on points wholly un-
occupied by adverse men. No men can be moved from the point on which
all {monte) are placed at the beginning until the first man moved has reached
the fourth table. No more than two points can be occupied in that table
in which one's monte stands; this, however, may be any two, or may be
varied from time to time. Doublets are played doubly, that is four times
the number represented by each die. When the men have all arrived at
the fourth table they may be either moved or thrown off indifferently. The
second chapter is devoted to explanations of the method of play under va-
rious circumstances, a note at the end expounding the doctrine of proba-
bility as applied to casts of the dice. The laws of the game, 28 in number,
are the subject of the third chapter, in the course of which we find that a
die is not counted when it leans against the side of the table or against a
man, in which case it is said to be in aria; and that the player uses for the
French "^'odowfte" either the word accancio or accommodo* Finally, from
the glossary wo learn that bossolo (** dice-box'") was formerly called, as the
compiler thinks with greater precision, cannello; that a marcia is a game
like a <' gammon" in English, in which a player throws off all his men
before his opponent has thrown off a single one, and that it counts as two
games; that marcia is styled a marcia per puntU when it is not gained by
means of a legatura (that is by barring the path of the adversary through
a series of impassable points); that the mucchio is the point occupied at the
outset by the men of either player (or perhaps the French point de repose) ;
and that each of the four parts, into which the board is divided, now called
a tavola^ was in remote times known as a campo^ while the word tavole
was applied to the men, now known as pedine (*' pawns'').
The game of backgammon, now most commonly known as tavola reale^
is still greatly played in Italy, as is shown by the fact that the folding board,
usually of wood, inlaid, rather than of leather, is to be procured even in the
smaller towns. They are generally not oblong as in England and America,
but nearly always square when folded, having on the outside a smaller
chess-board and merelles board. To give a fair idea of the usual method
of play wo copy the section devoted to the diversion in a recent anonymous
handbook of games, which shows comparatively few signs of having been
compiled under foreign influence. It is styled 'Ml libro dei giuochi*' (Flo-
rence 1894), and the description of tavola reals is to be found on pp. 360-363 ;
*'Ecco un altro Ara i giuochi nobili adottatissimo in quasi tutte le famiglie
di una certa condizione, e per il quale molti signori spingono il gusto fino
alia passione. II suo materiale consiste in quella cassetta quadra sul piano
esterno della quale si vede quasi sempre la scacchiera per gli scacchi o la
dama. Si coUoca aperta flra i due ginocatori, i quali avranno cosl due scatole
unite, segnate in ciascun fondo di sei Areccie da un lato e sei dair altro, per
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STRAY NOTES
237
lo piu alternate, una bianca e una nera. Vi sono inoltre quindici pedine
bianche e quindici nere, un paio di dadi, e un bussolo per ciascun giuoca-
tore, con che agitarli e gettarli. Prima di cominciare il giuoco si dispongano
le pedine pKcisamente secondo la flgura 19. U giuocatore delle bianche mo-
Oiuooatore delle p«cU&« a«re.
Oiadc»tor» d«ll« pedine biaaohe.
Fig. 19.
verji le sue pedine da destra a sinistra nel lato opposto, da sinistra a destra
nel lato proprio, cio6 percorrer^ in giro dalle sue due pedine bianche op-
poete yerso le due nere che ha suUa sua destra nella propria parte. II giuo-
catore delle (nere, al contrario, percorrer& il giro dallo due nere che ha in
faccia a sinistra verso le due bianche che ha nella propria parte a sinistra.
La parte A verso cui concorrono tutte le pedine, tanto bianche che nere,
dicesi cMa. Scopo del giuocatore 6 di ridurre in essa tutte le proprie pedine,
e quindi di toglierle, come vedremo. Chi primo le toglie vinco la partita. Si
decide con i dadi ohi deve giuocare per il primo, avendo questi un piccolo
vantaggio suir altro. I dadi devono esser gettati o neir una o neiraltra parte
della scatola. Balzando fuori uno di essi, si dovr& gettarli di nuovo. II primo
dunque getta i suoi dadi, e fk avanzare verso la direzione gift indicata due
delle sue pedine, oiascuna per tante Areccie qnante ne indica eiascun dado ;
ovvero Ai avanzare una sola pedina per tanti punti quanta 6 la somma del
punti fatti dai due dadi. Indi V altro giuocatore prende i dadi e giuoca alia
sua volta : cosl tiro per tiro le pedine di oiascuno avanzano verso la casa.
Quando vi sieno tutte raccolte, non prima, allora si cominciano a togliere
di tavola corrispondentemente ai punti che si fitranno. La pedina che nel suo
corso va a posarsl dove ne 6 una sola deir avversario, la toglie di giuoco
prendendo 11 suo posto. Gi6 si chiama dare air altro. Ma non sempre con-
viene di dare, ed b anzl talora buon giuoco di astenersene. L' altra dovr&,
tirando i dadi, rientrare in giuoco, cio& ricominciare il giro dalla casa. B se
i punti tratti corrispondessero a freccie occupate da pii^ di una pedina av-
versaria, non pu6 rientrare, e ritenter^ nuovamente air altro suo tumo, senza
poter movere le altre sue pedine flnch^ ue abbia Aiori df giuoco. Oettati i
dadi e toccata una pedina la si dovr& movere se ^ possibile. Per6, altoreh^
gettando i dadi sortono ciascuno di essi con punti eguali, ci6 si ^ un dep-
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CHESS IN ICELAND
pietto, si considera il tiro come doppio, e allora si muovono quatti;o pedine,
due per il doppio dei punti fatti, o una per il quadruple. I doppietti hanno
nomi special i, cio^ : bambini, duetti^ temi, qwxdreUi, china^ sena. Dopo il fin
qui detto, si capisce bene che non b unico scopo del giuocatore di correre
impazzatamente alia meta, ma vi saranno molti calcoli da fare, e molta cau-
tela da adoperare. Cosi, ognnno cercher^ di restore il meno possibile con
una pedina sola sul corso deir avversario {restare a tavola) e procurer^ di
accomodare la mossa dei due pezzi in modo che vadano a riunirsi o addos-
sarsi ad altri. Procurer^ altresl di ooprire piu che possa, sempre con piu di
un pezzo s* intende, quante piu pud freccie della casa dalla propria parte,
p per trovarsi pronto e bene sterzato coUe pedine per 11 memento in cui co-
mincier^ a levarle : 2^ perch^, dandosi il caso che all* avversario si avesse
tolta una pedina, gli 8ar& tanto piu difficile di rientrare nella casa nostra
quante piu frecce vi trover^ impedite, fino da non tirare affatto quando lo
sieno tutte. In questo caso chi ha i dadi tira di seguito e muove flno a che
non rcsti libera una freccia nella sua casa. Cosl, per eserapio, supponiamo
che il giuocatore delle bianche tiri per il prime sei, asso. Egli con una pe-
dina (iella froocia M [fig. 20] far& il sei, con quella della fVeccia R f^r&
CHaocatore d«ll6 pedin« nere.
I H 8 FED
N P0R8TUVXYZ
Oiuooatore delle pedine biancbe.
Fig. 30,
r asso ; e metter^ cosl due pedine suUa freccia S. Supponiamo che il giuo-
catore dei neri tiri quattro, due. Egli fardi ii quattro con una pedina della
freccia H, e il due con una della freccia F, ponendole entrambe suUa frec-
cia D, e cosl, come taluni dicono, avr& fatto una casa. Facendo il giuoca-
tore dei biancbi, per esempio sena egli pud muovere il grnppo della freccia A,
e portarlo snlla freccia O., e poi, perchd con cotesto gruppo non potrebbe
fare un altro sei, essendo la freccia N occupata dai neri, ei pad staccare
un* altro gruppo d^ due della freccia M alia S. Ecco chiaro il vantaggio dei
doppietti : muoverne, due per volta. Ridotte tutte le pedine in casa, le si tol-
goDo a seconda dei punti. Cosl relativamente al bianco, facendo china, ed
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STRAY NOTBS «39
avendo iutte le pedine in casa, ei ne potrebbe togliere quattro dalla freccia U.
Facendo quattro e due, ne toglie una dalla V e una dalla Y. Se la Y fosse
vuota, avanza di due punti una pedina del T, o del U. Se non vi sono pe-
dine suUe frecde superior!, cio^ punti da fttre, si tolgono addirittura di
giuoco le pedine dalle freccie inferiori al punto fatto. Alcuni muovono piii
tardi che sia possibile le prime due pedine della parte opposta della casa,
per aver con esse la probability d' incontrare qualche pedina a tavola e to-
glierla di giuooo. Talora si h veduto V uno dei giuocatori aver la pedina
fuori e V altro mezze le pedine tolte, gi& presso a vincere ; ma costretto que-
st! a restare, nel togliere le sue pedine, a tavola, e V altro fatto il punto di
quella freccia, levargli alia sua volta quella pedina, e vincer la partita per
aver la sua casa ben barricata.'* The variety here described is the ordinary
English backgammon (the French '^toutes- tables''). We must always re-
member that it may be a modern importation into Italy.
A still later compilation by J. Gelli, **Come posso divertirmi'' (Milan 1901),
before cited (p. 102), devotes a few pages (207-17) to the game, which it calls
sometimes tavola reale and sometimes tric-trac. These pages are evidently
a compilation from the French. Two variations are described — fricrroo and
the giuoco del giacchetlo. Three or four others are simply mentioned— al-
ways by their French names {garanguei, dames rahattues^ toute'table or
gammon). The technical terms are sometimes Italian and sometimes more
or less distorted French forms. The Italian designations of the doublets arc
stated to be : aces, ambassi, ambo gli assi, asso doppio : deuces, ambo ; treyR,
tema; fours, quaiema; fives, china; sixes, 5Ctw— showing some slight
differences when compared with the list previously cited. TrictraciB spoken
of in one place as tavola reale alia francese. The terms Jan, contro-Jan^ and
angolo di quiete o di riposo are employed; a **blot'' is a pedina scoperta;
a point, that is one of the twelve on each side of the table, is a freccia. Tlie
French ** abattre de bois '' is rendered as far legna^ and is eiplained as *'a
cast of the die which enables the player to advance two men instead of one."
When the player is not able to play the points displayed by the dice the
position is said to be chiuso. In giacchetlo the man thrown forward at the
commencement of the game to the fourth table is styled corriere. The
compiler states that the number of men in trictrac is thirty, rarely thirty-
two, while in giacchetlo^ it is always thirty. How much the two French
varieties which are here treated are actually played in Italy it is not easy
to say.
As to Germany, we have already learned (pp. 90-91) that the nard game,
in the stage when it was known as vmrfzabel, was established in tiiat
country as early as the Xlllth century. It would not be easy to demonstrate
absolutely, by documentary or linguistic evidence, that any vernacular terms
relating to dice, or simple dice-play, were in use before the table-game
proper could have became known north of the Alps. In fact, so far as any
extant German literary records go, we might surmise that dice and tables,
that is some form of backgammon (Roman or other) must have crossed tlic
mountains at about the same time. But, on the other hand, it would,
nevertheless, be too much to infer that the German people first knew the
die only as an implement appertaining to the table-game, considering that
dice, as a means of diversion, must have been known as (At back as the
days when soldiers of Rome garrisoned so many portions of Germany— long
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240 CHBSS IN lOBLAND
before the downfall of their great empire. It is most probable, indeed, that
tlie Qermanic peoples learned the use of dice from the Roman soldiery, in
spite of the fact that Taoitus conveys the idea that the habit of dice-play
was a peculiarly German evil. Nevertheless (we are always in a period of
doubt), it is not impossible that dice may have reached the more or less
nomadic tribes of northern and eastern Europe from Asia— to which quarter
of the world a cloudy legend assigns their origin. The so-called ^^ Qrando
encyclopedic *' of France has thus summed up the commonly conceived no-
tion of the ancient Oerman and general mediaeval devotion to games at dice:
'* Lc jeu de d^s, selon Tacite, etait une veritable passion chez les Germatns:
lorsquMls avaient tout perdu ils jouaient sur un dernier coup leur liberte.
Plus tard au moyen Age, ce fut un des jeux favoris des chevaliers. On troo-
vait des academies de jeu de dds (schol<ie deciorum). II y avait memo une
corporation sp^iale d'industriels qui ftibriquaient les des & jouer, les deciers.
Malgr^ les interdictions et les ordonnances (en particulier, celles de 1254 et
de 1256 par lesquelles saint Louis ddfendait le Jeu et la fabrication des dds)
le jeu resta chcr pendant tout le moyen slge aux hommes et aux femmes;
plus tard les lansquenets se signalerent sp^ialement par leur passion pour
les des.'' As to the testimony of Roman writers in regard to the prevalence
of dice-play among the German tribes wo shall come to that farther on.
We shall now first endeavour to learn what we can about the appella-
tions connected with dice, in the early centuries of the modern period, since
most of those appellations may be considered as a part of the terminology
of backgammon. The generic German word for " die," is wurfa (plural
as singular); according to the lexicographers it is a derivative of wurf, a
noun signifying a ** throw" or '*cast." This latter is formed from the
plural preterite stem of the verb werfen (singular, ich warf, plural, wir
lowYen), and is really genuine old High German (influenced, as stated below,
by the Low German form). Unlike the languages we have been treating so
far, and unlike the English, the German, therefore, possesses an indigenous
term for this important implement of the backgammon game. The congener
of werfen in English is the verb '* loarp," which had the same signification
(to ''throw" or ''cast") in its Anglo-Saxon and Middle English forms, a
meaning now lost. The second or terminal element of vourfel is the derivative
syllable -el (-0, which, even in very old times, served two purposes, first and
foremost to form substantives and ad^jectives from verbal and other stems;
secondly and subsidiarily to form diminutives. In this way wUrfel would
literally moan a " throwing," *' throw," '* little throw," or " little thing
thrown." In old High German — during the Xlth and Xllth centuries— it took
the sliape, under Low German influence, of wor/U, worfel. From wUrfel
comes, by means of the verbal suffix -en (-n), the verb vyUrfein^ to " cast" or
" throw dice," to " play dice," to " dice." A dice-player is styled a wdrfier,
and dice-playing ("gambling"), or the "game of dice," is known as icAr-
felspiel—^ minstrel of the Xlllth century, as we shall see hereafter, exclaim-
ing: der iiiuvel schuof das wUrfel spil^ " the devil created the game of dice."
Remembering all this, we shall understand the old German name given to
nard-backgammon, wurfiabel (that is ** throw-tables "), to which we may
have occasion to refer again. We dwell somewhat fully on these etymolo-
gies, because it is by means of these philological evidences that we may be
able, if at all, to decide on the simultaneous or non-simultaneous introduc-
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S7RAYN01ES 241
)D into Iceland of pQre games of dice, and of table-games, in which dice
9 sabordinately employed. As to dice-play, there is a singular bit of
/ere prose comment on the subject in Haus8d()rffer's ^^ Compendittses
xikon Apophtegmaticum '* (Niirnberg 1718): "Der die wiirfol erftindon,
t sechs galgen verdient: den ersten fur sich, den andern fiir seine spiel-
sellen, den dritten fur den zuseher, den vierten fiir den, so den spielf^latz
It, den fanften fur den, so das spiclen erstlich lehret, und den sechston fiir
hcrrsehaft, welche das spielen nicht verbietet.'*
The numbers given to the dice-pips play a noticeable part in later
tin mathematical history. As we are taught by the most famous of the
ssical architectural writers, Vitruvius, the mathematicians of Rome
led 6 the "perfect" number (because of 1 -i- 2 -♦- 3 = 6), and accordingly
noed a peculiar terminology applicable to the elements contained in it.
} six lowest members of the numeral series were given these names: unto,
':o, tet'nio, quatemio, gmnio, senio (all feminine substantives, forming the
itive in -onw). However these forms may have originated, they seem
>nce, or within a short period, to have been applied to the dice-pips, the
ly-sided Isidore of Seville (who, born about 570, died in 636), apparently
wing them only in that connection; for he says, in his chief work
rigines,'* 12,65): " Jactus, quisque apud lusores veteres a numero voca-
ir ut wnio, binio, ternio^ quatemio, quinio, senio/* Notice his expression,
res veieres ("ancient players ''), as if he believed the terms to be classic,
reas they are really post-classic. These numbers, or many of them,
ied over into modem forms, and were, in their new shapes, or in the
inal Latin, of frequei\t use, as the reader will have, perhaps, already
irved, in the mediaeval " tables " manuscripts.
The numbered pips, or dice-spots, known by names derived from the
ince tongues are, in the older German, as, daus {tus, dausz^ iaus, tausz),
jce;'' quater {quatter, hatter), "quatre," "cater;*' zink {zingg), '>ci»7;"
(a middle High Oerman form), " sice.** One of the newest German pub-
ions on games (A. von Hahn*s " Buch des Spiele,** Leipzig 1900,
edition, p. 262), in describing the backgammon variety toccategli, says
e names of the dice: " Die eins heisst, as oder ^.v; die zwei, dons ; die
zuweilen dres; die vier quatuor oder quater; die fiinf cinque oder sink;
ochs sis Oder sess**— hut dous is not often so written, and dres is
own to most lexicologists. Older works on the same table-game (as,
istance, the anonymous " Neueste Anleitung wie die trictrac- und toc-
lie-spiel recht und wohl zu spielen,** Niirnberg 1773, (p. 5), and various
►ns in the same century of the Oerman Hoyle, (" Das neue konigliche
ibre,*') vary in their orthography, writing ass oder ess, ires, sis, while
add the technical titles of the d6ublets: aces, ambesas or beset; deuces,
? deux ; threes, femes or iournes; fours, carnes, carmes; fives, qui7ies;
sonnes, sanne or san7iez—8A\ of Romance prev&nance. Ass is, of course,
same origin as the French "as" and our "ace;" an earlier orthography
le High German and late old High German) was esse. The newer form .
btless influenced by, if not directly derived from the French. There
absolutely certainty as to the remote origin of this term, common to
ny languages and used in all of them in so many popular sayings.
it makes the French as to come from the Latin as, which came to
r the unit of measure, and was thence applied to the playing card, or
31
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242 CHESS IN ICELAND
to that Bide of & dice-cnbe inrhich is marked with a single point. The Latin
dictionaries nsually suggest, as the source of the Latin as^ a Tarentian dialect
form, i^f of the Greek el^ ('*one''), but doubt is thrown on this by the
"Century Dictionary" {sub "ace"). Daus follows our "deuce" in having
a double etymology. As a dice term it is to be referred to duos (accusative
of the Latin duo); when it is an adjuration (as in the English "Deuce take
you!" or the German Was der daus/) it is doubtless, a corruption of the
Latin deus ("deity"). This debased signification (=" devil") belongs to a
common class of phenomena occurring in the process of etymological de-
velopment. The vernacular drei is, in modern usage, much more usual
than ires or dres. The varying forms of quater come, of course, through
the French numeral form, ft'om the Latin quadrio or quatuor. Cinque and
jing' represent the French "cinq." Whether sis or sess is of direct modern
Romance derivation (like our " sice ") is not yet, we believe, fully decided.
Of the doublet names carries (contracted f^om quatemo), quines and sonnes
are from the series enumerated by Isidor, very likely through the French.
These appellations of the dice-points— au^en = " eyes" as they are styled
in the vernacular— were used figuratively very early in German literature,
both by the poets and in proverbs. Instances of the latter are very nume-
rous, but are generally, if not always, suggested by the dice, or drawn from
pure dice playing, having no apparent reference to any table-game. One of
the most wide-spread is the rhyming adage which has been popularly ascribed
to Luther (and which is said to be really found in a still existing MS auto-
graphic collection of proverbial sayings compiled by the noted reformer):
Dans ea niehts hat ;
Sm sink niehts dat [" girea "] ,
Aber qnater drey
Dia aind ateta dabey [" alwaya on hand] ,
or as Luther makes' the final lines: quater dreyhalten was {uns) frey, other
versions having as the closing words, hilfen fret. It is sometimes found in
a slightly varied form : Daus es hat nichts^ | sess zink gibt nichts, \ quater
drei muss herhaUen, Here, of course, the smallest numbers are employed to
represent the lowest and poorest classes, the intermediate numbers indicate
the sober, more trustworthy, commercial middle ranks, and the two highest
stand for the nobility and less energetic wealthy orders. The theme is fre-
quently varied and has gone into many languages, whether from the German
or Latin we hesitate to say, the oldest Latin form being: ZMio pauperior
Codro est^ ut binas egenus : senio nil conferi : quinio nil tribuit. As is seen,
temio and quatemio are omitted, so that the point of the saying is missed. *
Codrus was the name of two insignificant Latin poetasters, one of whom
was made fi&mous by the accounts of his extreme poverty. In an old volume,
which contains some translations from Ovid, there is an English metrical
rendering of the proverb Just cited:
Deaoe ace eannot
Pay soot and lot;
Sioe aink will not pay ;
Be it known to all —
What paymenU fall
Moat light on ooter tray,
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STRAY NOTES 243
— " coter " being quater. Similar is the couplet from the story of '* Reynard
the Fox " as given to ns by P. S. Ellis and T. F. Crane (London 1897)—
That which it likened to deaoe aoe
Hath in esteem the lowest place.
An old popular German bard, yclept Rosenplut (Rosenblut), who made the
llowers of poesy bloom at Nuremberg between 1431 and 1460, says in IiIh
" Nil ruber ger rais:"
Taos es wart das ir nioht Terlast
TJnd weichet nieht von kotter drei ;
Die werden enoh das spiel gewinnen.
Ses sink die wonen each nioht pei.
Here tatis es refers to the common people, kotter drei to the middle classes,
and ses sink to the nobility. But the boldest allegory based upon the dice-
points is one cited from a middle High Gorman piece by the Rhenish poet
Reimar von Zweter (died after 1252), which ascribes the origin of their num-
bers to his Satanic majesty:
Der tiorel sohoof das wfirfelspiel
Dar ambe das er sfilen ril dA mite gewinnen will.
Das esse er hAt gemaht dar tt dos 6in got gewaltlo iat.
Der himel in slnen handen stAt
Und dio erde, dar ftf er das ttis gemaohet hat :
Die drlen M die drle namen die er hAt, der sfiese yoare Krist :
Das qnAter wohrte er mlt groaen listen
TJf die namen der Tier drangelisten :
Den sinken id des mensohen sinne
Wie er die fttnfte maohe krano :
Das ses. wie er seefas woohen lano
Die wasten nns mit toppel ane gewinne. *^
Sometimes the allegorical meaning attached to the points takes another
shape, as in the lines from '^Eraklius,*' also a poem of the Xlllth century,
ascribed to one Meister Otto, whose birthplace, residence and family name
are all unknown, and who, as it seems, elaborated it from an early French
poetical piece, called "L'empereur Eracles" by Gautier d'Arras, a writer
who lived and wrote nearly a hundred years before Meister Otto. This is
his allusion to some of the dice-numbers:
Umbe die frowen stAt es sA
Sehte als nmbe ein toppelspil,
Ob' mans se rechte merken wil,
Br ist wAr and niht gelogen.
Es yelt eim rlohen hersogen
Als lihte ein esse oder ein tfts
Ala dem boBsten [meanest] yon dem hfts,
which seems intended to indicate that the same destiny awaits both high
and low.
Still earlier in the same century lived the rhymer known only as the
^'Strieker*'— by profession as has hence been supposed, a rope-maker —
whose home seems to have been in South-eastern Germany and in Austria.
He died about the year 1250. After having produced an epic on Charlemagne,
*"* A modem German rertlon of thig pieee is given on a rabseqaent page.
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244 CHESS IN ICELAND
he composed a variety of poetical works. Id one of the beat known of which,
the "Pfaffe Amis/' ho cites proverbially the two lowest dice-points:
Dar ambe tiil wlr prison
Den pfkffen Amiaen,
Twle verre er foor in das lant
Das man dooh sallen slten Tant
Yll gWte«n rAt in sine htm
DA yiel das eaae nooh daa tfta
Nioht an der handelonge.
A yet more renowned rhymer of the same period, meister Freidank, whose
individuality, after long research, is still a subject of debate, classes together,
as alike treacherous sports, dice, racing and falconry {federspiel) :
DeM pfand gar oft Im spiel rerfilllt,
Der seine ehr' aof wnrfel stellt.
WnrfiBl, roes and federspiel
Haben tron die tangt nicbt viel.
Among others of a later date, Hans Sachs introduces the terminology of the
game into one of his quasi-religious dramatic pieces, when he makes the
soldiers of Pontius Pilate cast dice for the garment of Christ:
RomanuM, — Das loss werfen wlr nber dem
Gestriokten rook, weloher in nehm.
Er wUrft mit zehn icHrfeln ein tourf und spricht :
loh hab drei ess, ich bin darvon,
Br wird an mioh mit langen tog.
Ver and&r KneehL — Ich hab drei daoss, gwin anch nit viel
Mit dir ich darnaoh gleiohen wU.
J}tr driU Knecht. — Nn seoht an, ich hab qaater drei :
Ich hoff iob sei anch nooh darbei.
n^r vUrt Knscht. — Gliiok waits, der wnrfel trfigt sees dans :
Der rook let mein, das spiel ist anas.
Another writer of theatrical pieces, cited by Vigil Raber in one of his
collection of twenty-six "Sterzinger Spiele" (1510-1535)— the twenty-fifth
play— makes one of his characters say to another: Du richtst dein sach nur
nach ses2, singg, qtwtter ; while in an old ballad to bo found in Uhland's
" Volkslieder" there is a similar passage:
Drei wiirfel sncket ioh herfilr
Und warf sink, qaater, drei.
0. Schade, in his "Satiren und pasquille aus der reformationszeit'* (Han-
nover, 1853-8), cites various old poetical allusions to dice, as Derpaur sprach
'quater, sinke\ (20-17); and in the well known **tragedia, der irdisch Pilger
genandt" (Niirnberg 1562) of Johann Heros, one of the persons says:
Gefiaien 1st mir qaattor ses,
Daraaf mir qnatter daas aaoh fellt.
Much earlier is the "Renner," a didactic poem by Hugo von Trimberg, who
lived at Bamberg through the first decade of the XlVth century, in which
we find what seems to be a rhymed proverb,
Yon sinken qaAter onde tfts
HAt manger eIn onberAtea hfts.
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STRAY NOTES 245
Many more such verselets and quaint sayings might be quoted. Thus there
is an exclamation made by a player who has been losing, on throwing a
small and useless combination of the dice: Dauszes, hastu mein pferd nicht
ffeseTienf^reteTTing to the wagered and lost horse. A somewhat quaint defi-
nition of this rather obscure phrase is given by a Qerman writer. He informs
us that it is vom spiel entlehnt und ausruf de^'enigen, der einen scIUechteti
wurf thutj der^ toenn ein pferd auf dern spiel steht^ sagen voill^ ** daynit voerde
ich mein pferd nicht getoinnen."* Der spieler redet gteicftsatn das daus-ess
an^ indetn er sagt: *^ H/ittest du mein pferd gesehen^ voUsstest du, loie gut es
i.?(, du worst nicht gekommen, denn du bist schuld, doss ich*s verliere.''
Quater auff einem wUrfel is a definition citod from a glossary of 1482. In a
collection of songs (1582) we have: Sie warf ein sinken unde ein ius (i. e.,
in all sidben), A thing is said to be so ungewis als wann einer mit dausz
ess ein spil gewinnen will. In an old piece, entitled '^Bruder Rausch/' the
following couplet occurs:
Er syraeh *'ioh [der tenfel] fkr in den wiirfel,
Yon dem quater mnoh ioh ein taaes."
An early Qerman adage is ses oder es^ equivalent to **aut Caesar aut nihil.**
All these shreds of literature apply more especially to dice-play, but wo
have reproduced them, as we have hinted, because the names of the dice-
points form liliewise an essential part of the vocabulary of nard-backgam-
mon. An interesting technical term used wherever dice are employed, and of
a peculiar importance in German backgammon, is pasch, which, though
singular, is really equivalent to the English "doublets** {pasch toerfen = io
"throw doublets"). More than one explanation of the word's origin has
been attempted, but the etymology of Orimm is . probably accurate, or, at
least, is the generally accepted one. He makes it signify both* "doublets**
and "triplets,** and derives it from the French pa^5&-dur (signifying: "goes
over ten,** " passes ten," "exceeds ten**), and seems strictly to have the
meaning of " at least eleven,** the definition in Grimm being ein spiel mit
drei idtrfeln loobei der wurf von mehr als iO {also mindestens ii) augen bei
gleicher augenzahl auf zwei wUrfeln gey^innt, woher ouch der mere Aachener
mundart das verhum ^' paschendise *" (loilrfeln, paschen) entnahm. Another
lexicographer, Daniel Sanders (1863), asserts that the word pasch is a name
sometimes given to mUhlspiel (merelles), which is, of course, one of the
customary lexicographical blunders, and then he goes on to give a secondary
(dice) signification thus : Beim spiel mit drei wUrfeln ein wurf^ bei dem zwei
wUrfeln gleich viel augen xeigen {doppelwurf) — making, if strictly interpreted,
thre^ dice essential, but he goes on to say that jungfem-pasch is a term
applied, wenn auch der dritte [wUrfel] dieselbe zahl augen hat^ but (sub voco
alle)^ he describes aUe pasch as ein wurf^ im brettspiel^ vaobei auf alien
wUrfeln dieselbe zahl dben Uegt, A minor lexicologist, deluded perhaps by
the phrase "numeri pares,** as applied to the upturned points of two dice,
suggests the word par as the origin of pasch. In connection with pasch a
word elfem is alluded to in some of the lexicons, but is sought in vain in
most of their vocabularies. Pasch is still used, in the various backgammon
games practised in Germany, in the sense of "doublets;** while, in the
variety known as der lange puff^ the higher first throw, to decide the begin-
ning player, i^ l^npwn, as general-pasch. The term is likewise employed in
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246 CITESS IN ICELAND
pure dice-games, yrhen on two dice the number of the pips is the same,
which are then counted together ; if the pips on three dice, thrown together,
are alike, they are counted four fold. Only occasionally does the word make
its appearance in general German literature. Hofltnanswaldau, a poet of
the XVIth century, exclaims somewhere in one of his -pieces: Hier ist der
wUrfelpasch ! ('*Gedichte,*' Leipzig 1645, 4. 5). Pasch seems to be used some-
times in the sense of to " throw dice," or "playing dice." Thus the learned
and ingenious essayist, Heinrich Friedrich Sturz (1737-79), says: Manhatte
mir vor karten gewamt und so wandte ich ein dasz ich kein spiel cUs hochst-
ens pasch verstUnde. Often, by general writers, the word is employed in a
mistaken sense, as when a seventeenth century writer declares of one of
his characters: er auch sogleich einen paschwUrfel nehst einer spielharte
hrachte, as if the signification were "a die,'* or a "set of dice." Abele von
Liljenberg (about 1760), one of the famous " Pruchtbringende Oesellschaft,"
appears to propose, satirically doubtless, to decide lawsuits by throws of
the dice, Alle rechts- Oder gerichts-verfahrungen mii drei paschfJoUrfel endigen
Oder erortem. As is so often the case with technical terms, the word got
to be applied to other objects than those which it originally characterised,
so that in the Bavarian dialect the children's game klicker (or schusserspiet)
was also named po^cTien — perhaps from the close or doubled positions of the
marbles. Sometimes the form basch — perhaps older — was used. Thus the
Gotha poet, Friedrich Wilhelm Gotter (1746-97), writes in a poem called
" Herr von Malaga und der tod " (1787) :
Mein held, ob ihm ror angst gleich jede nerve bebte,
Die sllhne klappten und die rang* an gaomen klebte,
Zwang (wie beym boaohe Mnst, wann ehr* and aeligkeit
Anf eines wiirfels fliohe sohwebte),
Sein mnakelapiel an falsoher heiterkeit,
Indeea er Spaniel in laDgen sngen schliirfto.
From the noun a verb paschen was formed, meaning originally to " throw
doublets," but afterwards to "cast dice," "play at dice" as well. The author
of the popular "Simplicimus" (Hans von Grimmelshausen) cries, Wollen
wir JeUunder paschen {1669), and a somewhat later writer says: toenn der
alter herr lust hat zu paschen oder.,., pihet »u spielen."" From pascTien, again,
comes the compound auspaschen, cited by Sanders (1871) with this illustra-
tion : zur vergUtufig seiner auslagen durfte er eine ente herauspaschen [that is
auswHrfeUiy u>Urflend ausspielen] lassen,'' thus meaning to "stake at dice, "
"raffle away." Another such verb, abpaschen^ defined as to ** throw away at
dice," is also found, with a citation from a minor writer: euch abzupasc?ien,
armer schficher, ist mir nur spass. Among other instances of greater or less
ignorance among lexicographers may be mentioned a definition by Radlein
(1711): ein pasch toflr/'e?="un jeu de dez; " one by Schmid (1831): basch=:
"jactus decretorius" (entscheidender wurf); one by another less known
compiler is less erroneous, paschwUrfel^toUrfel zum paschen.
That the German should have, and should have introduced into otjier
languages spoken in the region round about his fatherland, such a peculiar
word as pasch to express doublets at dice, may strike the reader as strange.
It may be partly owing to the fact that the counterpart of our word "double "
(or "doublet"), coming to us from the Latin through the French, got another
and established meaning in connection with dice at an early day. Doppeln
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STRAY NOTES 247
litarally to "double/' signified to *'plAy at dice," to "dice." Grimm has
some interesting remarks on the word. He says that the meaning to " play
at dice," which was its earliest signification, became especially common in
North Germany. Later it was applied to other dangerous or injurious games
of chance, to which were attached the reputation of treacherous, swindling or
contemptible methods of play, which bad signification was also applied to
the noun doppeler (gambler). In the Holstein dialect, diMlen even tneans, in
general, to " play at cards." The word is a derivative from the Latin duplus,
and implies the doubling of the stake at game«. Some other lexicographers
cited by Grimm agree with him in this explication, regarding it as "a staking
double," an increasing or outbidding the stake of the adversary at dice or
cards, either by agreeing to pay double, if a loser, or by adding an additional
sum to that already at stake. Other writers refer its origin to that which is
now called pasch, the cast of equal dice-points (that is, double point8),-the
French and English " doublet," In old High German the term is not found,
but it existed already in old Frisian {dobbela, doblia). In middle High German
it was toppeln; in Low German (niederdeutsch), dobbeln, dobeln: in Dutch
dobbden ; in early Icelandic it was du6to, dtt/fa, to gamble (in the Norwegian
code known as the "Gulapingslaug" of the Xllth century), and the noun dufl
(gambling) occurs in the same code, while in a mathematical essay of the
XlVth century, "Algorismus," it is used in the sense of" double;" the Swedish
has dubbla or dolbla, and the Danish doble. In the earliest citations of Grimm
something of the sense of duplicare, is still retained. The earliest is from
Wolfram von Eschenbach's " Parzival " of the Xlllth century:
Umbe den warf der aorgen
Wart getoppelt.
A similar sentiment is from the same period:
Maneo nnaiieie schande
Wart getoppelt dA der beidenaohaft.
The following, too, is nearly of the same date:
Wir hAu teste nmbe den wurf
Getopelt der grteen aorgen.
A preacher, a century later, says : ir suit ouch dar umbe mit tamen an dem
nwtceiage Oder spiln oder toppeln. In a glossary of 1482 toppeln is explained
as " ludere cum taxillis," by which it will be seen that it then had only its
technical signification, to " play dice." Another preacher exclaims : spilest
und doppelst mit ihnen wie ein erzlqtterbube ! In the XVIth century the pro-
lific Johannes Fischart, who, among his other labours, produced a free render-
ing of the "Gargantua" of Rabelais, uses the word in his version: Lasz
uns eins toppeln, der minst ist knecht ; and again Jst niemands hie der dop-
peln willf A later and less famous moralist, Henneberger, dwells on the
evil of dicing : Den^i es von cUlerlei losem gesinde ein zu hauf gesammeltes
volk war, welcTie nichls anders thaten denn in den tabemen doppelten, spieUen
und soffeti—spielen and doppelen being here, as often, joined in the same
phrase, and must perhaps, sometimes be translated " playing and gambling."
A glossary, much more recent than the one we have cited, that of Henisch,
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248 CffESS IN ICELAND
''Teutsche Sprach und Weisheit, A-G (1616), renders doppeln by *Uudere
aleis, jacere tales, aleas, tesseras, duple ludere/' all but the last definition
referring literally to dice-play. Lessing makes one of his characters a de-
termined doppeler: Dieser mensch hat ganx und gar keinen geschmaek am
tanzetiy und bet^eitet den spieler unvermerkt in ein seitenzimmer mit ihm zu
gehen^ um eine viertelstunde mit einander da zu doppeln. The 1863 edition
of Sanders cites a passage in which a good dean is seen to have such bound-
less faith in providence that it even embraces the dice-box: Der dechant
i/pricht..,, seine segen itber die wUrfely wenn er doppelu Sanders here expresses
a doubt as to the origin of the play-term doppeln^ whether it come from dice-
play or from the table-game; he even suggests that it may be connected
with the English word ** dub." In his *' Fremdw5rterbuch " (1871) Sanders
gives the word doublet, explaining it as ^^pasch im wUrfelspiel."* A Swiss lin-
{ijuistic student, Stalder (1757-1833), asserts that the word, in a central Swiss
dialect, is employed in target-shooting: doppeln Jieisjzt auch deti doppel
erlegen hei sckiessen. The term occurs in proverbs, as in one quoted by
Simrock : Wer im finstem doppelty ve^'liert die wUrfel ; and others are to be
found in Wander's great '* Sp rich wdrterlex icon " (1867-80), as Auff doppel
spiel muss main leib, gut und cUles loagen; and toer gem doppelt^ kommt
leicht zu nichis. TO the former of these two is appended the following
historical note: Dies sprichwort hatte man im 17 Jahrhundert trotz der
gesetzlichen bestimmungen der spieler solle nur das verlieren, was er zum
spiels bringe, und selbst dies nicht vollstdndig, weil man toegen spielschulden
niemand weiter als bis aiifs hemd pfdnden solle, und namentlich nicht vervoet-
ten solle, was ihm Gott anerscha/fen hat. An old dictionary-maker, Caspar
von Stieler, has, in his *» Teutscher Sprachschatz *' (1691), not a few quoU-
tions relating to doppelspiel : Er doppelt Uber die maszeti gem ; das dop^teln
(the verbal noun) hat ihn zum armen inann gemacht; heim doppeln musz
mann aufsetzen, a sort of proverb which he. renders into Latin: ^*exercens
aleam pecuniam in ludum deponat;*' Stieler also uses the verb, ausdoppeln,
to ** cease to play dice.'*
We have thus expressed what, so far as our researches have gone (and
they have by no means been exhaustive), we are enabled to say in regard
to the introduction into Germany of dice, and of their use as a means of
gambling; we have also treated the subject of the names given in German
to the dice-pips, a matter which concerns not only the pure dice-play, but
also the game of nard-backgammon in perhaps a still higher degree. Pre-
vious to any account of the varieties of back-gammon, and the German
methods of play, we shall give a hasty version of a recent essay on dice-
play in Germany by the orientalist, August Wiinsche, published in the
widely-known review, " Nord und Slid " (Breslau vol. 80, Marz 1897). The
article bears the title: "Deutsche manner und frauenspiele w&hrend des
mittelalters," but we are only concerned with the portion^ (pp. 329-334),
which relate to dice and the nard-game. " The dice-game," he says, allud-
ing to wtirfelspiel, "which is probably identical with bickelspiel, originated
in the east. According to tradition it was invented in the city of Hazarth
(Hezar) in Palestine, wherefore it is often called a game of hazard. Among
the adherents to old Germanic mythology Wotan (Odin) was regarded as the
inventor of dice. But on the introduction of Christianity several old attri-
butes and spheres of activity were transferred to the spirits of evil, and
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STRAY NOTES 249
thus the devil, at a later day, came to be regarded as the originator of dice.
He was supposed to have created them for the purpose of gaining souls for his
infernal kingdom. Yet against his will the product of his ingenuity was
made to serve Christianity, as is shown by a short poem of Reinmar von
Zweter, in which the six dice-numbers were symbolically applied to the
Christian faith:
Der teafel schaf das wnrfelspiel,
Weil er damit wiel teeien lioh gewinnon will,
Dm MS hat er deehalb gemacht, well eiu gewalt'ger Gott da itt.
Der himmel sammt der erde eteht
In seiner hand, anf welche swei daa daos wohl geht,
Die drei anf seinen namen, die da hat der tvuM wahre Cbriai.
Dae qnatre, das sohoT er mit grouen listen
Auf die vier evangelisten,
Die flinfe aof des mensohen stnne,
DasB er die flinf ihm maohe krank,
Die seohs, dasa er sechs wochen bug
Die fiMten una dnrch wiirfeln abgewlone. '"
Dice-playing was known as toppeln [topeln) and the dice- player as topeler.
The dice-board, also the backgammon-board iwurfzabel), in old French styled
'^berleno,'" was generally of marble, the dice themselves, on the other hand,
of bones of the ox, and bore, as they still bear, the numbers esse, (uo% (tatos),
drie, kwater, zinke and ses. Even the ancient Germans, as the Roman histo-
rian Tacitus ('Germania,' cap. XXIV) informs us, were passionately devoted to
dice-play. He writes: *They practise dice-play— at which one will naturally
wonder— soberly, and quite as if it were a serious business, with such hard-
ihood in winning and losing, that, when they have nothing more left, they
stake their freedom and their person on a last cast of the die. The loser
resigns himself voluntarily ^o servitude ; even if he be younger and stronger
than his adversary, he allows himself to be bound and sold. Thus great is
their stanchness in an affair so bad; they themselves call it keeping their
word.* «* The Roman, coldly calculating, and acting always with medita-
tion, could not comprehend how the German, with his serious earnestness
could give himself up to dice-playing, and could even make it accord with his
sense of morality. This same popularity was enjoyed by games at dice dur-
ing the Middle Ages, among men and women, monks and nuns, and fre-
quently high sums were staked. It even happened, and not so rarely, that
a player lost all his possessions in the space of a few hours. Often dice-
play led to brawling and strife, but in spite of that it was eagerly carried
on. Knights devoted themselves to it, especially in their after-dinner repose.
Thus it occurred, according to the rhymed Holstein Chronicle, that the
Danish King Eric III, ^Plogpenning,' as he was styled, engaged in an after-
noon game at worptafelspel (backgammon), was surprised by his foes and
murdered. On festival occasions, such as coronations, espousals and drink-
^ For the original middle High German text of these lines see p. 843.
1*4 The words of Taoltos, In the place oited| are: " Aleam, qaod misers, sobrll inter ssrfa
exsrosnt, taata Incrandl perdendive temerltate, ut, earn omnia defeoerant, extreme ao noyis*
simo jaeta ds llbsrtate ae de eorpore contendant. Vietus Tolantsrlam servltutem adlt; quamTis
JuTsnlor, qaamvls robastlor adligare se ao venire patitur. Ea est in re prava perTieaola; ipsl
fldem Toeant."
82
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250 CHESS INJCELAND
ing-bouts, games at dice were particularly common. At the coronation of
King Arthur, as the poet of the ' Roman de Brut * tells us, his knights called
for dice, tables and chess; one won and another lost; they pawned their
effects for money, until at last they began to cheat each other, and finally
separated foaming with rage. The passion for dice-play penetrated even
into the convents, and the monks, in their absorption, not only forgot the
prescribed prayers and other acts of devotion, but also neglected their stud-
ies. On the Lauterberg (now Petersberg) near Halle, in the year 1223, there
existed in a convent such a rage for play, and such a corruption of man-
ners and morals ensued, that dice-play went on furiously even in the apart-
ments of the superior (propst), and chess and draughts [this latter could hardly
have been known in Germany at that date] were played, while mead and
wine were sold at the same time. Playing at dice was even carried into
the next world. In the well-known tale (fableau) of ' St. Peter and the
player' (*St. Pierre et le Jongleur*) St. Peter one day, during the absence
of Satan, appears in the lower regions with dice and a dice-board, and begins
to play with the temporary guardian -> a demon devoted to dice— for lost
souls. At first they played for only a single condemned soul, but the game
^ew constantly hotter and the stakes larger, and before long the saint had
won all the souls to be found in hell, and carried them off in triumph to
heaven. When the devil at last returned and found the luckless player alone
in his uncomfortable region, he fell into a great fury, but he couldn't change
what had happened, and nothing was left for him to do except to ponder
how he could repeople his infernal world with new souls. It is not wonderful
that princes and magistrates, in order to bridle this madness for the dice-
table, issued sharp ordinances and other legal regulations. As early as
952, the emperor Otho the Great, at the diet of Augsburg, notified the
bishops, priests and deacons that they would be obliged to give up their
ofiices unless they restrained their fondness for gaming. Later, in 1232,
Frederick II published a severe statute against dice-players {de aleatoribus),
and the pious St. Louis of France, who had many German subjects, forbade
dice-play under heavy penalties to all the officials of his kingdom, and also
prohibited the fabrication of dice. According to an ordinance of the muni-
cipal council of Strasburg, dated 1241, every one who was found, after the
third stroke of the wahteglocke, or night-guard's bell {post sonitum tertium
campanae)^ at play in a house or tavern, was to be arrested and punished.
To these inhibitions and punishments, designed to cure the mania for play,
were joined the anathemas of many of the mediaeval lyrists and moralists.
They regarded gaming, in its uncontrolled excesses, as an evil ruinous to
both body and soul, and uttered many expressive words of warning against
it. The same minnesinger, Reinmar von Zweter, whom we have already
cited, calls the pleasure taken by his count^ymen in playing dice a greed
much stronger than the passions of love, of acquisition of property, or of
dfink:
Bin schdnes weib bexwiiigt den mann,
TTnd iBt dabel aaoh Bilnde, to iftt dooh kein wander d*ran.
Es Ewingt eln ■ohatc anoh geioen knecht, duz er in selnem Dienst mass Bteh'u.
So zwingt eln hen aach wohl aeln gat,
Dmz m thm dienen mass and leiden, was er mit ilun that,
Ee Ewlngt dea weinea kiaft den nsann aaoh, daas die ainne Ihm rergehn,
Dooh weias ioh nooh ein wandeirbarea zwbigen.
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STRA Y NOTES 251
Das wnnderbar ror alien andem dijigen :
DasE elnem todten wiirfel-knodhen
Bin mann, der lebt, mlt here and ainn
In Boloher gier aioh giebt dahln,
Dasi ihm reratand mass werden abgesproofaen. '"
Wherever the word spiel is used by the medi?eval and some of the later
poets the reference is generally to dice-playing, as in that great codex of
verse at Paris, known, trom its supposed compiler, as the Mannes MS, in
which an anonymous versifier says:
Beide, lotterie and spiel,
Bringen leib and seel' in fall;
Wer massloB ihnen folgen will,
Dem maefaen ale die hnfen sclunal.
And that didactic poet, Thomasin von Zircl&re (about 1216), says almost the
same thing in his distich:
Das spiel giebt hasa nnd corn gar vlel ;
Gier nnd boahelt is^ belm spiel.
We have already read Freidank's utterances on the game (p. 244) ; an even
more fiimous rhymster, Sebastian Brant, who was in many respects a fol-
lower of Freidank, but who lived more than two centuries after him, employs
this severe expression about gaming:
Spiel mag selten sein ohn'sind'.
Bin spieler ist nioht Gotles kind ;
Die spieler alle teofels sind.
But neither the decrees nor menaces of punishment issued by princes, nor
the condemnations uttered by poets, could check the popular rage for dice-
play, but both tavemers and players submitted to heavy penalties rathSr
than abandon their fi&vorite vice. It is deserving of notice that in order to
lesson the evil of the ordinary dice-game, Wibold, bishop of Cambray, then
a city of the empire, invented as far back as 982, a dice-game, which, in an
ingenious way, made the method of play indicate various ecclesiastical re-
lations and institutions.'*
The author of this essay has comparatively little to say about back-
gammon, in which the employment of dice is a much more innocent affair.
He goes on, however, to tell us that "By the side of the pure dice-game
existed other and different sorts of table-games (*Jeux de table,* callad, in
middle High German, Jidbelspile). Amongst these was the ' wur&abelspier
*"* Tbe following is the old form of this modornised version of an interesting pleee:
Daa sebonia wtp betwlngent man,
Und iat da sflnde bf, son Ist di docb nlbt wonders an ;
86 twingel sebats oaeb stnen kaebt, als6 daa er Im dieaen mnoa;
So twiagei gnotes berre oob gnot,
Daa er im dionen maos nnt Itden, swas er mit in toot;
86 twinget wines kraft ooob stnen man, daa im wirt sinne bnoa.
Dannoeb weia ieb ein wunderltobea twingen,
Das wanderltcher ist ob alien dingen:
Daa elaem tdten wflrfelbeine
Bin lebende man ben oade moot
86 gerlieb nodertnaie toot|
Daa ex im nimt slane ande witie aleine.
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252 CHESS IN ICELAND
tric-trac, our present puff. According to tradition the discovery of this was
due to the knight Alco at the siege of Troy, which is indicated by the lines
from *Der Renner' (verse 11401):
Warfcabel ich das spil aoch nenne,
Das TUt ein rittor hies Aloo,
Vor Troye, des iit ril manger onfyro
Worden and wirt leider noch,
Dem spil aafblndet des kamers noch. '*"
The fourfzabel (or backgammon) boards were, in general, very costly, espe-
cially when the various fields (or compartments and points) were filled with
artistic inlaid work. The catalogue of the Munich art-exposition of 1876
describes (no. 2453) such a one discovered in the mensa of the altar of
St. Valentine at the diocesan church of Aschaffenburg in 1852, in which it
served [on account of its beauty, doubtless] the purpose of a reliquary. The
unadorned points consist of pieces of veined red, oriental jasper, which is
only polished on the upper surfaces, but on the sides, and below, is inlaid;
the other points are overlaid with thick pieces of split or cloven and
also inlaid rock-crystal, below which are small terra-cotta figures, variously
painted with green, red, yellow, blue and white tints, lying on a gold ground.
These represent partly twin-tailed sirens, partly dragun-like monsters, cen-
taurs, and contests of beasts with men. The spaces between the points, as
well as the borders and edges of the sides, are covered with very thin silver
leaf laid on hard cement, in which foliage and other ornamental designs are
impressed by means of metal stamps, which appear, looked at fVom the Aront,
as if in high relief. The flowers and leaves on the two sides are enamelled
in red, green and blue. At each side of the board is found a small division
for holding the men now lacking, which were probably of chalcedony. The
covers of these recipients are of rock-crystal adorned with silver. ^ The
backgammon game was played [by no means always] with three dice, and
the prizes of victory consisted mostly [hardlyj in rings {vingerlin); only when
ladies participated, did the loser have to submit to any penalty [f]. In rela-
tion to this it is said, in that bulky work, the * Trojan war* of Konrad von
Wiirzburg, which dates from the second half of the Xlllth century:
DA spilte mit der kflnlglii
Eintweder umber vini^erlln
Oder nm senfte biuie [blows].
*** The writer of the ** Nord and Sfld *' paper didn't path his researebes far enoagh to
dlieoTer the blander In this passage. The name of tho Inventor of the game rests In lai^e
part on a misprint, and possibly partly on the resemblanee of the name to Attains, one of
the nomerons mythloal inventors of ohess. The Important lines of " Der Renner " ran thas:
Noch i»t oin^ Uic tpUl, dn hMrrmt tpulgmt von dan doeh vil sUndan und vil tchamd&» Inmi
«toi0siwM: wur/Mahel ich daa cpU in name; dot vmni Hn ritUrf hica Alco vor J¥oic," The
name of the knight Is in the MSB alee, a Latin appellative equivalent to alealor, meaning a
diee-player. The original moaning therefore may have been that a diee-playlag knight at the
siege of Troy invented baokgamraon. Bot also Is misprinted in both the edittons of ** Der
Benner *' (Frankfort 1549 and Bamberg 18S8). In the former it was printed Albo and la the
latter iilco. The latter espeelally has henee beeome a ** ghost-word ** ~ the name of a
sappoeed Inventor of backgammon — who never existed.
^ We have already oalled attention (p. 167) to riehly-woaght table-boards or baekgam-
men boards In the mosenms of Maremberg and other eitles. To these may be added the
many fine and eostly speotanens in the HIstorleal Maseam of Moniek, and In the Moseom of
the Kings, honsed In the Ilosenborg palaee at Copenhagen. Bnt many other pablle and private
oollaetions oontain them; they were a favorite objeetlbr the exercise of the erafbnaaa's art.
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STRAY NOTES 253
Sometimes the stake was money, and in that case it was easy to lose con-
siderable sums, whence the warnings against backgammon/'
We now come to backgammon, its story in Germany, so fkr as we can
make it out, and the methods of playing it in later and modern times. It
lias several names and not a few varieties. It will be remembered that the
word wOrfa ('' die *') is old High German, and is first heard of in the Xlth
century. The oldest name for backgammon is buf— in its present form der
(or das) puff or daspuffspiel, which appears, for the first time, between 1272
and 1285, a century and a half or more after toUrfel—thhi is to say, just
about the date at which king Alfonso in Spain was letting us know that
two varieties of the game of tables were called la bufa cortesia and la bufa
de baldrac.^ In the course of -time we read of many other appellations
'"* Blue* tb« aUailoiu made In preTioiu pafsi to the AlfoDtioe MS, through th« great
klndnoM of ita owner, Mr. J. O. Whfte, of CleTeUnd, Ohio, United Sutei, a copy of that
inralaable work has been earefally examined. Thla eopy, as is suted, Is not made direetly
from the original In the Hbrary of the Bsaarlal (dated 1988), but from a not qnlte eomplete
transeript of the year iaS4, preserTed In the library of the Madrid Hlstorleal eoelety (Real
Aeademla de la Historla). The White MS was transeribed in 1857 by that noted seholar, so
well known to foreign students of Spanish llteratnre, Don Paseal de Gayangos. In It, elosely
following the ehess section, eomes that entitled the " Libre de loe Dados, " In which are
described Tarions pare dice games nnder the titles of «I iua^ ds moyorss, el iuego ds la /Hga
(with three methods of play), «l ittego que Uaman asar [haeard], «I iutgo de mariotaf si iuego
de I« Hf/a, P^*" con as, panquUt, wtedio-uMart aeav'pujado, gui^rguieeca — the whole spoken of
at the end as the " XII ioegos de loe dados ; ** of these names it Is perhaps proper to say
that the Arabic word <*asar** is the original of ear English <* haiard."
Thereupon eomes the next book, under the title of the <' Libre de las Tablas. ** {^gui
eomicfifa el libro de Ics iuegee de Uu tahlas). Afterwards follow diagrams of the different
Tarietles of tables (or backgammon), with some short descriptions and the name of the par-
ticular game attached to each diagram. It is with these names that we shall particularly
concern ourselves. After an Introduction, we have a diagram, preceded by the words: "Rste
es el primer luego que Uaman loe quiiue Tahlee, *' followed by the diagram, nnder which we
are told of this, or the next Tarlety : '* Bste inego Uaman lot doee sanss, o doee k^rmanoe. "
Thereafter we have other titles of games accompanied by diagrams: " Questo luego Uaman
dohlet]*^ "este es el inego que Uaman /alias;*' *' este es el iaego que Uaman eeis dos i a«" ;
'* este Inego Uaman en Hspanna emperador, ** Then oeenrs a head-line, "Qual es la barata
deste Inego,** describing a teohnieal term found In later MSB: *'La barata ee quando el nn
iogador tiene meioria del otro, e tlene doee tablas entabladas, per que ell [slo] otro magner entre
non pueda sallr, e de las otras tables, que tiene a se de baxar, o fliQer y alguna a que d4. B
quandol d& quatro tablas, o mas, el luego baratado, per que puede levar sns tablas en ealTo,
darle mas, se qnislere, e gana el luego por este logar.** The Inecriptioas under the sub-
sequent diagrams are : ** Bste inego Uaman cl wtedio emperadikr ; *' " este luego Uaman la pa-
reja de entrada; " " otro Inego hay de tablas, q* llaman ca6, eguinal ; ** '* este luego Uaman todaa
to&tes, ** " este ioego llaman lo^fuef '* (described, *' laquet e slnegase eon dos dados, e eata-
blasee desU gnlsa *') ; '* esto luego llaman, en las 'otras tierras, la hu/a eorteeiai" ** este inego
llaman la h^fa de batdrae;** " eatm inego llaman lot Bwmanoe resneon^ral. ** The section
doses with a Taeaat diagram, with one of the usual headlines abore it : " B este es el de-
partemento deste iaego — B esta es la flgura del eatabllmlento,*' but nothing under it, show-
ing an CTldcnt intention of continuing the treatise on tables, a feature of incompleteness
common to Italian and other medieval M88 on table-games ; after the close of the section on
tables we baTc other kinds of gamee. The first one is eaUed ** grande aeedrea,** on a ISXIS
board, apparently played with the aid of triangular-faced dice (one side of one showing seven
pipe), In eeanection with which we are told that ** Hoc. rey Don Alfonso mandamus facer
dados ** of many forms, of which specimens are given. One of the diagrams of this section
represents a backgammon board, with seventeen mea used by each player and eontoinlng seme
of theee multiform dice ; another portrays a circular backgammon board with six points (or
hoaees) in each quadrant.
The next foUowing section relates to the merellee varieties (algaer^iM), opening: **E
comon^remoe prlmerasniente en eU Alquerque.** In this paragraph Is Inserted the figure of a
round backgammon, mentioned above, bat it seems doubtAil whether It belongs Just here, but
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2&4 CHB88 IN JCBLA ND
applied to this table-game, or to its varying methods of play, some of them
being, without doubt, nearly identical in their features. We have, for in-
stanoe, lurtsch or das lurtschspiel (occurring in English, as we shall see, as
" lurch *'), contrabuff, regalbuff {bauf royal)^ der lange pufft der hontrdre puff,
toccadille or toccadiglio (which we have heard of in Italian as ^^ toccategli *'),
trick'trackj or dick-dach or tie^tac (probably reaching Germany from France),
nnder it foUowa this : " Bfte es al alqaerqne de dose qae iaega oon todos iob trebeloi/* ... " ••-
gnnd aqaelloa tret sabiof dleren U macatra el Rey e depuea loa departleren loa omnee aabldoree
d« iogar... qoeremoe agora aqoe desir de otroa iuegoa... Aaal etmo loa alquerqaee, qne tanaea
al aeadrea, « 4 laa taUaa, e & loa dadoa. B talea y a que tanneu al aoedrea e 4 laa UUaa,
« no a loa dadoa. " Tbe flrat diagram la that of tbe *' alqaerque de doie " (apparently, aa
Ita name aignlilea, merellea played with twelve men). The board ia that giTen by Brunet y
Bellet, being oompoaed of four aimple morria boarda united (aee ilg. S, page 100), and, in the
MS| la preceded by a longlah deaaription. Then we haTe, played on the aame board, the
title of a variety " Bl iuego qae llamaa de eerear la It'<5re ; " and thereupon a aeeond Tariety,
into which dice are Introduced "Rate ea el alq%urqu9 d* ntuva que ae inega con dadoa." It
muat be remembered that the arrangement of tbe matter in the MS la aneh that It ia very
diiBonlt to decide, in many caaea, whether the Inaeriptiona refer to the preceding or the following
diagram though iu general the latter aeema to be the rule. At any rate tbe diagram follow-
ing thia laat Inacrlption, referring to the ''alquerqoe de aneTC*' (that la, << morria of nine,'*
being oar **niBe men morria,*' moat likely) la that of the moat common — perbapa older —
morria board (aee iu thia Tolume ftg. 6, page 109), on which are portrayed nine upright (white?)
pawna, and eight reveraed (black) pawna^that ia men reaembllng eheaa pawna in ahape,
partly " heada up," partly ** heada down, " all the anglea, except aeven, having men oa
them. After thia eomea the laacription, " De come ae iuega ell alguwqwtdenune sin clo^loa,*'
followed by the aame diagram, with eight upright and eight rcTeraed men. Tbe morria-
board, which we have apoken of aa the ordinary oae ia America, haviag additioaal diageaal
linea, atar^g from each comer (aee flg. 4, page 106), waa apparently not known to Alftuuo,
which conflrma our belief that it la the younger of the two forma. The oigaarfiM aaetion
oloaea with the aimpleat of the varletlea, the *' three men morria: *' " Rate ea otro alqnerqae
de trea " (that ia " of three "), with a repreaentation of the board (aee flg. I, page 97), on
which ataad two reveraed and three upright men. Finally follow variooa gamea, all haviag
an aatronomioal look, in which the lodiacal aii^na and the planeta are much to the fore, the
flrat headline of the aection being; " Bate ea tablero de loa eacaqnea, e de laa taUaa, quaae
iuga por aatronomia " (It muat be remembered that King Alfonao waa a great aatroaomar) ;
tbe volume enda with a aeven-aided (or aeven-parted, almoat round-like) board, oa whieh
there are wtjfin m^a -atanding on pointa along the tranaverae liaea la each of the aevaa
eompartimaata — that Ja forty aiae pleoea in all, of aeven difttreat oolora. Later oa thaae
colora are ezplalaed aa referriag to the heavealy bodiea, thua: "Satnrao de negro. Jupiter
de verde. Mara de vermeie. Bl Sol de amarleUo. Yenua de violet. Mercuric ^e moehoa
colorea diveraaa; la Luna bianea." Here may poaalbly be the origin of tbe terma ero«a, sUUa,
{two, etc (aee page 106) applied in the roedlaval manoacripta to the morria men.
Lack ef apace forbids the incertion here of much more than the above crude and an<
aatlafactory abatract ef thoae portiona of the Alfonalne codex In which we are Jnat now
interealed. The *< Ubro de loa toblaa " begina with an extended deaeriptioB of the dice,
tbe board, the men and their poaitioua. We learn " que el tablaro en que ae an do logar a
de aeer quadrado, e en medio a de avor aeanal ea gulaa que ae faaan quatro qnadraa, e ea
oada quadra ha de aver aeya eaaaa, qo ae fasaa per todaa veynt e quatro. " Of the man
we are told : ** B otroaai a meater que la meeUd [alo] de laa tablaa aeaa duaa color, e la
otra meetad, dotra, por que aean coaoacidaa, uaaa dotraa. B aa a aeer quiaae de eada color
por que ea la uaa qaadra de la meetad del tablero, pueda poaer en eada ana eaaa doa doe^
e Hear tMa pora de foera por baratar del iaego, e pora maaaar, quaado meater ftaera. Ca
aia eaUa ao ae podir faaer." The deaerlption of the variety called dohUt la aa foUowa :
" Cada uao de loa iogadorea deve teaer laa doie tablaa, e peaerlaa dobladaa, una aobre otra
eada uao ea an quadrit del tablero, que aea la una en dereoho de la otra; B el que veaelere
la datalla(?) lanfara primlero. B devenae bazar aquellaa doae tablaa, qae eatan aobre laa otraa,
por laa auertea de loa puntoa de loa dadoa. B otroaai ae devan levar ; e el que laa ante levar,
puiarA el Iuego. Bat al por aventura qualqulere de loa iogadorea laafare aaerte, que noa teaga
Mkblaa de que la faaar taa bien de ba»arlaa oomo de levarlaa, davelo faaer el olro.iegador.
B deeta cniaa (qniaa?) avleue mnehaa veaea, que gaaari ell aa togador por iaa Martea que
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STRAY NOTES 255
verkehren or verkehrt, garanguet (French), gammon (an English word),
revertier (a French equivalent in meaning to verkehr&n)^ and so on. In
several early writers are to be found longer or shorter lists of those back-
gammon varieties (see that cited from Hans Sachs, p. 158, note), such as that
in the statement of Johann Agricola, the compiler of the noted work on
proverbs, the earliest edition of which appeared in 1529: '^Wir DeuUchen
IftBfATft ell otro." It it plAlB from all thla tbat this it tb« gMD« •allwl *' donbloti " lo
England In tlie elght««nth oentory, and in France *< damM rabattuM." In tba nidat of the
daseriptlon of the game called faUoM {/ayU», fail—,'* tee pagei 87, 88) we are told the origin
of the name: **a si fallaese que alll o el derie entrar, el otro avie entaUedo wo% tablae,
fellearie que non podrle entrar, e perdlere el iuego por ello. Otroeci el que lan^aee en ma-
nera qae no ovlesee do Ir eino en la eaea qae ell otro ovfetM pohlada perdlere el iuego per
que falle^rie. Oade por esU raien Uaman /oUm k este inego. " Other words and phraeec
oecnrrlng in the decorf ptione of the gamei are : ** e el que reaee la batalla a la mano "
[=flnt moTo?]; «* en la eaea del aeyi," ** del doe" [on the fix point, two point]; " en la
del at " [on that of the ace, aee-polnt); " eaca del dnco " "del qnatro,'* " del tria." In the
game known as 9l tMdio •mpn-admr we find that, as in the following Italian period, somettBes
two, sometimes three dice were osed : *' B este se loga en las doe qaadrns, e Ingasee eon dos
dados, o eon tres, mas non se barata eomo ell otro " [1. e. in the preeedlag game]. The
game styled iodas to6Ias is, as the description of the manner of pladng the men at the
beginning of the game shows, the French ** toutes tables '* and onr ordinary English back-
gammon; the diagram, too, agrees with the description. It is played with two dice. In the
games called la ^ufa cortstia and ta hu/a ds baldrat the deseripttons throw no light on the
exact eignifleaUon, or genesto of the term bu/a.
As to the origins of the three principal games treated by King Alfonso, the situation,
so far as he is concerned, may be easily sUted. In ehees, the name of tho game itself and
not a few of lu other technical words come immediately from tho Arable, and abundantly
proTc that the Iberian peninsula was indebted to its Moorish conquerors for the introduction
of the Indian game. In the morris-game, its Spanish title, alquerqne (owing espeeially to
the al') has an Arable look, althoufh no one has yet attempted to aseertalB its precise
Arabic source; the only other alternative is that the al- may poaslbly rcpreeent the Italian
dedolte article, but It would be difficult to find any ether instance of lU use in Spanish as
a prefix ; tho remaining element of the word, -qturque, certainly strikes the eye and ear
as rather Moorish than Latin, although this statement is, of eoune, of little philological
weight. In tho final group of games, those embraced under the name otiabtM or ** tables "
there Is absolutaly nothing In the tarminology to Indleata the descent of ** tables '* from the
Perso-Arabic ** nard. " There may, perhaps, be some slight doubt as to the word ** bufa«'*
but, if that be of Eastern orlgiu, Its parentage cannot be found in any description which we
haTC of •* nard." It may not therefore be a legltlmale conclusion, but It h, perhaps, a nat-
ural one, that while chess certainly came to Spain from Arabia, and while merelles may
have been known to its old Arable population, the game of tables, If originally the AsiaUo
** nard," may well have reached the peninsula by the way of Italy or through some other
romance natioaality. In this connection It Is to be noted that we have the expression. In
describing the "bofa" variety; ssls itugo Uaman sn la$ otraa tierrat [In other oonntriei] la
bu/a oortetia ; considering the word <^eortosia, '* this can only refer to one of the romance
lands. — Since the preceding was written, a note from Mr. Guy Le Strange, the distinguished
Arabic srholar, mentions the fact that in the Arable dictionary of Kasirmirski al qwrqw (or
al kirk) Is defined as an '* esp^oc de Jeu d*enfant, qui consbte k placer do petlU eallloux
dans chacune des cases d'une figure formic par le trace de trols carr6t coneentrlques dlvls^
par deux llgnes diagonales et deux rectsngulalres. " This deeeribes exactly oar figure 4
(p. 108), the morris-board still used at leatt In America (but which, as stated above, Is not
Indicated in the Alfonsine MS). Mr.. Le Strange adds that the lexicographer Deiy states that
the modern Arable name is daryt, A still more important point Is that al ^ttsr^usls mentioned
in the "Kltab al Aghanl/* the author of which died in 967, more than three centarles before
the date of King Alfonso^s trentlse ; this ancient Arabic work describes a certain person as
furnishing a room with shatranjit, nardftt and qirkat, that is, with boards for ehess, back-
gammon (nard) and merelles (morris). This Is the more Interesting because the writer thus
early groups together the *Uriad of games,** which make up the contente of so many medieval
M8S — at a far later period. This must be regarded as decisive of the fact that the morris
game, like chess, reached Europe from the Arabs through Spain.
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256 CHESS IN ICELAND
haJben mancherlei spiel mil kurten und mit wUrfeln, im hret, das grost var,
dreierlei hUf, bUf regale da man gibt den ganzen ufUrfel^ aJUe ses^ alle zinken,
alle qualiMT, alle drei, alle taus, aUe es^ bUf unden uncC oben, bUf und siben
su rticke, das frawenspiel^ das lang verkerety das kurz und das lorzen, auch
der dickedack,^' Some of these, which are evidently all backgammon games,
it would be difficult, until after much investigation, to explain. Hans Sachs
mentions only a portion of them : das kurz, das lang^ puf, gegenpuf, puf regal,
dickedack and lurtsch. The Swabian lexicographer, Schmid, quotes the
passage, with an attempted etymology of buf: Hier mahnt allerhand an
framosischen ursprung (buf Oder bouf royal, tictac^ trie trac) doch die be-
nennung buf scheinl daher :u riihren, dasz die faUenden wUrfel das bret stoszen^
schlagen, einen bufgeben, Brachet, the French etymologist, claims that tho
French "bouf,*' meaning a "blow,'' "stroke," is onomatopoetic. Schmid
ends by citing the Swabian conversational expression alle buf, meaning
♦•every time." The lines from the anonymous writer known only as "The
Schoolmaster of Eszlingen " (p. 158 note) are in full:
Der soharle bAt dria Bpil verplicbt
Du 6rste spil ist buf genant,
Daz verlde der prins, er braoh die bondo 8& w liant.
Christian Hoffmannswaldau (1618-79), who opened a new period in German
poetry, cites some of the backgammon games:
Dick dack and contra puff....
Dial aolten nnare kartc- iind Unge weile seiu,
the last line containing an evident allusion to what Hans Sachs calls das
kurz, das lang. The satirist Moscherosch (1601-69) edited Georg Gumpelz-
haimer's " Gymnasma de exercitiis academicorum " (1652), in which the
author says: lurtsch spielen in alea primus modus est^ das lurtscheny buff^
contrabuffy regalbuff^ dickeddcket. A little known author, Wesenigk, who
wrote a book entitled " B3se spielsieben " (1702), also enumerates some of
these games: Da ist im bretspiel das spiel aus und ein, das puffen^ ticktack,
lurtschspiel, verkehrtes, das interim, u. s. w., in which wo have the new title
das interim, of which no German lexicographer attempts a definition. The
same writer alludes again to lurtschspiel : " Jener vater ftatte seinen sohneti
von dem lurtschspiel befohlen : ihr sohnigen, sohnigen, was ihr thut, behdhlt
die 4. und 6, gut ; welcher aber unter den spielem dieses nicht beobachtet, die
haben sich arm gespielet, Hans Sachs also mentions somewhere the German
lurtsch :
Yorerat faoh mir an daa lurztpisl!
In Meyer's " Konversationslexikon " (1896), the writer on pw/f passes by all
other kinds and notices only two: Von verschiedenen durch besondere regeln
bedingten variationen abgesehen, fiat man zwei hauptarten des puffs zu un-
terscheiden: den langenpuff, bei welchem beide spieler in demselben feld, im
das zweite brett iibergehen und schliesslich aus den andem felde des ersten
brettes ihren auszug nehmen ; und den kontrdren puff, bei welchem dis spieler
in den beiden gegenUberliegenden feldem desselben brettes einsetzen, sich im
andem brett begegtien ufid ihre steithe atis den entgegengesetnen feldem des
ersten brettes herausnehmen. The Brockhaus ** Konversationslexikon " (1886)
mentions only one kind of puff, and gives only a most general description of
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STRAY' NOTES 257
that, more lucid, perhaps, than that of the previously cited cyclopaedia, be-
cause its substance is little more than that the game is played between two
persons on a board and by the aid of dice. Meyer (1889) describes trick-
track as a game played on the puffbret and virtually the same as puff. In
the same edition his description of tokadille [sic] is even more vague: Bin
aus Italieti stammendes den puff venoandtes spiels toird von swei personen
mil je IS {auch 16) sleinen gespielt, nac?i regeln, die auf denen des puffs
berufien, aber vertoickelte)' sind U7id mehr abwechslung bieten als dieser.
We cite these passages merely to show that several of the old names of the
various games still exist. The Meyer of 1897 has the word toccategli but
refers to tokadille. Another game appellation, verkehren {verkehrt, the
participial noun, is used less frequently), occurs among the poets, though
perhaps at a less early date. Paul Fleming (1609-40), whose name at least
is known to all American readers, and who lived not much longer than Keats,
alludes to it:
Ich bin sa MitUch hi«r
Doch gieb das bretsplel hier, and nim m an mlt mir,
£8 gilt mir beydes gleich, verkdhren oder dunmen,
dammen being, of course, draughts. A later poet, but one, who during a long
life enjoyed great popularity, is Christian Wernicke, who died about 1720.
In one of his pieces of verse he says of one of his heroes:
Thrax pflegt sich Sbor viel ge«cliaffer zn beachweren
Und spialt docli inancheu tag bia abend im rerkehran.
We will now examine the names of the varieties of the modern games
of tables in German, repeating as little as possible what has been said of
these names elsewhere, that is, in treating of the French and Italian games.
Of course the most notable of the names is puff (anciently buf) because of
its possible relation to the historical development of the game. When we
recall the fact that bufa is of frequent occurrence both in the Alphonsine
Codex and in the very oldest Italian MSS, it is impossible not to doubt all the
suggested derivations of the word, when applied to its relation to the back-
gammon board. Most lexicographers make it identical with the modern puff
(the verb puffen, English " puff ''), having the sense of " blow," ** stroke/' a
"gentle blowing of wind," then a '* blowing up," "puffing up by wind "
and so on. The latest etymological authority, Kluge (6th ed. 1899), says that
it is first used in modern High German, being properly, however, a low
German word. Now either of these statements would preclude its connection
with the Alphonsine and Italian bi4fa. For, first, it is hardly conceivable
that bu/a could have made its way from the Low German into the southern
romance tongues, and, secondly, buf, as a nard-backgammon term, is older
than the middle High German period. It is likewise notable that the Italian
buffo, which has something like the signification of the German puff, a
" windblowing," something "puffed up," is not only masculine in gender,
but doubles its f, in both of which characteristics it differs from bufa.
Again, it is difiicult to believe that buf\ as a backgammon word, does not
come from south of the Alps, when we bear in mind the very frequent use
of it by the old Italian writers on tables {bufde as, buf de du, buf de temi,
la buf in duobis (a,riifis, and many others in the MSS of Rome and Flor-
as
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258 CHESS IN ICELAyD
ence). Now all this looks as if ftw/a, or bufj in Spanish and Italian, and
pufr,.9is the name given to German backgammon, may be another instance
of the confusion of two words quite different In their origin, like the Ice-
landic hnefl (="fist," the Scotch " nief "), and ?me/i in hnefaiafl, the name
of a game— which we have already discussed (p. 58). But we will quote the
remarks of Kluge, promising that he omits the backgammon signification
of the modern German pw/f— being possessed of the lexicographer's usual
lack of knowledge of technical terms. His first sentence is a quotation
from a previous authority: "2)ic berUhrung der bedeutungen ^blasen* und
^schlagen* ist tiicht ungewohnlich y fvz, ''souffler* und ''souffieV liefen ein naJie-
liegendes beispiel; die ronianischen sprachen besitsen denselben toortstamm* and
he adds: ^'•ohne dasz entlehnung aufeiner seite ansunehmen toare: der stamm
*buf* kann als onomatopoietische schopfung auf beiden gebieten unabhdngig
entstanden sein, Vgl. itaL * buffo* (windstoss)— ' bu/fetare* (schnauben), span,
'bofeiada* {bachensireich):' Wo have mentioned Brachet's opinion that the
stem is of onomatopoetic origin. But the whole question is etymologically
difficult, and cannot well be resolved until we have Italian and Spanish etymo-
logical dictionaries of a high character. As we have hinted, the history of
bufa and buf has much to do with the story of the origin and development
of the European " nard.''
Of the other names, we have dwelt perhaps at sufficient length on
"trictrac" (pp. 185-8) of which "triktrak" and '* trique-traque " are only
variations of orthography, and " tick-tack," " tiquetaque " possibly only
variations of form. Gammon can only come from the English. Verkehren
and verhehrt are presumably translations of the French ret?errt'er— which has
been used, however, in German, in its French shape— although the word re-
verquier, occasionally found in French tor r ever tier looks as if the borrow-
ing might have been done by the French. Lurtsch is, again, most likely a
loan-word from the English (which has it both as a noun and as a verb),
or both the German lurtsch and the English " lurch " may be corruptions
of some older and untraced vocable, having nothing to do with the English
noun and verb in their usual signification. The reader will recall that
'* lurching" is cited as an English word in the British Museum medi»val
Latin MS on tables (see p. 163). Garanguet, or, as one writer has it, grati-
guety we have already seen as a French term. All that can be said of tocca-
tegli (tokkategliy tokadille) has been said in a previous place (p. 224) except
that one eighteenth century writer on the game, after explaining the com-
monly accepted origin of trictrac or tictac, asserts that toccategli expresses a
similar idea, coming von demschlagen Oder treffen der steinc, adding: denn
dieses italUinische wort will jiicJits anders sagen, als ^^berUhrel iTin," **6'cWa-
get tAn." As to lurtsch^ we may get more light on its origin when wo come
to treat the story of English backgammon.
As to the other technical words we shall here pass them over hastily,
noticing, in general, only those which are peculiarly German. Of course, in
the XVIIth and XVIIIth centuries, in games, as in many other cases, French
terms were greatly employed; nor have they been entirely lacking in more
recent days. We thus find Jan and its compounds, plein, bredouille^ d^bre-
dauille)\ point, partie, doublet, not to speak of the names of the dice-pips and
dice-doublets. As to the German terms, pasch has had a sufficient treatment.
The ** coin de repos," or farthest point in the outer table, is called die huk
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STRAY NOTES 250
or die huke (modern die hucke^^' hay-stack," in its ordinary signification);
and sometimes die ruhe-ecke (that is " le coin de repos "); stein is the custo-
mary word foreman;" zunge is used as a general name for each of the
twenty-four " points " of the board ; der band or der bund, applied rather to
the men than to tho point, means a double-point, that is the two or more
men on any one point, and a man so standing, accompanied by another, is
known &&eingebundener stein; on the other hand an exposed man is called
ein blosser, like the English " blot,** a term applied again to the man rather
than to the point; die binde is sometimes the rendering of the French "jan,**
while the "petit jan'* is translated occasionally by schuster, oder das schus-
tern, and the "jan de retour'* is der rilcJ^an; "envoyd k Tecole** is literally
rendered as in die schule geschickt ; becher, or wUrfelbecher, is the ordinary
term for tho dice-box; the fifth and sixth points of the entering or home-
board are called die bUrgerlicheti echen; the French "case du diable** is
called, in one German treatise, der tetifelsband ; in casting the dice, if one
fall on top of the other, or fall askew (not upright), they are said *u brennen
("to burn**); as in French, the men are sometimes designated as hoU
("bois'*). The absence of any descriptive treatise on backgammon before
the XVIIth century makes this rough list of terms very unsatisfactory; such
a treatise would doubtless give us many more indigenous technical ex-
pressions.
The German literature relating particularly to the method of playing
backgammon is not very extensive, nor have we anything of a very early
date; and this is true of the mediaeval " tables ** as well. The earliest special
treatises on backgammop seem to be those found in the " Acad^mie des
jeux ** class of books. It was at Paris in 1654 that the first of the " Acade-
mies** saw the light under the title of "La maison acad^mique,** compiled
by a Sieur D. L. M(ariniere). This was a score of years before Charles Cotton
produced in England (London 1674) the first edition of a similar manual of
social games, which he called " The compleat Gamester,** and nearly a cen-
tury before Edmund Hoyle gave to the world the original issue of his
" Games ** (London, probably in 1740), which still appears from time to time
in England and America under the name of " Hoyle*s games,** but, of course,
much changed in its character and contents. After several issues (the last
at Lyons 1697), the compilation of Marinifere (or was his name La Marini^re,
the la represented by L in his initials?) was finally superseded by the " Royal
jeu de rhombre ** (Paris 1685), of which the editions were printed at Paris,
the Hague, Brussels, Berlin. Amsterdam, the latest bearing the date of 1736.
It was also issued in German, " Das neue kOniglich Tombre,** first of all at
Hamburg in 1708, and thereafter, through the whole of that century down to
the middle of the next, latterly at Liineburg (the very latest edition having
the date of 1845). The earliest German issue at this moment before us is
that of Hamburg 1770 (pp. 360), apparently, though not numbered, the tenth
edition— still styled "Das neue kOniglich Tombre.** The games at cards,
billiards, chess and ball (being tennis and racket) occupy by far the larger
part of the volume, followed by two backgammon games (pp. 292-360). The
first of these has the title: Das verkehren im brettspiel (in numbered sec-
tions I-IX), the other being Das trictrac oder toccateglispiel (divided into
chapters I-IX), the latter occupying the larger space. In beginning the former,
the writer tells us that the game is named verkehren (the verb meaning to
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260 CHESS IN ICELAND
**turn the wrong way," "invert," "reverse") because the player, thinking
himself to have the best of positions, by some slight act of neglect or by
an unlucky cast of the dice, finds it turned or converted (verkehret) into
the worst. There are two methods of playing it, and the players must decide
at the outset which they will adopt— either to carry on the game with only
five single men (that is, " blots ") or with only five double points. In the
former case, each player must have played five men from the point on which
his men are originally heaped or stacked, before being permitted to form a
double point (band) ; in the latter, each player is allowed to make only five
double points; but should he, by error or otherwise, make more than five
they can be *' hit " by his opponent as if they were only single. The fifteen
men are placed, at the beginning, on the first point at the extreme left hand
of each player's adversary, the point being called the Jiatis or mahl (moZ).
A player may advance two men as far as is allowed by the number of pips
on each die, or he may add the sum of the pips and move one man as many
points as the combined pips amount to. Doublets are counted twice (two fives
as four fives, for instance), and from one to four men may thus be moved on
casting them. Blots may be hit and the captured men thrown out for re-
entrance to the board (into the board, as it would seem, in which the player's
mal was) in accordance with the throws of the dice. It would look as if
only one captured man could be re-entered upon the same point, for the rule
is laid down that, when a player has more men out than there are vacant
places on which to enter them, he is said to be made a Junker^ or, as it
might be expressed, to be " junkered." A player cannot play so long as he
has men unentered. A player cannot form a double point on his oppo-
nent's side of the board, except on the hucke, which is described as the
eleventh point from the mal. We have such irregularities in the gender
and form of the name of this important point as are implied by the use of
diese hucke in one paragraph and in dem huch in the next. In a player's
own side, in both halves of the board, he makes his double points, moving
them as far as possible unbroken from left to right, until, he comes to the
final throwing of them off. When the game has proceeded so far that one
player has hit and thrown out so many of his adversary's men that the
.latter has no double points on his board, the former has won a " single,"
or " simple." When this state of things doesn't occur, then the player who
has first thrown all his men off wins a " simple." If a player has captured
so many men of the opponent's men, and his double points are so united
that the latter can no longer find a point on which to re-enter, then the
former wins a '^ double " and is said to become a jdhn (Jean), or to be
'^John'd," as it has been styled in English in the same variety of back-
gammon (there called '» verquere ") in the " Compleat Gamester," as we
have already noted (see p. 189). " Doubles " are also won in other ways.
There are rules given about moving or throwing off men towards the end
of the gdime, when they have all reached the fourth quarter, very similar to
those applied in the ordinary English backgammon. The second treatise
is on trictrac or toccategli (pp. 316-360). The text of this is virtually iden-
tical, except in respect to a certain typographical arrangement, with that
forming a brochure (which we shall shortly notice), published separately
three years later than the date of this issue of "L'hombre." The game
described is, excepting a few modern alterations and additions, the '* Grand
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STRAY NOTES 261
trictrac," or complicated French variety, which we have heretofore imper-
fectly described (pp. 180-182). The terminology is in general, either French
(with the various Jans) or a kind of French- German, like marqmren, de»*
marsch^ marquirte points. We find partie d^bredouille, Jan auf drey toUrfe,
contrqjan^ jan van seeks bldttem, doppeldoubletteuy der Jan der nicht kann,
schulen machen, teufelsband^ hurgerwinkel or burgerhucKe (these last being
the two points 5 and 6 nearest the bar, which might, perhaps, be roughly
rendered ^* bar-points *'). The compiler of this last essay begins by giving
us some etymological information, a part of which we have learned before,
declaring that trictrac is derived from two Greek words xp^^ and xpa^i!)^
it being so called on account of the difficulty of mastering it. It is said by
some to be more rightly designated trictrac or tictac^ on account of the
clatter made in playing it. Thereupon he gives the origin and meaning of
the word ioccategliy which we have recently cited. Whenever the toccateglie
(as it is generally here written) variety differs from trictrac proper, the
variation is stated in a foot note. After the first treatise on verkehren
(pp. 308-314) follows a Dutch poem containing advice to the player (signed
at the end by the initials ^'I. G. K."); it is accompanied by an anonymous
German metrical version on opposite pages. This latter is here reproduced
in a foot note. ^^ The Dutch original will be given in treating backgammon
in Holland.
*"* Th« title of th« German tmniiUtion If ** AoweUung zam Terkehren ; " It eomprleea
58 lines (two more than are In the Dutch original) :
Ihr freunde horet sa, liebhaber vom verkehren,
H5rt melnen nnterrleht, und wae leh each will lebren,
Seut fleleiiff itelne ab, wenn Ibr das tplel anfangt,
Daiiilt ihr in dem brei die eeke glelch eriangt.
Sehlagt ohne vorthetl nioht, wenu ihr glelch kOnnot relehen,
Man muss oft wiederum mit grosien sehadcn weichen.
Reisst, wenn Ihr schlagen kSnnt, sogleieb die bftndo nicht,
Man bauet allsu schleoht, wo hols and grund gebrleht.
Werft nicht, bis contrapart die steloe hat gesetset,
Wer spejt gem wieder aas, was ihu suYor ergOttet,
Rfn ander nimmt es glelch sa seinem vorth«ll etn,
Und iehrat ans sa sp&t mift sehaden king su seyn.
Bait enro b&nde feet, Terlaaft eueh nieht su welt,
Setat nicht fOnf stelae blosx, wo nicht die aoth geboat:
Splelt redlieh, sonder falseh, das nnrecht soil hlor passen,
So wie Ihr each es nleht wollt wiederfahren lessen.
Setst seehs and viere gut, wie man doabletten macht,
Die einqaen slnd nicht schleeht, nar nohmet each In acht,
AUwo sle miUsen stebn, imglelehen seehs uud drey,
Was man nieht wehren kann, steht nicht sa setxen frey.
Bevor ihr werft, so seht, was gut and sehleeht sa wagen,
AUsdann so splelet friseh and aach mit mladerm sagen.
Ich hab es erst galernt, da mir ein braver mann
EIn fltsehen batter leleht doreh solehes abgewan.
BeUt nieht verw&gea aus, wenn Ihr es anders kOnnet,
Sonst furchtet, dass Ihr selbst lelcht ins gefangnlsx rennet.
Doch kOnnt ihr sicher seyn, and lachet each das gltlek,
So splelet, aber sleht bey noth aach wohl sarttek.
Splelt elnor each sa king ; welch kinger wird sich wagen,
Mit einem starken kerl, sleh ohne noth sa sehlagen ?
Und splelt Ihr aaf credit, so sehreibt nicht sa g«sehwinde,
DasB, wenn Ihr anch Terllert, man eoeh nicht sornlg (Inde.
Beym credeeplelen kanne nieht eoader sehaden eayn,
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CHESS IN ICELAND
In a still earlier issue of Das neue konigliche Vhomhre-spiel (as it is styled
on the title-page), that of Hamburg 1737 (supposed tabe the fourth edition),
the backgammon section, as afterwards, closes the volume (pp. 291-318).
The first page of this part is in the shape of a bastard title: Das verkehren
im bretlspiel recht und wohl su spielen, samt denen grundregeln. This is
followed (292-6) by the Dutch poem, and (297-301) its translation, and then by
a description of verkehren^ tcxtually the same as in the later issues. There
is as yet no account of the irictrac-toccaiegli game, from which we may
possibly conclude that the oldest German variety of the modern backgam-
mon is verkehren. To this 1737 issue is prefixed a pretty copperplate front-
ispiece, in the style of the day, portraying groups of players at chess, cards,
backgammon, billiards, tennis, the backgammon-board being precisely like
the ordinary folding-ones of our own time.
Another edition of " Das neue kdnigliche Thombre," also under our eye,
is that of Hamburg 1783, which, though stated, like the other one, on its
title-page to be a Neu vei^esserte und vermehrte au flags, exhibits few im-
provements and few additions. The edition is not numbered, but, according
to the list published by Van der Linde, must be at least the Ilth of the
German series. So far especially as the backgammon pages are concerned,
the modifications in the descriptions of the two games are very slight, but
the Dutch poem, '* Ordonantie op't verkeeren,'* as well as the German render-
ing of it, is omitted. The volume has a larger page (there are 275 in all),
but the printing and paper are much inferior. The opening of the trictrac
treatise varies somewhat in this issue, the etymological first paragraph
being omitted; for it are substituted five lines stating the slight differences
between trictrac and toccategli, abbreviated from the foot note to be men-
tioned in the next paragraph but one.
It may be well to mention that the oldest issue^of the " Neue k5nigliche
riiombre spiel,'' published, as we have stated, at Hamburg in 1708, has a
Detwegen thut •• nleht, «■ sind iwey gef«n eln.
Dooh UMet den verdrass niobt aoa den augen spftrcn,
Man kann aoch intt geduld oft waa naeh haas« fabren.
Sohwalgt, nvann eln an der tplelt, ei lettat nar rerdraM,
Wonn ibr so andern tprccbt, und Icb verapiolen mniia.
Zumal, wana eontrapart arht iteine noob surlleke,
■ Und nfobtt Terlaafen bat, ao aofaweigt bey aolebem glQckc.
RIn klnger ttaut dabey riel boaaer, daas er aebwclgt,
Und aieb genihtg hftlt, ala actne bl5«ie eeigt.
Seht Ofters livjiaa buob, dat belaxt : anf eure aaokeu.
So kann man allot leloat In eel ten riobtig roachen.
Seyd artig In dem spiel, modest In den raanteren,
Und lasit, wenn ihr reraptoU eaeb nlcht den corn verfnbren.
Ja flaeht and sebwttret nieht, seyd im gestebte frey ;
Dean sanersobn iat sebleebt, ob glelch eriaubt dabey.
Spreobt wohl tou Jedermann, er sey da odor nicht,
Und well aueb der gewlnnst nocb kelue rent bersprlctat,
So praleC nieht dabay, eo triift cam Ofterii etn,
Heat pflegt eln apieler releh and morgen arm «a seyn.
Und endlleh wenn Ihr oplelt, ao nchmt kein falaebea geld,
Hingegen aahlt anoh ao, dasx es die wage bait.
Verkehren iat eln spiel, ao edel und ao worthy
Daas, war mit raeht gewlnnt, recht gate mans begehrt.
Indeaien lebot wohl, ihr fronnde roa ▼erkehren,
Und splelet nun geeehlckt, naeh wohl gegebnei lehren.
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STRAY NOTES 263
frontispiece portraying, above, a tennis court with players, and, below, a
round table at which five persons are engaged at cards; on the floor lie an
open backgammon-board and other implements of games. The full title (in
red and black) is (we retain the typographical features) : " Das Neue E5nig-
licho THombre Spiel, Auch wie Espadille For^^, L'Hombre selb Ander,
selb Dritte und selb FiinfTen nach jetziger Manier zu spielen; wobey ncbst
noch andern Carten-Spielen beygefiiget: Das Pilcken-Tafel, Das Schach,
Das Ballen-Spiel, Und Das Verkehren im Brett. Mit Erklarung der Worter,
welcher man sich bey don Splclen gebrauchet.— Hamburg, Bey Benjamin
Schillern, 1708.'' The unnumbered folio after the title-folio (that is the
third) has the " Vorrede" and the •' Innhalt." Then come "Thombre" and
other games, the pagination being irregular, as is sometimes the case with
old books. It goes on all right to page 216, and then changes to 127 (in
the middle of the section on "Ballen-Spiel'*), and the new numeration
continues to the final page 167 (which, properly, should be 267). In tlie
course of the erroneous pagination occurs the division of backgammon.
"Ballon-Spiel" ends on p. 135, with a blank reverse. The next page,
[137] =237, is a new title-page: "Das Verkehren Im Bret-Spiel Recht
und wohl zu spielen, Samt denon Grund-Regeln. [Vignette]— Hamburg,
Anno 1708." On the reverse of this the text opens (p. 138), with the poem,
Ordonnantie op" t Ve^-keeren, beginning:
Aen boort Yrienden, aen hoort Beroinders vftn't rerkeeren,
ending at the bottom of page 143 [=243J with the initials " I. G. K." On
page 144 follows its German version with a heading which we reproduce
exactly: " Denen Liebhabern zum Vergniigen, hat man die Regeln folgender
Gestalt ins Hochteutsche iibersetzt." Hereupon succeeds the translation
(with no hint of the translator's name) commencing:
Ihr Frcande boret zu, Liebbaber von Vorkehren,
and ending on page 150 (=250) with a phrase in large type in order to fill
a too -vacant space: Mehres hievon findet der geneigte leser in folgenden
zu seinem Unterricht. After that follows (pages 151 = 251 — 167=267) the
prose description of the game, precisely as in the edition of 1737, which we
have already summarized. In this "Verkehren" portion there is likewise
some irregular paginal numeration. After page 151 [=251] the numbers
run 152, 143, 145, 151, 156, and then regularly to the end (143 = 153, 145=154,
151=155). The words, verkehren im brett^ in the two title-pages, perhaps
throw as much light on the origin of the name as can be gleaned by re-
search. The verb vei^kehren means to "come and go," "pass and repass,"
"reverse," "invert;" "passing and repassing in the board," or "reversing
in the board " may possibly be the original signification as nearly as we
can define it. The second edition (Hamburg, Bey Benjamin's Schillers
Wittwe 1715) has the same frontispiece. . At the end of the title proper (after
geb7'auchet) is inserted this additional matter: "Mit mtiglichster Accuratesse
nach der neuesten Frantzdsischen Edition durchgesehen und an vielen Orten
verbessert." The erroneous paging in the first part is repea^ted (which is
singular, as the volume is wholly reprinted). The section devoted to back-
gammon is likewise newly printed but with its erroneous pagination cor-
rected, and yet its special title-page still bears the date: "Anno 1708."
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264 CHESS IN ICELA ND
The volume ends with a supplement of 71 pages, with title-page and text
in both French and German, containing the novel matter alluded to on the
main title-page, being "Decisions novelles" relating to "Thombre." The
title-page to this bears the date of 1715. In this second edition the back-
gamihon part is virtually unchanged; for the longer heading at the begin-
ning of the German rendering of the Dutch poem, is substituted simply the
words: *^ Teutsche Ubersetzung/' With some regularity there was published
at Berlin, from 1797 to 1820, an annual under the general title of Spielal-
vianack. This was under the editorship, first of one Julius Casar, secondly
(beginning with 1810) of G. W. von Abenstein (both of which names Van
der Lindo declares to be pseudonyms). Wo add a description of one issue,
which chances to be at our service. Its title is: ^* Spielalmanach fiir karten-
schach-bret-billard-kegel-und ball-spieler zum selbstunterrichte von Julius
Casar.— Nach den griindlichsten regeln und gesetzen durchaus verbessert
und mit neuen spielen vermehrt von G. W. v. Abenstein. — icaidia toiv
itovcuv Yj8o3p.a Spiel ist die wiirze der arbeit. Plutarch, — Berlin, bei Gottfr.
Hayn. 1810.'' This is the first volume of the continuation by ''Abenstein'*
of the ** Julius Ciisar" series of the "Spielalmanach." How far its con-
tents are those of the preceding issues wc cannot say. It comprises 396 pa-
ges, of which pages 322-345 are devoted to das tohkateglispiel. The first
third of the article forms the ioccategli portions of the ** Hans Helling"
Buch der spiele, on which we have commented— neglecting, however to say
that the English word 7tiatch is used, as we have found it used in another
foreign language, to signify the highest kind of a winning, namely a "qua-
druple." " Helling " has been copied, as far as near the bottom of page 331.
Thereafter we are presented with twenty-four numbered pieces of advice as
to the proper playing of the game, of which we translate the earlier ones
as specimens: 1. If, in the beginning, you throw dice with fewer than seven
points fin all] try for the little Schuster [that is, the little Jan, or six
combined double points in the home-board]. 2. But if your dice result in
more than seven points, try for the possession of the hucke [that is the
final or eleventh point from your massed men], 3. Endeavour to form a
barrier of six covered points in the second quarter of the board. 4. Prevent
your adversary from making a barrier (sumachen), which can only be done
by getting a double (covered) point in his board. These observations are
all clearly written, and contain one or two noticeable points. Thus wo
learn, in the twenty-first paragraph, that when the dice run against a
player, and he cannot unite a barrier of six adjoining covered points, the
position is called an enfUade, Tables of the chances of throwing combina-
tions of the different dice-numbers (pages 336-7), and observations on them
(pages 338-40) then follow; thirteen numbered rules of play {gesetze des
tokhaieglispieles) terminate (pages 340-343) the section. The almanach is
well-printed, and has on its cover- title a vignette showing a section of a
billiard-table, with cues, cards, chess-men etc. lying upon it.
The following anonymous pubblication must be here briefly noticed:
"Neueste anleitung wie die trictrac und toccateglie-spiele recht und wohl zu
spielen. — Mit allergnadigsten privilegiis. — Niirnberg, bey Johann Eberhard
Zeh, 1773." It is a small octavo of 48 pages. To the end of page 46, it seems
(with two slight exceptions) word for word the same as the treatise on the
same game, or games, in the " L'hombre " book of 1770. The first difference
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STRAY NOTES 265
is a foot-note to the first page of the text as follows: Das triclrac^ oder vote
man es auch sonstcn nennet grand trictrac^ ist ton dem toccategli-spiel in
vielen unierschieden^ und muss also mit selhigen nicht vermenget toerden.
Dann, so unterscfieidet sich dieses von jenem i. in schlagen^ 2, zahlen oder
merken^ und 3, im fortrOcken oder bande machen, vole unten bey gelegenheit
hin und xoieder^ too es von dem trictrac abgehet, angemei'ket werden soil,
Dann ausser diesen drey en stUcken toird es gespielt wie das trictrac. The
othor distinguishable feature of the ** Neue anleitung'' is that here the small
dissimilarities between the two varieties, mentioned on the title-page, are
described in more or less brief paragraphs inserted here and there, in
SDiallcr type, in the text. The text is mainly occupied with trictrac, but
whenever a feature occurs, which is not exactly the same in toccategli, the
difference in character, or in the method of play, is explained in these
inserted notes. As we have given the reader to understand, these little
toccategli notes, in both the 1770 and 1783 editions of "L'hombre'' are
remanded to the bottoms of the pages. The last two pages (47-8) of the
work are occupied (probab)y in order to fill the unused space), with' an
account of the Italian " mora,'' here named das fingerspiel, which is called
both ein besonderes spiel and dieses locherliche spiel. What are the real
relations between the essay which forms the substance of this volume, and
the almost identical essay in Das neue kdnigliche Vhombre, cannot, in the
present state of our knowledge, be decided. Perhaps there may have been
an earlier edition of the little book, which was subsequently made a part
of "L'hombre; " or perhaps the publisher or editor of the book wanted to
produce a volume solely devoted to what he conceived to be the principal
game of backgammon, and found the easiest way to do that was to reprint
the trictrac- toccategli section of the German " academic.'*
The next German work devoted specially to backgammon is of a higher
character than any of those heretofore described. Its title is: "Zwei brett-
spiele. — Das toccategli- und das gammon-spiel. — Li'ineburg, im verlage
von Herold und Wahlstab. 1804 '' — an octavo of XVI, 147 pages, besides a
page of errata and a folding-plate. It is dedicated by the nameless author
to the Gerichtswalter von Bremen zu BeverRtedt, his frequent adversary at
backgammon. It is preceded (pp. III-XI) by an introduction of considera-
ble interest. After some praise of toccategli- oder wie man gewohnlich zu
sprcchen pflegty loccadille-spiel^ and some answers to those wlio criticize or
condemn it, the author states that ho has been unable to find, in any lan-
guage known to him, a clear and comprehensible guide to the game. He then
says that Alles was ith in bUchern oder almanachen u. s, ic. die anleitungen zu
spielen enthalten, davon findety ist grosstentheils nichts atuiers als ein aus ter-
icechselung, vermischung und verwirrung der regeln des frantosischen trictrac
mit denen dcs toccategli efitstandeti, ?«tr, undjeden toccategli-spieler dessen
urtkeil darUber zu horen ich gelegenheit hatte^ unverstdndliches chaos. For
this reason he has decided to compile a new manual. After explaining his
method of describing the game, be states, in the final paragraph (VIII) of his
introduction, his reasons for also giving an account of the game of gammon.
We translate: '' I have added a short explanation of another table- game less
generally known in Germany, which, however, gives entertainment to the
Englishman, so venturesome and so sagacious in his sports, as well as to
the less active Portuguese, Spaniard and Italian. It may be that its name
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266 CHESS IN ICELAND
at least is not so unknown to us Germans, since it was tho favorite diversion
of the good Primrose, the rural clergyman of Wakefield.'' He closes by saying
that gammon is an easier game than toccategli^ and does not admit the number
of changes which are constantly taking place in the latter variety; and he
has therefore been able to fully explain it in much less space than he has
felt obliged to give to its more elaborate rival. The style of the book is
clear, grave and pleasing; the arrangement of the matter is excellent; and
the typography is very neat. In the essay on ioccategU hardly any French
terms are used, the "jans,'' "bredouiller " and so on having disappeared.
The author's intelligence is manifest in many ways, in none more noticeably
than in his knowledge that our English backgammon {toutes tables) is much
played in Portugal and Spain; we have, in another place, called attention to
the fact that one of the most frequent Portuguese names of backgammon,
gamaoy is derived fipom the English ** gammon, " Another indication of his
superior capacity (much in advance of his generation) is the record (pp. 141-147),
with critical notes, of three games o( gammon, or English backgammon, by
means of a simple and easy method of notation akin to that employed in Ger-
many for writing down games of chess. Even yet — a century later — no
manual treating backgammon, published anywhere in tha English-speaking
world, has published records of games at backgammon, or suggested tho
possibility of such a thing.
There are issued, we believe, in the German lands, from time to time,
small and indifferently compiled manuals devoted to tabic, social and other
games. Some pass through many editions, being often stereotyped. In that
case, to conceal the fact that they are not fresh publications they are very
generally undated. One such chances to be available for a hasty description.
It is called: liuch der spiele gesellsckaftspiele im simmer mid im freien fur
ycwachsene und kinder. Von Hans Helling, Berlin, without date. It is a fair
sized octavo of 128 pages, selling for a single mark. Two backgammon va-
rieties are here described (pp. 7-13), and there is a very crude wood-cut of a
board. The first game is named jmff. This resembles the game known as
** Russian backgammon " in England and America. It is likewise played in
Germany, as we shall shortly see. This puff is doubtless meant for it, but
differs in one or two of the minor rules, as is apt to be the case in different
lands in nearly all table games, except possibly chess, in which the same
laws and methods now prevail at least in all European countries and in their
colonies. It is singular, however, tliat the oldest German appellation for
backgammon {puff, or pvffspiel) should here be bestowed upon a variety,
which is generally regarded as modern, and appears to be comparatively little
known to the Latin world. The other variety treated in this little hand-
book is iokkategli. The account is rather meagre, but we have many of the
terms with which we have already become familiar, partly half-foreign: tho
old names of the doublets, as bezel or ambesas, double deux, temes and so
on; die hucke oder rtikeche ; spielmarke (instead of the French "marquer"),
a metal token for marking the game; blosse ("blots"), single men standing
on points; doublette (instead ofpasch, used in describing the previous variety);
Schuster or der Meine jan ; der grossc Jan ; riicl^an ; and band (" covered
point," whereas the "double point," which is the sAme thing, is denominated
ein bund in the account of puff). We translate a few of the rules and defin-
tions to show its resemblance to the Grand trictrac, treated in the French
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STRA Y NOTES 267
backgammon section of this volume: *' The counting [with the spielmarke]
takes place when I have hit a blot; I then make one on the board by placing
my ^ marker' in front of the head of the first point in my second compart-
ment, advancing it one with every blot hit; if I have passed the * marker'
through my twelve points, and my opponent has hit no blot, then I have
won a ^quadruple;' has he meanwhile hit a blot once or twice, then I win
a 'triple,' if three or four times then I gain only a 'double,' if seven
times then I can only count a 'simple.' If a player has thus marked twelve
then it rests with him whether the game shall be continued or not. If a
player hits a blot with doublets, the ' marker * is advanced two more points.
One cannot occupy the adversary's ' coin de repose ' {hucke) witli a single
man ; it can only bo occupied by two men, either by means of a doublet,
or by two men, which, in accordance with the dice thrown, can be moved
thither at once. If I have established in my second board six successive
double points (geschlossene bo.nde), called a schusier, or ' the little jan,' or
' the little closure ' (sumacfien)^ then I mark two, and this with every throw
of my opponent until I am obliged to break up my six double points. The
second board, or compartment of the opponent is called 'the great jan,' and
his first board ' the counter jan ' {rnr.ltjan). Into the second field of my
adversary I cannot place a single man ('blot'), so long as he maintains
what is styled his force^ that is, so long as he can make six successive
double points with his men.'* These sentences, made at random, prove that
the game is that known in France as " tric-trac," having all the complicated
features of that variety.
One of the best of the more recent German handbooks of games bears
the long title: Buck der sjyieL Encyklopfidie stimtliclier hekannten spiele und
if Titer JialiungS'Weisen fUr alle kreise. Gesellschafis- und schersspiele alter art^
orakelspiele^ ball- und reifenspiele^ sportspiele, hegelspiele, tanzspiele^ domino
und lotto^ hrcit-und positionspiele^ schachspiel, billardspiel, loUrfel- und kar~
tenspieli patieficen und karienkunstsiUcke u. s, w. Herausgegeben unter
mitioirkung erfnhrener fachmfinner von Alban von Hahn. DtHtte auflage.
Mil 277 abbildungen. IsCipzig, Verlag von Otto Spamer. 1900. This third
edition (the first appeared in 1894) is a good-sized octavo of XIV -h 507 pages,
well printed, well arranged, well indexed, and in some parts well illustrated.
Notwithstanding its assertion to the contrary on the title-page, it can
hardly be possible that experienced experts, of the first class, have contrib-
uted greatly to improve its backgammon section, which, it may also be
stated, has not a single illustration, not even a cut of the backgammon -
board. The section is, in many respects, behind that devoted to merelles
{das mUhlespiel), of which we have given some account (pp. 145>6). It
contains descriptions (pp. 256-266), of varieties bearing the names of das
lange puff^ triktrak, garanguet, tokkaiegli {tokkadille), gammon, revertier^&
list which may be regarded as summing up all the methods of playing this
ancient table-game now practiced among the German nationalities. The
first game is das lange puff and is virtually the same as puff in the Buch
der spiele of Helling, just noticed, that is the " Russian backgammon." The
description is here fuller and more exact. The backgammon boaid is spoken
of as "the puffbret usually found in the inner side of the well-known
draught-board," the allusion being to the folding chess-board, on the inside
of which is a backgammon board. To decide on the beginner both parties
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268 CHESS IN ICELAND
cast the two dice, and the higher number confers the privilege of the first
play. This throw is called general-pctsch and must be marked down, since
its recurrence later gives the thrower a special indulgence, as will hereafter
be explained. The men are entered in accordance with the numbers of dico-
pips turned up. The play commences in the field at the remote left of one
player and at the remote right of the other. The men of neither player can
be moved until they are all entered. Thereafter the player may move two
men according to the pips of each die, or one man according to the sum of
the pips. When doublets are thrown, they may be played twice, then the
doublets on the other side are played twice, whereupon the player is also
entitled to another cast. Should gcneral-pasch be thrown by either player
he may then also play the exposed pips twice, and afterwards the pips on
the opposite sides of the dice likewise twice. Blots may be hit, though in
such a way that the capturing man, which takes the place of the captured
and consequently thrown-out piece, must remain on the point firom which
the captured man has been removed, and cannot be advanced further until
the next cast of the dice. The captured man must be re-entered on the
entering board, and until this be done the player to whom it pertains cannot
move any of his men. A double point (with two men) is called a bund. If
a player have five hUnde adjoining each other, his opponent can only pass
the row with double sixes, {sechs-p<tsch), since the lower number on the dice
must be first played; therefore five-six, for instance, will not permit him to
pass his man over tho united bUnde. Arriving at the fourth field, the men
are thrown off, in accordance with the pips turned up, and the player whose
men are first ofT the board wins. The writer states that another method of
playing this variety consists in both players entering their men in the same
table, moving in the same direction and throwing them out in the same
quarter of the board, lying opposite, of course, to that in which they started.
This mode, in consequence of the obstacles offered by the double points
{bUnde) of each player to tho movements of the other, and by reason of the
more frequent captures of men, is more lively and interesting than the other,
and demands greater forethought and more careful planning. Whether this
game be the same as that styled " the long,'' or der lange puffy by writers
of the XVlth and XVIIth centuries whom we have cited, is not to be easily
determined. If it be, then what we have mentioned as the quite modern
'* Russian game" (not so named, so far as we are informed, outside of
America) must be of greater antiquity than we have supposed. The second
game is the "grand trictrac;'' the description is a good specimen of con-
densation, the terms largely French, sometimes translated. The writer
speaks of one of the ** Jans'' as der rehompens^an oder der j an dei* belohn-
ung^ and also of berUhrtes holt, in bredouille sein, and the grosse bredouille.
At the end is a serviceable wurftabelle des triktrah^ skewing the points to
be marked at all the possible turns of the game. The section concludes by
saying that in trictrac " quick observation and exact calculation and combi-
nation of all possibilities '' are essential. The third variety is garangtieu
which we have already briefly described (p. 182). The fourth is tokkateali
{tokkadUle), the compiler confining himself to the few differences which
distinguish it from triktrak^ upon which we have previously dwelt (p. 265).
The fifth is gammon^ the rules given varying slightly but not materially
from those laid down for the customary English game, which variations
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STRAY NOTES 269
have been previously noted. The sixth and last garno is revertier (that is,
verkehren)^ the description of which coincides with that in the three issues
of Das konigliche Vhorribre^ which we have examined. The regulation requir-
ing beforehand the choice of one of two methods of play is here omitted,
and the term's jrVzw hn&'jnnhev are not employed. There is no mention of
the fact that this variety of backgammon is, or has been called in German
verkehren. In fact there is no historical or literary information in regard
to any of the table-games included in the volume, except in the four or five
pages of introductory matter to the section devoted to chess. But the same
may be said in regard to the articles on other table games in all the cyclo-
p.'pdias, in whatever language or country they may have been published.
In fact, as has been hinted, no histories of backgammon or the morris-game
could have been heretofore written, because nobody has taken the pains to
study or to read those portions of the many Latin, Spanish, Italian and
French manuscripts in the great libraries, which treat of those games in
common with chess- They have been made use of only by writers o'n the
story of chess. As for the minor old games, like draughts and fox-and-
geese, very little has been written on the origin and development of the
f()rmer, and nothing in reference to the latter. Even the folklorist, to
whose province the study of these more popular games, of such wide extent,
properly belongs, has not devoted much time or thought to them. There is,
we must not forgot to say, another manual of games in German, like the
one which we have just reviewed, which claims to be especially historical.
The copy we are consulting, as will be noted, is of the fifth (and latest)
edition. We reproduce its long title: " Encyklopadie der spiele enthaltend
die bekanntesten karten-, brett-, kegel-, billard-, ball-, rasen-, wiirfel-
spiele und schach. Gri'indliche anweisung zur erlcrning dieser spiele, ncbst
angabe ihres geschichtlichen ursprungs. Mit einer geschichtlichen einleitung.
Von Friedrich Anton. — Fiinfte Auflage. — Leipzig verlag von Otto Wigand.
1889."' It is arranged not by classes of games, cards, table-games and so on,
but alphabetically in a real cyclop?edic style. It looks very complete, for it
not only includes draughts and merelles {milhU), but such games as the
Japanese ** go " and the Italian " mora.'* It deserves some credit, too, as
the first book of its class, which even affects to treat its subjects historic-
ally. It opens with a general introduction of ten pages on gaming, in
which the laws against it from very early times are hastily p lanced at.
After this there is a chapter, with many historical references, on ** cards as
the most important means of playing or gaming '' (Die ktirien als wichtu/ps-
sjiiclmittel) ; this includes a brief sketch of the introduction of cards into
Europe, the different character of those first used in difl'erent lands, and
explanations of the origin and signification of the names given to the four
suits (hearts, clubs etc.); this is followed by a note on the technical terms
common to most card-games. This is pretty much the sum of all the histor-
ical matter contained in the book. Now and then the opening line, or lines,
of a section contain an attempt at the historical, such as the first phrase
of the section occupied with tohkadille: *'• Die aus Italien statnmende iokka-
dille toird auf dem puffbrett gespielW and that's the whole histol'y of tokha-
dille. The longest introduction in the body of the book is that prefixed to
rric/rac— being a page devoted sur geschichte des iriHracs, all about the
Phoenicians, the abb<J Bartliel^my, the Greeks and Romans, the contention
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270 CHESS liY ICELA ND
of Germany and Franco for the honour of the game's invention, the origin
of its name— but nothing showing any research beyond the pages of the
nearest cyclopasdia. The backgammon varieties treated we glance at in their
order: gammon (pp. 219-222) comes from England {stammt aus England)^ was,
however, played for a time in France under the obsolete name of " toutes-
tables''— but not a word about its revival in that country; the game is
still a favorite in England. This is more than an averagely fair specimen
of the book's endeavors to write history. After it follows an abridged de-
scription of the game. Garanguet occupies ten lines (p. 222); it is played
with three dice; if the dice show a doublet (ein pasch) it is played doubly,
but only when the sum of its points are greater than those of the third die.
Jacquet (p. 295), fifteen lines in all; each player places his men on the corner
point at the right in the opposite board; the player must continue to carry
forward his men until they have reached the table opposite that in which
they wore originally placed: then he can play as he pleases, although it is
difficult to imagine in what this liberty consists other than bearing his men.
t^fr (PP- 403-5); it is spoken of as das heliebte puff; the description is of
the briefest, being less than two pages, beginning with a word or two on
the difference between das larige pu/f and das contr&re. Reveriier (pp. 428-432) ;
etymology, Latin " revertere; " names of the doublets; the mass of the men
entered on the first point of the board, on beginning the game, is styled der
haufen^ '^ the heap;" the final (eleventh) point in that board is known as
der kopf^ "the head;" pdsche is used as the plural of lya^ch; Uberb&nder
seem to be the men above two on covered points, but they are also called
matadors^ since they serve to attack the opponent's blots without making a
blot on one's own point; finally the method of bearing the men and finish-
ing the game is described in some detail. Tokhadille (pp. 583-586) comes
from Italy; it is played with thirty men, sometimes with thirty-two; the
latter resembles the former, but is more risky especially by reason of the
contimuLlion, which is the privilege of going on with a game, after having
scored twelve points (really a game) by crossing over into the enemy's
board, and keeping up the play there for a more complete victory; partic-
ularly important is the formation of barriers of six continuous covered
points, preventing the opponent's advance; as in the "grand trictrac,"
which tokkadille so closely re^mbles, the rules and methods of marking the
scdlres are very complicated; the hucke, which can only be occupied by
moving into it two men at once, plays a great r6le. Trictrac (pp. 593-622),
occupies two thirds of the whole backgammon space.; the description of the
game is quite full, with the French terms partly translated, as usual; a
point on the board is called pfeil, *' arrow; the customary romance names for
the doublets are employed, except that deuces are styled doppeUwei ; Frencli,
too, are many of the names of the Jans, of the talon, bredouilley enfilade :
some of the explanations are new and clearer as: 7nan ne7mt den kleineti
Jan die erste tafel Oder abtheilung, in u>elcher die steif^e aufgesteUt toerden,
weil man darin den kleinen Jan Oder kleineti voll (" plein ") machi, and so
yvMh the grosse Jan And grosse voll; vergeltungs-Jan or helonungs-Jan are
both employed for the French "jan de recompense;" blank signifies a
" blot;" there is the customary tablis (pp. 619-10) of the points to be scored
for the different operations on the board {tarif Uber die loUrfe); besides the
tetifelsband, another covered point, which is valuable to make with the
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STRAY NOTES 271
oarly throws of the dice, is the tenth point (counting from the talati)^ because
it enables the player to check, in many ways, the movements of the adversary
and is hence named the "double point of observation" {observatUmsband) :
this is sometimes known as the Tr'avanisband, because tho marquis de
Travanis, a very strong trictrac player, was the first, under certain circum-
stances of the game, to establish this point, in opposition to the rules and
practice prevailing in his day, and thereby won considerable sums. The
earlier players were wont to leave this point uncovered to the last, or to a
later stage of the game, and styled it the "scholar's point'* (schuUrband).
It is probable that this division of the book is a translation, more than
usually well-made, from some French n^nual, with rather too many of tho
French terms left ungermanized. The whole " Encyklopadie," with its 650
pages, was well- planned, but the editor lacked both the ability and proper
assistance to carry out properly his design. The illustrations are very scanty
and of meagre quality. The "• Buch der Spiele "' of von Hahn is not only
newer but superior.
Before bringing to an end the rough sketch hei*e given of the forms
assumed by nard-tables-backgammon in Germany we ought to say a
word on the lack of productions, in general German literature, in which
this diversion is made to play a part. We have in Italian the backgammon
episode in Parini's **Giorno," and in French the novelette of Merrira^e, but
there is nothing in German, so far as we know, which compares with them;
and yet the game has been quite as common among the Germans as amon^
their neighbours. There is indeed an early German version of Parini's poem,
which must be of considerable rarity, since in the three or four German
book-collections in which we have sought it, the volume was not to be had.<^^
Of the history and practice of backgammon in Holland, a country very
nearly akin to Germany, little can be said without more extended researches
than the writer has been able to make. The story of the game must have run
here very much as in Germany. The mcdiajval tables was probably played,
and references to it doubtless occur in the popular epics, the knightly verse,
the chanson de geste, tho dramas, the satires, and the moralizing pieces,
which were as numerous during the early centuries in the lower regions of
tiie Rhino as in the upper. The game has been very likely influenced both
by France and Germany. From the former it got the name of one if its two
most common varieties, and from Germany that of the other. These seem to
be tikiak {trik-irak is not to be found in most of the dictionaries) and
verkeer (verkeerspel). One noticeable thing is that both these words occur
as verbs as well as nouns. Tiktakken means to play at iihJtak^ and verkeeren
signifies to play the verkeerspel ; this linguistic peculiarity extends to other
games, schaaken (from schadk^ schaakspel) is " to play chess.*' and dammen
(from daw, damspel) is " to play at draughts.*' How much these verbal
forms are now used may be a matter of doubt, but they were common
enough two or three generations ago. The names of the backgammon ac-
cessories are: tiktahbord^ verkeerbord^ or simply spelbord; streep (etymolo-
gically ** strip " or " stripe ") is the only word we have found to indicate
the twenty four '* points" of the backgammon table; taerling (taerlingk)
'^ lU titlo is : DU tier tagesMnUn in dtr ttadi, titi* fr^ie Uberatlsung atu cf«m itaJiani-
tclun, Frankfurt am Main 1778. The translation i« apparently anonymous.
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272 CHESS IN ICELA ND
plural, tacrlingen = die^ dice, a low German word with a slightly diflfercnt
orthography in the Scandinavian brancli of the family ; but a more common
term appears to be dobbehteen, compounded of dobbel {dobbel-spit) the original
appellation of '* the dice-game" and steen ("stone"). To throw (dice) is
werpefi, the German ** werfen," goojen or smakken; the dice-box has, accord-
ing to the .lexicographers, various names, some of which may very well
be obsolete : dobbelhoom (koorn = ** horn "), smaakhorntje, a diminutive,
dobbelbeker (6^A:er =" beaker "), dobbelkrues (krues meaning "cup"). Ooge
(plural oogen), literally "eye " (or sometimes slip, " dot") is, like its con-
gener in German, applied to the pips of the dice. The namos of the pips
are, except aas, "ace," the same as the numerals, twee,drieyVier,vijfyzeii.
Dubhlet (pi. dubblellen), from the French, is " doublet," but the special
names for the doublets do not seem to have been introduced into Holland,
although the French forms may have been used, with other French terms
(as in Germany and Italy), by practised players in the cities, but, as in
England, diibbel aas, dubbel iwec and so on are general. Passedix and pas-
seiHsJe are cited as the equivalent of pasch, but are not frequent, dubbletien
(as in England and America, "doublets") being apparently the customary
term. Dobbel is the German doppel^ and was early applied to the dice-game
proper, and like that ultimately meant "gambling;" dobbelen is "to play
at dice," "to dice;" dobbeltafel, is ** dice-table,'* gambling table," while
dobbelbord is even more common; dobbelaar, dobbeUmrster = "dice-player,"
"dicer;" dobbelaarij = dicing '^ while we have already cited dobbelstcen.
There are, in Dutch, as in other languages, numerous phrases and proverbs
derivable from the dice, the board and the game. It may be premised that
spel, unless qualified, usually, means "dice gaming" or "gambling," and
"bord" usually refers to the "board" of a table game. " Tvsee aaseur
fjooijen" is,' as already stated, " to throw ambesas," "double aces," and ttoee
vierefi is "double fours" ("carmcs"); van den dobbef houden, "to be devoted
to gaming ; " hij gooijd niet als dubbletten, "he throws nothing but doublets;"
in het bord speien, "to play backgammon; " de beuri voinnen, "to win the
first throw;" gooijen om de beurt, "to throw for first play" — 6ettr« signify-
ing "turn," "chance" (French "tour"). The following are generally used
figuratively or proverbially: de taerlingk is geworpen, "the die is cast;"
legen twaalf oogen dobbelen^ "to play against double sixes," "to play a
desperate game; " zig van de galg vry dobbelen^ "to save one's self by luck;"
ik weet wat op die taerlingk loopt, *JI know what I risk," or "what I am
about;" ik heb hooge oogen gegooijd, "I have had great luok;" dertien oogen
gooijen =^'''io have an impossible piece of luck." Of technical terms at play,
hand (plural batiden) is "a double point" (French "case"); xoerkeer{je appears
to mean " partie" at backgammon ;Ya^5eAe dobbelsicenen are "loaded dice;"
schijf (plural "schijven") is " man," often called damschijf, "draughtman."
Few are the references in the poets and other writers ,to backgammon
or dice which wc have been able to gather, but they would probably be
found to be numerous enough on investigation. Coenrad Droste (1642-1733),
hardly a great poet but a man of learning, says in his "Reminiscences"
("Overblijfsels"):
Ken8 speeldeii wy verkcei-en,
Ik. . . spoeldeii altyt roort, tot d'eeu of U'andro sag,
Dut midtleu in het bord iota by do banden lag.
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STRAY NOTES 273
A little earlier in time the following passage is found in the first volume
(p. 136) of a work of travels (1698-1711) in the Levant, Russia and as far as
India, probably referring to the Mediterranean east. The author is Cornelis
de Bruyn, deceased about 1719: " De manier van speelcn [op het verkeerbord]
is dezelve als by ons, maar met dit onderschied dat men zyn party niet geheel
uit het bord kati sla an, maar altyd plaats moot laaten om te konnen aangaan.''
The difference here implied between Dutch and eastern backgammon is not
easy to comprehend. The next quotation relates to tfie dice-game, and is
from the romance ** Akbar" by P. A. S. Limburg Brouwer (1829-73), the son
of a more famous father: **Hier en daar zaten... de spclers met hunne
dobbelsteenen om het bord waarop ze hun inzet hadden gewagt.'* Willem
Bilderdijk (1756-31) is generally reckoned to be Holland's greatest poet. In
one of his pieces of verse backgammon (rather than dice-play) seems to be
referred to:
D«ar Loor ik 't nmmlend spel, wiiarby 't behemtig gisaeu
De oDxekre kunseo raamt, die vau het lot betlisAen.
Het ooK steari wedeKijds in *i opgesliigoii bord,
Met gretige ijvenncbt, naar 't geen de beker stort.
A minor writer, whose name is apparently Schimmel, is cited by one of the
lexicographers, the passage given being from a story: »* Harry maakte de
opmerking dat de oogen van de dobbelsteenen op sommigen meer invloed
uitoefenden dan de schmachtende blikken eener schoone/'
We have reproduced on a preceding page the German rendering of a long-
ish poem devoted wholly to one of the games {verkeeren) played on the
backgammon -board in Holland. Hero follows the Dutch original, styled, as
the reader will remember, Ordonnantie op *t verkcereti^ ** Direcjlions for back-
gammon," which we copy as it is given in Das neue konigliche Vhombre of
1770 (pp. 308, 310, 312, 314). The full name of its author ("I. G. K.") we have
not been able to discover. It is proper to say that in these extracts, as well
as in the Dutch words and phrases cited, we have followed the orthography
used in our authorities. This results in many discrepancies, since some are
older and some younger than the orthographical changes effected by Bil-
derdijk— -not one of the least of the services which he rendered to his country.
The writer of our poem, it will be noticed, introduces many of the technical
terms of the game :
Aen Loort vriODduu, aon hoort beniindera vao'i verkeeren
Myn ordouuaucy, eudo let op't ^lieeD 'k a sal leeren :
Als gby n epeel begin t, set scbyveu af en maeckt
U meeeter van den boeck : al ist dat gby cock raeokt.
En wilt niet baeatig Bchlaeo, ten ay met avantage :
En bandt oook niet te raa, 't is qnade timerage
Ale men gbeen bout en beeft : werpt niet eer n party
Syn sobyven beeft geset, want aelden is men bly
Ala men teert eot, 't beeft my dickwila oock wel gheapeteu,
Daerom speelt met gbenenght, gbeeft uiemandt duervan te etoti.
Hoot a banden by een, vorloopt niet dan nyt noot,
Alat andera weeaen macb, set gbeen vyf scbyven bloot.
Sobout ongelyok te doen, scbout oogbelyck t' ontfangben,
Laet u party niet gbaen, gaet oock gbeen qnade gangben.
Set sysen qoatres goet, end'al aud're donbletten,
Cinqnen syn seldeu quaet, docb wllter wel op letten
' Hoe dat se stacn, neempt oock op systroys goede acbt,
35
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274 CHESS IN ICELAND
Dooh al diit quaelyok sfcaet kon warden niet gewacht.
£«r dat ghy werpt, so elet wat goet of quaet kan rreeaoo,
800 salt gbj Rpelen raa, oud'oock met minder vreeaen,
Dit heb iok eerst geleert van een syn eerlick man
Die daermede van my een kin'tge boteis wan.
Saet niet iu texhen't booet, als ghy't andors kont luaekeu,
Ten ay gby selvers vreest In heob tenia te raeoken,
Ala ghy't kent doen 80 set a scbyven op bet veer,
I0 a partye sterok so komt niet licht'liek weer,
'T son qaaelyck mogben guen, 't is bennelyok na recbteu,
Bat teghen een sterok geek niet goet en is te veobten,
Als gby speelt op syn reyds, eii wilt niet baestig schryveu,
End* als men met a scbryft, en wilt niet bassUgh blyvcu,
'T is scbade voor de bandt te sobryven op de stecn,
Dos doet bet niet, want*t is altydt twee tegben ten,
£n zegbt bier tegen niet dat gby seer xyt gbobeteu,
'T is beter wat gberaeck dan in 't gebeel gbegbeten.
Swygbt in een anders speel, vel eeggou marckt gbeeu ▼reught,
Kent gby niet swygben, segbt so welnigb als gby mrenght.
Als a party beeft aent goed' sobyren wilt niet sobnlien,
Bn Bonder groot verloop wilt resten nocbte mtten,
'T Is beter dat gby swygbt en a gbe ornstigb boodt,
Dan dat gby met onrnst, soboat, rest end o booft bloudt.
8iet altemet nae't boeck, boe 't gaen men alien aaeckeu.
Op dat men al abays in tydts macb rechtig maecken.
West in a speel modest, end' bond oook goed niAniereii,
Al ist dat gby Torliest, wilt baren nocbte tieren
Noob Tloecken, sweren med*, maer bond a anslcbt bly.
Indien gby knot, soo niet, be^xnynien staet u vry.
Bn segbt van niemandt qnaet, spreeckt wel van all abseiitou,
Glorieert niet in n winst men boopt daerom gbon renteu,
Indien gby bayden wint, niorgben kant anders syn,
Daer winst is groote Trengt, daer is 't verliesen pyen.
OntCanght ghen gbelt ghescbtoyt, verboden nocbte licbt,
'T gbeen gby betbalen moot laet syn ran goedt gbewiobt.
'T rerkeeren is te eel, ten lyd'gbeen qnado mnnt.
Die met goet spelen wint, is goet gelt wel gegnnt.
Adiea vrienden, adioa beininders, van't verkeeren,
Neempt dit legaet in danck, el let wel op myn leerenr
The most important of the Dutch '^ Academies des Jeux*' or manuals of games
(including instruction in backgammon) of an earlier period, which we have
chanced to encounter, is without date (but probably printed not far from
the beginning of the nineteenth century). It is a volume of 222 pages,
entitled: '* Ordonnantien en gebruiken van verscheiden soorten van kaart-
spellen. Als het h*ombre [sic], quadrielje, piketten, modernen, klaverjassen,
geerten en voltespellen. Beneffens verscheiden nieuwe kaartspellen als moedo
het koninglyk schaakspel, billiard, vcrkeer en kaatspel. Op nieuw na do
hedendagsche manier en order geschikt door H. D. K. £n zyn te bekoomen
te Dort... Haarlem... Leiden... Delft... en verder in alle steeden by de boek-
verkoopers.'" The sum and substance of the description of backgammon in
this volume is an anonymous poem, similar to that of '' I. G. K.'\ which we
have just reproduced. Its title is ^^Reglement en grondregels van het
vortreffelyk verkeerspel.*' Some few technical terms are to be found in it
such as zessen ("sixes*'), vieren ("fours"), hlote schyven ("blots'*) band
(•' double point") and its plural, handeii, Jan (printed as if it were a foreign
word) and aa^e (diminutive from), *Mittle ace." The volume is nowhere
mentioned by Van der Linde, but he cites another of the same class, hav-
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STRAY NOTES 275
ing 116 pages ("Geschichte/" ii, 74), also undated: "Beknopt onderrigt in
verschillonde kaartspelen, alsmede in het dam — schaii — billiard — domino
— en trictracspel. Naar de beste bronnen bewerkt 's Gravenhage, by H. C.
Susan, C. Hozoon'.'" The author is said by Van der Linde to be H. C. Susan.
The title reads like a new edition of the " H. D. K '" book. It will be noticed
that trictracspel takes the place of verkeer on the title-page. From the size
of the volume the descriptions of the games must be very brief. "*
We insert here the text of this second backgammon poem (pp. 208-214) :
Llefhebben dio dit apol tot in de grond veratMu,
En die aobier nimmer, of seer lelden font begoan,
Dees' wet is niet voor n, mMur roor de nienwelingen.
Die meeeten tyd het spel door goedoD goojen dwingen.
Dat Aohier nla elgen is Min iemaod dio eerst leerd.
Zo gy dan leeren wild boe dat men wel -rerkeerd,
Zo salik n terstond dee spels boedanigbeden,
Zo yer 't mj' is bekend, nit liefde gaan ontleden,
Zet eerst twee schyTen af, so gy geen sessen gooid
En wild gy dan n spel behoorlyk sion roltooid,
Zo rooet gy met Terstand bet gantsehe spel doorletten,
Dat gy de sessen en de vieren goed meet zetten,
Want 't een komt seldon goed en 't ander yeeltyda kwaad,
Mankt dat gy niet te veel met blote sohyren staat,
Ten ey dat a party daar niet wel by kan koraen.
Zes drISn dient in 't begin ook naarstig waargenonen.
Yorloopt a aobyven niet so 't anders wezen kan.
Want scbyren boiten 't bord brengt seldeu voordeel aan,
Kn band niet al te vroeg, so gy wat nit wilt reohteii.
Daar moeten sehyyen syn snlt ge u party bevecbti^n,
En so gy banden maakt, so hood se dioht byeen ;
Een ongesloote spel verliest men in 't gemeen ;
Wilt niet al to onbedaeht een redelyk spel wagen,
Aan de nitral ran een gooi, nog soekt bet niet doorslagen,
't Komt somtyds wel eens goed, maar diekwils weer heel kwaad.
Wanneer men al te los party syn sohyren slaat ;
Dog staat het spel wat loe, en knnt gy 't dan so maken,
Dat Q party daar door ten borde nit komt raken,
Zo is 't meeit altyd goed. Verbrol het dan maar niet,
Gelyk men in *t gemeen wel ran een leerling ziet.
Op Jan te spelen doet somwyl een spel TOrlopen,
Zodanig dat men 't nog meet met yerliea bekopen ;
Dog siet d&ar nimmer op, speeld na *t beloop van 't spel ;
Al valt het kwalyk nit, nochtans so speeld gy 't wH.
*^' One reason of the paueity of early technical literstare in Dutch relattng to baek-
gammon is probably ihe fact that so many editions of the French " Aeadtole des jeux ",
the aathoritatlTe manual of social and Ubie-vames on the Continent during the whole of
the XVIIIth century and later, were issued in Holland. The first Amsterdam edition wss la
1756 and was followed by others in 1768, 1760, 1763, 1766, 1770, 1773, 1777, 17M and 1780
(two s<«parate Issues). Of two of these (1756 and 1768), copies lie before us. They both
coaUln a seotlon relating wholly to backvammon games, and having its own Uble of contents
(1756, pp. 418-580 ; 1768, seconds partfe, pp. 87-186). In the latter, the «< Chanson de trie trac"
(*• Oalans, Je veux tous apprendre "), precedes the text. The varieties described In both are
the same, as is the matter (the language being here and there slightly altered): trietrae,
reoertiert touf-tahU, U* dame* rahatttet, plHn and toe. Of the space, by far the larger part
Is given to trUtrac, There was another compilation or reprint of the Paris '* Academic"
having the title of " La plus nonvelle aeadtoie des Jeux ", of which Van der Linde citee the
following Issues in Holland : I^ Haye (the Hague), 1686 ; no place given by Van der Linde,
1718; l^lde (Leyden), 1721 ; Amstfrdam 1788 (merely a reissue of 1781) ; Amsterdam and
Lei pale 1768.
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276 CHESS IN ICELAND
Iiot Tlytig op de kop en loopt 'er niet op binnen,
Schoon ik het Eeatienmoal Eodanig hob sien winnen,
Ook van eon eerstling, met nog eons vyf daar by,
Die hy loo achtereen gewonneu heeft van ray;
Nocbtans la niet veel goeds van anlk een apel te hopen,
Dat roott vryvrillig of gedvongeu in moet lopon.
Braag sorg ook dat gy n geeii boeren jan en let.
Want gy het niyden kont Indian gy 'er sleohta op let.
Vyf bandeu moogt ge u wel gemeenlyk op vertronwon,
ICaar ala gy daar dan wilt vyf lopera by gaau honwen,
la 't meeat wel een te veel, en hebt gy 't spel wat raooi;
Zyt niet bovaardig, want 't verkeord vaak door een gooi ;
Denk aan den naam van *t apel. Zyt altyd eena van sinnen,
Of gy het apel verlieat, dan of gy 't komt te winnen,
Te letten op het apel en 't apelen van part}-,
Dat ia de siel van 't werk, a dna zo aohynt hot niy
Yergrypt gy eena een achyf; wilt daarom niet krakoelen,
Gy moet, al waar 't tot achA, die zelve aeiiyf dog apelen
Gooi niet voor n party cyn aetten heeft gedaan,
Want gooid gy kwaad, gcwia party bond sig daar nan,
En aal n door aoo'n aont xorotyda hot apH outleggeii.
Wilt in het apel on niot ala 't nodige maar aeggen.
Speeld met geen achyf to veel, nog met geen achyf te min :
Wont 9E0 n dit geviel, dat gy 'er kwam op in,
En nam a achyven nit, party die son n krygen<
En achryven 't apel n aan, en gy aond moeten Kwygen.
Hebt gy een achyf te Toel, party die neemt ae nit,
Na eigen ainlykheid, gy zyt* er meA gebmid.
Hebt gy'er een to rain, party zal op n paasen,
En n, ala gy't niet giat, met deeze achyf verrasaen,
Het zetten op de broek, als hy zyn voordeel ziet,
En helpen zo n apel achier t'eenemaal tot niet.
Draagd zorg ook dat gy komt niet eene achyf te roercn,
Ten zy gy vooraf weet ala dat gy ait kont voen^n,
De waarom van de zet, met goede en vaate re6n,
Of andera apeeld gy zo maar in het wilde been •
Daar moeten reden zyn, 't verkeeren ateond op grouden;
Geen ai^fe hoe gering of 't ia 'er aan gebonden.
Wanneer ala n dan dnnkt dat gy het apel verataat,
Ten minaten dat. het zo wat redelyk henen gaat,
Zo gaat dan over aan het apelen met gedagten,
(Of ao dat word genoemd) achoon veelen het verngten.
En zeggen dat het niet ala maar een loopje ia.
Zy taaten in die zaak, dnnkt my, geweldig niia,
Het ia de grond van *t apel, bekwaam om door te leeren.
Den ooraprong en het pit, «n 't merg van 't wel verkeven.
Want allea wat men gooid daar 'a weinig apelen aan,
Hy wyat zig aelfia, of dit, dit ia 't beloop daar van
*t Zyn veeltyde raadzela, of het zyn gedwonge zetten :
Maar op het aodere valt meerder op te letten.
Een dana na een phiool word liohtelyk ge<1aan,
Maar dasaaen en zingen t'zaam daar ia meer moeiten aan.
Die nit een vreemde taal een boek gaat overbrengen,
Schoon dat het heerlyk ia, moet eohter dog gehengen,
Dat men niet zeid ala: het ia wel getranalateerd.
Zo ia 't met de geen die na de gooi verkeerd,
Daar men zig zelve dog geatadig na moet richten :
Een meetter moet bier door vaak voor een leerling zwichten
Uit ooraaak van de gooi en ateenen die*'t hem do«i
Yerliezen met geweld, dat niemand kan verho6n,
Maar zonder ateenen zo en ziet men znlka niet blyken ;
Die *t apel 't lieat verataat die gaat' er mede atryken,
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STRAY NOTES 2T7
Hoewel dat ik 't gebroik der •feeonen nlet veragt,
Nog ienumd soekt te ontr»6D, d»t heb ik noolt ffadagt ;
Speeld wat o best geralt, de nrroB^ea wuk*t vorkeeran,
Moet gy dog sekerlyk door do godagten loeren.
The two OP three recent Dutch publications embracing backgammon,
which have fS&lIen into our hands, are of the most ordinary class. The first
has sixteen pages, and is entitled '*Reglement voor hettriJiLtraJiLspel.— Tweede
druJi.—Aliimaar. P. Kluitman," having no date, but issued evidently very
recently. It is a separate reprint of the backgammon portion (pp. 76>87) of a
small manual of games, ^* Handioiding en regels voor den kaartspeler. Whist,
boston, ombre enz.— Elfde druk.— Alkmaar— P. Kluitman " (also without
date). The game treated is verkehr, though styled triktrak. There is little in
the meagre article to demand notice, but it gives us the modern orthography
of some of the terms. We rapidly enumerate these: koker is ** dice-box;"
dobbelsteen, **die;" werpen.to "cast'* or "throw;'' toorp^ "cast" (noun);
oogen^ "dice-points; aas (plural, a^en), "ace;" aUe azen^ cUle tweefn, aUe
drieen, "double aces," "double deuces," "double threes;" dubhelen^
"doublets; " *c/iv/ (plural sch\;ven), "point" on the board, but when consid-
ered with reference to the movements of the men, frequently punkas vijfpunt^
zespunt^ "five-point," "six-point; " gedoubleerde schijveny "double points,"
"covered points;" haek^ "coin de repos." The compiler of the brochure
records a rule for the proper construction of the backgammon board, which
we do not remember to have seen elsewhere. The twelve points on either
side of the board most, he says, each have a length equal to two-fifths o(
the breadth of the surface inside the board, so that the remaining one^fifth
will be the space left between the two lines of points. Another booklet of
even less pretention is "Dammen domino en trictrak [sic\ door W. van
Buuren^Derde druk— Gouda O. R. van Ooor zonen 1903. (pp. 63). The final
pages (56-63) are devoted to " trictrac of bakspel"— the latter word being a
novel appellation. Bak (plural, hakken) is " trough," " box," " basin," and
is the term for either section, or half, of the backgammon-board, united by
its hinges ~a name describing the shape of the sections. We are told that
the game is played " in een bord, dat samengesteld is uit twee bakken."
This explains the literal signification of bdkspel^ although there may be in
it a reminiscence of the English &ac/tE-gammon. We are told that the game
is very old " and, according to some writers, of English or Saxon origin,"
the author's way, doubtless, of trying to express " Anglo-saxon." Then he
tells us that Swift— it is here written " Zwift "—esteemed it to be "the only
game which a clergyman can properly play, not even excepting chess "—a
deduction, apparently, from the asserted extract from the letter of Swift to
a friend lately removed into the country, which we have elsewhere cited.
Terms not already quoted from the other volume are: Hnnenhak^ huitenhak^
'' home- board," " outer board ;" drieTiofffterf, tj^W^n (singular driehock, re-W),
board-points, but we find here punten likewise; puntje (plural, pun^jes),
" dice- points; " beker^ "dice-box." Next, the author ftirnishes a list of a
dozen technical words, among them being: doeblet (which the preceding
work calls a dobbel)^ " doublet," with examples as twee azen^ twee iween etc.;
piouj '* man;" overbrengen, to "carry on," or "move" the men; teUon^ the
first point, on which the men are massed at the beginning of the game
(borrowed from the French) ; band^ " covered point; " bintg, literally "bridge,"
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278 CHESS IN ICELAND
the barrier formed by six contiguous double points; slaan, to ** strike," or a
*^ strike,'* a term of counting, setting a '* marquer/' as in the French game,
in front of one of the board-points, on scoring a game-point; afbrengen
(literally, " bring off''), to " bear; " codiUe, a borrowed card-term, equivalent
to a double loss, a '' backgammon." After this brief glossary, we have
thirteen ** rules of the game," and the text ends with a few explanatory
notes; deciding the first play; moving the men in accordance with the
number of dice-points; how doublets are played; the *' bearing" of men and
so on. It is still difficult to form any certain idea of the game here de-
scribed; it seems to be either a simplified French trictrac^ or verkehren with
a few trictrac features.
In England we shall find much more material for the treatment and
illustration of the nard-backgammon game than is available in any other
land. Yet much more than we have been in a position to get together will,
without doubt, some day see the light. The mediaeval game or games of
tables, however they were played, seem in England to have become common
and popular outside the court and convent sooner, and to a greater extent,
than elsewhere. The Latin MS— the work of an English pen— which we
have reproduced (pp. 161-ld5), would appear to mark partly the transition
period between tables and the modern games, partly the definite beginning
of backgammon. One technical term cited in it certainly continued in use
down to a recent period. But we have before discussed this matter of the
chronological line which separates the age of tables from that of backgam-
mon (pp. 78-79).
First of all let us consider the dice. The word die comes into English,
like a multitude of other Latin vocables, through France, where it is to be
found some two centuries before it occurs in England. On its etymology
we have already dwelt (pp. 70-71). The old French was " de " (earlier
**det"), the plural being ** dez." The English form dey existed in the
XlVth century, and this and des were sometimes used down to the XVIIth
century. The " New English Dictionary " enumerates many orthographical
variants particularly of the plural. The chronicle of Robert de Brunne gives
us (1330) the plural des, while the '* Chester Plays" (1400)— unless that be
due to its modern editor— has the form now in vogue: ** Using cardes, dice,
and cupes smalle," the cupes (cups) being, doubtless, the dice-boxes. The
oldest Chaucer MS has dees, which survived, says a lexicographer, as late
as 1484 in a book from Caxton's press; but in Caxton's *' Playe of the
Chesse" (1471) we have another form, which is treated as both singular
and plural: ''He caste three dyse, and on each dyse was a sise [six]," and
elsewhere in the same work: *' In his left hand thre dyse." These passages
recall the fact, already noted, that in certain games of tables two and in
others three dice were employed. This was the case in England as well as
on the continent. Thomas Wright, in his ** History of Domestic Manners "
(1862, p. 217), cites from the French translation of Jacobus de Cessolis' work
on chess the mention made of a dicer, who is represented as using three
dice. The writer adds: " Two dice were, however, sometimes used especially
in the game of hazard which appears to have been the great gambling game
of the middle ages. -Chaucer, in the 'Pardoneres tale,' describes the *hazar-
dours ' as playing with two dice. But in the curious scene in the ' Towneley
mysteries,'— a collection of thirty-four mystery-plays edited by the Surtees
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STRAY NOTES 279
society, London 1836— the scene mentioned is on p. 241— a work apparently
contemporary with Chaucer, the tormentors, or executioners, are introduced
throwing for Christ's unseamed garment with three dice; the winner throws
fifteen points, which could only be thrown with that number of dice/' The
scene mentioned anticipates the similar one of Hans Sachs, from which wo
have quoted, by two centuries. In 1393, Chaucer's contemporary, Gower,
tells us, in two of the thirty thousand lines of his •* Confessio Amantis,"
that
The obMiuoe i« caste upon a dec
But yet fall oft a man may ao,
and so on. In a work of 1430 the. author declares **Nouth so grct as a as
[ace] in a dee.'' The well-known passage in '' Richard III,"
I Lave set my life upon a oast
And I win stand the haxaT4 of the die,
is thoroughly Shakespearean, reminding one, in its construction, of the
*' stalemate" passage familiar to most chess players; it is interesting, too,
as giving a second dice-term, the noun cast. In another drama of the same
period, " The Changeling " of Middleton and Rowley (1623), we discover this
couplet:
'Tis a precious craft to phiy with a false die
Before a cuuuing gamester.
Child's great collection of ballads (III. 296) has a piece, "Young Hunting,"
containing these lines:
t Will ye gae to the cards or dice
• Or to a tavern fine ?
In more modern writings the references to dice are, of course, too numerous
to cite. There is a slang expression, now rarely used, but once common:
** The whole box and dice," implying "the whole lot," "the whole number
of persons or things." Dice-hoxe occurs in a vocabulary of 1552, with the
Latin definitions, " flmum," " fritillum." The word has thus been, for three
centuries, the ordinary name for what the French style the " cornet." Addison,
in the "Guardian " (no. 120) alludes to "Thumping the table with the dice-
box;" the implement is sometimes called in American slang "the shaker."
As to the dice-points or ptp^, this latter word is said by recent diction-
ary-maliers to be a shortened form of " pippin," which signifies originally
a seed of a fruit, while the former {point) does not seem to be given in any
dictionary in the sense of dice-pip. The French names of the dice-points
were greatly used in England until the last century, and are even now gen-
erally given, in a more or less corrupted form, in many treatises on table-
games. The latest one of importance furnishes a. list of the names of the
points on the board {acCy deuce, trois, quatre, cinque, six); but the author
also makes use of the same to designate the dice-points. Some confusion
is caused by the fact that we English use point both for the "dots" on the
dice and the twenty four points (French " filches ") on the board: 1. Ace is the
French " as," which is the Latin " as," meaning an " unit," or a " one "
which again is said— but recently doubted— to come from &<; a dialect (Ta*
rentine) form of the Greek et? ("one"). In early (middle) English it was
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280 CHESS IN ICELA ND
written in various ways, as, aas, most commonly, or ais^ ase etc., occurring
perhaps as early as the word dice. We find it as a pure dice term in
Shakespeare's ^^Cymbeline: '' ''Your Lordship is the most patient man in
losse, the most coldest that euer tnrn'd up ace."* Other illustrations of its
use follow below. 2. Deuce, as a dice-numeral, is derived from " duos," the
accusative of the Latin '' duo '" (the second of the numerals) through the
French 'Meux.'* As we have stated, it has nothing in common, etymologi-
cally or otherwise, with the other (exclamatory) word deuce (** deuce take
you I), which is a depreciative corruption of the Latin noun " deus " (*'god").
Deuce was early written dewes and deus and in other ways, but. we find
deuce in 1519, while Florio (in 1598) makes its plural detoses. Besides the
technical use of deuce there are many instances of its employment, with
ace, in its figurative sense as representing the lower or poorer classes (see
pp. 242-3) among which are most of those which follow: Caxton, in his "Rey-
nard the Foxe '* (1481), speaks of ** A pylgryra of deux aas," while we find
that in another version of the same old allegorical story, but apparently of
much later date, the idea is expressed in these two lines:
That which is likoned to deace-aoe
Hath is eatoem the lowest place.
From Shakespeare's "Love's Labor Lost" (1588) we take this: "You know
how much the grosse sum me of deuce-ace amounts to .... which the base
vulgar call three." 3. Trey {tray) is through the old French ** treis," modern
" trois," from the Latin " tres." The old play " Royster Doyster," Nicholas
Udall— the earliest English comedy (1566)— has: "I wyll be herewith them,
ere ye can say trey ace,'" 4. Cater {catter^ quater) is, of course, the French
"quatre," remotely from the Latin "quatuor," and was formerly in frequent
use for the four-point of the die. William Harmon, a chaplain to queen Anne
Boleyn and a writer of rare learning, says in his " Vulgaria" (1519) "Cater
is a very good caste." Sir Thomas Wilson, in his *• Arte of Retorique " (1563),
employs the word but not in a dice sense. John Kersey, tlie younger, in his
" Dictionarium Anglo-Britannicum " (1708), explains caterpoint as "the
number four at dice," though it doubtless meant the four-point on the board.
Bailey the lexicographer, a little later (his dictionary appeared in various
reprints or editions from 1721 o»), defines cater-trc^ as " the four and the
three, hence apparently, a cant term for dice." But long before the time
of these writers of dictionaries we find cater in very general use. In the
before-quoted " Chester Plays " (1500) this occurs :
Here is catter-tmye,
Therfore goe thoa thj wayo.
"The quarrel was about cater-tray," signifying that "it was a dice-dispute,"
is a phrase in the tract " Pappe with a Hatchet " (1589), now usually ascribed
to the dramatist and novelist, William Lyly. 5. Cinque {cinq^ sink, synke)^
from the Latin "quinque," through the French, appears to have been com-
mon from an early day. Herman (1519), cited above, speaking of ancient
dice, asserts that "Deuce and synk were not in the olde dyce." In Otway's
tragedy, "The Atheist" (1684), a character exclaims: Farewel .... seven and
eleven, sink- tray and the doublets! " Perhaps the oldest appearance of cinque
is in the " Pardoner's Tale" (1386) of Chaucer, who certainly knew the dice-
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STRA Y NOTEiS 281
points familiaHy, as probably most dwellers in cities in those days did. The
passage is: ^^Seuene is my chaunce and thyn is cynk and treye/* Motteux
(1708), the translator of Rabelais, speaks of ^* Cinques, quaters, treys and
duces." 6. Sice {si:e^ syse^ sis) are from French *' six " and Latin " sex.*'
Chaucer (1386) in the '' Monkeys Tale '' has these lines:
Bmpoytead of thin onyne folk fcboii were ;
Thyn sis fortune hAth tamed into aae.
In his version of the satires of Persius, Dryden produces the couplet:
Bat then my etody was to cog the dice
And dexterooaly to throw the Incky aice.
The next citation,
Thonghe ays or'ayuke them fayl»
The dyae oft renneth open the ehaonoe of thro,
is found in the translation (1509) of the German "Ship of Folys" by Sebas-
tian Brant. -
The names of the dice-doublets are in English almost wholly restricted
to that given to the double ace, which has entered largely into literature
and must, at one time, have been in ordinary use. To this word, amJbes-ace
(ambs-ace)^ in early English, ambesas, ambesaas, we have before more than
once alluded (see especially p. 190), and have cited one of the earliest pas-
sages (1900) in which it is found in literature. Chaucer, introducing so
many dice-words, did not neglect this term for double aces. In the " Can-
terbury Tales '*— so faithful a picture of English life in his time— the '*Man
ofLawestale'' (1386) has:
Yonre baggea ben nat fold with am boa aaa,
Bat with aya aynk« that ronneih on year ohaonoe.
But before the '^ Harrowing of Hell '' (1300) and before Chaucer, we have, in
a metrical chronicle of England (1297), reputed to be by Robert of Gloucester,
and of which he pretty surely wrote a part, a phrase: "Ac he caste per of
ambes as.*' Another writer, who wrote very near 1300, makes a speaker
' say: " Thu ert icome therto to late; thu hast least ambez as.*' In a middle
English poem usually styled "The History of Beryn," for a time attributed
to Chaucer, but written about 1400, occur these lines:
I bare thre diae in myne own para ;
... I Uat [caat] hem forth all three,
Aud too fll [fell] amya aae.
That widely- famed voluminous writer of those old days, John Lydgato, who
died about the middle of the XVth century, was fond of calling himself
" Chaucer's disciple." In one of his minor poems (composed about 1430) he
writes of one,
Whoa cbannoe gothe neyther on aink nor aloe,
Bat withe ambea aas encreaith hia diapenoe.
A character in Shakspeare's "All's well ends well" (1601) cries: "I had
rather be in this choise than throw ames-ace for my life." The other French
word for double aces, "besas" ("beset"), which has rarely been used in
86
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282 CBESS IN ICELAND
Knglish, is defined by Cotgrave in his French-English dictionary (1611) as
'* aumes^ on the dice/* Cleveland (or Cleiveland), the cavalier poet, in his
" Vindiciaa," a collection of verse, speaks, in a poem (1658), of some one:
In whom Dame nature tries
To throw loM thui aamt ace upon two dice.
The couplet,
Idly vent'rlng her good graoeo
To be disposed of by slms-aces,
is to be found in a piece of verse (1680) in the '' Remains" of Samuel Butler,
the author of Hudibras. Mrs. Susannah Centlivre was popular, both as an
actress and a dramatic writer. In her play "The Gamester'* (1705) a char-
acter exclaims:
My evil genios flings am'a aoe before me !
It is a little singular that William Wollaston*s ''Religion of Nature** (1722),
a book greatly read in its day, should contain the following bit of figurative
language: ''Nobody can certainly foretell, that sice-ace will come up on two
dies [sic], fairly thrown, before ambs-ace." Sherwood's English-French
dictionary (1650), which was the second part of Ck>tgrave's work, renders
"to cast ambes-ace*' by " faire ambezatz" — a noticeable orthography of
the French form (now written "ambesas '*). The philosopher, Thomas Hobbes,
in those "Questions of Liberty, Necessity and Chance** (1656), ^hich he dis-
cussed with his acrimonious critic. Archbishop Bramhall, introduces the
dice- term: "This will be yet clearer by considering his own instance of
casting ambs-ace, though it partake more of contingency than of ft'eedom.**
Fielding, in one of his less-known plays, called, we believe, "The Lottery,*'
introduces the term: " If I can but nick this time, ame*s ace I defy thee.**
The expression, after falling into disuse, has been revived in our own day
by one of the most distinguished of American essayists, James Russell Lowell,
who in his "Among my Books** (1870), characterizes something as" A lucky
throw of words which may come up as the sices of hardy metaphor or the
ambs-ace of conceit. ** Here we have two words unknown except to the
technical writer. ^^ Besides this special word for the two aces we have noted
no others which have been introduced into English, either in dice-games or
table-games, nor do any seem to be known to the lexicographers. The Ital-
ian duini is interpreted into English by Florio*s dictionary (1598) as "two
deyses.**
The varieties of backgammon, which are or have been played in England,
are numerous. The first edition of " The Compleat Gamester ** (1674), which
was anonymous, treats various kinds of what it styles " Games within the
tables,** that is, inside the table-board, meaning the folding chess and back-
gammon boards. That they are named " tables ** is probably on account of
their double character, being composed of two pieces, although there may
'^ Lowell WAS Tery fond of old words of s quaint ehsraeter. The writer remembers
▼ery well hfa aoeoont of his search for a word, of the existence of which he had no doubt,
although he could discover no Instance of its use. His delight was great, therefore, one day
in spring, when riding beside the " stage-drlTer," In a rather remote region of Massa-
chusetts, between IVuIt-treeB laden with flowers, to hear the latter say: '*A flne bl<nothf sir,
this year ! ** Lowell had found his word.
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STRAY NOTES 283
be a (kint echo in the term of the early times when people played ** tables,'*
and so called it. The list of games, to each of which a section is given, is:
Irish^ backgammon^ Hcfttach, dubblets, sice-ace^ and keich-dolL Another and
shorter list (1700), which we have mentioned (p. 79), spoke only ot backgammon^
tick-tack and Irish (unless two others, '* oaks *' and *' basset, " were back-
gammon games, which they pretty surely were not). The derivation of the
general name of the game, as we now regard it, backgammon^ cannot be '
altogether definitely decided. It is said by the best lexicologists to be a
compound of back and gammon. The former element had its present signi-
fication ; the latter is our word game, which, in middle English, was variously
written gamen^ gomen, gammen, gammon. It became our modern English
game because the -en, (-n) came to be erroneously regarded as an inflectional
suffix, like -en in *'oxen'* and '* brethren,** and was accordingly dropped as
the development into the newer English went on. It is an indication of the
age of the term that the compound, backgammon, was probably formed before
gamen became game^ and the second element, for this reason, underwent no
change. As to the literal meaning of the compound, and especially of its
first element, back, in this connection, the general opinion (or shall we say
surmise 1) of the lexicographers is expressed by the ** Century Dictionary**
(sub voce). It states that the game is *' apparently so-called because, in
certain circumstances, the pieces are obliged to go back and re-enter. The
reason of the name is not certain, but the formation is clear.** There is
another surmise that may be made, and which is at least equally probable.
Let us suppose that in the varieties of the very earliest mediaeval tables,
each player was confined to his own table, advancing his men forward
through the twelve points, and that then the game ended by. his having
brought his men to the last point, or when he had thrown them off from
his own second board (that is from his last six points). There are indica-
tions that this was the case with at least one method of playing tables.
Now supposing that in one variety (which may have existed before, but from
its supposed superior difficulty had not been common) — one new variety,
let us say— the course of each player*s men was continued. They crossed
over into the opponent*s second board (second six points), and, reversing
their course, were played or moved back to the other end of the board, whence
they had come. This variety, from the peculiar feature which we have men-
tioned, got to be known as b€u;kgammon, the game in which the men went
back to the portion of the board whence they started. Becoming popular »
the most played of all the games ^' within the tables ** — it led to the aban-
donment of the venerable name ** tables** so far as England was concerned,
and the adoption of the generic appellation backgammon for all games
'« within the tables.** It must be remembered that this was the course of
events only in England, in which the backgammon proper has always been
looked upon as the typical ''tables** game. In other countries, the ancient
''Indus tabularum,** perhaps for similar reasons, assuiped other names. We
have a strictly modern form of the ward backgammon in the technical term
back-game, which is explained in the " Ck>m pleat Gamester ** to be like the
French "jan de retour,** which has nothing to do with " re-entering** the
men, but is really a first step, by going over to the enemy*s side, towards
playing the men back to the other end of the board. But the whole of this
explanation is, we confess, not wholly convincing, and certainly that of the
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284 CHESS IN ICELAffD
dictionaries is assuredly of no greater force. We cannot imagine that any-
body would call the re-entering of the captured men a back-^ame at any stage
of the game*s history. The word game is not descriptive of the operation.
The name of the game is often mentioned in English literature after the
XVIth century. It occurs in Howell's <* Letters" (1645), as we shall see
hereafter. Thomas D'Urfey in his play, "Madame Fickle" (1676), speaks of
it as if it were a well-known game: "I won 300 guineys of him t'other
night at backgammon." In Butler's "Hudibras" (1678) the author says:
The hADgmaii
Wm like to larch yon at baok-gammon,
in which lines we have likewise the very ancient and widespread back-
gammon term, lurch. In " Humphrey Clinker " (1771) we And that Smollett
alludes to the game in the phrase: ''And play at billards, cards or back-
gammon." In Lockhart's life of Scott (under date of 1814) the great romancer
tells us that '' In the evening backgammon and cards are in great request."
In "Don Juan" (V. x.), Byron (1820) has the following comparison:
Like a baokgammon board the place was dotted
With whites and blacks.
Mrs. Piozzi, the friend of Dr. Johnson, in her "Journey through France*'
tells of "A backgammon table preserved behind the high altar" of some
church she visited. We have not been able to discover any instance of the
use of backgammon in the XVIth century, although it is very likely that
the word may have begun to be employed in the latter part of that period
(see pp. 79-80). Prefixed to the earliest "Gompleat Gamester" (1674) is an
elaborate copperplate frontispiece picturing, in its different divisions, the
playing of six different classes of games treated in the volume. Opposite is
a rhymed " Explanation of the frontispiece, ' ' with allusions to each panel
and the game depicted thereon. The lines, relating to backgammon run as
follows:
Now t' Irish or back-gammoners we oome,
Who wish their money, with their men, safe home,
Bnt as in war, so in this subtle play«
The stragling men are ta*ne up by the way,
By entring then, one reinfoc«etb more,
It may be to be lost, as those before.
By topping, knapping and Ibnl play some win ;
Bnt those are losers, who so gain by sin.
" Topping " is Ihus explained by the "Century Dictionary: " "A method of
cheating at dice in vogue about the beginning of the eighteenth century.
Both dice seemed to be put into the box, but in reality one was kept at the
top of the box between the fingers of the person playing." In connection
with this explication it is natural to ask what became of the " fingered "
die? Of course, the, two dice must fall on the table, or the cast would be
void. Did the holder drop it on the table, by some prestidigitation, on the
side he wished it to lie? The explanation has its difficulties. By the same
authority nai>pin^ ("to nap") signifies "cheating," the work citing a pas-
sage: " Assisting the frail square die with high and low f^lloms, and other
napping tricks" from the works (1707-8) of Tom Brown, the satirist. But
what are " fullums?" Of the origin of the name of the variety called Irifih^
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STRAY NOTES 285
nothing, so far as we have ascertained, is known. Like *' Russian'' back-
gammon in America it perhaps received the name because it was unlike the
game with which everybody was familiar. Hence it was supposed to come
from another country. It was unlike the English game, and as nobody knew
whence it came it might as well be baptized Irish as anything else. It is
styled by Hyde (1694) 'Hictac seu trictrac Hibernornm,'* which seems to imply
that it came Arom, or was much played by the Irish, but he gives no definite
or ftirther explanation. It was evidently much played in the XVIIth and
XVIIIth centuries. In a volume entitled "Tarl ton's Newes out of Purgato-
rie" (1590), ascribed to Richard Tarlton or Tarleton, a famous comic actor,
although he is now believed not to have been its author, occurs an allusion
to Irish: *'Her husband that loved Irish well, thoughte it no ill trick to beare
a man too many" — punning on the backgammon phrase, "to bear a man."
The comparison, ^< Like an after-game at Irish, that is wonne and lost divers
times in an instant, " is found in the "• Essayes" (1601) of that good knight.
Sir William Cornwallis. A little later in date is Beaumont and Fletcher's
^'Honest Man's Fortune," in which the advice is given to a would-be man
of the world to
Keep a fonr-nobles na^s and a Jack -merlin,
Learn to love ale, and play nt two -hand Irinh,
the merlin being a falcon. In the "Letters" (1645) of James Howell, the
editor of Cotgrave's "French and English Dictionary," which we have men-
tioned more than once, there is a passage which refers not only to Jrw/t,
but to an early form of the word backgammon: "Though you have learnt
to play at baggammon, you must not forget Irish which is a more serious
and solid game." Another knight, and a comedy- writer, Sir George Etherege,
in his "Love in a tub" (1664) says: "Here's a turn with all my heart like
an after-game at Irish." Addison, in " Cato," uses after-game, and in doing
so is perhaps thinking of Irish. Until after the middle of the XVIIth century
Irish was still to be found in the "Com pi eat Gamester," but has long been
discarded Arom books oh games. The next game in the "Gamester" list is
tick-tack. On the supposed origin of this name, we have already touched
(pp. 185-7). It would seem that the form was used in England rather than
trick-track (the French spelling, tric-trac being, of late times, more common
than either). Trick-track^ of course, came from France, and it is possible
that tick-tack may have reached England iVom Holland. Hyde (1694) pretty
plainly sa^is that tric-trac is used in France and tictac in England. The
dictionaries do not help us to judge which is the earlier. Tick-tack is used
by Shakespeare (in "Measure for Measure," first acted in 1604): "a game of
ticke-tacke ; " by Milton, who speaks of "A game at tick-tack with words;"
and earlier than either by Ben Jonson in "Every Man in his Humour," flrst
produced in 1598, this being the oldest citation yet found: "He'll playe at
fayles and tick-tack," which we have quoted more flilly in an earlier place
(p. 88), also explaining " flayles." The reader will perhaps recall the absurd
etymology quoted from the "Complete Gamester" (p. 159, note). This is cited,
apparently in all seriousness by the "Century Dictionary;" it even calls
special attention to it. The definition given of tick-tack by the dictionary is
incorrect: "A complicated kind of backgammon, played both with men and
with pegs; " what is here referred to is the "Grand trictrac," which we have
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CHESS IN ICELAND
described; it is not played with pegs at all — the pegs are employed merely
to mark the game or the game-points. The '' Century ** gets this bit of
wisdom from " Webster's Dictionary " (1882), without any effort at ftirther
research, and repeats it under the word trick-tr€u:k, which Webster does not.
The game following in our list is doublets. Cotgrave makes the French
name ^^renette, '' concerning which word the French lexicographers do not
give us much light. Then comes his definition: **a game at tables of some
resemblance with our doublets or queenes game/' As regards the latter
name Hyde (ii, 37) quotes a passage, explaining its significance from one of
the learned opusculi of Salmasius (Claude Saumaise), the author of the
^* Defensio regia pro Carlo I, '* and the intensely hostile critic of Milton —
"the diabolical rebel Milton'' the translator of the work cited makes him call
the great poet — the passage explaining that **renette" is a corruption of
"reglnula" or rather "regineta," a diminutive of "regina:" ** Praeter tric^
tracum quem vocamus, alium etiam ludum cum tesseris & calculis in tabula
lusitare consuevimus: reginulam vu1g6 vel reginetam vocamus, quasi parvam
reginam; nam quidam calculus nuncupatur. Ingeniosus hie Indus, & mul-
tum habet artis, & super duodecim tantum tabulae punctis luditur. Vincit
autem qui omniim tabulae punctis luditur." Hence the game is called the
"queen's game." From the peculiar value of doublets in the game (double
fours, for instance, as we shall see, enabling him who has that cast to move
eight men) comes the other name of this variety. It is heard of in literature
in the XVIth and XVIIth century. Bishop Latimer, the reformer and martyr,
in his fourth sermon before Edward YI (1549), says: "They be at their doublets
still. " In one of his plays (1651), the poet William Cartwright puts into the
mouth of a character:
What ! where' 8 yonr oloak t . . .
To tell yoa trath, he hath lost it at donblete.
Still another bishop, John Earle, in his "Microcosmographie" (1G28), which
went through many editions before 1786, says: "At tables he reaches not
beyond doublets, " though this may refer rather to the dice than to the game
of doublets. There is the same doubt about the passage flrom Osway's
"Atheist," cited on a previous page. The name of the next "Gamester"
game, sice-ace^ can hardly be found outside of the manuals of games. It is
so called because of the prominent part played by the dice-points, ace and
six. It is slight in character and may be played by five persons. It will
be described with other English games later. The final game in {he " Game-
ster" list bears the name of ketch-dolt; from the game's character there
is little doubt that the word is properly catch-dolt, ^indeed it is printed so in
later issues — which explains its own derivation. The only other issue of the
"Compleat Gamester" now before us is the eighth (London 1754), eighty years
after the first. In those eighty years two other games were added to the list
of those "within the tables. " They are "The famous game of verquere" and
" The noble and courtly game called the grand trick track/' as they are denom-
inated in the head-lines of the sections describing them. This makes the
number of backgammon varieties eight. It is perhaps reasonable to suppose
that between the two dates the two games added (and which are given a position
before the others) had either been newly introduced into England, or had re-
cently become prominent ; or either or both may have been translated from
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STUA Y notes 287
Marini&re, or the '* Acaddmie des Jeux/' after the manner of the compilers of
hand-books of games in our day. *« Of verquere we are told, in this final
edition of the " Gamester, " that it " is said to be originally of Dutch extrac-
tion, and one of the most noted diversions among the Hollanders,*" a statement
'" NoM of th« bibUograpbica give at mueb information In regard to these volumes
bearing the Utio of *• Gameeter," whieh were without doubt auggeeted by Marlnt^re^s " Maison
aeadimiqae." One bibliographer (for Instanee, AlUbone) simply copies the exceedingly
meagre notices of another (for Instance, Lowodes). Continental book-lists, as Is too often
the case, afford ns somewhat better accounts of Kngllsh publications than lire to be had from
the lists issned In Kngland. Though in this ease even the former are deficient. SUrtlnj;
with this eighth edIUon of the **Compleat Qamester ** (17M) — it will be remembered that
the first (1974) was anonymous — we find It sUted on the title-page that the book was
" First written for the use of the young princesses, by Richard Seymour, Bsq ; And now
carefully roTlsed, very much enlarged and improved, agreeable to the present method of
playing the several games, by Charles Johnson, Bsq.'* The title proper is *'The compleat
gamaater : in three parts. Containing, I. The court gamester : or, full and easy instructions
for playing the games of whist, ombre, quadrille, quintille, picquet, and the royal game of
chess [this last occupy lag pp. ltfl-186]. II. The city gamester : or, true manner of playing
the most usual games at cards vis. all-foum, cribbldge [sic], put, lue [ale], brag, lottery, &c.
With several diverting tricks upon the cards ; also rules for playing at all the games both
within and without the tables ; and at Rngllsh and French billiards.... III. The gentleman's
diversion : or, the arts of riding, racing, cocking, and bowling. " The preface Is signsd by
Richard Seymour, and Its final paragraph (p. vil) reads thus : ** The seci>nd and third paru
of this treatise, were originally written by Charles Cotton, esq ; some years since, but are
now rectified according to the present standard of play." This preface may have been
prepared for some previous cditioui and some of Its statements may not be applicable to this.
It is to.be inddently noticed that neither draughts nor morris, nor foz-and-geese has been
noticed In the issues of the '* Compleat gamester." We have then three writers mentioned
in connection with this manual of aames, and we shall look at them in due order. The
original edition (1674) was anonymous, but has been always ascribed to Charles Cotton
(1990-1677), a humorous poet and a translator of poetical works, but who Is best known as
the author of the second part (trout and grayling) of that work of wide fame, the *' Compleat
Angler " (1668), by Ixak Walton, who Is said to have been the adopted father of Oot:on.
This second part was published separately In 1676, but was also attached to the* fifth edition
of the "Angler,** issued la that year; since then the book has been known as ** Walton and
Cotton's Complete Angler. ** It is not unlikely that the title <'Tbe Compleat Angler"
suggested to Cotton that of " The Compleat Gamester. " The secoud name is that of Richard
Heymour. He Is only mentioned in connection with the "Gamester," and Lowndes puts the
edition of 1784 under his name. It may be that he was the first reviser of the *' Gamester '* and
that the preface dates fk'om that year, but we Mhall hear a little more about him. The third
name Is that of Charles Johnson, and here we are met by the obHtade that the bibliographies
speak of two of the name — contemporaries. The first wrote, as we are told, nineteen comedies,
and lived from 1679 to 1748. The other compiled a general history of *' the most notorious
pyrates from their first rise In the Island of Provldedfee in 1717 to 1794," whieh api>eared at
London in the latter year. This was followed by a " History of the lives and action of the
most famous highwaymen, murderers, street robbers, Ice., with the voyages and plunders of
the most noted pirates. ** This was published in folio in 1784, with many remarkable
lllastrstlons, which have made it a sough t-for book. There Is no record of the years of his
life and death, nor any note of any work by him after 1734. Despite the bibliographers
these two may be one. Now Van der LInde (*'Geeoblcfate ", ii., 60) reproduces the title
apparently In full, of the sixth edition (1789) of the *• Gamester", and likewise of the eighth
(1754) (the one we hare had before us). In the title-page of the former, there is no mention
of Charlee Johnson, although the title-page Is in many respects identical with that of 1754
(*'The compleat gamester : in three parU." 8ko.). Van der Linde records the seventh edition,
but having never seen a copy, he does not give the Ml title, nor the date. In his " Jahr-
tansend der Sehachlitteratnr " he has ascertained that the seventh edition was printed in
1789. That then, as Is likely, was the edition which Charles Johnson first edited, nine years
before the death of the poet Charles Johnson. In his ** Jahrtausend,*' which gives only very
brief titles. Van der Linda makes the following presontment of the compilatioas bearing the
Utla of '* Gamester. " First, under (Cotton), '< Compleat Gamester **, London 1674, second
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CHSSS IN ICELAND
we have previoasly cited (p. 188). As we have suggested, the Dutch verkeer
may have come from the German verkehren, or vice-versa, but the former is
possibly the more likely case. The word got into French as reverquier^ but
was superseded by revet^tier. The variety, so far as we know, has never had
a genuinely English name. The other additional game, the ''Grand trick
track, " is the French **tric-trac,'' which, from its elaborate method of play,
has obtained its epithet of "grand." We have already stated that the only
one of the numerous ''Jans'* explained in the account of the French game
is the "jan de retour'* which is here spoken of as the "gens des [sic] retour
or the back-game '* — indicating perhaps that the editor got his knowledge
of "trie trac** orally, and not f^om any French manual. The name of
verquere never made its way into general literature, much less into the
dictionaries; nor has the French name, revertier^ been used in English as it
has been in German. We find "Grand trictrac** cited once outside of the
manuals, although iiHctrac is more frequent. The London Camden Society
in 1857 published the old " Journal of the very Rev. Rowland Davies,** dean
of Ross, kept in 1688-90; in it the writer says: " 1 taught them to play grand
trie trac,** which proves that the name and the game were known in Great
Britain more than a generation before it could have been treated in the
"Gamester." "There's Mrs. Delacour leading Miss Portman off into the
trie trac cabinet,** writes Maria Edgeworth in her novel of "Belinda** (1901).
In Jalia Pardoe*s "Beauties of the Bosphorus** (1839), the author mentions
the game among other customary diversions in Turkey: "The amusements
consist principally of.... matches at tric-trac." Hyde, in connection with
the passage cited from Salmasius in regard to doublets ("renette**), adds a
phrase showing that the "grand trictrac** was already in his day so called
in France: "Idem sit hodie in eo trictraci genere quem magnum vulgd vo-
cant. *' This refers to the first half of the XVIIth century. In regard to
other names of varieties, we have spoken of "Russian backgammon,** a
favorite game in America, and likewise described in handbooks printed in
England, but there seems to be, as has been liinted, no trustworthy inform-
ation obtainable as to the provenance of the cognomen bestowed upon it.
odltiou 1676, followed by otben dated 1G80, 1709, 1781, 1725, and cue, ityled Apparently.
"Garnet,** without date. Second, under (Seymour), *' Court (iametter,'* flrat edition,
London 17X0, and then 1721, 17S2, 17M, 17S4, 1789, to the olgbth (ae be nuinbere them) 1754.
It is dliBeuU to reeonoile theve two li«t«. Aa nearly as can be deduced from the fuller titlea
found In the '* Qescbicbte des Schacbsplels,** the ** Compleat Gamester " of Cotton went
Ibroogb these editions:' 1674, [1676V], 1680 (seemingly styled on the title-page the s«cend
edition) 1709, 1721, 1715 (on the tlllo page the fifth edition); bat in 17S1 had appeared the
<* Court Gamester'* (''wriltea for the use of the young princesses" according to tha title-
page), apparently anonymous, but asorided by the bibliographers to Richard Beymour, the
second, third and fourtii editions following In 1791, 1722, 1728. There is here no trace of a
1721 edition of the original eompilalion by Cotton. After this time It muit hftTe been decided
to merge the new «* Court Gamester** into the old ** Compleat Gamester'*, which resulted in
the sixth edition of tho latter (1734) with Seymour's name on the title-page, and his acknow*
lodgement of Cotton's work In the preface, as in the eighth (1754) edition. Seymour may
bAve died before the next issue, and then Johnson may have edited It (1799), but that can
only be settled by a sight of the complete title. The 1754 edition Is the final appearenoe
of the *' Gamcstor. ** The more modem handbook of Hoyle saperseded it. But there was
another book of the '* Gamester" kind, which never got beyond the first Issue: ** Annals of
gaming ; or the fair player*s sure guide, containing original treatises on whist, haaard, tennis,
lansquenet, plcquet, billiard*, loo, quadrille, lottery, ba^gammon &c. By a Connoisseur.
London 1775,** which may or may not be of value as regards backgammon
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We have suggested that the German lurtsch or lurtschspiel may have had
its origin in the English lurch, but the latter, so far as we know, has been
little used except as a technical term (*'to lurch"') at backgammon.
In trea.ting of such terms, we should first recall the fact once more that
lurch is one of the oldest we have, it occurring even in the ancient tables,
as we have recorded. The word seems to be in a very confused etymological
condition. Hyde (ii. 36) tells us that in France there is a mode of play
(** lusum ") known as ** ourche," in which, by a certain rule, the loser suffers
a double penalty and the winner wins a double stake. This feature is well
known, he tells us, in Belgium and in Italy, in which latter country it is
called ♦* marcio,*' whence the word has gone into the " lingua franca *' of
the east, where it is '' mftr^ '* (which he also gives in Arabic letters). It is
styled *'jan " by the Danes, and among the French of to-day it is **bredou-
ille,'* and this mode of winning is denominated a '' partie bredouille.** He
then speaks of the use of "Tourche" (that is "the ourche") in English,
and states that it is employed outside of the game of backgammon, quoting
the expressions : " he is left in the lurch,"' " to lurch anything."' Much of
all this must be cautiously taken. The " Century Dictionary " thinks that
the I- belongs to the word, which should thus be written in French "lourche"
and is probably connected with the old French ** lourche," meaning ** in-
snared," "deceived,"" "duped."" Its first definition of the English noun
(probably inexact) is then "an old game, the nature of which is unknown,""
and it cites from Sir Thomas Urquhart"s translation (1653) of Rabelais the
sentence: "My mind was only running upon the lurch and trie- trac;"" and
another from the prolific dramatist Thomas Dekker"s play, " The Bellman of
London "" (1608) : " Whose inn is a bowling-alley, whose books are bowls,
and whose law-cases are lurches and rubbers."' The second definition is
that of a technical term at cribbage (more common, if common at all, it
would seem in England than in America), the third is " a cheat,"" "a swindle,""
and then the^ phrase "left in the lurch "" is cited. Then a verb "to lurch""
is explained as " to win a double game at cribbage, picquet, etc.,"" and as
"to leave in the lurch, disappoint."' This has the same origin (old French
" lourche ""), but the lexicographer thinks that it has been, to some extent,
confused with a pure English verb " to lurch,"' being another form of " to
lurk," and signifying variously "to lie in concealment," "to shift or dodge,""
" to walk unsteadily or stagger,"" and so on. No clear use of lurch as a
backgammon term is given, but it is quite certain that the German "lurtsch,"'
if not from tlie English, has the- same origin as the English term. A very
old word in backgammon is the verb, to bear. It signifies to move or throw
off the men from the board, after they have been all advanced to the fourth,
or final quarter. To throw off is now often used instead of it. But it has
entered into literature. In the " Epigrams and proverbs " (1562) of the witty
and popular writer, John Heywood, we find the following :
I will no more play at tables with thee :
Wben wee oome to bearying, thou begylest mee,
In beaiying of thy men,
and later in the same work he says: "Eache other caste thou bearest a
man to [too] many." An early (1748) edition of Hoyle's " Games," as cited
in an article in the " Penny Cyclopaedia " (iii. 240), gives this backgammon
rule : " If you bear any number of men, before you have entered a man
B7
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290 CHB8S IN ICELAND
taken up.... such men, so borne, most be entered again in your adversary's
tables.** The " Compleat Gamester ** (1674) says under backgammon, *' When
you come to bearing have a care of making when you need not," and ** If
both boar together, he that is first off without doublets wins one.**^ In the
newest English '' Handbook of Games ** (1890) we read : '' as soon as either
player has brought all his men into his home table, he must begin to take
them off the board, which, in the technical language of the game, is called
bearing his men.... If it is impossible to play up a man, the man must be
borne.'' This term bear must not be confused with carry^ which has also
been long in use and means •» to advance " (or •* move forward ") the men.
The *' Handbook " describes it thus : " The game consists in moving the men
from point to point, according to the figures on the dice thrown, out of the
adversary's home table into his outer table, across into the player's outer
table, and then over the bar into the player's home table. This process is
called carrying a man or men, " A blot is a single man on a point, and
therefore exposed to capture. The origin of this term is doubtful ; some of
the lexicologists suggest the Danish blot, Swedish blott, but the history of
the game will hardly support this. Another guess has been the Dutch
Moot, •*bare," "naked," "exposed," It is not easy to see why it should
not be our ordinary word " blot," in the sense of "spot," " mark," "speck,"
since a single man, before it is doubled, is a weak "spot" in the game or
a " mark " for the adversary. In the Italian dictionary of Florio (1598) he
renders the word " caccia," literally " hunt " or " chase," but used technic-
ally in backgammon, by " a blot at tables." Henry Porter the dramatist,
in his only now extant play, " The pleasant historie of the two angry women
of Abington" (1599), makes one of the characters say to another: "Look
you mistress, now I hit you." The other responds :
Yon never nee to mine a blot,
Eepeoiallj when it stenda so &ire to lUt. . . ^
I hoi your man.
A more noted writer, William Wycherley, in his comedy, " Love in a wood "
(1672) makes a character exclaim : " Tho I made a blot, your oversight has
lost the game." With blot is associated the verb, hit. To hit a blot is to
capture a man standing singly on a point ; from being a backgammon term
it has become a very common figurative phrase. We have Just cited an
instance of its use as far back as 1579, but it is probably earlier, and is still
used in all the manuals. The figurative use is likewise early. Thomas
Hale, in his " Account of several new Inventions " (1691), says : " And he
there hits a blot in the papal tenets that was never hit before." Dryden, in
the dedication to the ^neid (1698), writes : " He is too great a master of
his art, to make a blot which may so easily be hit." The following lines,
Ita faolu. . . hava tanght him the wit,
The biota of hia neighboon the better to bit,
occur in a political ballad of 1734. Cowper employs the figure in his poem
"Hope" (1781):
The very bott of slander, and the blot
For every dart that maliee ever ahot.
In our own day it occurs constantly in such sentences as : " Here the critic
has undoubtedly hit a blot." But the noun hit, as a backgammon term,
bears generally quite another meaning— so different that it is difficult to
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StRAY NOTES 291
perceive any connection between the two. One might perhaps say that when
a blot has been hit^ the player has made a 7U'<, but we have never heard or
read that expression. A hity in backgammon parlance, is tile simplest or
mildest form of victory— the winner having borne or thrown off all his men,
while his adversary remains with some of his still in the bearing board.
In the '' Compleat Gamester ** (1754) this advice is given : '' If your design
be to get only a hit, your taking up only one or two of your adversary's
men, will secure it better than if you took up a greater number ; '* and in
the recent '* Handbook of Games'* (1890) this is the definition of the word ;
'^ The player who bears all his men first wins a hit or single game, provided
his opponent has borne off one or more of his men." It is doubtless the
result of a misunderstanding that hit is sometimes used in literature in the
sense of game or «' partie.'' Goldsmith in the '' Vicar of Wakefield *' (1766)
commits this error in speaking of backgammon, '^at which my old friend
and I sometimes took a two penny /itf — a meaningless expression. In the
novel by Lever, "The Martins of Cro' Martin " (1856), is found the passage:
" A hardly contested ' hit ' of backgammon was being fought out,'' regarding
which the author might claim that the players were playing for a hit— h mere
simple win— but whether it were to be a hit, in this proper sense, could
hardly be decided while the battle was still '' hardly contested; " so we fear
that Lever is in the same category as Goldsmith. The 1890 '"Handbook"
explains in connection with the two hits, other technical words : ** But if a
player has borne all his men before his opponent has borne any, that player
wins a gammon, equivalent to two games or hits. If the loser still have one
or more men in his adversary's home table, or waiting to enter, when the win-
ner has borne all his men, the latter is considered to have won a backgamnum,
provided that the loser has not previously borne a man." These two terms
are likewise in use as verbs; to gammon one's adversary is to win a gammon,
and to backgammon him is to win a backgammon. That long-continued and
useful serial, the ''Annual Register," for 1798 (p. 246), uses this phrase: "At
length he by death is back-gammoned." The verb gammon is not lacking in
general literature, having been used in 1735 by the unfortunate Rio^rd Savage:
At tables DOW t
Bat oh, If gmiiimoii*d tbero
The stwtliag eehoee Iomh liko him to iwMr,
but Still earlier (1694) by Laurence Echard in one of the plays of Plautns
translated by him : " Ne'r a gamester of 'm all has half the cunning. Faith,
't was an excellent cast ; 't has quite gammon'd the rascal." In a novelette
in Dickens's " Good Words " (1867) we read : " * More fool you,' remarked his
ftither, without looking up from the backgammon-board. 'There, madam,
you are gammoned.' " The noun backgammon, in its technical sense, is found
in the earliest "Oimpleat Gamester" (1674); both gammon and backgammon
are in use in the last edition (1754); and the proper definition of gammon is
given in the dictionary of Dycke and Pardon (1735). Formerly gammon was
occasionally used for backgammon, the name of the game, but has long been
rare in that sense ; it was perhaps never more than a merely conversational
expression. The poet Thomson, in his "Autumn" (1730), inserts these lines:
Or the quick dice.
In tbimder leaping ftom the box nwako
The aonndlDg ganmoo,
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2« CHESS IN IC BLAND
an odd bit of writing, to say the least. In the lives of several of the North
family by Roger North (1734), the writer says of one, whom he is describing:
^* Whatever games were stirring, at places where he retired, as gammon,
gleek, picqnet, or even the merry main, he made one.*' In 1800, in "The
Mourtray Family," a novel by Mrs. Hervey of Alton, the reader learns that
"Mr. Chowles was above, playing &i gammon with mistress.'' The "Noctes
Ambrosianse" of " Christopher North" (1826), furnishes this: *»The tailor
at Jarrow ford dang ye all to bits baith at gajoimon and the dambord "—
the final word being the Scotch for draughts. "It may be inferred that he
too was a gammon-player," says an article in the ** Monthly Magazine"
(1814). On the other hand a line in the " Gentleman's Magazine " (1800)
affords a legitimate use of the word : " And by quick taking off, a gammon
win." The term back-game is used in the " Grand trictrac " as the equival-
ent of the French <'Jan de retour." In the English game it signifies, ac-
cording to the "Handbook:" *' exposing of blots unnecessarily, and otherwise
waiting for the opponent to make blots, with the view of prolonging the
contest in the hope of being able to outplay the adversary." Nor should
this be confused with aftergame^ a term used in connection with " Irish,"
the definition of which, sufficiently vague, is given by the "Century Diction-
ary : " "A second game played in order to reverse or improve the issue of
the first ; hence, the methods taken after the first turn of affairs," the last
phrase describing, as it seems, its figurative sense. The definition is credited
to the "New English Dictionary." Can it be of the nature of the "reprise"
(" tenir ") in the French trictrac (see p. 181)! Probably not. It appears not
now to be employed in English backgammon, but was familiar in ^he
XVIIIth century, when the ancient name tables, for the backgammon game,
still lingered (see p. 79 for two examples). The definition of the " New
English Dictionary," " a game at backgammon," is not quite correct, as
whatever the term may mean, it is really only a part of a game. In chess,
back-game signifies "a variation," or "a previous mode of play," Thebar
is the division or ridge between the two halves of the backgammon board-
separating the two home-tables from the two outer tables. The word, in
this technical sense, is so far as we know, explained by no lexicologist.
Nor are we told anywhere, except in the special manuals, the meaning of
bar'point, an important term, which denotes the seventh point of each player
counting from the first point in his home- table ; in other words it is the first
point (next the bar) in each player's outer table; "when you have gained
your cinque point your next care must be, to secure your barr point,"
" when you have secur'd your cinque and barr points," are phrases in the
"Gamester " (1754) ; " when your cinque and bar points are secure," "secures
his bar point " are similar ones from the latest authoritative manual. But
bar has another meaning connected, however, with the dice, not the game.
The word in this sense is omitted ft'om the vocabulary of the " Century," but
found in the "New English Dictionary," in which it is explained as "A kind
of false die, on which certain numbers are prevented from turning up." It is
explained or alluded to by that noted scholar, Roger Ascham in his "Toxo«
phile" (1545), when he mentions "Certayne termes.... appropriate to their
playing; whereby they wyle drawe a mannes money but paye none, which
they oal barres ; " and occurs in the old romance, tcom the same century,
«' Nobody and somebody ; with the true chronicall history of Elydure"(1592),
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STRAY NOTES
which talks of '* those demi-bars .... those bar sizeaces.** In a supplement
(1753) to the '» Cyclop»dia " of Ephraim Chambers (the first English work of
its kind), we learn of " baT^ dice, a species of false dice, so formed that they
will not easily lie on certain sides." There is likewise a verb bar with a
different meaning bat used of dice, " to bar the dice," explained as '^ to
declare the throw void." It is this verb which Dryden makes use ot in his
little-read tragedy of " Amboyna" (1673): "He would have whip'd it up, as
his own fees.... but that his lord bar*d the dice, and reckoned it to him as a
part of his board wages." Bat there is an adjective, derived from our previous
bar (= false die), namely, barred^ perhaps more often written bard. This is
found in a singular work, printed anonymously and without date at London,
entitled: ^* A manifest detection of the most vyle and detestable use of dice-
play," ascribed to Gilbert Walker (although the "New English Dictionary"
does not mention his name); the date of the production is variously given as
1532 and 1552. The writer says: "Lo here.... a well favoured die, that
seemeth good and square, yet is the forehead longer on the cater ft tray than
any other way. Such be also called Itard cater tres, because, commonly, the
longer end will, of his own sway, draw downwards, and turn up to the eye
sice, sinke, deuis or ace." Dekker, f^om whose play, ''The Bellman of
London*' (1608), we have already quoted, speaks in it of "A bale of bard
cater- treas," while in another of his comedies, '' The honest whore " (1604),
he makes one of his characters say: "She suffred your tongue, like a bard
catertra, to runne all this while." A few other technical words connected
with the game will be noticed in examining the English methods of play.
The two games now, so t^r as can be ascertained, almost exclusively
played in both England and America are that called simply backgammon,
and that styled " Russian " backgammon. The former is the " toutes- tables "
of aforetime in France, of late very much less played (p. 133) in that land,
and the game now called " gammon " in Germany (and now likewise grow
ing more common in France, according to the cyclopedia of Larousse, which
would indicate the revival of " toutes- tables," but under a foreign name).
It is one of the oldest forms of this table-game, going back, without much
doubt, to the "todas tablas" of king Alfonso^s treatise, and thus probably
representing, as notably as any other method of play, the " tables " of the
middle ages. Its typical characteristic is the method of " setting " the men
before opening the game (see fig. 21). Their arrangement on the board is
a most ingenious one, although it does not seem a difilctlt one to devise.
But, taking into consideration the march of the men, the relations of the
pieces of one player to those of the other as they advance, the making and
hitting of blots, the formation of series of double points to block the advers-
ary's movements, the mode of re-entering the men which are hit and the
rules for the final "bearing" or throwing off the men— considering all
these features, the practitioner, as soon as he has well grasped their signifi-
cance, will concede the cleverness of the initial distribution of the pieces.
It is no wonder that the " todas tablas " has a recorded history of move
than six centuries. This is the variety of backgammon which has princi-
pally entered into English literature, having been the favorite diversion of
men and women of culture among the English-speaking peoples for many
generations— particularly among those classes, like the rural clergy and
gentry and the more intelligent and leisured of the professional and corn-
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894 CHESS IN ICELAND
mercial orders, who dread the fascinations of cards and have neither time
nor taste for the more severe intellectual labor demanded by chess. It has
been especially the relaxation of declining years. ^^^ One reason of this
wide-spread fondness lies, perhaps, in the fact that no other game combines
so happily the elements of skill and chance. The dice are AiU of surprises
not to be calculated before-hand, and the throws are frequently fatal to the
player who eagerly watches their fall, but in the long run the best player
wins. It should be remarked that the earliest names of this variety (^'todas
tablas,** *' toutes tables ") apparently signify thai the men are moved through
all the (four) tables or divisions, there having been other varieties in which
each player's operations were confined to his own side of the board. The
men having been properly placed (fig. 21) each player begins to move his
men from point to point, according to the figures on the dice cast, out of
his opponent's home table into the opponent's outer table, across into his
own outer table, and then over the bar into the player's home tabic. On
the way, each player, finding that his opponent has on some point only a
single man, may, if the numbers on the dice permit, remove that man from
the board, occupying the point by one (or more) of his own men. The op-
ponent, before advancing any of his men, must re-enter the man, thus removed
or taken up, in his adversary's home table. If the points in that table in-
dicated by the dice are covered (that is have two or more of his adversary's
men standing upon them) his captured man cannot enter, and he cannot
play. A point having only one man upon it is called a hlot^ and capturing
that man is styled hitting a blot. Doublets (two aces, two deuces &c.) thrown
may be played doubly; for instance, double sixes entitle the player to move
24 points (if the situation on the board permit) either (a) one man 24 points,
(b) one man 18 points and another 6 points, (c) one man 12 points and two
others 6 points each, (d) two men 12 points each, {e) four men 6 points each.
Of course, if a player throw six- three, for example, he may move one man
6 points and another 3, or he may advance one man 9 points, but he can
move no man to a point held by two of the opponent's men; nor can a man
be moved (by the throw six- three, for instance) to the ninth point if both
the third and sixth point be covered, that is, have two of the enemy's men
upon them. If the third point be vacant, or be a blot, and the ninth point
be covered, then the man may be first moved to the third point and the
six point must be played with another man. If the third point be covered
no man can be moved to the ninth point by that throw. When either
player's men have made the circuit of the board, and have reached the
player's home board, then he can begin to bear them, or throw them off.
For every number thrown a man is removed from the corresponding point,
or if the player choose, he may move the man or men further on in the
home-board, instead of bearing them. The player, all of whose men are
if* The writer r«««lli ono dear Udy of clear Jndgmeiit, and of warn lympatfalM, and
bloMcd with a •pfrlt unflinchingly fearlan and a mood uniformly «beerftal, who, after three
■core yeara of aetlve exletenee, found real and reercation iu the pleaaure and Intereot yielded
by tberenerable game '* within the tables.*' Daily after dinner, ibe welcomed the appear«nee
of the board, and was prepared to engage any clever adTercary antll the last hoar of the
twenty-fonr had passed away, eorapletlng the dial symbolised by the one soore and fonr
points of the ancient iMftf, If It may be permitted to extend the simile of Che old Persian
▼later ; and this went on until she bad long passed her four score and tenth year.
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STRAY NOTES 295
first borne or thrown-off, is the winner. The other prevalent' English game,
the so-styled ** Russian " backgammon, is played in the same way except
in two respects. The men are not placed on the board before commencing,
but are gradually entered, those of each player in the same table, in accord-
ance with the dice-numbers thrown. The table selected is called the
" entry table. " If the first player throw five-ace, for instance, he enters
two men, one on the ace -point, the other on the five point, counting from
the outermost point of the board of entry. If the other player then throw
five- trey, he enters a man on the trey point, and with another hits his op-
ponent's blot (the five point), and removes his opponent's man there placed,
putting it outside the board with the unentered men, and it has to be
re-entered. This process goes on until a player has entered all his men in
the board of entry. He then begins to advance his pieces through the tables
to the remotest table, where they are to be borne or thrown off, the first
player to throw off all his men being the winner— all exactly as in the or-
dinary backgammon. The other feature which is different in the Russian
game, is the treatment of doublets. If a player throw doublets, he not only
plays them doubly, but afterwards he may again play doublets, that is those
on the opposite sides of the dice, and after that be done, he is permitted to
have a second oast of the dice. If he then chance to throw doublets again,
the whole process is repeated. Thus, if he throw cinques (double fives), he
plays four fives, then four deuces (the number on the reverse of the dice),
and then throws again. All this is done, whether he be entering or advanc-
ing his men. In England, however, but generally not in America, the pri-
vilege of the second throw is denied to either player when he throws his
very first set of doublets. As stated, other varieties of backgammon are
now rarely played in the English lands. It is well to call attention to the
fact that this long existing English backgammon (Alfonso's ''todas tablas")
is not described in the British Museum '' Tables '* MS.
Of the other varieties known and practised in Oreat Britain, the oldest
is fayles {faUes f)^ which goes back not only to the time of the British Mu-
seum MS, but even to that of Alfonso, in the former of which it is described
under the name of faylys (see p. 164) and in the latter under that of fallas.
It would seem to have been practised as late as the time of Ben Jonson,
who mentions it in the same line with tick-tack (see p. 88, note). Francis
Douce (d. 1834), the antiquarian, may have derived his brief description of
it from the British Museum MS. Of the 15 men, 13 were placed, at the be-
ginning, on the sixth point in the table to the right of one player and the
left of the other, and the other two on the ace-point of the adversary in the
table opposite. The other player's 15 men occupied the two points directly
opposite. He who first bore his men won; or if one party threw a number
which could not be played, he was at once declared the loser.
We shall now* copy the whole backgammon section of the '* Compleat
Gamester" (1754), partly to give an idea of the varieties at that date known
in England, partly on account of the quaint language of the descriptions,
which is, except in the case of verquere and the " grand trictrac," virtually
the same as that employed in the first edition of the work in the third
quarter of the XVIIth century. Our extracts include pages 229-250, the first
relating to verquere : '^AU the table-men are placed on the ace-point, where
you set the two men at back-gammon; and as at that game, bring them
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2»6 CHESS IN ICELA ND
roand into your own tables, but with different circumstances; for you are
not allowed to make a point in either of your tables, next your adversary,
the farther ace-point excepted, for there you may do it as your discretion
does best direct you; but you may take as many points in your own tables
as you think good, to advantage your game, and by so doing, to hinder
your adversary from approaching you, or by the luckiness of his throw to
get the better of it. In the next place, you are to observe, that this game
is commonly played double and single; the double is called John, which is
a particular advantage your adversary gets over you, if his luck in throw-
ing be extraordinary: but you can never be John*d except you have more
men than you can enter upon six points, that is to say, 7 men, which is 1
more than your points will bear; and in such a case you must yield the
double, and consequently your game is in danger to be lost. Note, that
tho' you always point as your cast affords you convenience, and to the best
advantage of your game, yet you cannot enter two men upon any point,
and in that particular this game is more remarkable than any other played
upon the tables. You play doublets, and at last bear away all your men,
as at back-gammon, and the art is in managing your throws to make your
game proper; for this, whilst your adversary, by ill throwing, or indifferent
management lags behind, is very convenient for you to be skilled at. Note
also, that when you have more men to enter, than you have opened points
to receive them, you are to let your adversary throw; which I have seen
for a considerable space of time; until by playing his men forward (contriv-
ing as much as possible he can, to gain the preheminence [sic], and pul
back your game) he makes room for you by a vacancy; else, perhaps, the
nature of this diversion is such, that the game may hold out a long time,
there being no possibility of going on, till you have the privilege, by his
opening the passage for you on the tables, to enter your remaining men.
Note too, that if you hit any of your adversary's men, by a fortunate oast
of your dice, and that he has the favourable fortune presently after, to hit
you again: in such a case, which, indeed, is not very common, if there be
not room for you to enter in his tables, nor for him to perfect the advantage
of this throw to enter in your*s, it is the nature of this game, that you must
lose it double, you being the first to throw. This, and the rest of the
accidents of verquere, are like most other games, to be understood, and
avoided, by experience in play." The next game to be considered is the
Grafid trictrac, which we are told in the introductory lines " is a French
diversion: and most commonly used by persons of the first quality," which
assertion most likely means that this form of the game never became pop-
ular in England. The writer goes on to say: ** It is thus played: table-men
are to be placed on the side of the tables. Next, it is also to be observed ;
that besides the table men, with which you play, there are 3 other pieces to be
used, called markers, whether half crowns, or halfpence, or any other coin:
these are to mark the throw of your dice, on the points of the tobies which
are advantogeous to you : for example, if in your first tables you make single
toots, in 3 casts, or throws, you mark with one marker 4. There are 12 holes
on the sides of your tobies, with pegs in them, for the use of this game. Note
then, that 12 marks gained on the pointo of your tobies, make an hole, and 12
holes make up the game, if you agree to it; else less, or more: If you fill up
your pointo, for every single throw on the dice, you make 4, and for doub-
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STRAY N0TB8 VFl
lets 6; and may hold your game as long as you think convenient, that is,
play on without breaking up your own, and your adversary's, if you believe
you shall get no advantage by beginning again. If you hold with your double
men in your tables, before you can make a point, and your adversary cannot
fill his tables, you are obliged with your man to pass over into his tables,
tho' it be commonly a disadvantage; but if he throws so well, as to fill up,
then it alters the matter, and you cannot pass. Note, that when you have
marked 12 without your marker, which, as I said before, makes up I hole,
you may go off, break up your tables, and begin again, provided you have
the dice; or else you cannot. If in playing this game, you touch a man
rashly, as intending to play it, and think to change it for another, you are
obliged to play it as you before intended. Note, as to those men that are
obliged to pass over into the adversary's tables, if he hits them, he marks
thus: for every single throw 4; for doublets 6; and if at any time, by your
good fortune in throwing, you can mark over and above 12, you must then
mark a hole, or else 2, if you go double, and the overplus remaining is
called to the good, provided you do not break your game : you cannot go off,
nor break your tables by your adversary's throws. And note, that if you
chance to make more or less than is right, it is in his power to take the
advantage, put you back, or oblige you to mark full. This is what is most
considerable in your first tables. Now, as to your adversary's second tables:
for every man you hit of his with a single die, you mark but 2; and for
doublets 4; tho' in his first tables, 4 for each single die, and 6 for doublets.
If you chance to hit a blot or two in your adversary's tables, and cannot
pass, by reason of his man standing in your way, and hindering you, it is
allowable for him to take the advantage of marking by your own throws in
both tables, as before-mentioned. The ace-point of both corners in the
second tables, cannot be divided here, nor fill the comers, as at other games;
tho' in lieu of that convenience, if the dice favour, for each single cast, you
mark 4; and for doublets 6. Then as that part of the game, called gens des
retour, or the back-game, which is the latter part; next, bearing off your
men, as it is used at back-gammon, you play your men as Atst as you can,
into his tables, endeavouring to fill up the points, as at the fore -game;
which being done, you bear off your men; only there is one distinction
between this and back-gammon (noted before) that as doublets thrown
at the last cast gives considerable advantage to the gamester there, it is
here of no value, nor gives any addition to the throw. Note, that if at
any time you break up your tables, and disorder your men, except by
gaining 12 points, you can mark a hole, it is in your adversary's power
to oblige you to hold your game on still, and to play all the table-men you
have so touched and disordered to his own advantage. Note, also, that we
distinguish the single from the double in this manner: if your adversary,
by his ill fortune in throwing, has no points on his tables marked, altho'
your throw is single, yet still you may mark a double point; but if, otherwise,
he has such good luck by the dice, to have any point to mark, then he comes
double; which you are to takeoff again, if you can hit him. These are
all the passages that are considerable in this game; which tho' easily to
be comprehended, by those who divert themselves with playing often at
tables, and especially such who have any skill in tick-tack, of which, this
game is observed to make a compleatment, by adding more parts and embel"
88
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m CHB8B IN ICELAND
ji8lu»(#iit0; 7^ the most rMdy way tbx « yoang gamester, who is desiroos
io learn it, is to see it performed by two gamesters; and then taking neUoe
of tbese instruetions, he will presently be let into the secret**
IHsh was oertainly at one time, as we have been able to see by the ci-
tations concerning it, a favorite diversion. The ^* Gamester ** thus describes,
not with too much lucidity, the method of playing it: *' Irish is an ingenious
game; apd requires a great deal of skill to play it well, especially the after-
game; it is thus played: The men, which are 30 in number, are equally
divided between you and your adversary, and are thus placed: 2 on the
ace-point, and 5 on the side of your left-hand table, and 3 on the cinque,
and 5 on the ace-point of your right-hand table, answered on the like
points, by your adversary's men, with the same number; or thus, £ of your
men on the aoe-point; 5 on the double sice, or sice-cinque point, 3 on the
cinque point in your tables, and 5 on the sice-point at home; and all these
pointed alike by your adversary. In your play have a care of being too
forward; and be not too rash in hitting every blot, but with discretion and
consideration, move slowly, but securely ; by which means, the* your ad-
versary has fllled his tables, but with all blots, and you by hitting him,
enter, you may win the game; nay, sometimes* tho* he hath borne his
men all to a very few. It is the part of a prudent commander, as he leads
out his men, to bring them home as safe as possible : So must you have
a care of your men as you are bringing them home, that they are not
piokied up by the way. Have a special care that your adversary doobie
not the trey-ace-point with his men; and so make what convenient haste
you can to fill op your own tables, and beware of blotting: that done,
bear as Cut as you can. For an after-game, I know not what instructions
to give: You must herein trust to your own Judgment, and the chance
of the dice; and if they run low for some time, it will be so much the bet-
ter,** The difficulty here is to determine exactly what an '« after-game **
is, or was. From the space given to it (ten pages) it will be noted that the
variety, known then as now by the simple name of hackffamnum^ was the
most notable of all the English games ''within the tables.** We omit the
'' Qamester*s ** account of it, since the method of play does not differ ttom
that portrayed in our modem handbooks.
The next game is tichr-tach^ which is thus described: ''AH your men must
stand on the ace-point, and from thence play forward; but have a care of
being too forward, pr so, at leastwise, that doublets reach you not. Secure
your sice and cinque-point, whatever you do, and break them not, unless it
be when you have the advantage of going in; which is the greatest advantage
you can have, next to a hit: lor your adversary's Uth point standing open,
you have, it may be, the opportunity of going in with two of your men, and
then you win a double game. A hit is but 1 ; and that is, when you throw
such a cast, that some one of your men will reach your adversary's unbound,
but sometimes, the* it hits it, will not pass, by reason of a stop in the way;
and then it is nothing. Sometimes it ia good, going over into your adver*
sary's tables; but it is best for an after-game. Playing close at home is the
securest way; playing at length is both rash and unsafe; and be careAil of
binding your men when you lie in danger of the enemy. Moreover, if you
see you are in danger of losing a double game, give your adversary 1; if
you can, it is better doing sq than losing 2. Here note, if you fill up all
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8TJRA T NOTSS
ihm poliits of yonp aeoond table with yonr own men, yoa win t; and that
yon may preyent yonr adrersary from doing so (if yon are in danger thereoO
if you ean, make a Taeant point in his tables, and it is impossible for him
to do it. This is the plain game of tielc-taek, which is called so from touch
and take; fbr if you touch a man you must play him, tho' toyour loss; and
if you hH your adversary, and neglect the adrantage, you are taken with a
why-not, which is the loss of 1 j likewise if you are in, and your cast is such
that yon may also go into your adversary's 11th point, by t other men, and
yen see it not, either by carelessness or eager prosecution of a hit, whioh is
apparent before your eyes, you lose 2 irrecoverably. Besides, it is a very
great oversight, as your men may stand, not to take a point when you may
do it. Now some play this game with toots, boveries, and flyers; toots is
when you All up your tables at home, and then there is required small
throws; for if you get over with a sice, you have no benefit of toots. Bo-
veries, is when you have a man in the 11th point of your own tables, and
another in the same point of your adversary's, directly answering. Flyers,
is when you bring a man round the tiibles before your adversary hath got
over his first table; to the effecting of which there is required very high
throwing on your side, and very low throwing on his. Much more might
be said as to the craft of the play, which cannot be so well dtseovered, as
from observation in your own or others playing.*' PeooHar here are the
singular technical terms, toots, boveries and fljfers, which have been noted,
so Mr as we know, in no dictionary. The explanations given of them in
this section are therefore of interest. The first of these words has been
used in describing a previous variety. The use of binding and unbonnd in
this paragraph, in the sense of German '«binden** and ''ungebunden** (see
p. SS9), is also to be noticed. They are of course connected with the noun
'^band** or *«bund" (a double point); an unbound man would, therefore, be
the same as «*ein ungebundener stein,'* that is, equivalent to the more usual
term, blot.
The accounts of the three varieties finally enumerated and described are
very brief, but doubtless sufficient, considering their slight importanee. The
first one is, -however, of great antiquity, as it is identical with tiiat called
^^doblet** in the codex of King Alfonso, and 'doublets,** or ** queens game**
by Hyde. This is the description of the •'Gamester:** **At doublets the
19 men are thus placed; upon six, cinque, and quatre, there are S men a-
piece; upon trey, duce, ace, but 2 a-piece. He who throws most hath the
benefit of throwing first; and what he throws he lays down, and so doth
the other; v^at the one throws and hath not, the other lays down for him
to his own advantage; and thus they do till all the men are down; and then
they bear, but not till they are down; he who is down first, bears first, and
will doubtlessly win the game, if the other throws not doublets to overtake him.
Now he who throws doublets apace, is certain to win; fbr as many as the
doublets are, so many he lays down, or bears. For example; if t fours, he
bears 8, and so for the other doublets; and therefore he who can either
nap, top, or hath high runners about him, hath a great advantage herein.**
Let us compare this with the text of Alfbnso describing his ^* doblet,** premis-
ing that the latter plays it with only twelve men, so that but two of the
men are placed upon each of the six points in the board of each player
(instead of two upon three points and three upon each of the other three) r
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300 CHESS IN iCBLAND
<' El otro iuego hay de tablas k que Uaman doblet que se iaega en esta
guisa— Cada uno de los iogadores deve tener las doze tablaa [twelve men],
e ponerlas dobladas, una sobre otra cada uno en su quadra del tablero, que
sea la uno en dereche de la otra; e el que venciere la datalla [who makes
the higher throw] lan^ara primiero. E devense baxar [French '^abbasser,"
lower, that is talLO the upper man off the point indicated by the dice, and
lay it down beside its fellow] aquellas doze tablas, que estan sobre las otras,
por las suertes de los puntos de los dados. E otrossi se devan levar; e
el que las ante levar [bears], ganara el iuego. Est si por aventura qual-
quiere de los iogadores lan^re suerte, que non tenga tablas de que la fazer
tan bien de bazarlas como de levarlas deve tuer el otro iogador [if one
player cannot play the man or from or to the point indicated by the dice,
the other player has the right to play the cast]. E desta guisa aviene
muchas vezes, que ganari ell [sic] un iogador par las suertes, que langara
ell otro. E este es el departiemento deste iuego, e esta es la flgura del
entabliemento ** [with a design of the board, displaying the position of the
men]. This is the exact description of '* les dames rabattues,** as doublets
is styled in French, given by the Moulidars ^* Encyclopedic des Jeux '* (see
p. 184).
We Anally cite the notices of the last two simple games recorded by
the 1754 *' Qamester,** both of which have apparently been forgotten. The
first one is sice-ace : " Five persons may play at sice-ace with 6 men a-piece,
they one load another with aces; sixes bear only, and doublets drinks and
throws again ; so have I often seen some who, for the lucre of a little money,
have resolved rather to lose themselves than a penny. It is commonly agreed
the last two, or the last out, shall lose, and the rest shall go free." Hero
we encounter the technical term '* driniLS,'' of which we have spoken else-
where. On a later page we shall find that this simple but very old game
(going back to the days of Alfonso), though lost in England, is still pre-
served in another North-European land. The next game is catch-ddt: '*At
catch-dolt, the first throws and lays down from the heap of men without
the tables; what is thrown at, it may be sice-duce; if the other throw either
sice or duce, and draw them not from his adversary's tables to the same
point in his own but takes them from the heap, and lays the ace down,
he is doited, and loseth the game ; or if he touch a man of the heap, and
then recal himself, the loss is the same. Some by frequent practice will
never be doited, and then they strive who shall fill up their tables first;
which done, he who bears them off first hath won the game.'' The ** Com-
pleat Gamester *' closes its review of the different varieties of backgammon
by exclaiming '' So much for games within the tables.*'
In English there is little literature, except in the books of games, which
is specially or exclusively devoted to backgammon. There are translations
of Parini's poem and of Merrim^e's tale, which we have noticed. A singular
anonymous tract, in octavo of twenty-two pages, is preserved in the British
Museum, bearing the following title: ** Back-gammon: or the battle of the
friars, a tragic-comic tale. To which is added, a short essay on the folly
of gaming by way of application. Printed for F. Wilfood at the Three
Flower-de-Lucds behind the chapter-house in St. Paul's Church-yard 1734."
The poem is in the style of the time, and cannot boast any great merit.
Such as it is we copy it:
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Of two bftttAliona Mt In lank and file,
And of tbo yariona plonder and the apoil
How each tfa'approacliM of the other dreada,
With two aagadooa gan'mla at their haada ;
How ahot the elephantine tooth heeomea,
And box«a rattle In the atead of drama;
How Inok and akiU altematdy adTaooe;
The force of Jadgement, and the pow'r of ohanoe,
Of poaaiona — overflowing in a trice,
And all the dieadftil tyranny of dice,
I aing : — inatrnet me to reeonnt the ttmj ;
And giro me patienoe, — more than when I play !
A donghty friar, Fabria waa hie name,
Of aober aapeot, and of goodly frame,
In table-bastlea many a foe had alain ;
And waa become the champion of the plain.
Wiaer in art, he bolder grew in anna,
And all the oonntry dreaded hia alarma.
The holy brotherhood with terror atrock.
All the lay-herd were TiotImB to hia look t
The malea againat him neyer conld aaeceed,
And ^1 the weaker aex were weak indeed.
For in thla table-war the fiir engage.
And make aometlmea an Amasonian age.
Nothing conld atop the frlar'a warm career;
Some Ibll for want of fortune^ tome for Jbar ;
In nnm'rona confilcta he had never iUl'd;
When art fell abort, th'almighty dloe prevaird.
ThoB the great Swede triumphantly went on
And battlea, without number, batllea won ;
Yanqniah*d hia enemiea jrithout oontronl ;
The hardy Buaatan, and the ragged Pole.
Bot let not thla, my ftrtend, elate thy mind ;
Survey the dubioua caaualtiea behind ;
See the great Charlea at laat to fortune yield I
At laat view Peter maater of the fleld I
Hence caution learn : o ! learn to be afraid,
And keep aeeuie the conquesta thou beat made ;
Leat thou arbforc'd thy trappinga to reaign.
And the renown'd Pnltowa'a fiite be thine.
The friar'a £une, extended Ihr and near,
Had reaoh'd at laat a brother friar'a ear.
He too in Ubie-battlee early taught.
From alma mater had the acience brought
Propoaing wisely aome diveraion benoe,
If doom'd to toil in Baaez or the Fana.
Yltoleo deem*d it but a piona care.
Both to revenge the holy and the hix ;
And expectation of the coming aport,
Ifade a long, anltry, tediona Journey abort.
They met: and danntle^a at the Iktal board
The aignal gave. — Sixe quatuor waa the word.
Fabria, with pleaaure aparkling in hia eyea,
Bravea hia new foe, and hia art defiea :
He then hia troopa in martial order plao*d {
Titnleo did the aame, and boldly Iho'd :
(Hie valiant troopa the olive colour boaat^
And Fabria led the Ethiopian boat).
The battle movea : the wary chiefr look round
To see, and gain th*advantage of the ground.
For the first onaet Fabria did prepare,
And quator sise began the mighty war.
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(Tbto WM » wrTi«e h« poCMn'd by roto^
And got the point that inited with his ootft).
Yitaleo than, two tixM by Ub alio.
Came niahiiig forward with a aaaly atildo.
Vabria aa yet ooneeal'd bla inward pain,
Dnoe aee oppoB*d, bot oh I oppoa*d in vain :
Homeward three paoea moT*d ha dai^y stood
And stopt directly in Yitnleo's road.
Thia is my pris'ner, sir, Yitaleo ories.
And if he meets me ones again, he dlea.
Fabrls attempts to plaee him in the field.
And sixes were his buckler and his shield.
With thow» alas I he no admittaooe fiNUid ;
The enemy began to wise the grennd.
With treya into an emply apaee he ran.
And got a gnard too for his naked man.
Trols aee for Fabris did admittanee gain,
And he paeaess*d him of the homewaid plain.
Dooe aoe atept Ibrth, and took him on the pate ;
He fhUs a Tiotlm to his adTsne fate:
And when he oame again, he enme too late.
No room for his nntlmely qoatara now ;
Two treya again poisn'd the fatal blew.
Filling a Bpaoe and moving forwarda too.
Fabria attempta the tranehea oMe again ;
Bat oinqoa and qnattor made th' attompt in rain,
Yitaleo presses on with eiaqns and dooe.
And made the ftitare blows of little nso.
This fos a rampart he dsaign'd to keep,
Or'e vhieh the nimblest warrior ooold not leap.
In ■aCtty now the oUva aqoadioas moTO}
In Tsin the Ethiopian pcis*neni itrore.
In namber three i they eooid no fkrther goy
Coop*d op within the trenehea of the leob
The fdftr almost did his fidth renoonoe,
And lost a triple victoiy at oaoa.
Another batUe Fabria then demanda;
Bat fimnd that fortane had forsook Ua hands :
Qnite Tanqnieh'd he began to sue for pMoe;
And stil Yitgleo's triomphs did inoreasa.
A little traoe oonolndea tfa'aneqaal fight,
And this like others, ended with the night.
The mom adTano'd Yitoloo waa the eame ;
And Fabrii did the whole oreatton blame t
The mdor pasiioaa to expresrion swell.
And tha poor fsnltlsM dies an wish*d at h^ll.
In the "Penny Magazine," (new series vol. 10,1841, pp. 100-101) there is an
essay on *' Backgammon," to which the author's name is not attached. The
magazine was in that day a popular publication, published by the *' Society
for the diffusion of useftil knowledge." The slight historical information
which the writer endeaTors to give is of the usual sort. He extracts from
a book of epigrams and epitaphs, called "Wits recreations" (1663), an epitaph
on one John Crop, a baokgammon player, in which, as will be seen, the
game is still called tabtoe :
Man's llfb'H a game at tables, and he may
Mend hia bad fortane by bis wieer play ;
Death plays against as, each diiieaee and sore
Are blots } If hit, the danger is the more
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STRAY NOTES «»
To teM tiM 8HMf tet aa «ld atwider hf
Biadi np the hVAM, and onret the malady,
Aad ao prolonga the game : John Crop waa he,
Death in a race did challenge for to aee
Hla play ; tim dioe ■>• throws; when flnt he driaka,
Gaata, makea a blot, death hiU him with a eiiiqae:
He oaata again, bat all in vain, fbr Death
By th'after game did win the ptiae — hia breath.
What though hia akill waa good, Ua luck waa bad,
Tbr aeTer mortal aoan worae eaating had.
But did net Death play iUae to win fkom aooh
Aa he t No donbt, he bare a man too mnch. «
The word ** drinlLB *' in the ninth line has evidently a technical sense. It
occnrs in one other place which we have noticed, namely, in the first and
following editions of the *^ Compleat Oamester/* in the brief account of the
game of sice-ace, in which we are told that *** sixes hear only, and doublets
drinks and throws again.*' It is difficult to say what it means, as we find
it in no dictionary. Possibly it is a way of stating that doublets are played
turice^ and then the statement is made that the thrower of doublets, has
another cast, as in Russian backgammon ; or *' drinks '* may mean that
doublets do not count in the game, but the thrower must cast again. In
the preceding phrase we are told that sixes can only be used in bearing (or
throwing off) the men. But the whole description (of nine printed lines) in
the "Gamester*" is, as will be remembered, obscure enough.
The " Penny Magazine ** proceeds to quote from Burton's " Anatomy of
Melancholy ** (part ii, section 2) on the tendency of such " honest recreation **
as '* cards, tables and dice, shovel-board etc.** to foster gaming and other
vices. From that the author goes on to discuss " tric-trac and tic-taok,**
citing the absurd derivation of the latter (" touch and take **) from the
" Compleat Gamester,** and afterwards quotes from a volume of essays,
entitled '* Horae vaciv» ** (1646) by John Hall of Durham, who asserts '* that
tic-tack sets a man's intentions on their guard. Errors in this and war can
be but once amended.** Then he draws upon Strutt's " Sports and Pastimes,**
citing the statement there given that Dean Swift once wrote to a friend in
the country, asking him : " In what esteem are you with the vicar of the
parish! Can you play with him at backgammon) **— evidence of the devo-
tion of the rural clergy to the game. He has taken it for granted that back-
gammon is of Anglo-saxon origin, and therefore closes by saying that its
continued existence is a proof of the slight changes made by the Norman
conquest. ^
As to the nations of Eastern Europe, many of them appear to have
known the old game of tables, though at a comparatively late day. The dice
game reached them earlier, and pretty certainly from Southern or Byzantine
Europe. The word for " die ** in many of the Slavic nations (in Russia,
hosie, kostohe, in Polish and Bohemian kostka), has its origin in the word
for " bone.** In western Europe there is no such connection between '* die **
and the material of which it is made, unless it be in the case of the Icelandic
'^ Al the eloee of the aeetfon treattag of haekgammon In Bogland, In apite of the fact
that we have already dlaooaned of the method of playing the venerable and moat popular
of the Rngliah Tarletlea, we add one of the elearett and briefest deaerfptlona of it known to
aa: «Tho game la played by two pUyert, who have eaeh fifteen nea (uaually draaghtmen )
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904
CHESS IN ICELAND
tenning, which the dictionaries make a derivative Arom Wnn^ ** tooth,*' sinoe
early Icelandic dice were made f)rom walras-ieeth. Perhaps the development
of the word was aided by the resemblance of the dice to *^ little teeth.**
Kostka is said by the Bohemian dictionaries to be a diminutive of kosU
" bone." In Russian, dice-play is igrd (= game, play) ve haste ; in Polish,
grac w kostki is '* to play at dice ; ** and in Bohemian, dice-play is hra v
hostky — all cognate expressions. There is no verb to be compared with the
German " doppeln.'* The points on the dice seem to be styled '* eyes ** in
Russian and other Slavonic dialects, as in Oerman, but whether this term
is in imitation' of the German is not ascertainable. No special word for
**ace** seems to be discoverable in any accessible Russian dictionary ; ^u^/tf
is to be found as a rendering of the German ''daus;** it may be the
French "deux." In Polish, ace is translated Je(in<i;'Aa by one authority, which
means also *' one-eyed,** and " daus " is rendered by " tuz," which may be
a loan-word from the German. The Bohemian dictionary gives us eso for
ace, and iaus for deuce, evidently derived from the German. It would seem
that the other points are designated as '* third eye,*' " fourth eye,** and so
on. In a single Bohemian dictionary " dice-box *' is translated by vrhavka^
which appears to mean a '* tlirower." In the same tongue the German
"pasch,** in the form of po^, is given by some lexicographers; and there
are the following derivatives of kostka (»* die ") : kostkdr^ " dice-player ; "
kostkdrstvi " dice-mania ; " kostkovatu " throw dice," " play-dice,** ** dice **
(the verb; ^^pasovati," is found in a Bohemian- German lexicon rendered by
one set being black *nd the other white. In befffnning the game the men ere plaeed on the
board In the manner shown In the following diagram, (Bg. 21) — two men on the aee-point on
eaeh side, Ave on the six-point, three on the eight, and flre on the twelve. The two dlee are
common to both players, hot each one has his own diee-box, and throws are taken alter-
nately. The dice are perfeet eubes, marked with dots from one to six. Kreneh terms are
commonly osed ; thus, one Is called oee; two, deue* ; three, tri {trey or troiM); four, ^uolrs;
fire, einqu4] and six, tU*, At every throw the two dice are employed; consequently the
player may throw from two (donble-aee) to twelve
(double-six). If the player throw doubUU, or two dice
of one number, he counts double the number of dots
ou each dice; thus, by a throw of double-two, ho
does not count four, but eight. Suppose the table, as
arranged in the diagram, to b« plaeed between the
players, whom we will eall black and white. The men
move towards their aoe-polnts, and are governed In
their moves by the throws of the dice. Thus, white
counts round from the ace-poInt of black, and black
counts round from the ace-potnt of white. These points
are seen to have severally two men on them, on opposite
corners of the table. The grand object of the game Is
for each player to get all his men played round into
his Inner table, removing them from point to point
^£- ^^* agreeably to the throws of the dice — white's course
being, as stated abore, from black's ace-point (1) to black's twelre-point, and then firom
his own 12 to his own inner table (6-1), and black's course being the reverse of this, from
white's ace-poInt (l) through white's both Ubies and black's 12-1 to white's inner Uble
(6.1) — and Anally bearing them or moving them olf the board. The player who first
clears his men off the board wins the game. In throwing, the number upon each die may be
reckoned by Itself, or collectively with the number on the other die. Thus, if quatre be
thrown by one die, and eiMe by the other, one man can be advanced four points, and another
six points; or a single man can be advanced ten points — always providing a point is open to
allow this moTemeot to It. If doubleta are thrown, four men may be moved as many places
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STRAY NOTSS M
the Gennan rerb '^pasehen''). In Rassiail there is an old word labU,
derived of conrse from the Latin '* tabula/* and representing the Bnglish
and French '' tables/* the name of the medisdval game. In a Rassian-Ger-
man dictionary tahlS is rendered by '' triktrak,** *' tokkatille.** In the same
work " puffspiel " is explained as igra ve phvke^ literally "game of puff(1)*'—
it being possible that phuke may be the German "pnff** transftrred to the
Russian vocabulary. The matter is very complicated ; a Russian lexicologist
eicplains phuke as " blasen (eines da'mensteins),** " the blowing (puffing) of
a draughtman.** This should represent the English "huff** or "huffing,"
used as a technical term in draughts, and defined in the " Century Diction-
ary ** thus : " In checkers [draughts] the removal of a player*s piece flrom
the board when, having the chance, he revises or neglects to capture ohe
or more of his opponent*8 pieces. The latter may liowever, if he deems it to
his advantage, demand the capture instead of removing the piece. The
removal is generally marked by blowing on the piece. The verb "to huff'*
is sometimes applied to chess in the same sense.** In German, instead of
blasen (•* blow '*), the word pfeifen (" whistle **) is sometimes used. Perhaps
this latter is the original of phuke. But what has all this to do with back-
gammon t It is difficult to say. Phuke does not seem to be a Slavonic
vocable, nor does the lexicographer, under it, say anything about backgam-
mon, while he renders the German " damenspiel ** by shashechna igra^ lit-
erally **game of draughtmen,** the singular, shdshha^ meaning "draughtman.**
The more common name for the modern backgammon appears to be in
fts XfMf Mre dot! on Ui« 4iM, Initead of one or two, M mfty bo don« in the omo df ordinary ^
throwf. Thna, ■nppoeo yon throw two doneeo, yon mny move one mam eighl plaeec, two non
foar plACOff or four m«n two plaooa, always pretamlng that the road be elear. Mo man oan be
mored to a point ooTorod by two of your opponent's men. If saeb point be ooTored by only
one man — which is called a hloi— then that man can be hit and be remoTod flrom the polht,
and piaeed on the b<r between the tables, and his place uken by the man who has won ft.
The removal of a man to the bar throws the player to whom it belongs eoaslderably behind la
the game, becaose the man must remain out of play till he is snlsrsd by a throw of the dice
turning up the number correspondiug to one open point on the adversary's table — the man,
or men out, being entered by replaeing them according to the throws of the dice, on the
points of the opposite player's inner table, bat such entering can only take plaee on points,
not having two or more of the adversary's men on them —after which he is brought round
in the same way as are the others in the set to which he belongs. The frequent oeenrrence
of this tdMng of a hlot gives an adversary a great advantage, and allows him to win his
^antsion. If at any time daring the game, every point to which you might move Is covered
by the adversary's men, yonr men must remain in stoto g«o, and the adversary Ukes hi4
tarn; or if only one man ean be played you must play it. We mast explain that there ar*
three kinds of victory — one the winning the hit^ the second the winning the ^asunon, and
the third winning a hackgammou. Tbe player who has played all the men ronad into his
own table, and by fortunate throws of the dice has borne or played the men off all the points,
wins tbe Ail. The ^emon may be thus explained : — When yon have got all your men round
to year own table, covering every point, and yonr adversary hes a man ont, then yon are
enabled to htar or lift your men away. This you do by throwing the dice and removing
f^om the points corresponding to the spots on the dice. If you oan bear all your men away
before yonr adversary has borne off one man, you win the gammon, which is equivalent to
two games or %tt«. Bat If your adversary Is able to bear one of his men, before yon have
borne all yonrt, then yonr victory is reduced to a hit» Ifthe winner has borne all his men
off before the loser has carried all his men to his own table, it is a hackgammon^ and held
equal to three hits or games. " This account is extracted from the anonymous " Boy's own
book ; new edition, London 1889," (pp. 6l9-!K>). The same volnme contains an acting account
of '* Backgaminon, a pantomime charade In three scenes," (pp. 79-81) — th^ first scene re-
presenting the syllable " back," the second " gammon," and the third the whole word.
89
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906 GHB88 IN ICELAND
Russian trikirak, in Polish tryktrak^ and very likely some form of the same
French vocable may be used in Bohemia. In Polish a derivative of the Latin
'* tabula *' exists, but we have not discovered that it is or has been applied to
a game, but it probably was in early times. For ** man ** at backgammon,
the word just cited shdshka^ '* draughtman *' (which is a diminutive otshaehy
** chess '*) would seem to be employed in Russia, though the dictionaries
likewise have two derivatives Arom the French '' dame,'* dama and its
diminutive datnka in the sense of '* man '* in table-games. In Polish the
word, warcab^ which looks foreign, is given as the equivalent of '^draught-
man** (with several derivatives like warcdby^ the plural, ^^ draughts,**
toarkabnic, '^ draught- player,** and toarcaba^ toarcapnica^ '* draughtboard.**);
while Hera, bierha (the latter a diminutive) is rendered *' man or piece in
table-games,** there being nothing to indicate that it is a native word. The
former of these words is found in Bohemian, as vhrcab (pi. vhrcaby)^ *' draught-
man ** {Jira ve vrhcabjft being '* game of draughts,** and vrhcabnice, ^^ draught-
board,** *' board for table-games.**) There may be in Bohemian a relic of the
old days of " tables ** in the word astabla (also written astahla)^ rendered by
the dictionaries '^ draught-board.** There are no derivatives.
Hungarian has also the word ostdbla, as in Bohemian, but we cannot say
whether it is originally Slavic or Magyar. Like the Bohemian word it is trans*
lated by '* draughtboard/* and there are various derivatives, which seems to
show that the form is Hungarian: osidblat, '' to play at draughts;** osid-
hlaSaiek, ''draughts'* {jatek=z^^ game**); ostdblakarika, ''draughtman**
(ifcariifca = " circle,*' "ring,** "hoop**); ostdbldt jduzani is rendered as "to
play at tables ** and ostablazni has the same signification. The Latin tabula
is used in various senses under the form of tdblOt among others in sakktdbla^
" chessboard.** Triktrak appears to be the most Arequent backgammon
appellation, though in one dictionary we find the Italian " sbaraglino ^*
rendered by kocjtka JdtSk, which however may mean " a dice-game ; ** and
the German derivative puf is apparently not unknown. Kocxka is " die,**
resembling the Slavic " kostka,** with which it may be connected, as it does
not seem to have any Hungarian affiliations; it signifies likewise "cube.**
The chief derivatives are kocjtkds, hocskdzni, kocskdzik, '* to play at dice;**
koczkdztat, " to hazard ; ** koczJ^at^k, " dice-game,*' " dice-board ** (" back-
gammon board?**), koczni, "to play or throw dice.** The dice-box is some-
times called koczkasorleg, a translation of the German " wiirfelbecher,** but
more usual is kocskaveto, veW signifying a " sower.** As in so many tongues
the dice -pip is an " eye,** szem ; the numerals are prefixed to this word to
designate the numbers of the dice-points, thus egy (" one **) in egyszem^
"ace;** hetszem, "deuce;*' haromszem, "trey,** and. so forth. Pass is a
loan-word; pdros (German " paar,** French '*paire,** Italian "pari**) like-
wise expresses equal points on the dice, that is, " doublets.** The usual
proverbial sayings originating in dice-play are not wanting, as : el van petoe
a kocjika, " the die is cast.** Occasionally, in imitation of the German, the
redundant word, hocjiko (k6 = " stone**), literally "die-stone,** meaning
simply " die,** is found ; while another compound, likewise the result of
German influence, is Jrf^ibid' ("gamestone**), signiiying " brettspielstein,*'
or " man ** at table-games. We know of no Hungarian manual of games
which includes backgammon, although the literature of Hungary is rather
rich \n worlds relating to chess.
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STRAY NOTES Wt
As to Greece we have heretofore (pp. 80-81) cited many early terms in its
langaage connected with dice and dice-games. ' The modern lexicons repeat
most of these, besides adding others, like TapXiCio, -capXttC'ri?, "dice-player,"
for instance. The word for '' die,*' in later as in older times, is, at least
in the literary dialect, xopo^, its signification of "cube** being, probably, a
secondary one. It has as many derivatives as those coming from the foreign
"tabula"— xoptU, xoptofxa, "dice-game" or "dice-play;" noptorJiptov, "place
for dice-play," "gambling-house;" xoptoto, xo3»orrj«, "dice- player;" xoPto-
ttxo^, "sltil^il at dice,** "relating to dice.** There are no means of knowing
(except in the case of xopo^) how much any of these are used directly in rela-
tion to backgammon. If we may believe a recent New-Qreek dictionary by
a French compiler, Emile Legrand, a good many words connected with the
ancient iteTtsia game are still in use. His vocabulary includes (we give
also his definitions): iceooocy Jeton, pion; ictoosio, icio<3eo|j.a, "sorte de Jen
rapprochant des dames ou du trictrac**; ictoo«iov, "lieu 06 Ton Joue k la
ictsovCa"; ictoaeot^ptov, "table k Jouer;** ictooRotirj^, ictooeow, "jouer k la
iceooeia ; " «eoo«oTiKo< (adjective), " de Jouer.** Again we cannot say whether
any of these terms are applied to backgammon. The ancient ictootia has been
classified by some authors with the Latin "duodecim scriptorum Indus**
among the games which may be considered akin to nard. Hyde (ii, 17)
gives various forms of the Arabic "zar" ("die"), introduced probably through
the Turkish, as occurring in the "lingua romaica sen greca moderna,**
namely: Capi* &Capi» &C<xp'v)i Capia; of these, later dictionaries mention only
&C<&pi, defining it as "die,** and as "the game of hazard,** and Capt "cube,**
"die for playing;** with the derivatives Cap(Ca>i "to play dice,** C«piot4}c,
" dice- player,** and CapwuatYvtJt, "dice-play.** We suspect that Capt is at
least as common as any other term for " die,** though we find in the very
latest lexicological works this and xu^o^ (pronounced kouvas), and a third
appellation, xoTot (perhaps of Slavonic origin). In a modern Greek work we
meet itatC** (pl*y) C*ptai to "play or throw dice;*' and 5Xa tA Capt« ppaivoov
xh TSto, meaning to "throw doublets,** but expressed by a paraphrase, li-
terally, to "cast dice quite the same.** In a German>Greek dictionary we
have ta^Xt given as " trick track-brett*' and tapXtCw as to "play trie trac,**
which confirms us in the belief that this old word is the ordinary name for
the game, though the French "trictrac** is very likely also used, as
elsewhere. In the same dictionary ncaoeia and all its derivatives are omitted ;
they therefore hardly belong to the language of daily life. The French
" pion ** (ictovt) is employed for draughtsman (though not for " pawn ** at
chess), and is therefore probably made use of for " man ** at backgammon.
For draughtboard there seems to be no single word but to a^axtov (board,
abacus) ty); vt<&}i.ag (literally "board of draughts**) expresses it in a round-
about way. In the same manner the dice-box is described in Greek as
to xtovt 8ta xa Wpca, "the ftinnel for the dice.** The latest dictionary *before
us also interprets " trictrac '* as xapXt, and a trictrac-board as sva tApXi the
same word, as in some other languages, being used for both. The notable
fact to be gleaned from all this is that z&fXi is in Greece still the customary
name of the nard game ; so that all the countries on the north shore of the
Mediterranean yet maintain the mediseval name," Indus tabularum,** ("tables**)
in one form or another. Spain (" tablas **), Portugal (" tabulas,** partially
crowded out perhaps by " gamSo,**) both preserve the plural form of the
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iOe CffESS IN iCSLANb
Middle Ages; Italy (''tayola reale**) and Greece (tdpXi)^ employ the singular.
Of other ooast- lands of the Mediterranean we shall have somothing to say
direotly. We do not know of any publications in the Hellenic tongue treating
of backgammon. The local history of the nard begins naturally with- the
latest centuries of the Byzantine empire. We know that chess (Catpixiov) was
played at the Byzantine court in the first quarter of the Xllth century,
^ eoming thither from the Arabic east, as is indicated by the name given to
it. Tables, whether arriving from the East or the West, should hi^ve soon
followed it.
In all the Southern Mediterranean lands from Turkey to Morocco, the
name of the game is tatUa {au pronounced like ovo in <* now''), identical with
**tabala'' and **tavola. '' Whether the name came from the Latin direct
or through the Byzantine Greek, or through the Venetians, may be a moot
question; it is a question, too, whether the appellation has extended to the
farther Arabic lands, Arabia, the coasts of the Persian gulf; Zanzibar ; nor
is the name used in modern Persian quite certain, though the dictionaries
seem to imply that nard is still the title in that country. In that excellent
and too litUe known Arabic dictionary of the Swedish scholar Berggren
(1844), we are told that trictrac in Syria is daqq or iowlu The former word
signifies '* knocking,'' ''ringing" in its original sense, and may in this
meaning be quasi onomatopoetic as the lexicographers assert '' ticktack " to
be« Ti^yoU is, of course, tavila (Berggren transliterates it elsewhere tfunole},
l^ mc4ern Elgyptian, li ^p ei iaiola is '' the game of backgammon ; '* it is a
most common diversion in the bazaars and cafi^s of the valley of the Nile
and in other Arabic-speaking lands. It is not improbable that backgammon,
in the Levantine regions, in the shape it has taken, may be of Venetian
origin, rather than Byzantine. The pronunciation of the name, which seems
to show no trape of an old &, but rather of a v, is an argument in favor of
that view. The fact that chess in the Levant (Greece, Turkey, Egypt) keeps
the old Arabic name is noteworthy, since there is no trace in that region of
the present or any modern use of the word '' nard." The usual word for
*' die " in Turkey and in the Arabic countries is jsdr (plural, in vulgar
Arabic, Jtardt), The dictionaries of the classical tongue sometimes give it
as zahr. It is, a most interesting vocable, having gone, as we have seen,
in the days of the Turkish domination, into Modern Greek, and being,
according to most lexicologists, the source of the word *' hazard '* in English
(in mediseval Latin zardum^ in Italian <uzardo); and, as we have noticed
(p. 84), a Bolognese canonical writer of the XlVth century speaks of '' Indus
azari," referring to dice-play, while in early Italian the dice-game was
called *« zara." If the vocable be pure classical arabic, it may be from tho
stem to which Jtahr^ signifying " flower," belongs, springing, possibly, from
the flower-Uke appearence of the sides of the die ^ the black spots on a white
grouq^. Some of the dictionary-makers believe that ka 'b (pi. hu^ub or aJICab)
also represents the word '' die '* in certain Arabic regions. This may or
may not owe its origin to the Greek xo^o;. On the other hand, Salmon^,
in his late lexicon of the classical tongue, does not give the definition of '*die"
to zahr^ but attaches the signification of '* dice " to the plural of quite a
different word. We have no information as to the variety of backgammon
pjayed by the modern Arabs. That, as Lane in his '' Modern Egyptians "
t^sserts, it is one of the most usual diversions, every observant traveller can
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StRAYNOTBS 8M
teftiiiy. As to the Persian nard^ that well-known authority on all eastern
table-games, Karl Himly, has a somewhat obscure article on it in the
*'Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenl&ndischen gesellschaft '' (1879, XXXIII,
pp. 679-81). If we understand him rightly the men at the beginning of the
game occupy the following positions (see fig. 20): White's men 5 on M, 2 on
A, 3 on R and 5 on T; Black*s men Just opposite these points namely, 5 on
N, 3 on H, 5 on P and 2 on Z. White is supposed to sit in front of N-Z
and Black in front of M-A. The brief sketch of the rules which be gives
seems to show that the mode of play as closely resembles that of the ordin-
ary English game, as does the arrangement pf the men. It is virtually the
'* toutes-tables '* variety, which perhaps confirms our idea of its age. But as
the modern European chess, and not the old *^ eaturanga ** is now played in
India, it is difficult to state whether the modem English nard -backgammon
may not have been introduced into Persia.
In 1639, near Gallehuus in Southern Jutland, then, as now, belonging to
Denmark, there was found a horn of gold, two feet nine inches in length
and weighing six pounds and thirteen ounces. On the outside of the horn,
which was divided into ring- like divisions, were many figures and orna-
ments. In 1734, a few paces away from the site of the first find, was dis-
covered a similar drinking-horn, weighing seven pounds and eleven ounces,
which, besides elaborate ornamentation, had also a Runic inscription en-
circling the base or larger end of the horn. Both these remarkable horns
found their way ultimately to the royal cabinet at Copenhagen, were stolen
by a burglar on May 4th 1802, and melted down. Fortunately drawings of
them had been made at an early day, though not with the accuracy of the
archaeological draughtsmen of to>day. Among the scenes depicted on the
1639 horn were, on the third ring from the smaller end, two figures, holding
up, each with a hand on its opposite sides, a square tablet. This tablet
was in an upright position, and around its inner margin were regularly
arranged, close to the edge of each side, a row of sixteen small discs. This
square tablet has been explained by some writers as a tables-board, and as
late as 1838 this opinion was held (see the '* Annaler for nordisk oldkyn-
dighed,** Copenhagen 1838-9, p. 152). But the perpendicular position of the
board and expecially the number and arrangement of the discs or counters
make this view an impossible one. But there is no doubt that the game of
tables was in vogue in Denmark at an early time. It was called (aW, a
genuine old word, which oocurs in some of the ancient ballads and elsewhere.
So dose were the connections with Germany that *^ wurfeabel "' would have^
readily made its way across the border. The Danish also has (now, with
its derivatives, obsolescent) the word dobbel, a congener of the German (or
north German) '' doppel ** (see pp. 248-8). It apparently lost, at a very early
day, its signification of '* dice-play,'* and took on the meaning of *' gamb-
ling '* or '' illicit play.** It has the derivatives doble (German '' doppeln **),
to '' play games of chance/* '' stake money unlawAilly ; ** dobler, dUMfMroder^
** gambler ; " dMelaug, dMelag, " fraternity of players," An old Danish
law- code declares that higen er pliffiig HI at hetaie hvis han i ddbbel taber^
*^ nobody is obliged to pay if he loses at doftM.** At disse kluber hcerkm
ere drikkeffitder eUer doblelaug, '' that these olabs are neither drinking con-
cerns nor gambling fraternities,** says Rahbek, a Danish essayist and scholar
a century ago. Christian Bfolbech, the Danish lexicographer, states only
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310 CHESS IN ICELAND
under doftbel in his Danish dictionary (1833) that the word is of unoertain
origin. But in the second volume under tavl^ of which we have been speak-
ing, he makes a suggestion which is not without interest. He cites as cog-
nate with tavl, the Anglo-saxon "t«fl," "tabl" ("dice," "alea" is his
dubious definition), and " teblere " (" aleator ''), and then refers the student
to dobbel and doble. He has previously said sub voce that " dobbeln is the
Low German form of '* doppeln." It does not seem impossible that this
stem dobl may have been formed from the Latin " tabula," like tavl, or at
least have been influenced by it. This, however, is a question for linguistic
students. But to return to tavl The chief derivatives are ta^Obord, tavl-
broBU ** tables-board;" tavUeg, '"table-game." How much these are still
used we de not know; they all have a more or less antiquated look. Some
phrases there are: at lege tavl or spille i br<Kttet^ '' to play at tables, or at
table-games; " de legte gtUdtavl^ '' they played at a golden board," is found
in a ballad. Then there are the old compounds: ikaktavl, "chess" or
"chessboard," and vartavl^ a table-game of some sort, no lexicographer
seems to know what— uar being our "ware" in "beware," "aware" and
"wary," perhaps. "Die" is tasming (from the Icelandic "tenningr" or
more modern " teningur) ; the plural is tceminger, Falsk teeming is
"loaded die;" tOBminghagger (an imitation of the German) is ** dice-box;"
tcerningmie (plural, -eine)^ is dice-pip ; tasmingspU^ is "dice-play" or "dice-
game; " tcemingspiler is "dicer." Tofmingfald is "cast of the dice; " the
Danish poet, Conrad Malthe Bruun (1775-1826), in later years more (kmous
as the French geographer, Malte-Brun, says in a piece of verse :
Dft ikal ^ m«re heldlgt tBrnlngfiild
I drikkdaoK ^^g Meptret glTe.
An earlier poet, Vilhelm Helt (d. 1724), has a line:
Lykken er deri som 1 et ternliigapll.
" Ace " is e«, with the plural, esser^ though the numeral eet is modernly used,
iggies is six-ace; and a common saying, but not a very clear one, is haner
ikke i sit es^ meaning " he is out of sorts." An old (but Veally German)
form is as. "Deuce" is simply to, "two," or with the affixed article toen^
" the deuce," and in the same way treen, " the tray " (for which tres is
sometimes used), ftren, "the four" (or formerly quatuor or guater)^ femmen^
"the five*^ (or quinque or sink), seosen, "the six" (or sis or ses). The
doublets are ordinarily the plural numerals, begge aser {esser\ "double
aces" (or, in old books, ambesas or beset); treer^ "twos" {begge dauser^
double deux, in the foreign manner, "both the deuces"); treer, "threes"
{temes, carmes); femmer, "fives" (quinis), and seccer, "sixes" {sonnes,
sanne). To femmer would be " double fives." " Point " on the baolLgammon
board is feld (felt) literally "field," or pille, "pillar," "shaft." "Brikke"
is the general term for man at table-games {dambrikke, being draughtsman,")
brikkerund, " round as a tableman," being an adjectival derivative; it is
also a low German term. "Blots" are blotte (&to( = " naked," "bare")
brikker ; and baand is used (as in German) for a " covered (doubled) point"
There are three names for backgammon, or varieties of it— all foreign words.
Verkehr is, of course, German, though we have somewhere seen cited or
used a Danicised form forkasring, which we do not, however, find in the
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STRAY N0TB8 311
dietion&ries; toccategli^ tokkadi{je, both having lexicographical authority,
come also through the German ; triktrak is now, doubtless, the most frequent
of the three appellatives. They, as well as the occasional employment of
daus^ and the two descriptions of backgammon games, which we are about
to cite, are common enough examples of the German influences which so
long prevailed in Danish letters and social life.
There has been really only a single general work on social and table-
games, so fl&r as we know, issued in Denmark, but it has appeared in three
editions. The title of the original edition is *^ Nye og fUldst»ndig dansk
spilUbog indeholdende rigtig og tydelig underviisning 1 de brugeligste kort-
spil, saasom Thombre, quadrille, cinquille piquet, reversy, treeett, taroc,
whist o. a. fl. samt grundig anviisning til billard- og schach-spil, verkehr,
trictrac, toocategli o. s. v.— KJ(5benhavn. 1786.*' <^ The compiler (the work
is largely # word for word translation of the German *' Neue k5nigliche
rhombre**) was Johan Christian Melbye (1754-1838), all his life a clergyman
on the Baltic island of Bornholm, and author of various Latin tractates on
theological themes. The second edition was published at (Copenhagen in 1802,
with a slightly changed title, edited by S. A. J0rgen8en, of whom nothing
beyond this fact is known. The third and last edition bore the following
title: Nyeste dansk spillebog, indeholdende rigtig og tydelig underviisning
i Thombre, boston* whist-, taroc-, flrantssuus-, piquet og alle andre bruge-
lige kort-spil, samt grundig anviisning til billard- og schachspil, verkehr,
trictrac, toccategli, dam, domino, gnav, keglespil o. s. v. — Tredie foregede
og efter nuvaerende tids spillemaade forbedrede oplag.— Udgivet af S. A.
Jergensen.— KJebenhavn, 1829 (pp. VIII, 344). The backgammon section Alls
pages 285-328. It is divided into two portions, verkehr (285-295) and trictrac
eUer toccategli^ (296-328). They are both reproduced almost literally from
the first edition, so that they are to be regarded from a point of view half
a century earlier than the book's date. As we have commented AiUy on the
German originals, we shall do no more than make a note of some of the
Danish technical terms; the notes to the second article, explaining the slight
differences between trictrac and toccategli, are placed at the bottoms of the
pages. In verkehr we find /iuA;= corner, used for the **coin de repos;'*
hortslaa^ "cast away," for "hitting" blotts hrikker; huus (** house") for
" home-table ;"yun4E0r as in German; haste ind^ "cast in," for "re-enter;"
det farste bret, " first quarter of the board; " Jan, as in the German original;
udiage (" take out "), for " bear " or " throw off; " feld (possibly a borrowed
German form, as the Danish is usually written " folt "), " field " for "point"
on the board. In the second section the following terms occur: doubletter
(plural), "doublets;" the foreign names of the dice-points as previously
cited; marschen (German, with the post-positive article), the "march"
(" marcio,") or progressive movement of the men; points, for "game-
points;" delingslist ("fillet of division ") for "bar" in the center of the
table ; partie hredouille ; Jan, jan som ikhe kan, janen paa tre kast, janen i
to bretter, contrajanen, messeasjan, den lille jan, den store jan (or else the
German sckuster), rukjan (distorted German).
"* For aonewlMt fuller tltlM of the yarioos edltioM of thU work, with eriUoal notot,
MO tko Tory conploto Nortbers ebOM bibliogr*pliy «t tho end of Uio Meoad yolamo of tbo
proMBt work.
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31t CHESS IN ICELAND
In Sweden notioes of dioe occnr not much lat#r than in the Other North-
ern lands. The well-known arohnoiogiet Hildebrand, director of the im-
portani historical maseum at Stockholm, states that what were apparently
dice of a crude sort have been found in what is now the southernmost
province of Sweden, which da& f^om an early period of the iron age. They
are made of pieces of ribs, are oblong and narrow — growing narrower
towards one end. The dice f^om the latest heathen age which have been
found buried, are always three in number. They still continued to be
oblong, Hildebrand tells us, although not so narrow as the earlier ones.
The form, he thinks, is peculiar, since a die, so shaped, must have had
.great difficulty in falling upon one of its smaller ends, on Which the ace
and deuce are marked, and which, for deciding the progress and result of
a game, are of equal importance with the five and six. From this fact he
considers it probable that during the close of the heathen age and the
beginning of the Christian, Sweden was not yet in possession of any game
in which the moving of pieces from square to square, or Arom point to point,
was determined or regulated by the pips on the dice, as in the present
backgammon; but that dice-players were anxious to cast only high points.
In a grave, supposed to be that of a Christian, on BJOrkd, an island in Cen-
tral Sweden, fklse dice have been discovered, having the number five on
three of the sides. In a later paragraph Hildebrand says that tables (back-
gammon) was apparently introduced into the North at a time when hhefO'
tafl (or hnettafl) had long been known and practised. He commits an error
in saying in a foot-note, that zabel in the German of the Middle Ages was
applied to draughts, in contradistinction to lourfjtabel, which meant back-
gammon, or as he styles it brOdspel (properly speaking, this latter word
should be a generic name fbr various table-games). Allusions, in Swedish
documents dating from early times, to the different gam^s we are investigat-
ing are infrequent, especially when we consider that some of the games must
have been very commonly practised, Judging by the flrequent finding of dice!
and of Uble-men. That after their introduction into Sweden they must have
continued to be played through the whole medisBval period, We have to take
for granted. They were very likely considered to be so simple, as compared
with chess, that it occurred to no one to write about them— an opinion
shared by Hildebrand.
Dice-play was forbidden, as in other lands, by the early Swedish law.
In the ancient code known as ^ Peder M&nssons stridslag ** we have the
following inhibition: ''Vi stadga och mrblnda, att Ingen skall dobbla eller
leka med t&rning, vartafvel (t), ... karthenspel eller annan lek om peunlngar,
ty deraf kommer kif och osftmja. Hvilke dot g^ra, l&gges i Jem, och h&lft«n
af penningame, om hvilke de lekte, tage g&rdsmHstaren, och den andra
h&Iften den som uppenbarade det. Den som tre4Je resan varde funnen s4
dobbla eller leka, han skal mista sin lOn ft$r en m&nad, hftlften &t konungen
och h&lften &t honom som dobblaren rOJde, och dertill nftpsas lekamligen
efter konungens sk(5iiijan.** This runs in English: '< We decree that no one
shall be permitted to gamble or play at dice, vartafvel (t), cards, or other
game for money, for trom that practice come quarrels and discord. Those
who play are to be cast into irons, and the half of the stakes shall go to
the informer. He who shall be condemned a third time for gambling or
playing shall forfeit his wages, or salary, for a month, half going to the
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STRAY NOTES 313
king and half to the person who informs against the gambler." Here we
have the words dol>bla (German, ** doppeln ") and dobblare (German ** dop-
pier **). or other words relating wholly to dice-play we have dobbel^ ^' dic-
ing*** ** gambling,*' ** game of chance/' dobUerska^ ** female dice-player,'* all
showing the frequency of the diversion, and all having, like the same
words in German and Danish, the derived signification of ^* gamble," ^* gam-
bling," " gambler," etc. Of other technical dice-terms the Swedish language
now has the following: taming (plural, tdmingar)^ "die," "dice," with
such common sayings as tdmingen dr kastad^ tdmingen har blifvit kastad,
"the die is cast," "the die has been thrown"— this wide-spread saying,
as the reader will have Judged, affording the best evidence of the universal-
ity and, to some extent, of the age of dice-play. The compounds of tdm-
ing are tdmingspet^ " dice-play," " dice-game," but in use is likewise the
Bnglish "raffle," orthographically raffel; and as verbs, att spela tdming
(to " play dice ") , ait kasta t&mingar, att spela raffel and att raffla all mean
about the same thing. Tdmingspelare is "dice-player"; and tdmingsbard
is cited as the name given to a board on which dice are thrown. The
nouns, kast and kastning^ and the verb, kasta, are the usual words for
" cast," " throw ; " att fd stora kast^ is to " make a high throw; " att st& sitt
kast^ to "stand by one's throw," to "accept the consequences; '^ Jag stdr
miU kasty " I abide by my throw " (also figuratively), and det fdr std sitt
kastj " one must abide his throw," " it may go as it will." But the noun
varp (from the same stem as the Icelandic verb " verpa ") still survives in
Swedish, so that one hears both ett godt kast and ett godt varp^ " a good
throw." To load or (cog) the dice is att hnipa (really " pinch ") tdmin^
gama. " Dice-box " is either tdrningkappa or, less usually, in imitation of
the German, t&mingbdgare, kappa meaning " cup ; " homett^ the French
" cornet," is found in Delen's " Engelskt och svenskt lexikon " (Stockholm
1806); and Ao^tM^ar^ (throw- beaker ") is given in Carl Heinrich's " Svenskt
och tyskt lexikon " (Stockholm 18S8); it is likewise styled hrddspelsbdgare^
" table-game (backgammon) beaker." Oga (plural, dgan)^ literally " eye,"
is, as in the neighboring Germanic tongues, the term used for the dice-pip;
att fd up tio ogon means to " turn up ten (points) on the dice"; det stod aUenasi
pd ett oga is, figuratively, " it was within the turn of a die;" but the French
pointy sometimes written as pronounced, poang, is likewise used. Ass (with a
second orthography, ess) is "ace," although, as in the case of the other points,
the genuine Swedish name of the number etta^ "an one," is also em-
ployed; dus is "deuce," as dus ess, "deuce ace," with an older orthography,
tus; but sometimes the ordinary numeral, tvd^ is used; and the nominal
tres (Latin, or corrupted French) is "trey," but equally common is trqfa^^,
Swedicised form of the French "trois," as tresess^ "trey ace," and some of
the dictionaries give» in addition, tria or trea ; qvart^ and the almost disused
giMUiM>r, represent the four point, with the ordinary numeral name, fyra;
cinha or, older, cinqua^ or, by some writers, zink^ sinka (French "cinq")
and less usual, the nominal numeral, femma, are the names given to the five-
point; sex, (or, at an earlier day sis, from the French) and its nominal seasa
are used for the "six " or "sice." AU sld dus, tres etc., is to "throw deuce,"
" trey" and so on. These terms are used in the plural to express the doublets,
generally with the addition of ally " all : " dsser aU, " double aces ; " duser aU
(older, dusenpar)^ "a pair of deuces," "double deuces;" tres aU (trcjor aU)^
40
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314 CHESS IN ICELAIfD
** doable threes; " qtuirier aU {quator ott), "double fours; cinkor all, "double
fives;" sexor eUl, "double sixes." We have, in occasional use, dubletter ("dou-
blets"), but the simple plural of allj which is cUlar^ is also employed to ex-
press any doublets whatever. There is a conversational phrase, sont seac
("as six"), which means "very much," and may perhaps be compared with
the American "like sixty," which signifies "with great force," "as hard
(fast) as possible;" this may be derived from the six-point, or highest
dic^-pip. Swedish literature affords little that can be quoted in regard to
dice, outside of the laws. The great authority on the ancient story, geography
and customs of the old Norths during the earlier and Catholic period, was
Olaus Magnus (died 1568), whose writings, composed in Latin, have been
often reprinted in Italy and other lands. He alludes both to dice-play and
chess, but only to condemn them because they occupied the time which
should be spent in doing good deeds. The women of the courts of the
Swedish kings were no less devoted, we are told, to games than the men,
and one writer makes the broad statement that from the Xlth to the XVth
century there was scarcely a lady of the higher classes who could not play
either chess or tables {tafveC). From the later mediaeval period we have a
couplet about Queen Christina, the consort of King John, who reigned from
1481 to 1513:
Htm knnde Till aldbnta m«d aitt ord
Ooh tibming kasta Ofrer tafvelboid.
This doubtless referred to tables (backgammon) rather than to dice-play,
for it reads: "She knew how to play with her words, and to throw
the dice on the table-board. V That the distinction between dice-play and
tables was understood at an early day is shown by the palace regulations
of King Magnus Eriksson (1316-74) and Queen Margaret (1353-1412), in which
one is called dobbel and the other iafbellek^ but later they seemed to be
classed together, since Peder M&nsson*s laws forbid every one to dobbla med
tdming, tafvel^ etc., that is to " gamble with dice and tables," as we have
just seen. We should have stated that Peder M&nsson, after having spent
many years of his earlier life in Italy (where he wrote both his "Strids-
konst" and "Stridslag") became bishop of the important see of Westeras,
in his Scandinavian birthland^ and died in 1534. The text of his brief code
of military law relating to gaming is as follows in the accurate edition of
Hyltdn-Cavallius (published by the Swedish "Fornskrift-sallskap," 1845,
p. 29), the heading being, "Dobia mz tserning, tafl^el etc.:" "Stadgom wj
oc ferbywdom ath jngen skal dobla seller leka mz tserning, wartaflVnrel, kar-
thenspel, seller annan leek um paeninge, thy ther aff komber kiif oc ossem-
ya, hwilke thz gera Iseggis J jsernen, oc halffdelen off paeningommen wm
hwilke the lekto take gaardz maestaren, oc annan halff delen then them swa
lekto wppenbaradhe Oc then som tridye resona wardher fwnnen swa dobla
oc leka, ban skal mista sin Ian fere en manadh, helffthena konwngenom,
oc helfftena honom som doblaren reyde, Oc ther til mz naeffzes likamlika
seffther konwngsens skenyan." In the appended glossary the editor explains
wartaffvel {variafveC) by hrddspel^ that is, backgammon. The text of these
remarkable productions on the art and jurisprudence of war was probably
written in lUly in 1522.
We have already learned that the Icelandic " tafl," derived from the
Latin "tabula," represented at a very early period by a derived form
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STRAY NOTBS 316
in every tongue of central and western Europe, took the shape in Swedish
of uiftel. It was applied generally to the nard-game, and did not become
in Sweden, as it did in Iceland, first a generic name for table-games, and
then an ordinary appellation of chess. It continued to be, for a long time,
the only name of backgammon, and for this reason no such word as kvdtra
as in Icelandic, ever made its way into the Northern JLingdom. Little as is
known about the game in medisaval days, still less is to be learned about
its story between that time and the appearance of modem Swedish books
of games. An early and now very rare Cologne compilation in German from
the ** De remediis utriusque fortunse '' of Petrarch was reproduced in Swedish
in the XVIIth century, but it did not include the section concerning tables,
and has now become as seldom as its German original. The chess treatise
of Jacobus de Cessolis was also rendered into old Swedish even earlier, but
never found its way into print until in our own day. But the early works
on tables were never given a Swedish dress. No doubt references to the
game may still be found dating from the XVth-XVIIIth centuries, but only
after a thorough search in archives, collections of letters, and other such
obscure haunts of literature. From the beginning of the XlXth century
some knowledge of backgammon may be gleaned from dictionaries, but of
course, it is confined merely to technical terms. We shall attempt to ex-
amine some of these. The board is styled brSde, and in compounds hard.
Both are, of course, variant forms of our English ** board; " the former was
adopted from the German brett, but grew to be so especially applied to the
backgammon-board that brddespel or br&dspel ('* board-game '*) may be said
to be the most usual name of backgammon, and was and is so understood
unless it be accompanied by some qualifying word or phrase. ViU ni spela
brdde f is perhaps the most common way of inviting a person to a game of
backgammon. The appellations of the various varieties we shall come to
later. The name given to the points of the board is tunga (plural, tungor)^
our *< tongue,*' but in its technical sense derivable from the German ^'zunge;**
but horn (njeaning '* horn"), ha, (" wedge"), pil (" arrow") and fdlt (*• field,"
German ** feld ") are also found in the manuals ; while ^' man " is (as in
Danish) bricka (plural brickor), a Scandinavian, or at least Low German
vocable, applied likewise to draughtsmen, and to morrlsmen, but at chess it
is, we believe, less used, its place being there taken by pfes (** piece ") and
bonde (*^ pawn "). Biotia (noun), virtually the same as the Danish, is the
English '« blot," being the nominal form of the adjective bloit ('' bare,"
^* naked," en bloUa bricka, *^a solitary man"); att bloUa is the corresponding
verb, alt bloita en bricka, to be rendered to ^* leave a man standing alone," to
•' make a blot" Ati sl& en bloUa is '' to hit a blot." Band (with the definite
article bandet) is a double point (two or more men on one point). Ati binda
(to bind) is to form such a point. Ati bryta band is to remove a man or men,
leaving the point a blot. When the points each side of the bar are secured
(double points), they are styled Jemband (iron doable-points) or fars- och
marsbanden (^* father's and mother*s points). The point next the hus (*'talon")
of either player, when doubled, is known as janhand. Points on which
more than two men stand are often styled polacker (** Poles ") or 6foerband
C* ofrer-points," '^ plus-points "). AU h&lla i hop sina band signifies ^* to
keep one's double points together," so as to form a barrier to the advance of
the adversary. Alia (the singular or collective) is sometimes used for ** doub-
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316 CffSSS IN ICELAND
lets/* when no number is expressed, bat more usnally the plnr&l aUor
(literally, if oneconld say so, **alls**). A series of singular names for the
various combinations of the two dice exists in Swedish, to which, so Air as is
known, no parallel is to be found elsewhere. Sixes (dtibbla seccan) are styled
sexwr mdng^ the latter word being a contraction of mdnga (^* many **). Fives
{dtMla femman) are cinkor {sinkor) mdng ; fours {dtibhla f)fran) are qparianer;
threes {duhhla trean) are traUor\ deuces (dtt5&2a te&an) are dissame par^ like
the English *^a pair of deuces;*' aces (dubbla essen) are essen par; six-flve
is ordinarily known as seosHofem (really '• sixty five *S> or sex till fern (*' six to
Ave"), or seas och fern (** six and Aye ") ; six- four as sexHofyra (" sixty-four")
sex till fyra, sex och fyra^ and so with six- three and six deuce; but after that
the two numbers are simply used together, the larger always first, as sex ess
(** six-ace,") sinka fyra^ sinka tre, sinka dus^ quart tre^ trtifa dus, tres {tress)
ess and dus ess. Some of these forms are probably very old, and are chiefly
taken, like many of the terms we have been giving, ttom the real and ordin-
ary Swedish backgammon. Very notable, in this variety, is the term munk
(meaning literally **monk"); if one player has finished the game, (that is,
according to the English expression, has harne or thrami off all his men),
while his opponent has still some captured men {slagna hrickor)^ which he
has not succeeded in re-entering, the loser is said to be tnunk (or, as we
might say, monked)^ resembling in character our *^ backgammoned." Now
this term munk is the Icelandic mukur which (as the reader will shortly
ascertain), is a contracted form of munkurj the Icelandic word for ** monk."
What is remarkable in the identity of these two terms is that Denmark,
and so txt as we know, Norway, do not know any such technical expression—
these being lands with which Iceland's relations, for many generations, have
been far more intimate than with Sweden. The connection of Iceland and
Sweden was much more close in the mediseval period than it has since
been; a Swedish navigator, indeed, was, according to tradition, one of the
discoverers of the island. To the historical bearing of this common term
we may probably have something to say later. The French ** talon " (that
is, the first or corner point to the left of the adversary, upon which all of
each player's pieces at the beginning are stacked in three piles of Ave each)
is styled in Swedish the hem («'home"), or hus C house"), ^his is the
point Arom which the play of each combatant begins. On '* bearing " or
** throwing off" his men, after they have completed the round of the board,
the Swedish player, instead of removing them outside of the board, is apt
to place them on this " home-point," so as to have them ready for the com-
mencement of the next game. Therefore, the English term ** to bear " is
rendered by aUspela hem ("to play home"), and "bearing" is Tiemspel (or
sometimes uttagning^ "taking out"). — There are in the established Swedish
game other remarkable resemblances to the Icelandic game. Instead of
finishing his game by "bearing" his men, a player may gain a win (or
" winning " as the Icelanders call it) by succeeding at the finish in arrang-
ing three of his men on each of the five last points of his "bearing-board;"
this is called winning a dulhelt kronspa ('« double crown-game"), being the
langi mukur of the Icelanders; if he end the game by arranging five men on
each of the three final points, then it is enkelt kronspel (a " single crown-
game"), the stutti mukur of Iceland. If one succeed in placing his men, seven
on the uttermost point, Ave on the next and three on the next to that, the
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STRAY N0TB8 317
winniBg is called irappspel (** staircase game*'), and if, without throwing off
any, he succeed in collecting them all on the final point, it is then styled
f^ppspel (about equivalent to ** played- up-game*'), being exactly the same
as the Icelandic meistari, or highest possible win. Other terms in this
Swedish variety are huken (*« die hucke *' of the Germans, the •* coin de
repos " of the French), huh being doubtless borrowed from the German word*
the French Jan has been introduced into this game, being such a position
of one's own men as prevents the re-entering of his captured pieces, while
sprHngjan is when the arrangement of his adversary's men prohibits it; the
expression for "to move" is aU flpija (our "flit"); that for "to take/' "to
hit" is ati slA ("to strike"); "to re-enter" a man is at sUt in or spela in,
"play in."
We know of no general treatise on games in Swedish earlier than the
anonymous " Handbibliothek f5r s&llskapsntfjen eller systematiskt ordnade
spel, lekar och konster," (Stockholm 183»), in two stout small ocUvo volumes,
the unnamed compiler being Gustaf Johan Billberg; the second volume opens
with verkehren, its first section (pp. 7-18) devoted to that sub- variety which
is known as friti spel. The first lines explain the German derivation of the
game and its name, followed by a Swedish rendering of the so-called Luther
verslet: Bus ess har intetl \ Sex cinqua ger intetl \ Men qpart tre \ Ar stedse
med. Then follow a description of the board and men, the names of the
dice-points and dice-doublets, the method of arranging the men at the hus,
explications of the huk, enkel hricka (" blot "), band, and ati sUt faute. This
last is when, having a captured piece to be re-entered, while some of his
pieces are still remaining in his hus (in which case he is forbidden to re^
enter them on that point), the player casts the useless throw of double aces
and loses his right to play until he throws a higher number; the French
faute is likewise applied to other situations, when a player is unable to play
his throw. An Sppet fmt ("open point") is one on which the adversary has
BO men. Then we are told that if more blots are hit (or men taken) than
there is space for them to re-enter, this is called to become Jtcniber or ^to^^n
ur brddet ("put off the board "). It depends upon the Junker's will either
to play in as many of his captured men as he can without throwing, or to
wait until he can enter them all. He chooses the latter if there is danger of
his becoming/an, and the former if he thinJu that the adversary will soon
be obliged to break up (bryta) some of his double points. The writer goes
on to say: "/an is when one has taken more of the opponent's men than
he can re-enter, even if the hus-point or his six-point be not doubled (or, if
men are still on the A««-point, the seven-point be open), the single man
on the six-point or seven-point being, in that case, called the Janibricka.
He who becomes Jem loses a double game, and the partie is ended." Tho
description is not over clear, but we render it as exactly as possible. The ae-
oount of the method of play continues, with explanations of hronspel, upspel
and so on, the game ending, in tiie ordinary course of events, when all the
winning player's pieces are brought around to his husrum (that is, when the
fiemspel is complete). After some important rules are given, we have the
second sub-seetion (pp. 18-20), being a description of verkehren utan Junker
("without Junker"), in which like Junker feature is done away with. It is
styled an abnormal variety, in which there is more of chance then goed
play, and \% which occurs the position of sprdnifjan (" bursting" or "break-
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318 CHESS IN ICELAND
ing jan**), when the player, having his men captured and anable to re-enter
them, does not become Junker, but is allowed to "hit" his adversary's
obstructing double points (hand) as if they were blots. The compiler con-
demns this variety. The whole section on verkehren seems to be an inade-
quate account of the real Swedish backgammon, spoiled by features of the
German verkehren gathered from a German manual. After this we have a
description of the French trictrac (the name being applied alike to the game
and the board), which, says the writer, is in many respects unlike verkehren,
and in others like toccategU. The terminology is, as usual, largely French,
with, in some instances, attempted translations, as bak-Jan, (the German
"ruckjan"), stora Jan and lilla Jan (** great jan," " little jan "), ianftr^Scte
(the field or quarter of the board in which the player's hus lies), marquera
(to '* mark points '*), and so forth. Immediately thereafter follows the ac-
count of toccaugli^ in which one of the terms is schuster^ defined as a phase
of the game in which the player is not yet prevented ft-om forming in his
opponent's board six double points. The men are placed at first on the
first point to the right of one player and the left of the other. The back-
gammon division of the work ends with the variety called schueter which is
declared to be properly ''a game for women.'* The men are placed as in
toccategli. We render the remaining few lines: ** According to the throws,
the men are moved from the hus into the next quarter of the board; if the
player there make or secure each point with three extra men {Uisa birickor)
on the three last, all following each other, he wins two game-points, and
the contest is over. If neither player obtain this position (called Schuster)^
then it is permitted to move across into tho adversary's board, and the
game is won by him who, in the ordinary way, first ^ bears ' his men. No
blots can be hit." This simple variety, as well as the two which precede it,
evidently all owe their descriptions to some German manual, but the last-
named, simple as it is, may still be of great age.
The next Swedish acad^mie is entitled '^Ny och fuUstandig svensk spelbok,
eller grundlig anvisning till alia nu brukliga kortspel.... &fvensom schack,
dam, br&dspel och blljard " (Gdtheborg 1847), being a pretty close translation
of the title-page of ''Das kOnigliche I'hombre." It treats only one back-
gammon game, namely, verkehren i brddspel " (pp. 298-909). This is the
game described in the preceding work, but the section is better arranged
and better written, and consists of twenty-two numbered paragraphs. We
shall call attention to a few additional features and terms. The third par-
agraph tells us that in entering upon a game a previous agreement should
be arrived at as to whether a player must have made Aye blots, before being
permitted to form double points, or whether fritt spel shall be allowed, this
'' tree play " meaning evidently that he can form double points at once, also
as to whether each combatant shall be allowed to make only tLve successive
double points (fern totuQ, or whether he may form six; likewise as to whether
the game shall be carried on with or without the Junker feature; if the series
of double points be limited to five. Junker is excluded, otherwise the game
usually includes the Junker. The throw to decide the privilege of the first
move is called fifrkastei (literally, "fore-cast," or "fore-throw.") Except
in two exceptional situations only blots can be hit (paragraph ten), the ex-
ceptions being (paragraph fifteen) when the game is played without the
Junker^ and yet one adversary does force the other into a Junker position,
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STRAY NOTES 319
and (paragraph eighteen) when the storm-Jan occars in a JunAurr-less game,
this being an enforced series of moves making the opponent Junker ^ when
the latter can also capture men on the double .(or doubled) points. Ultag^
ning (" taking out ") is used for " bearing " (he^nspel). AH vinna pd sista
hrickan (** to win on the last man **) is when a player, after his adversary
has borne all his men but one, captures that one and thereby gains the right,
in order to hinder its advance when re-entered, to form a barrier of six sue-
cessive double points, even if the pre-arrangement has been made to play
with only five. The phrase here given is also used figuratively.
The latest and by Air the most important treatise on games published
in Sweden is the ^'Illustrerad spelbok en handleding i de fiesta i Sverige och
utlandet brukliga spel .... efter de b&sta kiillor utarbetad af Tom Wilson ''
(Stockholm 1888), a handsome volume, the pseudonym ^^ Tom Wilson " re-
presenting, it is asserted, a well known Stockholm Journalist. The fact that
both " domestic and foreign games " (i Sverige och utlandet brukliga spel)
are described prevents a clear recognition of those which are actually
practised by the Swedish people. We shall enumerate the backgammon
games in their order, afterwards examining, in considerable detail, the most
important and interesting one. The space occupied is pages 218-283: 1. trik-
trak, the well-known French variety, of which we have already said much.
The section is apparently based on a careful study of the latest French au-
thorities. The compiler boldly asserts, following French compilers, that it
was known to the Greeks and Romans, and states that its present laws and
methods were established during the reign of Louis XlVth. It has never
been much played in Sweden, and is therefore often underestimated by unin-
formed persons. If compared with the only bacJLgammon much practised among
Swedes, it is difficult to say what would be the result. The French game is
more complicated and therefore much more difficult; but simplicity is after all
a merit, and just that characteristic, in addition to its variety of features and
movements, makes the Swedish game particularly prominent and interesting,
and preferred by many to its French rival. The board-points are variously
called pilar^ fdlt, tungor, kilar^ spetsar (th# last being literally ** points ").
The ^^coin de repos'' or *^ruhecke,'' is styled huken or hvilovrdn (this compound
meaning *^ rest-corner.'') The French terms for the doublets (**ambesas,"
or '* beset,"' " terne " or " tournes," ** quaterne," etc.) are explained by the
genuine old Swedish expressions (tvdor or dusam par, traitor, quartaner,
sinkor m&ng etc.), the foreign terms thus being unnecessary. After further
definitions follow a table of the possible combinations of the dice, a defini-
tion of skolan (** Tdcole"), an account of the various Jans (their names in
part translated) and other positions, a table of the values of the game-points,
and finally a recorded triktrak partie, '^ according to the method first pub-
lished in 1738." This is a game of seventeen throws (moves), each one care-
fully commented, with two variations, one running to the thirtieth throw, the
other to the eighty-fifth — the whole being a most useful feature for the
learner. But all the section is every way well done. 2. ProtokoUstriktrak
(^' trictrac k ^crire "), which we have mentioned, the description being only
a single page in length. 3. PtOlspel C*Jeu du plein*'), a few lines. 4. Toc-
categli (or tockadUl, French, " toe"), its origin attributed, as usual, to Italy;
four pages are given to it. 5. Puff, (two pages) describing both the varieties
l&ng and konirdr, citing bro (^' bridge ") as the name of a barrier formed by
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820 CHESS IN ICELAND
a series of united double points. 6. Revertier^ meaning the German verkehreii^
to which four pages are devoted. 7. Qaremguet^ half a page briefly portray-
ing this three-dice backgagimon-game. 8. Jacquet (one page), telling of
this French game and its variety, Versailles-Jacquet. 9. Tre-band (**Jeu de
tourne-case**). The writer explains toume as an old French appellation of
the three-point on the dice, and gives a page of particulars of the game.
10. Backffamman^ a page concerning this game, **a great favorite in Eng-
land ; " it was formerly in vogue in France, we are told, under the name
of '* toute-table," which is rendered into Swedish as hela hordeU bordet rund
(''the whole board," *'all round the board *'); but the brief account of the
English game is a correct, but totally inadequate one. 22. Svenskt brddspel
(''Swedish table game,** or " Swedish backgammon,**) filling seventeen pages.
This, by reason of its many interesting features, some novel to us, we shall
summarize, giving likewise the Swedish text. *^
'" Yi glfTA beolmaingen Somukt brUdspel &t del brlldap«l, hvilket ftr det I Bverife mwt
brukllfa. All denoA form Af brftdipel ttppftannlU i Sverige &r ej enUgllgt; fSrmodllgeB &r
det nrspningllgeii Mmiiia ipel looi BswrtUr (Verkthrm), hvllket p& ilna ttiUIen ipalM U, att
det niaua alldetoi 9frereiiMtainner med v&rt iTensk* bridipel. Delta kaa i alia hiadelear
eftgae utgSra JScverlier ned oigra mindre vlawdtlifa asdriagar och UUftgg. Bridfpel aUer,
•oin man brokar kalla det, <« ipela brftde " torda bdra UU da i Bvertga meet bniUlfa epel;
det fSrekomoier 1 alia lands&ndar, om &n lUlan bland allmogen, oob man ikalle derpi kanna
tiUftmpa, bvad den eagelfke fSrfattaren Swift slger om enfoltmanneai bridipel baekgamaaon,
all " det bi0ta t&Uel all Tinna aktaing af preaten i fSraamlingea ir alt visa konom, atl man
kan flpela br&del ** Bollgl T&rt fjlrmenande loUger bland brftdspel eveaakl bridspel fr&msta
rttmmet. Skolle nagot brftdipel kanna gOra det ■amna rangen atrtdig, vore det mOJUgen
triktrak, kantke &fyen deai Tariant backgammon. Men egentllgen kanna ieke triktrak oeh
ivenakt brftdapel JemfSrac med hvarandra, redan fOr det alldelea aklljaktiga tpelaattets aknlU
Deatnlom rider den itora akflDadeni alt triktrak Ar ell ganaka koaaplSeeradt tpal oeh darl-
genom aArdelea BTirt, si alt brad gUler en OfTerblick af apelet, kan btoda Intel annal tpel
kan JemfSraa dermed ; sTenakt brldepel deremot utmlrker alg Juit fOr sin enkelbet, men
erbjuder pi aamma g&ng de intreaaantaate komblnationer oob ger en akieklig apelare tlllflUe
till ritt djnpa ocb flna berftknlngar, bTilka egenakaper Ja kunna algaa utg9ra dygden koe eti
Bpol. — iS^elala imrdUning, Till br&dapel — yi aafinda f5r korthetena aknil eadaat denaa ba-
ntmaing -> h6ra: oil bridapelbord, briekor oeh tirnlagar. BrddtpeMord^t atgOrea af ett
bord, hyara yttre kan rara beakaffadlpi olika afttt, 1. ex., aiaom ofta bmkar vara fSrhiUandel,
fSrsedt med en akifra, ai att berdet kan anyftndaa till kortapelabord o. a. t., men hvara iare
bestir af en lida, eller brad man na vill kalla det, aom uIgOr ajelfva brldet eller apelbordel.
Spelbordel, till ain form rekungnlirt, ftr klftdt, Tsnllgtria med grSat klftde. I bordaU
midt, pi kvardera liagaidan, fSrekommer en, dock ieke Ofrer hela bordet giende, aUa
endaal nigra lam nUkJatande aki\Jevigg, byarigeaom bordet delaa i 4 brOdeu eller /2U», 2 pi
bvardera aidao. Utefter bordeU bida l&ogaldor forekomma aammaalagdt t4 hilar (kallaa
ftfVen pilar, /dtU, tungor) 12 pi bvardera Iftngaidan, 6 1 hvart brftde, af annaa fftrg ftn bordcle
beklftdnade. Kilarno ftro omvexland Ijoaa (hvita, gala) oeh mdrka (avarta, r0da) UU fftrgen,
hvar anaaa kil IJoa, hvar annan mdrk, ocb atiende ai, att mot Una kil pi ena aidaa ararar
mflrk kil pi motaatt alda. Kilarne i flgureu 1 [IS] ftro numrerade endaal fOr att anderlfttta
notationen af apelet; i verkligheten fOrekommer ieke deona numrering. Kilarne 1-6, 7-11
utgOra de tvi brftdena eller fftlten pi hvardera afdau, aUtai aammanlagdt lyra brftden. Higoa
a&rakildt beaftmniog pi de tyi brftdena pi hvar alda, aftaom i triktrak, fOrekommer ieke. —
Bfiekitma ftro aammaalagdt 80 till antolal, nemlingea 16 \Jaaa, aom Inaehafraa af den one
apclaren, 15 mOrka, med hvUka den andre apelar. — Tdmingame ftro S till antalel oeh
anvftodaa gemenaami af de bida apelarno. Inga andra ttllbehOr forekomma, do i aft mftnga
brftdapel brukliga bftgarne anvftndaa Ieke. Bpeltftrningar ntgOraa, aiaom bekaal, af kober,
hrilka pi hyar oeh ea af de aex ytorna bftra nigot af namren 1-6, fSrdelade ai, att de
nammer, hvilka ati midt emot hvarandra, till aammana utgOra talet 7. Pi aidan midt emot
aexan atir allUi en etia, midt emot femman en tvia o. a. ▼. Numren pi tftrnlngarne braka
kallaa Ogim, Ollka 5goa pi bida tftrnlngarne (t. ex. 6-8) kallai enkalt kast^ Ilka 6gon (t. ex. 6-6)
kaUaa alio. De bida tftrnlngarne gifra till aammana aaledaiag UU 86 komblnatleaer, hvilka
aaiSraa lUhr, amedan dot ftr UU aytta atl Iftra kftaaa dam. BJa kaa kooiaa nfp pi 6 ollka
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STRAY NOTES
321
' The author*s name for this variety is given to it because it is the most
practised in Sweden. Probably, he thinks, it was originally identical with
•' revertier '' (** verkehren "), but has undergone some, perhaps unimportant
changes, and has added some new features. It is the best-known of all
Sweden^s games of any kind, and is played in every quarter of the country,
even in the rural regions, though not much by the lower or uneducated
•ftU, alltU 6 kombinatloner. Rftknar man alU do ollka kMt, lom kaaoa gOrM med 2 Vktmlng-
«r, flaaM efentligen endMt 21 kombinatloner, neuUigeii: 6 oeh 1, 6 oeta 2, 6 och ^, 6 oeb 4,
6 oeh 5, 6 oeta 6; ft ooh 1, ft oeh 2, 5 oeh 8, 6 och 4, 6 oeb 5 ; 4 ocb 1, 4 oeh 2, 4 oeh 8, 4 oeh 4;
8 oeh 1, 8 oeh 2, 8 oeh 8 ; 2 oeh 1, 2 oeh 2 ; 1 oeh 1. Deaaa ftro do 21 kut, eooi kaUae tmrkUga
eller a^maibla^ men till deata 21 komblnationer m&eto man ligga 16 aadra, kallade fmaentiHa,
hvilkaa tillvaro ftr l&tt att bcvlea. Det kan tyekai, «om om 6 oeh 1 och 1 oeh 6 borda vara
12 11 10 » 8 7
5 4 8 2 1
MM-
1
1
2
8
10 11
12
4 6 6 7
Fig. 22.
■amuia aak. Mtm denna tamma aak frambringaa pa tv& aitt oeh bSr rtknaa 2 ganger; ty
emodan hvarje t&rnlng bar on 1 och en 6, flna dei tvi 1 oeh tyk 6, oeh den t&rning, aom ona
gangen kom upp med 1, kan nftata g&ng komma upp med 6 ; tamfngon aom ena g&ngen kom
opp med 6y kan aedan komma upp med 1. Detta akulle gdra Anna 21 komblnationer, a&
▼Ida man loke fr&nr&knado de allorna, hvilka leke knnna komma npp mer &n en ging.
Foljande iabell ntylaar de ollka numren oeh deraa Jiombinationer :
Oyoa pa da bad*
AaUl att att
AaUl
tlralatani*.
kon
ma upp.
komblnaUoner.
12
86
Ufter aom 7 bar de fleata kombinatlonerna, b6r detta dgoaantal oftaai komma app, hvarilU
man bOr taga H&na/n. De ollka t&rniogakaaten ha erbftlllt fdljando namn : Dubbia aezaa (6-6)
kallaa atxor mSng-, dubbia femman (5-5) kallaa ainkor (einknr) mAng ; dubbia fyran (4-4) kallaa
qvartaiurf dnbbla trean (8-S) kallaa trallor; dubbia tv&an (2-2) kallaa diMome par; dubbia
ettan (1-1) kallaa cfaan jiar; aex och fern (6-5) kallaa aaxtio/am (aex till fom, aox ooh fem); aex
oeh fjrra (6-4) kallaa aextio/yv (aex till fyra, aex oeh f^ra) ; aex oeh tre (6-8) kallaa aeaMoIre
41
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322 CHESS IN ICELAND
classes. According to the writer it takes the foremost place among the va-
rieties of backgammon, only to be compared possibly with triklrak ; and he
then proceeds to describe their diverse features. The board used for hrddspel
— the name is used for brevity's sake — is usually provided with a slide
{skifva)^ so that it can be used as a card-table etc., the inner part being
the brOdspelsbard proper. With the aid of an illustration, the board, its
(MX Un tre, MX oeh tre) ; mx oeh tH (6-S) ImIIm aexHotvA (mx tUl tvA, lex oeh tT&); mx och
ett(6-l) kallM mx «m; fern oeh tyr* (4-5) kallM •tnfta /yra ; f«m oob tre (6-8) kallM Hkka tre',
fern oeh ty& (6-1) kalUt Hnka dtu; f«m oeh ett (6-1) kallaa sMCa —•; tff% oeh tre (4^) kaUu
qvart tre; tjn ook tT& (4-1) k«llM gvart due; f/ra oeh ett (4-1) kellM qvari m«. tre oeh tvi
(3-1) kftUai treja due; tre oeh ett (8-1) kallM ttMS «m; tH oeh ett (1-1) kaUM daw e$$. Den
hOgre tftmi&gen i ett kMt namnei alltid fSrtt. SpeUdUet. HTiirdera ipelaren har, sleoin redan
namnU, 16 briekor, den one de IJosa, den andre do mOrka. Man tUplar npp lina brickor i
wioUpelarene vetutra Mm, i 8 hSgar, 6 briekor i hrardera hOgen, liaom fig. 1 [11] ntriiar.
Hvardera tpelaren har allt«i alna briekor pi kilen 1, enllgt flgvreni p& moUpelarene itda.
Plafien, der man har slna briekor I tpeleta bdrjan, kilen 1, kalUi htu (Ami). Att gi at med
briekor ftin denna plaU kallaa att ifd /rAn hu$ (fiemifrdn), Bpeleta ajelfra gmndTal tr den,
att man alir med timingarne oeh tager f6r kaatet, d. t. ■. att •& m&nga tfgon, aom man Or upp
pi tlLmiogarne, ai mAnga kllar fir man flytta en eller tvi eller, nftr man alir alia (ae derom
l&ngre nod), flora briekor. Med andra ord, man kan gi antlngen med endaat'an brieka ttt hela
kaatet, d« ▼. a. f5r bida tiUningarnea dgonaammanrftknade, eller med tvd briekor, en fOr hvar-
dera tamlngen o. a. ▼. Man alir, med hvar aln timing, om hvem aom akall b6ija, hvliket I
allm&ohet &r den, aom alir de ligata dgonen. N8r en brieka flyttaa, iaberftknaa ioke kilen,
hTarpi den atir : aum rdknar/rdn kiUn nd$i efUr <2«n, hvarpd briekan $tdr, DelU glUer, Tare
aig briekan akall flyttaa frftn hua eUer frin nigon annan plata, dit den redan gitt. T. ex., om
man i fSrata kaatet alir troja dna (8-1), kan man antlngen gi med •» brieka hemifrin, hvilken
d& flyttaa fern kilar (8 + 1), alltai kommer att ati pi pilen 6 ; eller oeksft flytUr man tvi briek-
or, en f6r trean, en f6r tvian; deaaa briekor komma att ati, den fSratb&mnda pi kilen 4,
den andra pi ktlen 8. Det bmkar fOr nybCrJare vara flSreoadt med aTirighet att flytta brick-
orna med tiUbOrllg anabbhet. Man b8r derf6r ibigkomma, emedan det nnderlftttar aaken,
att f9r Jemna Ogon pi de bida t&rnfngarne tlU aammant flyttaa en brieka till en kil af Ilka
f&rg, fSr ndda Ogon tiU en pll af annan filrg.
AUor tagoi duhheli, T. ex., om man alir dnaame par (S-1), tar man ieke endaat f5r 4
dgon, utan fSr tTi ginger 4 Ogon s 8 Ogon. Man kan di, pi aamma a&tt aom ntmnta vid
enkelt kaat, antingen gi med en brieka frin boa, hTilkeu di kommer att ati p& pilen 9, eller
oekai kan man gi med ivd briekor frin hua, di man med den ena briekan tar fOr tre af de
fyra triorna, med den andra fOr den Qerde tvian; den fOratn&mnda briekan kommer pi
kilen 7, den andra pi kilen 8. (Taga fOr 1 tvior med hvardera briekan, di 1 briokor komme
pi aamma kil, nemligen kilen 6, kan man ieke, emedan man iuna Ieke fir ha mora En en
brieka pi en oeh aamma kil, hvarom mora l&ngre nod. Ofvanatiende exempel ega ain tll-
Ijtmplighet, nir man gir med brickor frin hua. Hade man redan briekor ute, atode t. ex.
med en brieka pi kilen 6, en pi kilen 6, oeh aloge dna eaa (1-1), hade man att vilja pi: a. att
gi fran hua med 1 brieka, aom di komme pi 4; 6. att gi frin hua mod 1 briekor, den ena
till 8^ don andra till 1 ; e. att gi med 1 af de briekor man har ute, Tare alg mod briekan pi
6 till 8, eller med briekan pi 8 till 9 ; d. att gi med bida briokorna man bar nto, i. ex. med
briekan pi 6 till 8, briekan pi 6 till 8. Hade man flora briekor nte, t. ex. en pi hvardera
af kilame, 6, 6, 7, 8, oeh aloge en alia, t. ex. eaaen par (1-1), oeh man ieke tIUo gi med nigon
brieka frin boa, utan fOredroge att flytta dem man redan bade nte, konde man med 1 brieka
taga fOr alia Ogonen, t. ex. med 6 till 9 eller 6 till 10 o. a. ▼. ; men man konde ifren taga
med 4 briekor, nemligen 8 till 9, 7 till 8, 6 till 7, 6 UU 6. Har man briekor nte oeh gOr ett
kaat tilrftekllgt hOgt att ni ai lingt, kan man med deaaa briekor gi Ofter pi motaatt aida af
bordet, den aida, der man ajelf altter. T. ex., om man bar briekor pi 10 oeb 11 oeh alir
6-4, kan man, om man ej Till gi frin hua, flytta deaaa bida briekor, t. ex. 16 till kilen 4
pi motaatt aida, 11 till kilen 8. Briekornaa giogaitt &r alltai: frin bOger till renater, ai
lingo man bar dem pi motapelarena aida, aedan, di man kommit Ofter pi aln egen aida, frin
Tonater tiU hOger. SpeleU appgIA ftr att fOra brirkoma mndt hela bordet, tlUa man alntUgen
«p«lar hmn dem till den plata, bvarlfrio man ntglek. Den aom fOrat lyekaa apela hem eller
aom det UVen kallaa uttaga alia alna briekor, y tuner partlet. Man kan llkTftl rinna Af^en
pi annat aatt, brarom mora lEngre ned. Nyaa glfoa exempel pi briekornaa flyttnlngaro ieke
afaedda att ntgOra nigit rid, bur man i bOrJan af ett partf bdst akall flytta dem; de npplyea
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STtUtNOtBS 323
points, the men and the dice with their combinations, and the names given
to the points and doublets are Ailly treated. There are twenty-one real
(verJdiga) or perceptible (5etm&to). dice-combinations (six-one, six-two, six-
three, six- four, six-flye, six-six, five-one, Ave- two and so on), and fifteen
imperceptible {insensibla)^ which are, not enumerating the doublets, one-six,
one-five, one -four, one- three, one- two, two-six, two-five and so forth —
endaal om de ollk* aAtt, hyarpi man kaa oeh f^ Ufa f9r kastan. Rn hnfVad regel d^rvld
&r, •ifom framgir af Sfvanaiieade, att man mlite tafa J net fSr de dgon, ■om komma npp pi
brardera Ulrninffea, med andra ord, att man leke fir i5iiderd«la kaatet. Sl&r man t. ex. troja
dai (8-1) oeh fljttar 1 brickor, mitte man t4ga en 8 mod ena briekan, en I mod den andra,
men fir ieko uga t. ox. fOr 1 med den ona briekaa, fOr 4 med den andra. Att taga med «■
brieka f5r bola kaetet bonimnee i det ofterfoljande att iaga /uUt med en. Man e^er lcft« rat-
Hghtt att taga/Or 9tl katt «d, att man trS^ar mot§p«larmu hut, n&r dor fine mora In «n briok*.
DetU laneb&r »i tU, att man Ieko fir t&tta en brieka I motipolarena hna, aom UVen, att man
ieko fir tr&flk det nndor Tigen. Att ** tr&ffa " win hlr elga att ni J oat dit med 5gonon pi
don ona oiler andra tHrningoa (det earoma aom i triktrak kallaa att hviia tig), T. ex., om
Jag at&r pA 11 oeh alir dnaarne par (2-1), kan Jag ieko fOr dotU kaat mod briokaa pi 11 gi
l>rror till min ogon aida, ty under vigon trillkr Jag mod en t?ia moUpolarona baa, Jag alir
nod (byilar mig) Jnat der. Deremot flnnoa iatot binder att fOr on 8 gi med brlekan pi 11
(ifvor till mottaat alda, till kllon 1, ty di paaterade Jag endaat motapelarona boa, ginge ofvtr
dot, men trftUkdo det ieko. Pinnoa endaat en brioka I motapelarona hna, ntgOr don intet hinder,
ty di alir Jag don likaom andra brlokor, hvilkon aak fSrklaraa Iftngro nod. (Bar motapolaron
nndor bomapol fitt en brieka I hna, fir man ieko ali don). Bn fOlJd Af att man ieko fir
triffa motapelarona hna ir, att man I bSrJan af partlot ieko vid alia kaat kan taga fOr bida
timlngamo. T. ex. om man i fftrata kaatet alir aoxor all (6-6), kan man taga endaat fSr
don ona aoxan, med en brieka fkrin bna till T. Tvi brlokor fir man ieko attlla pi en oeh
aamma kil f5rr, in mac nitt pllen 12 (ao llngro nod om Allien), oeh ta ftillt med on fOr detta
kaat kan man ieko holler, ty di triffado man motapolarena boa. Dot kan fSrokomma, att
man tlU ooh med alia Ieko kan taga f6r ott kaat. T. ox. om man 1 fOrata kaatot alagit ainka
eae (5-1) oeh frin hna taglt follt med en Ull 7 oeh man i nftata kaat Ar aexor all (6-6), ai
kan man leke flytta nigon brieka; ty brlekan, aom redan &r uto, triflkde motapelarona hna,
oeh gi frin hna med nigon brioka kan man leke, omodan kilon 7 redan llr opptagon af den
I fOrata kaatot llyttado briekan, oeh attta tvi briekor der fir man ieko. Under apolet kunna
Aera llknando fall Intriffa, nomllgon att man leke kan taga f5r kaatot, hvllkot ieko bar nigon
annan pifOljd, in att motapolaron alir aom vaullgt ooh man ajelf alir om, ntr man &r 1 tar.
Det ir regel, att man alMd mdete taga JOr tUt Jcattt ndr nAgon wtOjUghet gifvta, Man brukar
&fven fOlJa den regoln, attaftr man leke, Tare alg med on oiler t?i briekor, kan taga f5r hola
kaatet, men vftl med en brieka fOr an<ln^«a den ona oiler den andra tirnlngon, tagor man
f5r de h6gata Sgonen. T. ex. om man alir aInka tjrn (5-4) oeh Ieko kan taga bide fommaa
oeh fyran, men y&l endtra, ai tar man fOr fommaa.
Hukm. KUon It kallaa bvk. Hvardera apolaren bar ain hnk i b5gra bdrnet pi aamma
alda af bordot, dor ban b9rjar apola. Kilen 1 pi donna alda Ir bane hna, kllon It bane hok.
AUtoi beh6frer man I fSraU kaatot 11 Ogon fOr att mod en brieka ai frin hat till hnk. Hu-
ken Ir af ator botydolse, ty den otgOr pi don alda af bordot, dor man bdrjar apola, don enda
kil (hnaot natarllgtvia nndantaget), der man har rlttlgbot att altta mora In 1 brieka oiler,
aom dot kallaa, gOra band.
Band, NIr man har mera In 1 brieka pi on ooh aamma kil, kallaa detta ott hand,
ifoteataen till band, nomllgon en enda brieka pi en kil, kallaa hloUa, Binda Ir att gOra
band , mod andra ord, att pi on kil, der maa ftfrut har on blotta, altta en oiler flora briekor.
Brgta band Ir att taga bort en ellor flora brlokor frin on kil, ai aU ett band fSnraudlaa till
on blotta. Bandon Iro af atSrata vigt, emodan maa Ieko kaa aid don) (uadaatagaadoa I dot
fall, aom llngro med omnlmnea). . 5ld. Man alir en brieka, di man enllgt timlngakaatet mod
on af alna briekor trifllar en af motapelarona blottor. T. ex., om moUpolaron har on blotta
pi kllon 8 (pi den aid a, der ban bOrJar apela) ooh Jag atir mod en brieka pi 11 (pi den alda,
der Jag bdijar apola), triffar Jag fdr 4 6gon pi timingarno donua hana blotu. Slir Jag don,
akall motapolaron taga bort den or bordot ooh fdr ickt figita nAgra andra brUkar /Orr, On
kan alagU in tig igtn. Bid In (apeU in) en brieka kan man g5ra mdatt i brddat (fdU^t), der
man har tiU hut, aUtai pi nigon af pllarno 1-6. Dot fir ake endaat pi on iedig kll, hyarmod
hlr fSratia en kil, dtr man icke tjtlf har ndgon brickaf 9art tig band tlUr blotta, oeh mottptr
larm iekt ndgot band, (Att man, di man akall ali In alg oeh motapelarona band ati I Tlgon»
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324 GffRSS IN ICELAND
this class differing because the higher number must be announced and
played (T) first. We have already reported the interesting names bestowed
upon the dice-oombinations (p. 816). The method of play (speUdttei) is,
before beginning, to place the fifteen men in three piles, each player^s in his
adversary's left-hand corner point. To move the men from their home-point
is called to gd [go] frdn hus {hemifr&n). Tho two points thrown may be
U an tofen annan plate flnnat l«dlf, agar att tli dem, ■• deram Uncra nad). Nir man akal
■U la gig, m4«t« man pi wd^ra Ulrnlngen It det arforderliga Ogonantalat, man f&r laka tU
ihap Sgonan pi da bida Ulrnlnfarae. T. ex., om man skall %\i In aig p4 kllan 4, m4cta
■Mn pi andara tftrnlngan fi en fyra ; fir man an traa pi den ana t&rningen oeh en atU pi
den andra, fir man ieka boprftkna Sgonan. Hw motspelarm m hloUa pd kilm, ohm* dm
9d9om Udig, Man slir di in tig pi ti eftlt man i tin tor slir daana blotu och ttiUlar alg
der den stod. Di man slir In an brieka, rSknaa hdrnkilan alter boaat fOr 1, don darpi
fOIJande kllan fOr S, o. •. ▼. T. ex., ou kllen 8 ftr ledlg, bebOfVar men 8 d;oa fBr att ili
In tig. Nftr motepalaren bdrjat litt bemapel oeh tpelet hem en brleka, betraktas dan lake
•om en blotta oeh blir leke tlagen. Den bricka, hvarmed jag f5r mitt kaat nir dlt, till
bane hot, ■ttttar Jag leke der, ntan pi listen bredvld. Den betraktae llkviU tiiom atiende
pi kllen, eom otgOr ham hna, oeh flyttat eeden 1 enllghet dermed. Deremot, nilr under
ntapelet en enda brloka qvantir 1 hne, blfr den alagen llkaom en vanllg blotta. Jfan /dr
ickt «2d hand, midaat blottor, (Rtt nndentag frin denna regal f9rekommer, tiaem nyee
nUmnto). Man agar rftttfghet att ali flera blottor fSr att och eamma kaat, oeh att g5ra detu
▼are eig mad en eller flera af aina egna briokor. T. ex., om Ja^ atir pi 10 (pi den alda,
der Jag bdrjar), motopalaraa bar en blotU pi 1 (pi den a Ida der ban bSrjar) oeh an pi 6
(aamma alda) oeh Jag alir qvart tre (4-8), ai kaa jag med min brleka pi 10 ali honom bide
pi S oeh 6. Har mottpeiaren blottor atiende ai, aom nyaa nimnte, jag ajalf en brleka pi 11,
an pi 10 oeh jag alir aaxtlofyra (6-4), kan Jag ali honom bide pi 5 oeh 1. F5r allor kan
jag helt naturllgt ali flera blottor, after aom allorna tagaa dnbbelt. DcC dr inM ivdmg aU
aid, Ofranatienda exempel ftro afaedda endaat att opplyaa om aiUtet att ali, leke hnr man
hdtt b5r g5ra det Det ftr Ifttt att Inae, af hyilken tfgt banden miata vara, pi den gmnd
atl man leke fir a)i dem. Att gOra band Sr hvad man fHLmat afiker nppni. Jfoii ef«r <«fca
rdiHghsi att ha JUr dn 6 hand omadalfrarf ^fier (hrtdvid) hvarandra, ntam i ett fall, aem
omnllmnea Iftagre ned. Bhurn man pi den si da, der man bCrjar apela, leke agor att gOra
band fOrr in i haken, ntgOr delta UkviU Intet hinder f9r, att man kan gi 6fver till motaatt
alda oeh g5ra band der, snnan man dnnu har hand i huknt^ f. o. m. innan man dnnu salt ndgan
brieka i huken. leke heller gttller nigon inskrftnkning ai till Tide, att roan fSrat akall ba
gitt frin hna med nigot viaat antal briekor, innnn mao fir bOrja gOra band. Banden pi
pllarne • oeh T kallaa jeruhandmif (fan" och mors&amian), baudet pi I janhandML Man har
rftttlghat att g9ra baud bestiende af mora an 8 briekor, man kan dertlU taga 8, 4, o. a. t.,
bur minga man behagar. Band beatiende af fler ttn 8 briekor benfUnnaa ofta polaeJt«r {S/v^r-
frond). I band beatiende af 8 briekor atfiUea den ena brickan ftramfOr den andra pi aamma
kll ; I band med 8 briekor aftttea den ena briekan mldt 9fver do andra ; 1 band mad 4 briekor,
tTi oeh tvi briekor pi hvarandra o. a. y. Bpelete nppgifl ftr, aiiom f5mt namnta, iUt fBra
briekoma rnndt alia briidena, tllla man alutllgen fir dem pi aamma plata, hTarifk-in man
ntgiek, hvUkat kallaa hamtpel. Den aom fOrat lyekaa apela ham alia aina briekor. Tinner
ankalt parti. Man kan mad alia briekoma i alaU brftdat vlnna ilfVan pi annat aStt, ftn genom
hamapal. Lyekaa man plaeera 8 briekor pi bvardera af de 6 alata kllarna (8-18), kallaa
detu ankaii kramapetj 6 briekor pi hTar oeh an af da tre alaU kllarna (10-18) kallaa dabhaU
jTonapel. Lyekaa man A 7 briekor pi den aiata kllan (18)^ 5 pi dan nAat aiata (11) oeh 8 pi
kllan demaat (10), har man trapptpal. Fir man alia briekoma pi alata kllan (18), kallaa
datta nppapal, hTllkat alatnlmnda hOgat attUan fSrakommer. Man bOr, di partlat nitt ai
lingt, fSradka vlnna det ganom nigot af nyaanlmnda apal, amedan da ofta brnka batalaa
hdgra An bemapel. Atmlnatona appapal bmkar batalaa dabbalt. Ljekaa man ieka gSra nigot
af da nimnda apalan, apelar man hem briekoma, Jfan /dr kike hdrja dn w t a d flfrr. An num
kammU m^d aHa hrUkoma i aUt Hsta hrdda,
YId hemapalat Uger man, nftr det liter alg gSra, pi Tanllgi afttt fSr kaatan. T. ex., IBr
an gir man ham mad an brieka ft'in kllan T, f5r an 1 gar man ham mad en brieka trtua
ktleu Ik, o. a. v. med alia andra kaat. Slir man allor, kan man gi hem mad 4 briekor
pi an ging. Har man redan utugit de ttngat hort alieuda briekoma oeh alir hOga kaat,
tagar man de briekor, aom ati n&rmaat de kllar, hvarifrin man aniigt kaatet aknlle taga.
T, ex., alir man aaxor, men redan apelat hem briekoma pi T, tar man I atUlet briekoma
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8TRA Y NOtES
385
played each for itself, op may be combined — in other words one man may
be moved (according to the sum of the two points), or two men. Doublets
are counted doubly. If the dice permit, the player may move men into his
own side of the board whenever he will. The march of the men is thus
ih>m right to left so long as they are on the opponent*s side of the board,
afterwards from left to right. The object of the game is to bring them all
l»i 8, har man leke heller dor oifra, ter man briekoma pi 9 o. i. ▼. Man ftr leke tkyldlg
att f5r hvarje. ka«t spela hero eller, tiaom dei ockti kalUe, toga at 2 briekor p& en ginf .
Kan man enllgt kaetet flytu en brleka pi Tanligt iiitt ttin en kll till en annaoi iir ftfren
detu tUUtel. T. ex., om man tMr 6-5 oeh bar ett band pi kllen 7, si kan man fSr eezan
tpela hem en brleka oeh fBr femman flytU den andra till hOrnet, kilen 11. loke heller llr
det regel, att man Tid hemtpelet akall bSrJa med de lllnget bort et&ende briekoma, e&
vlda man leke f&r de hOga kaet, torn rooUvara dem. 81&r Jag t. ex eaeen par (1-1), kan
Jag epela hem 4 briekor fr&n kllen If, ftntkOut de Iftngre bort etlende bandoB Xnnn leke
tfro hemapelade. Men lUr man hSga kaet, tom motevara de Iftngtt bort etiende banden,
m&tte man ftfren apela hem dem; t, ex. el&r man lexor all (6-6) oeh har 8 briekor pi kllen
7, t pi kllen 8, miate man ipela hem alia 8 briekoma frin kilen 7 oeh en ttiu kllen 8.
Har man tpelat hem alia tina briekor oeh mottpelaren ftonn har nigon brieka slagen, ftr ban
muhk, Man h6r ander hemapeiet akta alg att komma efter med blotter ; ty har man tp^kU
A«m alia briekor utom, en, ocA moUpelarmi «Mr den, eger han rSUtighmt ati tdUa kar wtdnga
band han b^hagar, Spelet kan aMataa, Innan man hinner Ull hemepel, nemllgen nXr
nigon af de bida apelarae bllr Jan eller tprdngjan^ Jan blir eian, om man /dr fiwa briekor
alagna, in d€t JLne plaUmr ait komma in pd i fSreta br&dei (1-6). T. ex., em Jag redan
har 6 blotter i mitt fOraU briide, der Jag akall apela In de alagna briekoma, oeh Jag ai
fir 8 briekor alagna, ai har Jag plata fOr endaat en af dem oeh ftr di Jan. 8e nedanatieade
Agar t [83]. Den aom apelar med ararta briekor oeh aom wl vllja kalla A, Kr hftr nftra att bll
A.
188466 780 10 11 12
^WTWI?vl
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mmMM
9 10 11 12
Jan. Det behSfrea endaat, att motapelaren, B, kaatar eaeen par, ai alir ban med aln brieka
pi 8 motapelarena blotter pi 10 oeh 18. Som A har plata endaat f5r en brleka, nemllgen pi
kllen 6, ftr ban Jan. B Tinner di dubbelt parti.
Fir man en eller flora blotter alagna oeh ieke har nigon ledlg kll att ali In alg pi,
derfBr att kllarae t brftdet, der detta akall ake, ire upplagna dele af one ogna bloit^tr, dele of
motepelareNa bandy ogrr man rUtOghet ait eld dem, Om di motapelaren leke har nigon ledlg
plata att apela In aina alagna briekor pi, ftr han aprcbi^'aii. Rn JemfOrelae mellan jan oeh
eprdmgjan bllr alltai den: jan bllr man, om hela bridet, der man akall ali In aig redan ftr
opptaget af ena egna blotter oeh man fir en brieka alagen, eller, nftr ieke aiki kllar ftnnn ftro
opptagna, om man fir flora briekor alagna, ftn det flna plateer for ; t. ex. om i bridet, der jag
akall ali In mig, ati fern mig Ullbdrlga blotter oeh Jag fir tfi briekor alagna. SprOngjan bllr
man, om man har band atiende I brftdet, der moUpelaren akall ali In alg, oeh de tffriga kllame
I brftdet appta^a af motapelarena blottor; om Jagdi alir en eller flora briekor fBr motapelartOf
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326
CHESS m ICELAND
around the board, until the player has been enabled to ^^play'' them '^home*'
to the point where they originally stood. They are generally placed on their
starting-point (when ''borne** or ''thrown off**), but this final stage of the
game is likewise called to uiiaga ("take out**) or uttagning ("taking out**).
To move only one piece at a throw (instead of two) is styled to toga fuUt
med en (" take fully with one. **) A man can neither be moved to a point
covered by two of the adversary*s men, nor played in such way that he
'would hit it if it were a blot. No double points can be formed until the
player has reached the eleventh point from his starting-point, that is until
he has arrived at thehuk ("coin de repos**); to illustrate this: supposing a
player has thrown five- ace at his first cast, and then plays one man six
points (to the point adjoining the bar); if he throw, at his next cast, double
sixes he is prohibited from moving, for if he play his sixes from the hits
they will reach the man previously moved, forming a double point, which
is not yet allowed, and if he move the man already played six points he
would strike the adver8ary*s hus. But a player may form a double point in
his own huk (" coin de repos **), the twelfth point from his hus^ and the
only point on the adversary*s board on which he can place two men. A
double point cannot be hit, or captured, except in a single case to be noted
mitte bAB for alt komnM In sU ett oiler flora af mlaa band. Har Jag leko nigoD plate ait tpola
la doMa •lagaa briokor pi, Hr Jag apriUgjan. Af OfTanstioado framg&r, att Jag I olt ftUI ogor
•I& motapolaroas band, nemllgon nftr jag skall spola In slagna brlekor oeh dot ioko flnnoo sigoa
lodlg plati. Finnet doromot o&gon lodfg kll, alltti on torn kil ellor on kll, dor motapelaron bar
on blotu, ikall Jagtli la nig dor ocb ogor leko rftttighot ait •!& motspolaron« band. I nodanot&ondo
Agar [U] ftr A sprftnglan. Han bar ilagit t?i blottor for B. Ingon plata flnnoafSr B att komma
12 8 4 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
6 7 8 9 10^11 IS
B.
Fig. 24.
In pi. B alir linka tro (6-8), •4aom t&mlngarno ntrlia ; ban alir A*a band pi kllarno 8 oeh 6.
A ftr alltai /m brlekor tlagna, men bar I bridot, dor ban ikall bH In elg (kllarno 1-6 pi motoait
■Ida), oodast tvA platsor att komma In pft, nomllgon kllarno 8 ocb 6, alltti ar A aprSnglan.
Man bmkar fBlJa don rogoln, ait om don one tpolaron tor, att don andro litt bfir Hnna Jan,
kan don fSrtta&mndo, Innan ban ftnnn gjort band i dtt 8 : e brXdo, gifra tpolot fSrloradt oeh
tappar di ondaot enkolt paril. Don torn fSrlorar, brukar f& bOrJa i nMtU parti. — TbU ineladoo
tbo whole aoetiott of the <' lUnttrorad Spolbok >* relating to the pooallar 89en»kt hradtpel, or
tbo oldett and mott ebaraetorittio and general form of baekgammon known to Sweden, Ibo
earofal tiady of wbleh, for bittorteal roatont It to greatly to be eommendod. That no dioe-
box It naod, In playing it, tbonld bo an additional tottinoBy to iu groat ago.
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STRAY NOTES 887
hereafter. Captured men are to be re-entered in that quarter of the board
in which the owner of the captured man, or men, began to play. A captured
man must be entered, in accordance with the dice-point thrown, only upon
a vacant point, or upon a point on which the player has no man already, or
upon one on which the opponent has not a double j>oint. But there is, as
we shall see, an exception to this last condition. The player re-entering a
man must do so on a point indicated by the number on one of his dice, but
cannot combine the dice-numbers for this purpose. Thus, casting three-one,
he must enter upon the third or first point, but not on the fourth. Blots of
the enemy, in re-entering men, are hit as in other portions of the board by
removing the ei^em/*s man from the board and placing the re-entering man
in its place. In re-entering, the corner point or hus is reclLoned as point
one, the next as point two, and so on. A man of the opponent having been
played wholly around and placed on his 7^w£- point (that is, virtually '' thrown
off'') cannot be hit: if by chance my throw carries one of my men to that
point on my way around, I must place it on the side or margin of the board
next to the point; in moving my man again, however, I reckon the board-
points as if it really stood on the adversary's Tiu^-point. On the other hand
when, in throwing off [under utspelet]^ a single man has been left standing
in the opponent's hus it may be hit like any other blot. Each player may
hit more than one blot at the same throw, and with the same man.
Neither player has the right to form more than Aye successive double-
points, except in a case hereafter to be indicated. Although a player cannot
make a double point on the side of the table in which he begins to play
until he reaches the last (or twelfth point), this does not prevent his form-
ing such points as soon as he has crossed over into his own table,
even if he has not had a single man in the opposite table's twelfth point
{huken). As we have stated, double points on the two points adjoining the
central bar are called Jernbanden (doubtless on account of the resistance
they afford to the opponent's advance) or fars- och marsbanden, A secured
point on the second point (counting from the left) in one's board is named
the Janband. In secured points having two men they must be placed beside
each other (one before the other) on the point; if a third man be added, it
must stand upon the others (half resting on each of the men under it); if
a fourth be placed on the point, they should rest in twos, one above the
other. Having reached the final quarter of the table the game may be won :
I. by throwing off one's men before the adversary has borne his; 2. by secur-
ing one of the positions known as enkelt hronspel and dobbeU kronspely
already described; 3. by either of the positions styled trappspel or uppspel^
likewise previously mentioned. If the succesfbl player cannot end the game
in any of these ways, then he should close it by bearing the men {hemsp^).
This process cannot be begun until all the men have reached the last quarter
of the board. The throwing off is carried on exactly as in English back-
gammon, except that the men borne may be placed either outside the board
or piled on the hits. It is permitted either to throw off the men, or to move
them farther up towards the final point. As we have observed, if a player
has thrown off all his men, and his adversary still has some men not yet
re-entered {Unnu har ndgon bricka sUigen)^ the latter is said to be munk
C monk "). If a player has borne all his men but one and that should be
hit, the adversary has the privilege of barring that last man's advance by
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ass CITESS IN ICELAND
a series of &s many actjoining double points as he may choose to form. In
other words he is no longer restricted to five consecutive ones. The game
can also be decided, before all the men of the one player or the other player
reach the final or throwing-off board, by Jan or sprdngjan. The former
occurs when a player has more men captured (''hit'*) than there are places
in the first quarter (the Auf>quarter) of the board, on which to re-enter
them. For instance, if I have already five blots in my first quarter, where
the men must be re-entered, and my adversary captures two men, then I can
enter only one of them and am Jan^ and my opponent wins a double game.
The other position is more complicated. If one has one or more men hit
and there is no vacant point on which to enter them, because all the points
in the re-entering quarter are occupied either by his own blots or by the
double points of his adversary— if then, the adversary is unable to re-enter
the men thus captured, ho becomes spr&ngjan. If a player see that he is
threatened with becoming jan be may resign, and thus loses only a simple
partie. It is customary that the player losing a game has the first throw in
the following one. The general advice to players, as to the proper style of
conducting their game (forming the last three pages of the account in the
'' Illustrerad spelbok''), we omit, both in this summary and in the original
text, since nothing therein contained throws any additional light on the
character of this interesting variety of backgammon.
From internal evidence it seems fair to conclude that this game, existing
so long, and so universally played, in a land like Sweden, comparatively
isolated in the remote Scandinavian peninsula, may well be considered as
representing the most common variety of the mediaeval game of tables (tafi
as it was first called in the North, or, in early Swedish, tatc^. Of course
such features as the two jans may have crept in at a later period, just as
we have seen, in our day, modifications introduced into popular modem
card-games like *'* euchre,'* which have soon grown to be generally accepted.
Another thing seems not improbable, namely, that between the earliest date
of backgammon in Sweden and that of backgammon in Iceland no very
great period could have elapsed. If this be the case a careAil study of the
two varieties would doubtless yield some notable results as regards the de-
velopment of games. In both countries the original European name gave
place to another, because the Latin word ''tabula" ("tabulae*') got to be
more particularly applied to chess or to table-games in general. In Iceland
the foreign (Latin or French) name of the most striking side of the die was
given to the game. We know not how long the appellation br&despel has
been in use in Sweden as a general name for backgammon; otherwise we
might say that the Swedes translated " tables '* into their own tongue, since
brddespel means simply, " table-game.** But, again, brSde may be itself a
foreign term borrowed from the Germanic dialects south of Scandinavia.
Here, again, we have an instance of how much researches of this kind are
hampered by the lack of reasonably complete lexicological works, based,
like the great Oxford English Dictionary, on historical principles, and pre-
senting the forms of words at different stages of their growth— even of words
which have now disappeared— with numerous examples of their use. More
intimate acquaintance, too, with Norway is especially desirable in prosecut-
ing our northern investigations. That land was the mother-country of the
Icelanders; there was a close and continuous intercourse between the mother
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and the daughter until some time alter the anion of Norway with Denmark
(after 1400), by which eyent Denmark obtained control of the Arctic island.
It would, therefore, be interesting to know something of the early history of
Norwegian backgammon, especially during the saga period and the centuries
which immediately followed, as well as to learn the exact character of the
most popular form of the game in that country at the present day, particu-
larly in the northern and more remote towns and Tillages. Iceland may
haye received the game flrom Germany or Sweden, or eyen f^om France by
the way of Norway. That it came by the way of England, as chess did,
seems to be excluded by the difTering technical terms of the game, while
the intercourse with Denmark was too slight, in the XUth-XIVth centuries,
to Ikvor the belief that the game made its way to Iceland flrom that country.
Two geographical points must be considered when studying this subject.
The first is that the limits of Sweden were, until the XVIIth century, much
more restricted than now, the whole southern portion, previous to that date,
belonging to Denmark. The second is that Scotland was until 1603 an
independent ^Lingdom, having a certain amount of intercourse with Prance,
and thus might have been the medium, if not directly then through Shetiand
and the Oriueys, for the introduction of foreign novelties into Iceland.
Perhaps we shall be obliged to look at this latter ftct, when we consider
more closely the matter of hnefatafl^ its character and origin.
At the end of the description of the Swedish Inrddspa which we have
reproduced, but not forming a separate section of the ^^ Spelbok," we find
a brief account of a minor variety of backgammon styled sex ess. This is
the Bnglish sice-ace (see our p. 900), which, singularly enough, still survives
in Sweden, after it has been long disused and forgotten in England. As the
sketch we have given lh>m the '' Compleat Gamester ** ftuls to describe it
properly we shall translate the notice of it (\' Spelbok," pp. 281-3). It will
be found afterwards, that besides the interesting fact of its survival in an
unexpected place, we have probably ascertained another Ikct of even greater
importance. The writer says: **0n the usual backgammon-board is played
a game which has received the name of * sice-ace.* It is quite a simple
game, the issue of which does not at all depend on skill or prudent foresight,
but only on the throws of the dice. It is played by two players, with six
men on each side, and two dice used in common. The point of the game is
to get rid of one*s men, the first one accomplishing that being the winner.
The pips of the die are reckoned as follows: Casting ace, a piece (or man)
is turned over to the adversary; casting six, a piece is laid aside; casting
Aye^ a man is placed in the ^ deuce * (dusen)^ which ordinarily has its place
between the two players [that is, as seems probable, an indicated space, so
called, on the board between the points] ; casting deuce, a piece is taken
lh>m the ^ deuce ^ {tager man in dusen); the pips four and three are not re-
garded. Each dice-point must be taken separately and nncombined. For
instance, if my throw be five-ace, I am not allowed to combine the two
points and play them as a six, but I must regard them as a five and an ace,
each to be played separately. Doublets are counted thus: if I cast double
sixes, I lay aside two men; if double ace I give my opponent two men; if
double fives, I place two men in the * deuce ; " if double deuces, I take two
men fW>m the ^^ deuce** (on condition, naturally, that there be so many
therein), in case the game is played on the principle that only one man
43
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330 CHESS JN ICELAND
shall be taken from the ' deaoe * for every deuce-point cast, which is not
so common a method as that which requires that on throwing a two all the
men in the *' deuce * shall be removed. Even this game, however mean-
ingless it may appear, presents some variety dependent on the different
ways of availing one's self of the five and the deuce, when they turn up
together. For example, if several men are in the ^ deuce,' and J turn up
five-deuce, it makes a great difference, whether I shall reckon the five first,
therefore placing a man in the * deuce ' and afterwards, for the deuce, take
away all the men in the * deuce ' (if that mode of play be adopted), even
the man Just placed therein, for the fLwe I have cast, which is really the same
as if I had counted nothing at all for the five; or whether I count the deuce
first, therefore taking away (ta in heUi dusen) the men in the deuce, and
afterwards putting in a man for the five. In the latter case it will be seen
that J have got rid of a man. The best play, therefore would seem to be,
when a deuce is thrown, to take up the whole * deuce,' except one man,
which is to be left in. If doublets be thrown, the player throwing has the
right to a second cast. When a player has got rid of all his ipen, then, in
order to win, he must still throw a free cast (sld frislag)^ that is to say, he
must turn up an ace or a six (according to whichever be the customary
mode of play). When he has done that he is pronounced the winner." We
have translated literally, but it is not all as clear and comprehensible as it
ought to be.
One historical £&ct of unexpected interest we have learned from this
account of the Swedish sioe-ace game, which the description of the English
game could not have taught us. In the latter, as the reader will remember,
there was no mention of the singular ^* deuce " feature (by that name at
least); the occurrence of this in {he Swedish game enables us to recognise
this variety as that which is mentioned in the Alphonsine codex as ** seis
dos d as" C' sice-deuce-ace"), thus identifying as still in existence, after
more than six centuries, another of the varieties of ^^ tables " practised in
the days of the royal author (see p. 253). We have no doubt that a fiititbful
and searching study of his manuscript^ accompanied by an equally careful
examination of all the other mediaeval documents- relating to the ludus ta-
bularum^ followed by a complete investigation of all the modern backgam-
mon games, would lead to the discovery of several other such survivals. In
regard to the game of sice^(deuceyace it is to be considered a backgammon
game only because the backgammon-men are used in it, for although the
backgammon-board may be employed on which to throw the dice, the board-
points do not seem to have any proper part in the game. We may conclude
from what we already know, which is far too little, that the name ** tables/*
or ludus tabulorum^ was a generic name for all the varieties played on the
'*Ubles," or perhaps, rather that ''tabul»" really referred to the two boards
(one, with twelve points belonging to one player, the other Just like it, con-
sidered as belonging to or placed before the other player), which were
Joined together to make what we now call the '* backgammon-board. "
Henjce the use of the plural '*tabul». "• Later on, as one variety became
more prominent than others in different countries, the term ''tables" went
out of use and the board was called, especially in lands north of the Alps,
by the name of the variety most generally played. Perhaps the custom of
including in one piece, on the outer sides of which were chess and morris
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STRAY NOnS »1
boards and on the inner side («' within the tables*') the backgammon board,
may have had something to do with the abandonment of the name ''tables/*
We come at last to the nard-backgammon game in Iceland and its lite*
rature. Dice were known in the Northern island at a very early date; indeed
it is hardly doubtflil that the first settlers, coming from the great Germanic
world, brought the knowledge of those ancient gaming implements with them.
They are mentioned, and their use condemned in the Ordgds ("grey goose,"
so called, say some, because the original code was written with a wild goose
quill, because, say others, it was bound in grey). The name was first given
to a law-code of North Norway, the "ProstupingsWg"— based on laws enacted
by the popular assembly {fing), which met on the peninsula of Frosta near
Trondhjom— and then in the XVIth century erroneously applied to the laws
of the Icelandic commonwealth. By act of the Althing, steps were taken as
early as 1018 to commit the laws of the land to writing, but some time must
have elapsed before there was anything like a complete written code. The
commonwealth came to an end in 1281. The oldest existing MS of the Ordgds
was transcribed about 1235, but there were certainly older ones which have
now disappeared. It is quite probable that the enactments of the Frostuping
had an influence upon the development of the laws of Iceland, even during
the period of Iceland^s independence. The centre of the Frostu}>ing district
was the city of Trond^jem, the ancient Ni9ar<)s, and that was the place of
all Norway with which the people of Iceland were most fiimiliar, on account
of many interests besides their commercial ones. Therefore it is natural
that there should have been, at a very early day, a provision in both Ice-
landic and Norwegian law-codes like the following, which we copy from the
jl^rdgdsj edited by VilhJ&lmur Finsen (€k>penhagen 1852, ii. p. 169). There
are two vellums of the commonwealth laws, one in the Royal Library at
Ck>penhagen, the other in the Ama-Magnsean collection. Dr. Finsen edited
both, but the clause cited is from the Royal codex (under the heading: Um
verpla host oc tafi); '*l>at er m»lt iltfgum v&rom at menn scolo eigi casta
verplom til fiar en ef casta oc var9ar Qorbaugs garS Men scolo oc eigi
tefia sva at I>eir legi fe vi9, oc enga pa lute er manne plckir betra at hafa
en on at vera. En peim er fe legr vi9 tafl eOa a5ra lute pa er var5a fior-
bangs garO, end erat heimting til fiar pess. En eigi seal kasta. ** In this
extract we have retained, of course, the original orthography of the MS. It
will be noticed that dice-pla^rs are here condemned to outlawry, the second
or minor degree, if we may so speak, of that penalty. In one of the laws
given to Norway by King Magnt!is H&konsson (who reigned from 1263 to 1280),
called the lagabanir^ or reformer of the law, we find this chapter against
dicing virtually repeated (see "Norges gamle love," Christiania 1848, ii,
' p. 206) under the heading "Vm veOian ok dulplan" — the final word is
doubtless a copyist's blunder for "duplan," that is, dufkm^ being para-
graph XXyill of the section known as the kaupabdlkur: " Ef menn dufla ^a
kasta tenningum um psaninga se uppnemt konongs vmboOs manne allt pat
er a bor9e liggr oc huer peirra ssekr halfre mork sylfrs uiO konong en ef
men vedia hafe at engo oc se ssektta laust." In these provisions forbidding
the practice of dicing we have two distinct names for dice. The first, appa-
rently the older, is verjrill. This is set down by Ou9brand YigfCisson, in his
(Oxford) Icelandic-English dictionary, as the German ''wurfel," but this
seems hardly to comprise the whole story. The Icelandic has a verb, verpa^
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332 CHESS iN ICELAND
meaning to *' throw/* '^cast'* (the Anglo-s&xon ^^weorp&n/' English '* warp**).
Just as the Germans have a similar and allied verb, ^^werfen," with a like
meaning. Now the noan verpiU is formed by means of a well-known nom-
inal suffix (-ill) from this verb, Just as the German noun ^'wurfel** comes
Arom the German verb, and both signify the thing cast or ttiroci^n, namely
the die. VerpiU has other meanings, especially that of a barrel or cask, or
a vessel made by means of warped pieces of word, and in this we have the
sense of the English ^<warp,** the congener of the Icelandic verpa. Whether
the Icelandic noun verpm can, under these circumstances, be said to be
derived f^om the German v>Urfel is a question awaiting the decision of phil-
ologists. The other word for *^ die ** is tenningur (with the modem form
teningur), GuCbrand VigfAsson says of this word that the ^'Dan. *terning*
is a corrupt form, for the word is no doubt from taf»n= 'tooth,* Husk,* the
dice being made of walrus- tusk.** This all looks reasonable enough so far
as the old Icelandic ienningr, the Danish "terning,** the Swedish "t&rning**
are concerned. But how about the Dutch "teerlingf ** The Icelandic (6'fin,
the English 'Uooth,** the Danish and Dutch Swedish ^'tand** are all the same
word and all signify ''tooth,.** But is it certain that the most common word
in all the Scandinavian dialects, and a Arequent term in the Dutch, for
"die,** is to find its etymology in a word meaning " tooth t** The lexico-
grapher has been influenced by thd belief, to which so much currency was
given, both in England and Denmark, by Sir Frederick Madden, that chess-
men were largely manufiOLctured in Iceland from walrus-tusks and exported
therefrom— a sul]dect to which we shall return hereafter.
In the saga of St. Olaf (or St. Clave; as he was known in London), one
of the great series of royal biographies, written by Snorri Sturluson, the .
greatest of Icelanders (we cite the edition of Munch and linger, Christiania,
1853, p. 90), occurs a dice incident. The holy Olaf and his contemporary, the
Swedish king of the same name, had a meeting of reconciliation at Konung-
ahella in Norway in 1020. There was talk of a place, the situation of
which was in doubt, that is, whether it lay in Sweden or Norway. The
sagaman entitles the story of what followed "Fra casti konnnga,** "about
the (dice) cast of the kings:** "Sva sagUi Porsteinn firofti, at byg» sv la I
Hising er fyigt hafOi ymisttil Noregs 66a til Gautlanz. f^at melto pa konun-
gar sin i milli, at peir scylldv luta [draw lots] um eign |>a oc casta til ten-
ningvm [throw dice], scylldi sa hafk er sierra casta9i [cast the higher].
Pa casta5i Svia konungr. vi. tvav. [Then the king of the Swedes threw sixes
two], oc melti at Olafir konungr purfti eigi at casta. Hann svaraOi oo hristi
tenningana [shook the dice] 1 hendi ser: enn ero vi. tvav [two sixes] a
tenningonom oc er gvOi drotni minom enn liti6 fire at lata pat upp horfa.
Hann castaVi oc como upp tvav sex [double sixes], f^a castaOi Svia konungr.
vi. ii. [two sixes]. Pa castaVi Noregs konungr. Var pa. vi. a avOrom. en
annarr hraut i svndr, oc voro par pa. vii. eignaViz pa bygQina. Eigi havfbm
ver heyrt getiC fleire tiSaenda a peim fundi. Scildvz konungar sattir.** This
is told, let It be remembered, by the same historian who gives us, in the
same saga, our first absolutely certain knowledge that any Icelander knew
chess, since he (Snorri Sturluson) not only alludes to chess, in a story about
the Danish king Canute and one of his nobles, but makes the king leave
"a knight en pW«e,** attesting the writer*s Intimate acquaintance with the
game. The above passage is thus translated in Samuel Laing*8 version of
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Snorri Sturlason^a '^Heimskringla/* which includes the *<OIafs saga helga'*
(2d ed. London, 1889, iii, pp. 1-2): ^'Thorstein Arode [fro9i=the learnedj
relates of this meeting, that there was an isolated district in Hising which
had sometimes belonged to Norway and sometimes to Gautland [Oothia, a
part of Sweden]. The kings came to the agreement between themselves
that they would cast lots by the dice to determine who should have the
district. The Swedish king threw two sixes, and said king Olaf need
scarcely throw. He replied, while shaking the dice in his hand: 'Although
there be two sixes on the dice, it would be easy, sire, for God almighty to
let them turn up in my Cayour." Then he threw and had sixes also. Now
the Swedish king threw again, and had again two sixes. Olaf king of
Norway then threw, and had six upon ene die, and the other split in two
so as to make seyen eyes in all upon it; and the district was adjudged to
Norway. We have heard of nothing else of any interest that took place at
this meeting; and the kings separated the dearest of friends.'* The trans-
lation is not very good, but it gives an idea of the incident. We see by
the tale that dice-boxes were not then known even among kings, and that
the dice were therefore cast firom the hand (see p. 186) in the ancient
manner.
The incident is repeated in another saga, the '^ Orkneyinga saga,** or
tales of the earls (jarls) of the Orkneys. We quote from the edition edited by
QuObrand Vigfi!u98on for the English master of the rolls (London 1887, i. 93):
'' I Englandi 6tu tveir menu peir er mikit tb ItfgSu vi5 kast [at cast, that
is on dice-throwing], ok haf9i annarr l&tiC mikit f&. I^a lag9i hann tt kugg
einn [a '' cog,** a kind of ship], og allt pat sem hann &tti, i m6ti pvi 6Uu,
er hann hafOi AOr l&tiS. En hinn kasU5i fyrir sex tvau. P& p6iii hinum s6r
uvsant horfa, ok h^t & inn helga Uagntls Jarl, at hann skyldi eigi l&ta sinu
eigu alia; ok kastaOi siOan. En tenningrinn hraut i sundr annarr, ok
komu upp tvatf sex ok Ass; ok hlaut hann allt pat er vi9 1&, ok 8i5an gaf
hann Magn<]isi Jarl mikit f&.** The tale is apparently omitted in the English
version of the saga by J. A. Hjaltalin and Gilbert Goudie (edited by Joseph
Anderson, Edinburgh 1878). It is thus rendered; "In England there were
two men, and both staked much at dice, and one had lost a great deal.
Finally the loser staked his ship against all that he had lost, and called
on St. Magnus [an Orkney saint, who had been earl of the islands] that
he should not let him lose all his property; and then threw. One die broke
in two in such a way that there came up two sixes and an ace; and he thus
won the whole stake, and he gave the saint a large contribution.** This is
very likely a reminiscence of Snorri*s story.
Still another incident of this sort is related in the "Sturlunga saga,**-
the story of the deeds of the family to which Snorri Sturluson belonged. It
was written by his nephew, Sturla P6r0arson, and is really a general history
of Iceland during a large portion of the Xlllth century (from 1202 to 1262).
The event in which we are interested is narrated in the edition of the
•'Sturlunga** by Gu«brand Yigfi^isson (Oxford 1878, i, 328), the text telUng
us that two hostile chiefe, Eolbeinn and Sighvatur, met, in order to settle
their differences, in theHOrgadal in the North of Iceland; <'En er peir k<)mu
til Aindarins, ok menu leitaOu nm s»ttir, kom pat helzt &samt, at annar-
hv&rr skyldi einn gOra; ok skyldu peir pat hluta meO s^r, ok kasta til ten-
ningum. En er peir hlutuOu Qrrir kast, kastiUii Sighvatur daus ok is. Pi
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334 CHB8S IN ICELAND
m»lti einn af fylg»&nn6nnum Kolbeins: 'SmAtt ftll nu dr hendi, Sighvatur
bondl/ En i siftustum Watum kastoCi Sighvatr starra, og hlaat at gOra.
Hann laak eigl gOrtJ upp A peim fundi.'^ There is not much to this little
narrative, but we find by it that in the earlier half of the Xlllth century
the words daus^ ("deuce") and ds ("ace") were in common use in Iceland,
and that dice were still thrown from the hand, for the remark to Sighvatr,
on his casting deuce-ace, made by a spectator, *not much fell out of your
hand then, master Sighvatr," proves this.
We have seen that the paragraph about dicing in one of king HAkon's
Norwegian laws bad the heading: Urn dubl, "About gaming." This word
dubl (often written dufl, but even then the f has the sound of h) is, like the
Danish "dobbel" ("dice-gaming"), connected with the German verb "dop-
peln" (to "gamble") and means "dice-play," or "gambling," since in the
North as i^ Germany in those old days, there was little gambling of any
other sort than by means of dice. It even occurs in an early Icelandic math-
ematical work " Algorismus," dating tvom about the beginning of the
XlVth century, in its original signification of "double." Elsewhere in the
old literature, so ftir as we know, its sense is always that of dice-play
(gambling). About the year 1271 King Magnus, the "law-betterer," sent to
his new subjects a code of laws, compiled under his direction, by some
learned Icelanders residing in Norway, the chief among whom is supposed
to have been the historian Sturla, author of the "Sturlunga." It was called
J4msUf>a ("Ironside"), perhaps from its binding, or the case in which it was
kept. This was finally accepted in its entirety by the Althing, but soon
became unpopular, so that a new law-code was compiled in Norway within
a decade and sent out to Iceland in 1281. This code was brought from Nor-
way by J6n Einarsson, the "16gma»ur," or "lawyer," as he was titled. For
this reason the book was called Jdnsbdk ; it has been in force ever since, being
still what may be called the "common law" of Iceland. We do not find the
word dufl {duUi ^^ the JdrnsUNi, where tafl is incorrectly used for it. The
phraseology of a part of chapter XXI of the section kaupdbdlkr is: " Vunder
tafl eOa tenneng skal engi ma9r fe sltt leggia. En sa, er tefidr ver«r til eyres,
giallde kononge XII aura, oc sua sa er af honom tefierr." The editors render
tafl eiki tenneng by "ale© et tessewe." In their Icelandic glossary they tran-
slate Ufli ek by "alea ludo," and after some remarks about the orthography
of taW {tafl) and tebla (tefla) timidly suggest an etymology: "An a Latinorum
Ubulat"— all of which shows that they knew very little about the matter.
(/4m5^a, published by the Amamagneean commission, Copenhagen 1847,
pp. 127-8 and 176). The word occurs again, however, in the Oula^ngslog,
another provincial law (like the "Frostuplngsltfg") of Norway, in which the
XXYlUth paragraph bears the title: Vm dubl (edition of Copenhagen 1817,
pp. 521-2). This clause was copied substantially into the ''J6nsb6k," as
chapter XYIII of the section Jtfdfabdlkur (relating to theft), which we copy.
The heading is: Umm dufl og teniningakast ("concerning gambling and
dice-play " or " casting of dice "). The text is : " Ef menu dufla eOur kasta
teningum umm peninga, s^ uppnasmt kongs ummboCsmanne allt }>iA er viO
bor« liggur, ok hver I>elrra sekur halfre m0rk vi9 kong. Enn ef menu ve9Ja,
hafe aiS iingvu og sd sektalaust." We have used the edition of H6lar (Ice-
land) of 1709 (p. 440). The English is as follows : " If men gamble or throw
dice for money, every thing on the board is forfeit to the king^s commissary.
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STRAY NOTES
and each Is fined half a mark of silver to the king. But if they wager,
nothing i« to be paid to any one, and the parties are not to be oonyicted/*
Outside of legal literature the word occurs in one of the most popular of all
the Icelandic sagas, the ''GretUs saga**; it is found in a verse (the edition
of Yaldimar Asmundarson, Reykjavik 1900, pp. 140-141):
Segta 1 linltwbygUr
BriMlyodr. at ^« tyndir
Uppl aXi hjA Kroppi,
Alm^llr, 8«»alkolla.
Par Tar ataddr A atedda —
Strjtt aUBikiui, Halli ! —
Droogor aA or drifgir Itogam
Dafl, i STOrtam kaAi.
The verse is ascribed to Qrettir, the hero of the saga, and not very easily
understood without the context. William Morris, the poet, who made such
good use of the old Icelandic literature, has pot the stanza into English,
retaining to some extent the alliteration so characteristic of Icelandic verse:
In broad-peopled lands aay (hen
Thai then aaweet eren now
Unto Kropp-fami*8 gate anigh,
8a,idle-fiar and Elm-atalk bight
That tbon eaweot etiff en eteed
<Oet then gone at greateet epeed),
One who loTeth game and play
Clad in cape of Uaok to-day.
Here dufl is translated by ** game and play/* The date of the saga, as the
literary historian. Dr. Finnur J<)nsson, surmises, cannot be earlier than 1900.
He ascribes its compilation to an anonymous priest in the neighbourhood of
Mi50(Jrdur in North-Iceland. *w
^ The word dujl (dmhl) haa of late years been oeeadonally naed in an unwarranted
way in leelaad, bnt haa been rorltrad in America in ita general aenae of **gambllBg.*' Afler
aome eommnnieatiena ooneemlng ita real algnlfleation in the eelamna of the Winnipeg HHm-
skHnglOf the editor, in a leading artlale (vol. zTlii, no. J 8, IMM), eltoa a eommnnieatton from
an anonymoaa oorreapondent giring ezplaaationa of the word, but without any apodal knowl-
edge of lu early hiatory or etymology. He eitea the <* Jdnabdk** (giving the year of ita
arrival in leeland aa IITO, iaatead of 1S81). He eliea eorreetly enough the eomment on the
word in the Jenrnal of the learned aoeiety *< LwdomaUatafUag ** (voU H, ITSt, p. It7>, where
the three linea devoted to duhl read; '< (Itutu aUarU, hǤard'9pU, dobb^l) afibiplax, tvofalldr,
en ordit merkir bar tabling aller apilan, er tvair leika aaman." Thaae papera in the ** Bit
]>eis lalenska LardonMllatafftlaga *> wore aelcctad ftrom a gloaaary of the old worda in leelandie
law-booka, made by Pill Vidalin, apeakar of the Althing (b. 16«7, d. ITlt). Tbo eomptete
poblieallea of hia «« Sk^ringar yfir foruyrM l«gbdkar *' di4 not take plaee until 1M4 (Reyk-
javik), but the ezplaaatlon of the word dubl waa, for aome reaaon, not included. At preaent
it ia aafe to aaaume that dubl (du/()f when uaed, la applied to any kind of gambling, bnt in
ita old aenae it meant only gambliug by dleo-play. Tt^/tf wrongfhlly employed In ** Jim-
aifta/* aigniflea any table-game, bnt, in Ita moat modern interpraUtien, la generally applied
to eheaa. Ita verb, UJla^ meana. In ita original aenae, to " play at a table game ** (Ubiea,
cheea, draoghta, backgammon and ao on), but it baa been used alao, though Incorreotly, aa
applicable to the casting of dico. — That profound llngulaac aeholar, the late college-reetor
J6tt l»orkelaaon, explalaa the ▼orae oouUlnIng duJl in the Grettia aaga in hia " Sk^ringar i
visum i OretUa s«<u" (Reykjavik 1871, pp. 18-19). He adds to hia explication the following
oonciae hlatorlcal note : «' Du/f, tail til fjir e5a nm f«. >etu orS Snat tA minni vltnnd eigi
i eldri iaienakum b6kum, mnu J6n«b6k, er hir var logtekin 1881: ' Um dnfl og tonlngakaaU
Kf mean dntta e9a kaata tonlngum um poninga, sd uppnismt konnnga nmboSamaanl alt ^t
er vi8 tiggr, ok hverr ^airra aekr hilfri miirk vi5 konung.* Pjo/abdUur, 18. kap. Groin ]»eaai
er tekin ur 28 kap. Kaapabilks 1 LdndMlogim MagnAss LagaboBtia, en ^an vera logtekin
irift 1S74 (Norgea gamle Love, 11. 178). i Ordgda mua orMS dufl elgl flnnaat; enn i henni
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CHESS IN ICELAND
The most important of the few works In the old Icelandic language
which were produced in Norway is incontestably the Konungs-shugg^d or
*^ Royal mirror/* a sort of didactic treatise, devoted to practical ethics,
reminding one a little, in its general spirit, of the " Perfetto Gortigiano ** of
Gastiglione, although addressed to less elevated classes of society. Its author
is unknown, and its date is generally regarded to be about 1250. It men-
tions both table-games and dice, but only to deprecate the practice of either.
The edition consulted, that of the learned loelander, Hilfd&n Einarsson
(Soroe 1768, p. 436) gives the brief phrase: '' t^at er ok siSgis^i at flyia tafi
ok teningakast,'* that is '* It Is also good-breeding to shun table-games and
the casting of dice.*' The author then goes on with his list of habits and
vices to be avoided. The book is in the form of a colloquy between a Ikther
and a son. In an earlier passage (p. 26) exactly the same counsel had
been given: ^*Enn ero peir lutir, er pu skallt sua flya ok varast sem
flandann sjalfann, ]pat er ofdrickir ok tafl.... pr»ttur ok kast um viSur-
laugor,** that is : ^' There are still other things which you shall shun and
avoid as you would the evil one himself, those are overdrinking and table-
games.... quarrels and (dice)throwing for wagers.** A more recent edition
of the text (by Keyser, Munch and Unger, Christiania 1848) gives (p. 7), as
a variant for the expression '* kast um viClOgnr,** as there given, ^' kast ok
viW5gur,*' " (dlce)throws and betting.'* We have now cited, we believe, all
the passages in the old literature having reference to dice- play.
The text of the passage which we have quoted from '* St. Olafs saga **
is given with a slight difference in the edition contained in the ^' Pormanna-
sOgur,'* a collection of ancient sagas published at Copenhagen (1829 IV, 211).
Instead of the sentence ** pa castaBi Noregs konungr. var pa. vi. a av6rum,
en annarr hraut i sundr** etc., we have a much fuller statement: ^^Olafr
Noregs konungr kastaBi eigi at siOr, var pa enn sex & OOrum, en annar
hraut i sundr i tvd, ok voru par k 7 augun, ok hafSi Olafr konungr nu
kastat 13, ok eignaOist hann sva bygOina.** This is without doubt flrom a
later MS than that used by the Christiania editors (which was written in
Iceland in the first half of the Xlllth century), namely from a vellum in
the Arna-magnsean collection but which pretty surely cannot be much more
than a- century later. The important point to us is in the phrase *'ok voru
par & 7 augun, ok hafOi 6laf konungr nu kastat 13,** ** and there were on
(the split die) 7 pips and king Olaf had now thrown 13,*' for it gives us the
early Icelandic term for a point or pip on the dice, namely auga^ being the
ordinary word for ** eye.** GuObrandur Vigfusson cites it as occurring in
only one other place— in the life of St. Magnus in the Orkney inga Saga.
It may be that it is found in the story cited by us from that saga, but in
another MS than that used by the editors of the edition of 1780. This is of
er i ]^«As ftaS toU6 am v^rplakatt og tajl : * ]>at er dubU i Idgom virom, at mean tkolo elgl
kMU Torplom til Q4r sir ; enn ef kuU, ok Tartar Qdrbangagar^. Mean ikola og elgl tefla,
•vi at ^elr leggl tk tI9 ok enga t>i hlutl, er mannl I>lkklr betra at hafa, enn da at yera.*
Grdgdt, V. Klnaent Atg. MS. kap. : U. 169. Ot%Vb duff vlreirt I>annig vera eldra, enn fri
•iftara hint ^rettAadn aldar, og ef sto er, I>i er vitao elgl ort i ttft Grettit.** The eztracte
from the old laws here given vary onljr in orthographloal detalle from thoee elted in the
text. The dedaotlone of Dr. Jon >ork«lMou are of inlereet, namely, that aa the word dufl
!• net older than the latter half of the Zlllth oentary, the verse elted from the Grettle eaga
aa the prodoetloa of Ite hero, Grettlr, eould not have been written by that redoubtable
peraonage.
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STRAY NOTES 337
some historical importance because it helps to show that dice reached Ice-
land directly or indirectly from Germany, and not from Oreat Britain. The
ace bears the title common to all Europe, dss, as we have seen in our extracts,
the deuce is dauss (accusative, daus), written like the German term, but pro-
nounced very nearly like the old French '^ deus,'' from which comes the
English *' deuce/* Gu5brandur Vigfiisson, in his dictionary (p. 97), makes a
most remarkable blunder in regard to this word, rendering it into English
by ** dice,*' and clinches the blunder by giving the phrase, kasta daus, with
the translation, *^ to cast a die/* The error is the more astonishing since all
preceding lexicographers, like BJOrn Halldbrsson (1814), Konrdd Gislason
(1851), Sveinbjdrn Egilsson (1860), Eirikur Jdnsson (1863), Johan Fritzner (1867),
had given the correct definition. Both ace and deuce seem to be used figu-
ratively in a verse in the Sturlunga saga (Oxford edition, !., p. 277), ascribed
to a skald of the period, GuOmundur Galtason:
Old aegir npp At f%Ili ftas gann>vita mnni
(Fri^-fllit komft flotnnin fram) ok daaM i Hvammi ;
Ok mi af efoam slikani alls ekki rel falla
(M6r er am mart l»at ek heyri marg^nett) nema lok h»ttl.
We shall see later on that dis is said to be in use as a variant otdaus, but it
has not found its way into the lexicons; the same may be said ef tr^'a, here-
after cited as the equivalent of the English " trey; " kotra is given by Bjorn
Hallddrsson (1814) as the name for the four point, while Eirikur Jdnsson has
hootra or kotra; fimm is the usual numeral "five," and sex is "six." We
shall also learn that the throw deuce-ace is called ds og daus^ but sometimes
dsdis, and shall hear how the doublets are expressed.
The proverbs and sayings connected with dice are given by Olafur Da-
vi5sson as follows: Forsjdlum teflara er teningalukhunni a^ trita, "the
prudence of the player is to trust to the fortune of the dice." Hann lygur
d annan teninginuj en stelur d annan, " ho lies by one die, and robs by
the other," the signification being far from clear. Leika mdtiu, loki^ er
a^ kasta, " you must play, the dice are thrown. " Lett er a^ leika^ ef
teningurinn vill veU " it is easy to play when the dice are all right."
IJdcf^u lukkunni teninga, "Lend the dice to luck,*-' Stri^ic^ er teninga-
kast^ sem veltir lukkunni upp og ni9*ur^ " the battle is the throw of the
dice, which turns fortune up and down.*' Teningtir er vondur vamingur,
" the dice are a bad piece of goods.** imizt veltur upp d teningum^
"anything may turn up on the dice.** Then there are these expressions:
a^eiga eitthva^ undir ieningakastU '*to have something on the turn of the
dice;** nii kemur til minna {fiinna) kasta, "now it's my (thy) turn;*' taflitf>
og teningurinn er hjd honum, " he's got both the board and the dice," that
is, " he has it all his own way,** perhaps derived from backgammon. These
two couplets are likewise cited:
TeniDgminii talaa beitir
TrygS bann Utla atandiim reitlr,
"the die is called 'talus,* keeps only a brief faith*' — "talus" being
used as the Latin word for die (in which tongue it also means *' ankle");
perhaps some play on that word is intended.
Ef Ab6ti teniufpa A 8«r ber,
Oas mtkknm leyft At tefla er,
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CffBSS IN ICELAND
**• if the abbot oarries the dice with him, then we moniu} ape allowed to
play.** Finally, in the '< Ddnsk orOabdlL" of KonraS Gislason, to ^' throw
or oast dice** is explained as hasta verplum or hasia teningum^ but, as we
have said, the latter is the more asual; '^dice-box** is explained d^sverpla-
gtaup^ the latter element being the Scottish ^'stoup,** signifying *'cu|>,**
*' beafeer,** but as he thinks it necessary to explain the word carefully to
his Icelandic readers, it is probably not much employed; for *' dice-throw **
he has both verplakast and teningakast; ''dice-play** is, aocordiixg to him,
•verplakast, citing ^'Or&g^;** and ''dice-pip** is tenings-auga.
There is also in Iceland a pure dice-game, known as goehatafl, in which,
though sometimes a backgammon -board is used for convenience* sake in
playing, the players usually sit down at any kind of a table. According to
'some, each player has twenty men, although Dr. Konrad von Maurer gives
the number as thirty-two (" Germania,** 1869, xiv., p. 108), but evidently any
number previously agreed upon would answer. All cast the dice three times
to decide who shall be goihi (apparently equivalent to " banker ** in some
card games). This is a complicated process. In the course of it the dice
are cast six -times, and at each cast a line of the following verse is recited:
Heima nelb eg goto ninn,
S«U yel og leingi ;
Sg akal gefti ]>te sftrt smdr og reiogi
i g69a geingl
Og kasta eg nti tjtit ^ig.
Thereafter, the various players throw the dice in turn and according to the
throw receive from the gothi^ or pay him, a certain number of m^n (they
would be called "chips** in -some of the American card games). Each
player plays until he has lost all his men. A long description, not easily
understood, is given by Olafur Davi5sson (" Skemtanir,** 1888-92, pp. 317-18).
Some ^proverbs are connected with this game. Two are cited at the refe-
rence Just given.
In accordance with the custom we have pursued, we shall give a hasty
aummary of the account of Icelandic backgammon contained in the essay
on Icelandic games by 6lafur DavlDsson, relegating the original text to a
foot-note. '^ Our sketch will include the principal matters which are treated
*^ Helxta tenlngaUfl iileiudlnga «r kotra, HvergI er getiS um hTerntg hiin er lelkin,
•TO eg viti, og tikfri eg l»vi svo Dikvasmlega fri hennl tern eg get. ]>a& er heldar ekki
▼aii]>6rf, t>Tf kotra er mjdg 6tib 4 ftlandl, aft mfnata koitl >ar ■em eg ^ekkl tU, en allra
tafla ■kamtllogiut og Qtfrlegutt i raan og Teru. Utlend er. kotra a!b oppran* oIm og ekik-
tafli^ og fellet eg i l»a5 ten Sigar^r milari teglr: <*: Kotra nun Tora frakkneekur leikar,
•liie og t61an5fiiin i teningunum og elna nGfniii tnor eto mar og jan benda til. *' NafulS
•Jilft fellar eaman ▼!& eltt tSlunafnift i teningunam, eina og aeluna aegir, og er pvi tama
m&ll a« gegna meft l»aft. Samt heflr kotra t>egar Terld tefld i Inlandl i fornSld, elna og atet
& aSgunni lir Blakupaaflganum, og telar Sigurdar m&larl, aS menu hafi fyrat aannar aapiir
af kotrutafll i iaiandi & IS. «ld. Annara er Srajaldan getiS um kotrn i islenekam b6kam. i
dtg&fti einni af **Bdaiagnm** flri kftr um bll 1500 er Jieaa ^ getl« e% p%^ koati 8 ilnlr a8
kenna kvotm, og er ^aft alt tA 6 kr6num. J6n biakup Araaon og a&ra Hallgrimnr Pdturaaon
ite&ka lika kotra i taflviaum afaom. Bggert 6la(iMon nefnir lika kotra og h%ta, nokkri AtJend-
iQgar, aem hafa ritad am ialand nefnt nafuid eptir honamt en afbakad l>a9 }>6. JBggert
getar ^aa lika a» kotra aft opt tefld i Kj6sarayalu, og er ])a9 alt og aumt, aem eg hefl »h^
am tiSlelk hennar & iaiandi ; en nd litor aro -At aem ialendingar bafl kotra i iitlum metam,
eta ad minata koati er kotrutafl 6vifta til. T)l era g«mnl r45 «« rlnna i kotra, ekkl ai»ur en
akiktafli og er ^tU eltt: "Et^A Tilt viaua i kotra, tak liratoal^arta og her» Jia» ]»ar
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StRAY NOTSS
either in his text or in the notes attstched to it, and on certain topics we shall*
enlarge or sapplement his observations. But despite a desire to* be exact
and clear, we shall be obliged, we fear, to leave many things in obsoarity
and many questions unsettled— partly because of the imperfect sources of
information open to our writer, partly because of his want of any practical
knowledge of the games he is investigating. The author states that the chief
Mill ft61 skin el 4,^ mj! ■iftan ■aniur of nd um tenlagm. ** ABrar aWertlr til^ aA vlnna i
kotra farfr J6a Arnason til i <« >J6^5ffam ** kiuam. Koferamenn tOgftn : "Olafr, 6lafir,
Haraldr, Haraldr, Blrakr, Blr«kr." " ^nna formila ilU sit, aem vtuDa Tildl, a« akrlfa i biaft,
og anoafthvort hafa i t^r blaMS ofta lita t>a6 uadir kotruborMd, ofan i IsBrina i air, meftatt
hann tefldi, og l«sa >ar a9 aaki paternotter til h«I«an 6lail konAuffi.** Hltt rMl6| aem
J6n Arnason netair, er luelra i ittina til kreddurMs ]i6H, sem ]>6gar or fetift: **'TII ^eta
a« vlnna i kotra tkal taka miridtlutdngu og ^arka vift a^lu, mylja Mva taman vIS meaio^n
og 14ta i teningtaogaDi og «r t>i rii Tlnningar. " I iGmu &ttina mon Tera kotraTora aem
Pill Vidalia uefbfr og aoglr ad « elgl glldi liftstrair nd i lagunnm og oi hall itt at gllda a«
forna ni sidaa < J6atb6k * kom inn '* hvaS sera Adur heflr TeriS. l»ad likar avo dt aom i&ikl>>
baa aagat k kotruveranm, ^vi Arnl P6turaaoii, aem brendur or i all^iogl fyrlr galdar IMl,
kannaat ▼!% |ia5 fyrir aadldtilb, me5al annara, aft bann hafl roynt kotruTOra matt qOlkyngla-
brOgftam. Bagan, aom og bofi teri til dr " BlakupaaOguuam,^' a:^nlr alfr lueno hafa teflt kolm
un M til forna, on >6 k ** Kononga-Skuggaji *' eflauat okkl vift kotra, ^ar aem hdn Tamr
▼Ift tenlngakaati, boldur tonlngakaat nm th, tafllauat, enda varar bdn & einom ataA basM yit
tafli og "kaatl am tpmOgur." Slikt var kallaft a6 dufla og kaatlb ajilft du/l; ]»«ttl llla-vltt>
a« tkH vift )>aft, ofta vera dudarl, on da aoglr milahMturina : •< Drykkjuram flfcat rM, en dafl-
arum akki. " >a» era Hka til fdefulr milahnttir, aom elga boinlinU rtft kotra, og l^kkl
Hann or kdagar i iLotra og kortapUom.
Kotra og kaana
gJOra morgan ttt»kaft mama.
Laang or von i koiru.
Nd Till el npp noma daoelnn.
Imolr elga 1 honni kotrik
>k w aA l^aa kotratafll oina og >a5 er toflt nd, og aet og tyrat avo litlnn appdr&tt af taHbort-
ino* mMi min« til ak^rlngar [flg. S&]. Uppdrittar froaal a;fnir kotruborS opnaft til falla efta.
kotcatafl. ]>vi or tkipt i Jafnat6ra fletl. A flaUbrdniraar era negldir o&a limdlr llatar, flllum
moginn og mynda ]^oir umgord um flatina. Reitlrnlr era milaAir i flotina, oina og a^nt er
i myudinai, en okki era ]>eir eina lagaftir i aUum kotraborftum. Nd era Aetlrnlr telngdlr
aamaa m«S bjdaum i t^rorliatanum og mi 1»4 leggja 1»A aaman. PtA er iralt gjttrt ]^gar ekkl
er toflt, og er [>i kotraborftld elogu likara on lAgum og amfaagsmiklam amikaaaa. i boUiia
mllll liatanna og flaUnna era toninifar l»oir og tflflar geymdar, aom tafltS or lolkift mefi.
Standum era m5rg taflborft akeytt aaman. Opt or t. d. mAlaS akiktafl og mylnatafl, annaft i
botBlnn en hltt k lokift, & kotrutaflakaasaoum. Kotra or tofld moS 2 tenfngom og 80 tOflom,
krlngl6ttam. Teningarnir «srtt voujalogir toningar meft 6 fldtom og aagiam & kverjam flati, en.
aagnatalaa era aex lagsta tSluataflralr: 1, 2, 8, 4, 6, 6. TOflurnar era mlalltar, 15 t. d..
avartar, hvitar efta rauHr. Keltirnlr era 24, 12 bvoram meglnn i tafllna opno og 6 hvorom
meglna i bvora taflborM, oina og a/nt or i.myudlnni. Boltirnir era nittdriega 5Srariai litis
en dlacld (grimnarinn), t. d. avartir & gulu. >oir era ^mialega lagaftir, atandam kringldttir,
atondum aptnr blaftmyndaftlr eda }>riatreudlr, olns og i myndlnnl. Mllll reltara&aaniL er
aflangt bil optlr ondiKVnga taflUiu, SSruvial litt en reUlrnir. ^ar or tenloguiiom kaataS. i
taflbyrjan altor atnn taflmador hvoram meglnn vib taflift. Bg kalla ^i ▲ og B til hjegd
verka; hvor ^eirra heflr 16 tOflar tU umr&fta og allar oina lita*. A aetar allar ainar t5flar
upp i reit ^ann, aem er loingat til h»gri bandar honum, i l»flirrl taflborftabllft haaa, aom.an/:r
fti boaum og er hda atnndam kOlluA heimabor^, Bg hugaa m6r hann fyrir neftan nyndiaa,
ogbet hann aotja l»»r app i a. B for eIna a&. Hann aotur alnar tOflar app & 1. Svo knstar
hvor ainam teningi, hror i alnn borSi. Si aem ter fyr mi&ua kaat leikor f^rat. Kaat me&.
bi&aa toAfaiguaum aoglr til hver loikariun er, efta hvernig i ad loika tOflanam. AjignatalAi
ad» aem kemAr upp i teninganam, er kOUuft da, daua efta dUf irajOf kotra, jllinai efta aex optix
^▼i hrort 1, 2, 8, 4, 6 efta 6 koma app. B( aama augnatalan kemar upp i biftam tenlaganMn,
i aam«, kaati, era ^aA kfillad aoaio^ og heita ^aa Aaar alUr, trejor aUar o. a. frv., opt|^.
>Ti hror t«Mut •«• Bexia Oil era Uka kdllaft t6{fln, Bi tern fie^ aanLTdrp verftv aft }M]Uk
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340 CHESS IN ICELAND
Icelandic dice-game is bacJLgammon {kotra)* No detailed account of its
method of play has yet been published, so far as is known, in Icelandic, and
he therefore proposes to explain it as fully as may be. This is not by any
means a useless task, for backgammon has now become infrequent in Iceland,
at least in those parts known to the writer, while in many respects it is
the most amusing and liveliest of all table-games. The old sagas show that
i5lu l>eirrl tem upp kom fjdrum sluuttai, ef hana getar. J6u 6lafa«oa aeglr aA aamir kalli
'paS> elUftHf l»egar 6 kemar upp i 5drum tenlugnaiu «n 6 & hinom. Pannlg «r leikift ad ein
tafia e&a tvaar tSflar eru fer^ar uiu eiua uiarga ruitl og augaatala ad bundlr i, aam kemur
upp i hverju kaatl, og or talid fri reitnoni, aoin taflaa a(6d a. Kf A faer t. d. kotra
og daua vib fyrata kaalilb, ]>4 flytar liauu tvasr tfiflur, aftra til c eu blna ill «. Uaun getar
lika uiltiirlega flutt eina til y, on optaat er vani a& far a ut meS trser tOflur fyrat, ef ^eaa
er koalur, en ])a9 cr ivalt, nema l>egar t6lfin koma upp (i fyreta kaati). Pk ar ekkl mfignlegt
aA fflsra neraa eina tfiflu. fiumlr i«g)a aptur ad |}tfgar avo ber undlr, luegl fara i&i loalb 4 t^^flur,
og loika )>eim 5lluu 4 6. reit fra uppaetuingarreltuam. Paft fylglr aSgaoni, a5 mdtatO&u-
ma&urlnn megl drepa ]>er, tfta rl/a t>{er upp, eigi tann koat i ^\\f a&ur en hiun kefir
dralft lir twim. Petta kvad ))6 ekki vcrn iaienck rogla. Pogar A litfir kaatali og leikift,
leikur B. Rkkert er i m6tl ];ivi, aft taflma&ar leiki a reiti ]}i, a«in Lauu & tOfla fyrlr i| en
ekki mk hanu lita iv»r «>da flelrl t5flur atauda a reit ufta nita^ fyr en i yxta r«it i ]>elrri
taflhlldinnl aem au^r fra bonam. >6 er bouum t>&S l>vi aft eina beiuillt, a5 bann ad konilnn
med ft tfifiur lit af uppaetniugarreituum eda kouiiuu lit m«% 5 tdflur. A mi l)vi reita eda
koma air upp reit k I, Aptur cr honum beimilt ad relta bvar aem bann Till binnm meginu
i taflinu, med aama akilmila og gutid heflr verld um. TSfiurnar ginga nefuilega fr& A*a
biid yfir i B'a blid, fri M og avo Afram ad 18. Gangavid t>eirra er t>vi fri a til 18 og fri 1
til I, B'a tOfiar. Hvorugur mi l«lka i ))ann reit, aem niotstddumadar hana i reit i, uemn
bonum ad 6n*6gulegt ad komaat yfir reitardd baaa. Pi mi bauu ri/a upp fyrir bonam, drepa
reiudar t5flur, )>ar som bann getur. Ei B i t. d. reitl i 1, I, k, j, i, og A, }>i getar A ekkl
komiat yfir, ekkl einu alunl l>6tt bann fil 6 upp i teniugunum, mi bann ^i rifa upp, eptir
l»vi aem kaat hana aeglr til. Pad l>arf })vi ad gjalda Tarbaga vid, ad relU i 6 reiti^ btrern
▼Id annan. Pegar m6tat5dumadurinn i aptur ad eiua tOflu i reit, ]>i mi A fcra tina'tSflu
i ^ann reit og drtpa hinai ef avo vill verkaat. Verdnr B ad ktma benni aptur <nn i holma-
bord altt, en J>i er uppaetniugarreiturinu talinn med. Bf bann fier t. d. kotru og aex,
«ptir ad tvser tSflur hafa verid drepnar fyrir bonum, I>i verdur bann ad koma l>eim inn i
4 og 6. Anuara er bann leiklaua, ]>iugad til banu befir komld poim luu. Bu |)eaa er opt
langt ad bida, ])vi ekkl mi baun aetja daudar tCflar inn i J>i reitl, aem banu i tSfiar fyrir
i eda m6(aiOdumadur bana reitl, nema bann eigl fleiri tdfiur daudar eu reitir l>e{r eru, aeai
bann getur komiat inn i. Pi mi bauu rifa upp reitl mottefiarana, eptir l>vi aem kSat bana
aegja ill. Bf avo atendur i tSfluikipau annarabvora, ad bann getur ekkl leikid eptir kaati
t>vi, aem bann befir foiugid, t>i er bann loiklaua i l>ad akiptl. 8vona geiugur taflld med
dripum og tOfam. Pad or mikid eda meat komid undir )>vi ad te^a bvor fyrir fldrura, en g<Sd
rid eru til ]>eaa ad eiga marga reiti i boidl hiua, avo bonum velti ervidara ad komaat Inn, ef
drepid er fyrir bonum. P6 verdur opt ad bafa bemil i dripinu, avo ad m6tteflariun geti ekkl
rlfld upp. Pad l>ykir lika farasBlt i kotru, ad ni kvtrkatakinu, eda ni ysta ruit i heimabordi
mdiatddamaunaioa og reit lieim aem er nteatur vid banu. Kf A i reit i 6 og 7, ]>i heflr bann
kverkatakid. Lokalnt er )>ad anjallraadi ad koma air upp reitardd, yst i j^elrri tafibordsbUd
ainnl, aem ad maunl an;fr, eda uUekiarbordinu, med Odrum ordum, ])vi l>i er vanaftd ad m6t-
teflarinn komiat yfir nema cndur og elu4, en ekkl mega reitirnlr vera 6, t>vi ]>i er m6at0da-
manninam 6m5guiegt ad komaat yflr, og mi I>vi rifa upp. Med ^eaau motl era moat liklndi til
ad geta gjdrt m6tat0damann sinn jan, «da janjd hann, og er t>ad meatur vlnningair I kotra,
en t>i er annar jarif liegar banu i iieiri tdflur daudar en bonum er mOgulegt ad koma Inn.
Vid jaw endar taflid, eina og edlllegt er, og eina vid utUki, aem er venjulejsaail viuuingnrinn.
J6n 6la(aaon talar um jatutork i forkieringi og kotru, og er t>ad eflauat aama aem /on, en
ekki getar bann um, bvernlg ordiuu befir verid komld fyrir, hvort aagi heflr verld " ad Terda
Janatork" eda bvad? Annara akil eg ekki J6n b6r, og ekki )>eir aem ''eg befi borld undir
Uauaa hana. Hann er fyrat eittbvad ad tala um ad janttork i6 kallad, l>egar annarbvor
komiat ekki i hornid, eu binn komiat At. Pegar allar tOflur manna ero komnar 1 littektar-
bordld, t. d. A*t iOAur i reiUna 7-18, t>i mi fara ad taka iU, en lika mi leika, ef vill,
medan l»08a er koatur. tjttektin er folgin i t>vi, ad taka tdflur ainar fit fir bordinu, og era
|»»r, aem fit era tekuar, fir aOgannl. Gott er ad fi aamvOrp vid fittekt, }>vi )»i mi taka 4
tOflar fit. Pegar tekid er fit, er lalid eiaa og ^gar tOflam er komld inn. Bf A i reiti i 9,
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STRAY NOTES 341
people formerly took much pleasure in backgammon, and there is a singular
narrative connected with it in the sagas of the Icelandic bishops C*Biskupa-
sfigur," ii. 1878, pp. 176-7). It is there said: *'It happened in the western
fjords that two men sat at the baclcgammon board, which is of common use
in those districts — although it is not a praiseworthy custom — and were
wagering several of the objects which they possessed ; in the end it began
10, II, 18 og far fimm og trejo, }>& ver^ur haun aS taka flmmf^ At af 9, en sjilfriftur er
hann, hvort hann leikur trejanoi til 19 eSa tekar hana lit tir 10. Yflr hOfali aft tala, er ci,
tern fnr hierrl kSit en hann getar leiklS, meftan tteudttr k littekt, tkyldur aft Uka aptan
af reitarflft slnni, og rerftnr ])aft opt til >eM aft m6ttt({ftumaftar ham getar droplft fyrlr honam.
Pegar svo ber undir, vorftar »k lem k tSflana aft setja hana inn i helmahorft aitt, olns og
aftrar dauftar tflflur, og m4 ckkl halda 4fram meft iitt«ktlna, fjr en hann heflr komift henni
aptur i Attektarborft iltt. Jan og littekt ora aftalvinnfngarnir i kotru, en ank ^9»b eru til
aukavlnningar og era t>«ir 4 : meislarif ttuiti mukury langi mukiir og Umgihryggur, Moittarl
er fdlginn i ])Ti, aft geta sett allar tOflur upp i hlunm yxta reit, tem t>»r geU verlft 4. Rf
allar Ittflnr A*a atanda 4 IS, )>4 hear hann feinglft melslara. Kf hann hefir ainar 5 t5Bav 4
hverjom reitanna 10, 11 og 18, ]>4 hefir hann feinglft atntta inAk. Rt hann heflr komift ainam
l»rem tOflom 4 hvern reitinn 8, 9, 10, 11 og IS, |>4 hefir hann feinglft Unga miik. Lang!
liTjgguT em 6 [tie] tSflar 4 hvcrjum reitanna 7, 8, 9, 10 og II. Hann ketonr varia fyrlr,
Doma ro6tatOftataafturinn eigfr relt 4 12 ; leitaat maftor t>vi vlft eptir megnl, aft n4 l)e8aani relt
fr4 honam og apila t>4 heldur upp 4 miik. Betra er en ckk) aft f4 mukana hdlfa^ on l>aft er ef
maftor getar komift 511um tofiunum i 4kveftift horf, meft aouarl angnatolunjl, aem kemur
opp. B apllar t. d. upp 4 atutta miik og hefir 6 tafiur 4 18, 6 4 11, 4 4 10 og 1 4 7. Nd
kaatar hann og fnr t. d. e«z og treju. Hann leikur aft elns trejanni og fior h4lf«n miik.
Bttmir lelja lUla meUtara meft miikuai. ^aft er litU melatari l>egar 8 tdflar eru 4 ysta reit-
num, aem toiliXrnar geta komlst 4, on 7 4 )>elni nteata. Aptur era l>elr fleetir aem ekkl taka
)>enna lltla meiatara glldan. Paft eyknr hvern Tinning, ef mdttefiandlnn 4 daufta tOflu, ]>ecar
vlnniugurinn feat; er 1>4 kallaft aft m6tteflarlnn rerfti mar 4 littekt, miikum o. a. frtp. >egar
A hefir tekift aliar tSflur ainar &t, en B er ekkl farlnn aft taka lit, ]>4 m4 B hafa 6, 7 og IS
eptirkottf eptlr ]>vi hvort hann letlar a6r aft reyna til aft f4 langa miik, atutta miik efta
meiatara, og era tielr g6ftir og glldir of hann fser I>4 meft ]ivi mdti. Binataka menu leyfa ]>6
eingia eptlrkfiit, og eru miikar roJSg ajaldgaeflr meft l>ri m6tl. Mikln er fr«gra aft f4 auka-
vinningHna en littckt. Melatari er frematur 4 blaftl. Pk atnttl miikur. I>4 langi miikur. I>4
langi hryggur liegatur i lopti. Eg heft vltaft vlnnlnglnn tallnn i tSlum 4 l»enna h4tt. Rlnfoid
littekt 9, langi hryggur 3, langi mdkur 6, atuttl miikur 7, meiauri IS, jan 16. Fyrir tnar
bataat 8 vlft hvorn vlnnlng aem er. Fyrlr mar 4 atutta miik eru t. d. 9. Fyrir h4lfa mdka
er helmingurinn af |)v{, aem or fyrlr miikinn. >egar annar hefir tekift allar aiuar toflar lit
og dta^ft er um aft binn f4l ro4k, er taflfnu lokift. Sumir leyfa l»eim, aem aelnna 14k i taflbyr-
jnn, aft lelka oiuu kaatl, eptir aft hlnn heflr tekift lit, og I4ta vera Jafntefli, ef ^4 verftar
jafut. ^aai regia kemur einkum til greina Tift littekt, })Ti opt 4 aunar aft eiua eptir 8 efta
4 tSflur, l>egar hlun er komtun lit. Kegia )>eaal kemur vol helm vlft l>aft, aft leyfa elngin
eptirk6«t. Ef flelrl kotrnr en ein eru tefidar hver optlr aftra, h4 4 14 aft kaata fyrat naaati
aem unnlft hefi^ dttekt efta janad binn. MAkar koroa 1)4 ekkl til greina.
J6n 6lafa8on getar um kotro, en alt aem hann aegir am hana er 4 rlngulrelft, avo litift
er 4 l>Ti aft graefta. Fyrat getur hann am kotungatafi og aeglr aft ]iaft a4 aama aem kotra ;
dragl hda nafa af ]>vi, aft h4a a4 lelkln meft 4 riddurum, efta af l>vi hda a4 feratrend. Ann-
arataftar aeglr J6a, aft 1 kotnogatafli atandi 4 rlddarar m6ti Ollam ** peftjuuum.*' M4 fara
eingar aOgur af l>vi aft kotra hafi verlft lefkin meft riddarum efta peftam og leikur m4r f^i
grunur 4, aft hdr 84 eitthvaft bogift. i annan ataft nefnir J4n kfunnkotru aem aumlr kalll
kotra. Hann lyalr henni ekki. i lirlftja lag! nefnir J6n alkotru. Eg hefi ekkl heyrt getlft
am neitt af ^eaanm ndfnam annaraataftar en h4r og get ekkert am )>aa aagt. Lokalna aegir
J6n 6lafa«on aft aumlr kalll kotra eingelakt Hektack og Jafovel /orkaring, Nokkru aelnna
aeglr J6n aft kotrulSfl a4a: 1. aS elta ttelpUTf 8. o/ati/elUngartaJl, 9, /orkaringur, A. go6a-
tafij 6. dlafa k6ng§ tafi, Peaaa akiptingu get eg alia ekki falliit 4, l>vi kotra, elna og hdn
er tefld nd, og hefir aft All am llkindnm verlft tefid 1>4, er alveg dlik t. d, goftatafll. Eg mlan*
let l>vi 4 l>eaai t«fi dt af fyrlr aig og l»t I>aa ekkl vera kotrutegundlr.
]>aft er ])6 eitt af t5flum ^eim, aem J6n Olafaaun viaar til antla undir kotra, aem 4 ]>ar
heima aft r4ttu lagl, on l>aft w piprj&Uinn, l>vi hann er ekkl annaft en breytt kotra. Man-
urlan kemar fram vlft aamvOrpin. I>egar tdlfln koma upp i kotro, er oezi lelklft fJ6mm
slDBom, en i pipij4l er aezunom leikift fyrat, avo flmmunam, evo kotranam, avo trejanam,
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^ CHESS Iff ICELA ND
to go TOry badty for one of the combatants, since the dice absolutely renised
to fayor him; but that is the wicked nature of this game that the more one
stakes and loses, the more difficult it becomes to get away from the bosrd.
So the games went o» until there was suddenly no more oil (in their lasup).
There seemed to be nothing to do except to abandon play, tor this all took
plaee on a dark night, but this did net content the losing player, who ex-
claimed in a low voice: * If the good St. GuCmund will that I win back that
which 1 have lost, then I will occupy myself much less with this useless
folly hereafter than heretofore.* Then he said to his opponent: *My friend,
we will play on/ The other replies : * How can we, since we have nothing
to furnish us light! ' *Lack of that shall not hinder us,' he responded;
thereupon he rises from the table, takes a vessel, goes to the holy well of
•TO ddMiHiam Of Mlaut &«unoin. ^egar iiaruir kom* aptar opp, or >eiiB lolkift fjrrit, avo
daBMiNiiii, wfo troJoBum, tro kotnMum, ito fimmiuiiua, tvo Msaaam. ttgmr kotrur, trcjjar
o^a dauoar koma npp, or >ein» lolki^ nidar i ▼!&, oo iaunum aeioMt, oo t>ogar flmmla koma
*>PP» ^ ^f ]»eim lefkiS npp k ▼id, e9a a5 «iiD« flmmuDaiu og seziinnni. I»etta or allor mauur-
iDa. Piprjill var lika kallaftur koprjdll, og or ^ aatekllld hvornig '"^kopar i alia" t
koni» Ids i toflvisa a^ra Hallgrima r^turuonar. 66ra Joa tngvaldMon tpill I4u aft pipiia
(''leika, daaaa ofta apila") Tora sawa aom pifrjUa of oiga akylt y\^ piprjil.
O/an/eUimg ofta ofoH/tUinfartafi, TaA t>otU er Mki» i kotruborM og lolka Uoir. Hvor
fft\T oif BOtar tv»r tdflur & kveru relt i Ufllyorftahlid t>oirrl, aom aa^r fri boaom, til hsfrL
haadar. Annar hcflr avortn iOllaraar, <»a hiau hTitu toflamar. I»v{ naat or kaauft am hvoc
olfl al kyr^a. S4, aom fer flolrl aagu i elaa kaall, kaaUr toniofonom of fsrir ofrl Iflfluraar
i roitMiom Bl^ur Tift bllftloa i aoftrl tSfloBBt, optir >vi bvor koat haaa f»r. Bf kaan ter t. d.
•OB Of daw, ^ ftertr haaa aiftor tdfloraav i mx og daua antimam. Bf hana ter iaa.v6rpk >4
fotur haaa okkl fluU aoma elaa toAa Biftor, ea boftr v4tt til aft kaata aptur, of ^ ^6 baaB
fk\ morf tamTdrp, ktpor epilr Saoar. HIbb kaotar Btk og for alt i affma loift, og »vo koli
af koUI. Rf koat ^( kemar upp, aom avarar til roltanaa, aom bdid or {tX\ teta ofrl tMoaa
ofaa afy ^& ▼orftur I>ab kaat ia^tt. >ogar aaaarbvor oda bMlr bafa Cert allar toAuraar ofaa,
fljtja >oir I>nr opp i uoM tOflunat aptur, ^ar aom >«er Toru fyratf opUr )»vi aom kSatla
acgja til. ]>egar altar iHAaraar ora komoar app optur, or twrxb aX> taka >ier ill, og f«r >oB
fram alveg olaa og i kotru. Si vlUBur aom or fyrrt ad taka allar toflor aioar 4t. J6b
6lafaaoa dropar aft oiua & ofaa fall ingartafl on l^sir I>vi okki. Sigorftur uilarl dropar lika
& ]»aft. Hallgrimar P^ioraaoo aofatr >aft. ^ Thia, aa tb« raador will at oaeo aadMVaUBd, aor*
roapoBda to tba •* dobiot ** of Kiog Alfoaao, tbo BagUab tparioty kaowa aa <' doablota," aad
tho Froaeta " damoo rabattaoa," whicb laat baa a namo agrooiaf la algaiaoaMo witb tbak of
tbo Icelaodio Torloty (aoo pp. 18ft aad 9f»-a00).
Ad elta 9ielfu. Tafl >oftU or lika lolkld i kotrabordl. Tvotr to^ Anaar boAr til
amrUa 6 bvitar tSflur ea Ubo 6 arartar, og er ]>oim akipab olaa og i odaDfolUagarlaflir
BOaa bto atoadnr aft aiaa elo k bvarjam relt. Hdr or lika kaataft urn >aft hver olgl aft byrja,
og or l»aft a&, aem far barri augnatdia i olaa kaall. Haao kaatar Bil. Bf haaa ter app
aax, I>& fl/tur bano ivnr ysta tSBurnar fram fyrlr binar til vlaatri, og olaa of baaa fsr
aamYorp, Boma t6lflo, ]>Ti >ofm fylgir rittar til aft flytja Q^rar. Auk ^oaa Bii baaa koala
aplar opUr ftU aamvorp. Bf baaa tor 4a, ^i lofkor baaa olaul. Bin kftatia era otl 6o^t.
^▼i Dieat kaotar blaa, og for alt & aomo loift, og avo koll af kolll. ^gar fromata tafla aaa*
arahTora er korola il^t & oadano i taflbelmlogaaro, ]>4 flytnr haaa optoata toflii(r) aioa(r)
yftr ]>Tort u/lborSift, A aaala roll i bioam laflbelminguamf eptir ]>▼! aom koatla aogja UL
Bf toflor aanarahTora atanda U d. i roltuaam g-i i vinatra kotro-laflborfttau (aji myadlna) og
baaa f»r aez og Aa, ]»4 flytur baaa tSAaraar af g, A og { i S» 8 og S o. a. frr. Bvooa oltir
bTor BBBaa. Pegar tSflnr anaara atanda A roltum li«tm, aom Uaa )>arf aft flytja iSflur aiaar
4, ]»4 dropar baaa ]^r. Bf tSflar aaaara ataada t. d. i 1-^, ea toflor bioo i 7-1 1 og a4
fyrri fsar t6lfin, ]>4 Hytor baoa toflaraar af 1-i 4 7-10, oa tekar toflor miutoftuuaanaloa 4
burl, og ora ]>Br Ar adgaoal. ^gar aanarbTor 4 aft elaa olaa ioAu optir, broytir h4o um
gaag aiao. HAo geiagar aft oiaa i boraia og er kolluft ^raaalDaZIa. Bf boraaakolla ttoador
I. d. 4 4, og s4 aam boflr r4ft yllr boaat faar aoz og 4a, ^4 leikar baaa hoani 4 8, 7 og 19.
I>aft aogir alg aj4lft, \ft borBaakollaa dropor aft olaa tKflar ]»mr, aom ataada 1 boraaaam.
Bkkl m4 holdar dropa haaa of bAn aUadur 4 miUi toflaa l>olrra, aom aitatoftoBiBftariBa
at/rir. Bf aaaar haflr U d. tSflar 4 6, 6 og T, oa kla& horaaakoUa 4 1, of ti aolaiil tor 4^ ^
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STRAY nOTBB MS
St. Oofimand, ftnd brings the vessel back full of water, whi<4i tie pours into
the lamp. Then they resume tlMi<r places at the table, and the water burns
like the brightest sperm- oil. All present praised God and the blessed bishop
OuOmund, but he who had brought the water gained several games aii4
thereafter oeased to play baekgammon (ktdtruna)^ thanking God who had
given to him to win back that which he had lost in his thoughtlessness."
This account is found in the particular saga of GuOmundur Arason, bishop
of H61ar, written by the abbot Arngrlmur. The same incident Is told more
concisely in the earlier volume of the admirable collection of the sagas of
the Icelandic bishops (1858, p. 596) : «' An event took place at Hvammur in
BreiOaQdrbur, when I^6r5ur Sturluson dwelt there, which was that some men
were playing backgammon {kvotru) at night, and one of them was called
leikar bann hennl 4 6, og drepur ioflu pi sem stdft l»ar urn lel9. Rf hlua for nili lika if,
^ TerSar haun alb lelka toflunni af 5 i 8 o. ■. fr7. Aptar er hornAkellan r^ttdraap, t>egar
hun atendur fyrir framau toflur mdUiSdumanntlDs. 6ein«it getar fasM avo, aft biUr ^afl
mlat allar toflur siaar nema hornattkellurnar, og ver&ur >i opt laognr eUingaleikur mfib
i)elni, ]>aDga% til obnur getur drepil^ hina. SVt l>ai5 endar taflilb. J6n 6lafiisoii nefnir ad ^Ua
»t0lpury og er }?%t> alt og snmt tern eg hefl 8^5 urn tafl t>QUaj ueina bornaikella er nefnd 1
** Norftanfara '* (xlii, 49). tns er getlS i " Aunaler for uordltk Oldkyadigfa^d ** (1838-9,
pp. 1&S-4) a« visa tafla i ▼taau ialenzk<i tenlngatafli s^ koUaft homatkcej^ja. Kg t>ekkt ekkl
nafnid, en I>yklr liklegait a% b&r a^ ilt yi& boroaakellu. Hallgrimur P&tnraaon mlnniafc i
tafl >etu i tadvitu ainnl. Till BJarnarion aegir m^r, aft IfM sem bann pekkl til, ad teflt am
einbTerJa nafngrelnda atiilku, og aitji ai uppl meft faana, a«m get! drepift allar toflur bine.
Af iMsaa er oafnlft eflaust dregift.
Ddnumaniut<nfi efta ddndimanntt€^fl, J6q Olafaaon seglr aft tafl ]>etU dragi nafh af ])▼{,
bvaft ^a!b sd teflt alvarlega. itaft ad teflt meft preuur tenlngum, og ad fitiftara en bin toflin,
' aem bann getur um. l>egar aezin oil komi upp ad toflnnnm leiktft um 18 alonam 6 raiti.
I>egar ia, daua og treja komi upp, ad t)aft kallad Acelungi; daua, treja og kutra, /jdtamadur;
treja, kotra og flmm, UIH ddnumadury cu kotra, fimm og aex, stdri ddnumadur. Sto litlft
talar J6n meira am tafl petU, en |>aft er bvorttveggja, aft irkkert or i pvi aft grafta am
ganginu i uflina, og er avo t»aft mjog utfreloilegt. Bg ileppl l)vi pesa vegna. Plunur blakup
Jdnaaon drepur i dinumaunatafl i oiftabokarbroti ainu en ekkart aft niarJii. Dinumaftur ar
nefudar i taflvUu Hallgrima Pdturasonar og ^flir eflauat aama bi og daaumannatafl. Lokaina
mi geta tieaa aft orai«$kift : " Nu kaatar itjin yflr '* (J6n Oiafcaon, Guftmundur Jdaaaou) er
dregtft af tafll peaaa.
Forkaringur, J6n OlatMon nefnlr forkaaring, en l;^alr bounm ekki aft markl. Hann
•egir aft ^aft ad alivandaaamt Ufl og lojog titt. Nafulft ad dregift af damika arftlnu *' Fotkjn-
ring," af pvi toflunum er leikiS ofugi. TafliO kvaft aamt vera ialenxkt, p6tt nafpift ^d nokkuft
donakulegt, og Bggort Olafsaon tekur >aft beiuliole fram, aft forkeriugur bekkiat ekki i
-dtltfndum. Um janttork i forkseriugi er iftur getlft. I ** Sigurbroaabugvekjum ** adra J6na
Jonaeonar, H6lum 11i)7, Ktondiir l>eUa i M. bid.: <«Gaft tebler lljka Mm forklnrlng vlft
Manenn i bo««um llelme; bvi lijk^ sem y^r er ymlat upp aa Teniugnum, ao elldlr j»ar og
yiuau" etc. Ma^nua Stepheuaen akopaat aft ]>ea8u i " MiunityerSum TiQIndum " (i., bla. 835),
og aegir aft iiklegt ad, I>egar avo djafnlr tefll aaman, aft mafturinn verfti mar i linga mi&k.
>fipllr b*i baflr laugi miikur itt sdr ataft 1 forkaarlng. Lokiiina aogir BJ6rn HAlId<Srsaon aft
85gnm ad fortaka, ^fli ''at tra'kku Brikkerne til den yJerste Unje i dot £pU Jf'orkiaring. "
l^etta er alt aeiu eg befi fundift uiu tafl l)etta, ^\i nil veit «g ekki betj^r, en b<^ sd t^nt.
Sdra Hallgrimur Pdtaraaon nefnir b»ft off BJarni akild I>6rftara800 nefair ];)aft lika i viaunni :
Myrkra eykur mila biog,
Menn l»egar ordum aniia;
FJandinn leikur forksBrlng
Fyrir ^k aam IJiiga.
Lokrina mi geta l»eaa aft BjOrn Halld6ra8on ^fllr knltaft <« bretapll," ** tmrningaepil,** en
mdr ar 41j6at, bvort bann kalUr Oil teningatOfl kndtafl, efta b»^ •' aft eins eitt ]ieirra. —
<^Forki9rlng '* iff, of eoncae, tbe Qerman ^'Terkebran," tbe Danlab <*varkebr" ("fqrj^
* ring") — the word, at laaat, oooiing from Denmark.
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344 CHBSS IN ICELAND
Hermundur, who was the principal person among them. Now it chanced
that the oil gave out and they grumbled much about it, and bade the women
to bring them more, but these refused to do it. Then said Hermundur: 'Let
us take water from bishop Gu5mund*8 well and try that.* This was done.
Now the water burned like the best oil and they piayed so long as they
wished." This briefer account is from the earlier saga of the bishop, which
was the work of an anonymous author about 1320. The later saga, by the
abbot Arngrimur, was originally composed in Latin, but was afterwards
translated into Icelandic, and dates from the middle of the XlVth century.
Arngrlmur was abbot of the convent of I*ingeyri from 1350 to 1360. He
wrote the eulogistic poem from which we quote below, when he was a simple
friar, which would be, of course, somewhat earlier. The miraculous game
of backgammon is likewise referred to in this laudatory poem (drdpa), which
the fi'iar composed on the same holy bishop of H61ar in 1345, which thus
becomes a sure date in the history of the game in Iceland. The lines in
which the consecrated well, the burning of the water and the playing at
kotra {kvdtra) are alluded to, are likewise published in the '^BiskupasOgur''
(ii. p. 199) :
Vsttn I)eir, er ^nrfti I>6tta8t,
• I>QnDnii faDjdsk i vSgftani bmnni,
Pvi t6k8t peiin i eina eiki,
EIris grand, A kalda landl;
Yatnit brann, avd at skildist akotuani,
Skyrligt verk meS krapti dyrnm,
TirAirll gaf ^xl ttiogla Bt^rir
Til t>eHS afl. Iij& kT&tra tafli.
Like chess, backgammon Is of foreign origin and the author agrees with
the declaration of Sigur9ur 6uI5mundsson, keeper of the Archaeological Mu-
seum at Reykjavik: "Backgammon must be a French game as is indicated
by the names applied to the points of the dice and by the words mor or mar
and Jan,^' The name of the game itself, as we shall see hereafter, is identical
with one of the dice-numbers, which is additional evidence of the origin of
this amusement. Backgammon has been played in Iceland from very early
times, as may be seen from the story in the *' Bishops' sagas.'* SigurQur
Gu9mundsson, the archaeologist, asserts that we have the first trustworthy
knowledge of backgammon in Iceland in the Xllth century. In the '' Sturl-
ungasaga," according to our author, we find in a passage the word kotra
(old edition, 1817-20, iii., chap. 26), and again with an older orthography,
hvotra, in the same work (v., chap. 38); and there is also another reference
to the ace and deuce on the dice (v., chap. 31). The two mentions of the
game in the ^* Biskupasogur " write the name kvotra (i. p. 596) and kvdtra
(ii., pp. 176-7). In the *^ KonrdOssaga keisarasonar '* (published in the
"Fornsdgur su9urlanda," Lund 1884, p. 83) is an allusion to qtmira: and
in the ** Karlamagniis saga " occurs the word kvdirutafl (pp. 470, 486). But
in none of these places is there any light thrown upon the method of play.
We shall, however, cite the passages in question with sufiicient fullness.
Of the *^ Karlamagnus saga,'' being a romantic history of Charlemagne,
there are two MSS, the first (designated as the A manuscript) from the third
quarter of the Xlllth century, and the second {B) from the beginning of
the XlVth. It is supposed to have been originally written about 1250. The
older MS was edited by the Norwegian scholar Unger at Christiania 1860,
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STRAY NOTES 34S
and from this edition (p. 470) we take these lines: ** Now king KarisoMgnAs
set out, and did not break his Jouraey until he oame to MiklagarVur [Con-
stantinople]. Half a mile from the city there was a garden of the king **
[that is, of the Byzantine emperor] *' with every kind of green thing in it.
There the king found twenty thousand knights, clad in velvet, ermine and
marten skin; some were playing at chess, some at backgammon {sumir at
kvdtrtuafli); some were carrying goshawlLs and some had domesticated
hawks sitting on their hands/' The three italicized words are omitted in
the B-manuscript, which, perhaps, may indicate that the copyist did not know
the game. The other passage in the saga is here quoted from the same edi-
tion (p. 486): ^*The same day in which king Marsill's ambassadors came to
meet Karlamagnt^s, he was sitting in a garden amusing himself, and his
friends with him.... There were fifteen thousand Franks, all of whom sat
under costly woven tents to keep themselves cool, and played at chess, but
some at backgammon {at kvdirutafU), both young and old; and every other
piece was of gold and every other of pure silver; and so were the squares
[points] on the boards, every other one was gilt and every other inlaid
with white silver.*' Those were indeed gorgeous days.
The next citation is from the story of Konrad, son of the emperor
0*Konr&Ossaga keisarasonar ''), a tale of chivalry published In the well-
known collection of romantic sagas, ^'Fornsdgur SuQurlanda,'* edited by
Gustaf Cederschi($ld, formerly of the Swedish University of Lund, but now
of Qothenburg. We translate it in full as follows (Lund 1884, p. 88):
'< At this entertainment Konrad and Matilda were crowned and led to
their bed. The wedding feast lasted for half a month; there were provided
everywhere amusements; some played at chess or hnettafl or backgammon
(qvdtru) ; and arrangements were made in ail directions for the Joy and di-
version of the people. The throngs were as great as at the greatest assem-
blies itingum); and every man could amuse himself as it seemed to him
best.'* Dr. CederschiOld, in his introduction, states that the '' KonrAOs saga **
was certainly written before the year 1300.
In regard to the Sturlunga, the greatest work relating to the history of
Iceland, matters are not so satisfactory. The first passage cited by Olafur
Davidson is from the portion known as the ^^OuOmundar saga d^ra ** (chap. 26),
written in 1270-1280 and relating to an incident which took place in 1196.
Two of the characters, Kolbeinn and OuOmundur are said to have quarrelled
'* about chess and backgammon ** (tafi ok kotro)^ but the second (Oxford)
edition of this work substitutes the older and probably more correct read«
ing, to/f ok konur (*' chess and women **), although it must not be forgotten
t|iat tafl in early days was used for '* table-game," that is either for chess,
hnefatafl or backgammon (tables). The other citation of kotra {kvotra) from
the Sturlunga made by our author is a wrong reference, since no mention
of the game is to be found in chapter 38. The third excerpt from the Sturl-
unga (chap. 81), relating to dice, is from the " islendingasaga ** (Oxford edi-
tion, I, p. 328). There is no allusion to a game proper, but only to the
casting of dice, two characters agreeing to decide a question in that way
>— the text of which passage we have already reproduced. In an edition of
the *^ Btialttg," of about 1500, it is said that the cost of learning backgammon
was eight ells of cloth, which would be about five crowns of our (Danish)
money. Bishop J6n Arason and the poet, Hallgrlmur PMursson, both men-'
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346 CHESS IN ICELAND
tion backgammon in their lyrics relating to games. Eggert 01af)98on (** Raise
igjennem Island/* p. 50) liJcewise speaks of kotra^ and some foreign writers
who have treated of Iceland have copied what he says, but have corrupted
the name of the game. Eggert Olafoson asserts that backgammon is often
played in the EJ6sars^8la. In a singular work entitled Gandrei^ (*^ Witches*
ride **), preserved in manuscript among the archives of the Icelandic Literary
Society (now in the National Library at Reykjavik), the author of which
is J6n DaOason, rector at Arnarbaeli, South-Iceland, (d. 1676), we are told
(chap. 47) that Attalus Asiaticus (see Y. d. Linde*s '' Geschichte,** I, pp. 10-12
^the name of this inventor comes from the ^* Roman de la Rose"), was the
first man **• in Europe to play kotra and dice, and likewise, as some say
riddaraskdk ('knights* chess*)**, soon after the battle of Troy. This is all
that the author of the *' Skemtanir ** has discovered in regard to the former
popularity of the amusement in his country; he thinks that at the present
time his countrymen hold backgammon in less esteem, and that it is played
in very few districts. We ought perhaps to remark, in reference to the
word mar or mor, cited in a preceding page as going to show that Icelandic
backgammon is a French game, that no such term is to be found in con-
nection with any variety of French backgammon.
There still exist In Icelandic old magical formulas to enable one to win
at backgammon, Just as there are others applicable to chess. One of them
runs thus: *Mf thou wishest to win at backgammon, take a raven*8 heart,
dry it in a spot on which the sun does not shine, crush it, then rub it on
the dice.** A similar fantastic counsel is that reported by J6n JLmason, the
folk-lorist: ** In order to win at kotra, take a tongue of a wagtail (the bird,
rnotacUla alba), and dry it in the sun; crush and mix it afterwards with
communion-wine, and apply it to the points of the dice, then you are sure
of the game.** The first of these formulas is found in a manuscript preserved
in the archives of the Icelandic Literary Society. Another method of coming
off conqueror at backgammon is mentioned by J6n imason, as follows:
'' The backgammon players (koirumenn) should cry * Olave, Olave, Harold,
Harold, Erik, Erik. * The one wishing to win must write this formula with
Runic letters and either bear it somewhere about him, or let it lie under
the backgammon board, on his knees, while he is playing; besides that he
must say* the Lord*8 prayer in honor of St. Olave, the king.** In his *' In-
terpretations of ancient terms in the code of law called J6nsb6k ** ('' Sk^r-
ingar yfir fomyr«i I0gb6kar,** Reykjavik 1854, pp. 179-80) PiU YidaUn speaks
of magical backgammon verses (kotruvers) ; and these must have been not
uncommon at certain periods, for JLrni P^tursson, who was burned in the pres-
ence of the Althing 1681 for witchcraft, confessed, before his death, among
other things,' that he had made use of kotruvers in his magic tricks. Many
similar things are related in connection with dice, but they can hardly be
considered as standing in any special relation with backgammon. But there
are some proverbs which have their origin in the game. Of these may be
cited: ffann er kongur i kotru og kortspilum (an alliterative adage signifying:
**He is king at backgammon and cards**);
Kotra og kaniM
QJSm nuurgan tttekan mauMi,
(a couplet which may be rendered ** A trictrac-board and a can make many
a poor man **); L&ng er von 4 kotru (** hope is long at backgammon**); Nk
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STRAY NOTES Ml
viU ei upp nema dausinn (an exclamation of desporation, ** nothing will
tarn up but the deuce''), but this may also be used of simple dice-play;
tmsir eiga i henni hotru, ^* different people, different lucJc at backgammon/*
These proverbs are seldom made use of in our day, but there is no doubt
that they were once in everybody's mouth. The last-mentioned is found,
for instance, in a letter written by the fkmous Ami Magnilisson about 1720.
Ami Magndsson in this letter writes thus : ^* og hugga mig viQ, a0 ^msir
eiga i Jcotru. "
Our author states that in the XVlIth century Motra was played for stakes,
as may be noted in the poems of Stef&n Oiafsson (Copenhagen 1886, II, p. 112.),
in which the poet's friend is obliged to pay a wager lost at backgammon.
The little poem runs as follows:
K« mi ByrOr klA lAr Unn,
i kotra mlsti hAn hrolpiiiii alnii,
Af l»Ti htn er dmagiiui
Skki par tmr Narfl minn.
liAftoilnii tapA reU Ymaa,
Yon er ligi geifla;
Ekki er ganum, aanr luuin«
Olaftir DavlQsson has discovered, in his researches, a drawing of a back-
gammon board such as was used in Iceland a century and a half ago. It
is like those now seen. He then gives a representation of a modern Ice-
landic board, stating that he intends to describe|the present method of play
(see fig. 25). He states that folding-boards, with a chess-board on the out-
side of one cover and a morris-board on the outside of the other, and back-
gammon on the inside of|both,|are of frequent occurrence. He then mentions
the number of men and dice employed, and remarks that he has never heard
that kotra is sometimes played with twelve men, as is stated by the director
of the Icelandic Archselogical Museum. Boards are occasionally found, in
which the points are not colored, but are formed by wooden strips tacked
to the bottom of the board; on these the men are placed as it becomes ne-
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348 CHESS IN ICELAND
oesBary; while within the folded and closed board, the dice and men are
placed when the game is over.
In beginning the game, the players sit each on his side of the board.
They may be called A and B. Each of them has 15 pieces or men, each 15
haying its own color. A places all his men on that point which is the
farthest to his right in that side of his table which is remote from him, and
whieh Is called sometimes the '* home table ** {heimabor^). He is supposed
to sit on the lower side of the table, and sets his men on a. B does the
same. He sets his pieces on 1. Then each casts one of the dice, each in
his own board (the division at his right). The one malting the smaller cast
plays first. A second cast, with both the dice, indicates what is the play,
or how to move the pieces. The points on the dice are called ds^ daus or
dis, treja^ hotra, fimm or sex according to whether 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 turn up.
BJ5rn Halld6rsson, in his dictionary, gives sett or skt as the name of the
highest number on the dice, but the ordinary numeral, seoo, is, to say the
least, much more/M)mmon. When the two lowest dice-points are thrown
they are usually spoken of as ds og daus (ace and deuce, or deuce-ace) but
sometimes the thrower calls out: ^^Here comes dsdis'' {Asdis being also a
female proper name). If the same number turns up on both dice at one
throw, the double numbers are called samvdrp ('« doublets '*), and they are
spoken of as dsar allir^ ireijur a^torC* aces all," "treys all") and so on,
according to the number. This corresponds, as will be remembered, to the
Swedish nomenclature. '^ Sixes all" are likewise called tdlfin (** twelves").
BJ6rn Halld6rsson has this word, but in the *' Flateyjarb6k " (1380) the term
seen tpS (" six two " that is to say, '^ two sixes ") is employed in the passage
which describes the casting of lots by the kings, St. Oiaf of Norway and
Olaf of Sweden, to decide who shall possess the little Swedish Isle of Hlsing
(at the mouth of the Gautaelf, near Gothenburg). Tdlfin is also used in
some proverbs, as in nu kastar tdlfunum, '^ this exceeds everything." He
who has doublets has to play the turned-up number four times, if he can.
J6n Olafsson says that some call it elleflny when one die shows six and the
other five. Play is so carried on that one or two men are moved as many
points as are indicated by the points of the dice which turn up at each throw,
and the count is made Arom the point on which the man stands. If, for
example, A haa four-deuce at the first throw, then he moves two men, one
to c and the other to e. He may also naturally move one only to g, but the
usual custom is to move at the beginning two pieces at the first throw, if
this can be done, except when double sixes turn up. Then it is not possible
to move more than one piece. Some say, however, that when this cast is
thrown four men may be moved out, and all played to the sixth point, firom
the point on which the men are originally placed. Some also say that the
adversary is allowed to capture them or break them up (rifti upp)^ as it is
called, if he can do so before the other has himself spread them or broken
them up. This however is also said not to be an Icelandic rule.
When A has thrown and moved, then B plays. Nothing prevents the
player from placing men on a point already containing a man, one or more
of his own pieces, but he may not allow two or more pieces to stand on
the same point, which is called reita {reitur is a square on the chess board),
until he has reached the uttermost point in that side of the table which is
opposite him, but that is only allowable when he has moved five men
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STRAY NOTES 840
from the point originally containing his men. Then A can place men on
the point L Again it is permitted to him to make points wherever he will
on the other side of the table, with the same conditions as have been stated.
The men go namely from A's side over into B's side, from 2 to 1, 2 and so on
to 1^. Their whole course is therefore from a to 12, and that of B's men
from I to I. Neither may play to a square on which his opponent has a
man except it should be impossible to get past his line of squares; then he
may ^* take up ** or capture pieces on points wherever he can. If, for ex-
ample, B has men on 1, 2, k,j, i, and h then A cannot pass, not even if he
should throw a six, but he may ^' take up '* in accordance with the throw
of his dice. Therefore one ought to beware of placing men on six squares,
each beside the other. This custom is the most common rule in regard to
the occupation of six squares in a row, but there is another rule which is
very ancient in Iceland. According to that it is not permitted to '^take up**
men on any one of six successive points which are occupied, but the oppo-
nent is not permitted to move until some of the points are vacated, unless
he has men beyond these six points, for over them it is impossible to get.
This is called to fortaka. Mr. SiguH^ur L. J6nasson, who communicated this
rule to the writer, says that the Rev. krni Helgason (of OarOar), who was
titular bishop of Iceland (d. 1858), always played in this way, and he was a
proficient at backgammon. When the opponent again has only one piece
on a point, then A may move his piece to that point, and take up the other,
if the dice thrown will permit it. Then B must, afterwards re-enter it (or
them) in his home-board, but in that case the entering point is included in
the count. If he throw, for instance, four and six, after two of his men
have been captured, then he must enter them on four and six, otherwise
he cannot play, until they have been entered. But often he must wait a
long while for this, for it is not allowed to place captured pieces on those
squares, on which he already has men, or on the squares which his oppo-
nent holds, except when he has more captured men than there are points
vacant. In that case he may " break up ** the points of his adversary in
accordance with the casts of his dice. If it happen that the position of the
men elsewhere is such that he cannot play the points he has thrown, then
he must refrain from moving.
Thus the game goes on — with captures and hindrances to play. It is
of great importance that each player place obstacles in the way of the other,
and it is a good plan for this purpose, to. hold many points in the board
of the opponent, so that it will be more difilcult for him to re-enter his
captured men. Frequently, though, the desire to capture must be restrained,
so that the adversary cannot break up one*s points. It is regarded as desir-
able at backgammon to attain the kverkatak (literally, *^ throat- hold **),
that is, to reach the extreme point in the home-board of the opponent and
the point which is next to it. If A holds the points at 6 and 7, then he
has the kverkatak.
Finally it is wise and proper to build up a row of points at the farthest
end of that side of the table which faces the player, or in other words the
^* throwing-off ** toble, for it is regarded as nnlikely that the opponent should
get past one*s men except occasionally, but the points in the row should
not be six, for it is in that case impossible for the opposite player to get
Us men over, and he is then permitted to " break-up,** or capture the
obstmcting points.
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350 CBB88 IN ICELAND
It is in this manner that there Is the most likelihood of being able to
make the opponent ^'an« or to ^'an him, and that counts for the most at back-
gammon; the other so-called Jan is when he has more captured pieces than
he can enter. The game ends with a^'an, as is natural, and also with the
throw! ng-off ('« bearing **) of all the pieces, which is the most common meth-
od of winning. The word Jan^ the author tells us, be first met in the poems
of Eggert Olatsson C'KvseQi,** Copenhagen 1832, p. 132):
Skramanr mnndn Torfta /on
Og hangbdaDS v\t hAaarl^an
Hraddir fidU i stafl.
J6n Olafsson says about Jan : ** neutrum, indeclin. vocula peregrina'* ; he like-
wise says that the word occurs in some card-games, for example one called
marias (a corruption of the French ^' mariage "). J6n Olafsson talks about
Janstork (5torA=** defiance**) in forkcering and kotra^ but that is doubtless
the same as jan, though he does not explain how the word occurs, whether
one can say " to be or become >atu(orJk,** or whatt He states that, in other
respects, he does not understand J6n Olafsson on this point, nor do those to
whom he has submitted his remarks. He seems to wish to say that jcai-
stork is when one of the players does not get into the corner of the board,
but the other one gets out (*' cum quis non tantum yincula tabularum in
ludo forkcering vel kotra assequitur, collusore altero feliciter eyadente *').
When all the pieces of a player have reached the ** throwing-off **
C' bearing ") table, for example, when A* s men hold the points 7-12, then
he may proceed to take them out, that is to throw them off, but he may
also move them, if he.wishes, while there is an opportunity. The throwing-
off consists in removing his pieces from the table, or board, and those
which are thus thrown out have no farther connection with the game. In
this process of throwing-out it is advantageous to cast doublets, for then
four men at once may be removed. In throwing-off, the points are reckoned
as when the men are entered. If A hold the points 9, 10, 11, and 12, and
throw five and trey, then he must take the five firom 9, but it is voluntary
with him whether he move the trey to 12, or whether he take it off from
10. To speak generally, he who throws higher numbers than he can play,
while he is throwing off, is bound to take off from his rear points, and then
it often happens that his opponent can capture one or more of his men.
When such a thing happens, he to whom the men belong is obliged to
re-enter them in his home -board. Just like other captured pieces, and may
not proceed with the throwing-off until they have again arrived at the
throwing-off table.
Jan and throwing-off {uttekt) are the most usual methods of winning at
backgammon, but besides these there are ^* extra winnings" (ctukavinningar)^
and these are 4: meistari^ C master"), sHUti mulrurO' little monk*'— mUkur
being a popular corruption of niunkur)^ langi mitkur ('^big monk") and
langi hr$ggur i^^highauok'*). Meistari consists in being able to place all
the men on the Airthermost point. If all the men of A stand on 12» then
he has gained the meistari. If he have five men on each of the points 10, 11
and 12, then he has gained the 'Mittle monk." If he have succeeded in
placing three pieces on each of the points 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12, then he has
made the ** big monk." ** Big back " is three men on each of the points 7,
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STRAY NOTES 361
§, 9, 10 and 11. This rarely occurs, except when the opponent holds the
point 12; one must then exert all his force to wrest this point from him,
and then rather play for a simple ** monk.'*
Better than nothing is to maJce a " half monJc/* and that is if a man
can get his men in a required position by means of one of the dice numbers
which he throws. B for example is playing for a ''little monk,*' and has
Ave men on 12, five on II, four on 10 and one on 7. Now he throws, and
gets six and trey. He plays only the trey, and thus has a *' half monk.**
Some players, howeyer, permit only one die to be thrown under these
circumstances. If the proper numbers turn up, then it is a regular ''monk.**
To all this the author, who, when he wrote, was a student at the University
of Copenhagen, adds: "Backgammon is hardly played anywhere so frequently
among Icelanders as among the Icelandic students at Copenhagen during
the summer, but this is not an old custom and perhaps may not grow to
be one [since the writer was at the university it has been largely superseded
by chess]. We have the rule that he who has arrived at the point of getting
a 'monk* may throw only one of his dice and make his 'monk* complete,
if his throw allow of it. But if he do not succeed, then we permit him to
throw the other die, and make his 'monk* a 'half,* if the dice will admit
of that. But this is too much of a fovour to the man playing for a 'monk.*
It would doubtless be the right thing to allow him to throw both dice, or
else one die once, so that, if he have the proper luck, his 'monk* will be
complete.** Some reckon " little meistarV among the " monks.** It is "little
meistari"' when eight men are on the uttermost point and seven on the
next. But, on the other hand, players generally do not consider this " little
meUtari^' authorized. In contradistinction, however, meistari' proper is
sometimes styled "big meistari'' (stdri meistari). It increases the value of
each "winning,** if the opponent has a captured man when the "winning**
is gained; it is then said that the adversary is mar in " throwing-off,**
"monks,** etc. The author Informs us that the .word mar is sometimes
pronounced mor, but he has never heard it in that form. Neither form is
found in~ any Icelandic dictionary. When A has thrown off all his men
before B has succeeded in doing so, then he is allowed five, seven or thirteen
"after- throws,** or extra throws (the number differing probably indifferent
tracts ot the island), according to whether he aims at making "big monk,**
"little monk,** or meistari, and these are good and valid if he gets them
with the throws permitted. There are individual players who do not permit
any after-throw, and without them " monks ** are very rare. It is regarded
as a greater honour to obtain one of the additional winnings than to succeed
merely in "throwing-off.** Of these meistari is foremost; then stutH mukur;
then langi mukur; but langi hryggur is the least of ail. The writer has
heard the value of the different winnings given in numbers thus: "simple
throwing off,** 2; langi hryggur, 3; langi mi*kur, 5; stutH mukur, 7; meistari,
13; jaw, 15. For mar, 2 is added to each "winning.** For mar, at stutH
mukur, for example, the count would be 9; for half a "monk** the count is
half of that which is given to a " monk.** It ought to be remarked that as
"throwing off** is a low "winning** in comparison with a "monk,** the
player seldom begins to throw off before he has regarded the position
sufliciently to see the impossibility of making a "monk.** When one player
has thrown off all his man, and it is plain that the other cannot make a
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«* monk," the game is closed. Some permit the one who was seoond player
at the beginning of the game to have one more throw after he has thrown
off his men, and if then the position be an even one, it is regarded as a
drawn game {JctfMefti), This rule can only come nnder discussion at ** throw-
ing -off,'* for often one of the players has only two or four men when the
other has completely thrown off. This rule is not in disagreement with
that which permits no ^'after-throw*' proper. Finally if more than one game
of backgammon is played at a sitting, he has the first throw in a following
game who has had, in the preceding one, a '^throw-off'' or a Jon. The
'* monks y do not count in this regard.
J6n Ola&son, the lexicographer (see p. 138, foot-note), mentions backgam-
mon, but everything he says about it is conAised and unintelligible, so that
little credit is to be attached to it. He first talks about kotungatafl (''game
of the crofter'') and tells us that it is the same as kotra; and that its name
comes from the fact that it is played with four knights (riddurum)^ or
because it is foursided (ferstrend). In another place he remarks that in
kotungatafl four knights are opposed to all the peif>Junum (a corrupt
orthography of the dative plural of pe^, the Icelandic word for "pawn").
Nowhere else is there any account of knights or pawns in connection with
kotra^ a &ct which at once excites a grave suspicion of the dictionary-
maker's intelligence. In another place the same writer speaks of kvenn-
kotra (" feminine backgammon,") which he says some call kotra. But he
does not explain the game, fiesides these he mentions aUeotra ("every body's
backgammon.'*) Olafur DaviSsson has found none of these names elsewhere,
and therefore has nothing to report in regard to them. Finally J6n Ola&son
states that some call kotra "English tictac," and also " forkaering." Further
on he. remarks that the different games at backgammon are these; l.o^ etta
stelpur^ 2. ofanfeUingartafl^ 3. forhasringur^ 4. goif^atafl, 5. (Jlafs kangs toft.
This classification it is impossible to agree to, for kotra^ as it is played now,
and as it was in all probability played at that time, bears no resemblanoe,
for example, to gothatafl. These games the author proceeds to say, he
considers separately, not regarding any of them as kotra proper. There is,
though, one of the games which J6n Olafsson alludes to under kotrd, which
rightly belongs there, and that is piprytUl^ for it is nothing but a modified
kotra. The difference consists in the treatment of the doublets. When
double sixes {tdlfin) occur at kotra the six is played four times, but in
piprjdll the sixes are played first, then fives, then fours, then threes, then
deuces and last of all aces. On the other hand when aces ^re thrown they
are played first, then deuces, then threes, then fours, then fives, then sixes.
When fours, treys, or deuces are thrown they are played successively
downwards, that is, aces last, but when fives are thrown they are played
upwards, that is, only fives and sixes. This is all the difference. PiprJdU
was also called koprjdll (both terms being, so far as we can learn, untelliglble
nonsense), and we can thus understand how the expression "Eopar i alin"
gets into the "taflvisa" of Hallgrimur P^tursson. Another Icelandic writer
thinks that pipdla (whether it be the name of a game or a dance) is the
same as piprydUij and should be related to piprydU. It is proper to state,
before this subject is ended, that J6n Olafeson, under kotra calls ofanfHIr
ingartafi simply ofanfelling. Under kotra also he likewise treats p(prjdU^
fofringartafl^ d<Andimannsiafl^ etc. as games at kotra^ but nnder tafl he
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I STRAY N0TB8 353
regards them as special table-games. In general he seems inclined to
consider as varieties of kotra everything played on tables and with dice
(compare the travels of Eggert Ola&sOn, i. p. 50); but according to this
definition 6laf^8 kongs iafi cannot be a kotra game, for that is played without
dice, as has before been stated.
OfanfelUng or ofanfeUingartafl, This game is played on a backgammon
board, the players being two. Each one sets two men on every point in
that division of the board which faces him at his right hand. One has the
black men, and the other the white. First of all the dice are thrown to
decide who shall play first. He who has the greatest number of points, at
one throw, casts the dice again and moves the uppermost lying men on the
points down beside the lower man, nearer the small end of the point, in
accordance with the dice-points thrown. If he throw, for example, six and
deuce, then he moves down the uppermost men on the six and deuce points.
If he throw doublets, then he can only move down one man, but he has
the right to another throw, even if he cast several doublets one after the
other. The other player now throws, and proceeds in the same way, after
which they take turns. If a dice-point turn up corresponding to a point
on the board on which the upper man has already been moved down, then
the throw does not count. When Either or both players have brought
down all their men, they then move them up again, that is place each again
on the lower, or underlying man, that is to say where they were originally
placed, moving, of course, in accordance with the throws of the dice. When
all the men have been again doubled up, then they are thrown off, an
operation which takes place exactly as at backgammon. The player wins
who has first thrown off all of his pieces. J6n OlaDsson mentions this
ofanfellingartafl, but does not explain it. SigurVur Ou9mundsson also touches
upon it. Hallgrlmur P^tursson names it. The word ofanfelling signifies
^^ felling down," or *4owering down.'' It will be evident to those who have
read the preceding pages that the simple game here described is identical
with the one still known in France under the name of *4es dames rabattues,"'
and which, as Hyde tells us, used to be played in England, where it was
called ^* doublets** or the ^'queens* game.** The surmise that it is one of
the most ancient forms of backgammon, to which one of the writers we
have cited has given utterance, may, therefore, be correct, if we may Judge
by its long existence and practice in Iceland.
A€^ eUa stelpur. This game (its name is a rather vulgar one, signifying
^^ pursuing wenches**) is also played on the backgammon board. The players
are two. One of them has at his disposal six white men and the other six
black men; they are arranged as in ofanfeUingartafl except that only one
man is placed on each point. The first player is decided by the throw of
the dice, the winner then throwing again. If six turn up, he moves the two
furthermost men forward before the others to the left, and does the same if
doublets turn up. except double sixes, for they give the right to move four
men. Besides this, he may throw again after all doublets. If he throw an
ace, then he moves one. No other throws count except six, ace and doublets.
Then the second player casts the dice and proceeds in the same manner,
and so on by turns. When the furthermost piece of either player has arrived
at the end of the half table, then he moves the aftermost piece or pieces
over across the board to the nearest point in the other half of the table.
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354 CEESS IN ICELAND
according to the throw of the dice. If the men of either player are standing,
for example on the points g-l in the left backgammon table (see fig. 25), and
the throw is six-ace, then he moves the pieces on ^, h^ and t to 1, 2 and
3, etc. Thus each one chases the other. When pieces of his opponent are
situated on those points to which the player must move his men, then he
captures them. If the pieces of one are placed, for example, on 1-6, while
the pieces of the adversary are on 7-12, and the former throw double sixes,
then he moves his men A*om 1-4 to 7-10, removing from the board his
opponent's men, which thereafter, being captured, have nothing more to do
with the game. Whenever either player has only one man left its move
undergoes a change. It can be played only into the corners, and it is called
a homaskella {hom= " comer," skella=^' rattle," "rattler"). If homaskeUa
for instance, is on the point 4, and he to whom it belongs throw six-ace,
then he plays it to 6, 7 and 12. As a matter of course the Jioma^keUa
captures only those men which stand in the corners. Moreover the piece
itself cannot be taken when it stands between men of the adversary.
If one player have, for example, men on 5, 6 and 7, and the homaskeUa
of the other player is on 1, and the latter throw an ace, then he plays it
to 6 and captures the man which previously stood there. If the other player
now throw also an ace then he is obliged to play his man from 5 to 8, etc
Again the homaskeUa is duly liable to capture when it stands in advance
of the adversary's men. Finally, it may happen that both the opponents
have lost all their pieces except the two styled fiomaskeUa, and then often
succeeds a long, chasing game until the one can capture the other. With
that the game ends. This includes all that the writer has been able to find
in regard to this game except a casual mention of homaskeUa in the Journal
"NoHJanfari" (1874, XIII, p. 49), where a letter constantly carried about in
the postman's bag and not reaching its owner is compared to a homaskeUa,
It is stated in the "Annaier for nordisk oldkyndighed" (1838-9, pp. 153-4)
that a certain piece, in a certain Icelandic dice-game, is called homaskosl^a.
The author does not know this word, but thinks it likely that it is simply
a case of confusion arising f^om its resemblance to Tiomaskella. Hallgrlmur
PMursson has an allusion to this game in his frequently cited "Taflvlsa."
Ddnumannsiafl or ddndimannstafl,^ J 6n Olafoson asserts that this va-
riety of backgammon gets its name f^om the seriousness or earnest pro-
priety with which it is played. The words ddnumaiher, ddindismachiTy or
ddndismathir (the Danish "dannemand") signify "gentleman," or literally
" excellent man." The game is played with three dice, and is more infre-
quent than any treated of by the old lexicographer. We do not know the
position of the men at the beginning, but very likely they are placed as in
the more common sorts of backgammon. When double sixes turn up the
men may be moved 18 points. When ace, deuce and trey are thrown, the
position (or the cast?) is styled haslungi ("all-in-a-row," the noun literally
meaning a "young bird following another"); when the dice yield deuce,
trey and four the position is known as fjdsama^ur ("cowherd"); when trey,
four and five, the name is liUi ddnumaihur; and when four, five and six,
they form the stori ddnumaihir (^drt=big). J6n Olafsson has something
more to say under this head, but it is not of such a character, as to give
any idea of the mode of play, and is otherwise very obscure. The writer,
therefore, refrains from the endeavor to report it. Bishop Finnur J6nsson
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STRAY NOTES 355
(1704-1789), in his fragmentary lezioon, alludes to ddnumannstaf., but says
nothing worthy of note. '^D&numaQur'' is cited in the taflvisa of Hallgrim-
ur P^tursson, and is there doubtless intended for ddnumannstafl. Fi-
nally it may be stated that from this game is derived the phrase: Nu
kastar dtjdn yflr (resembling a dice term already quoted) ~&1j&n, ** eighteen'*
referring to the three sixes thrown— which is found twice in the *'Gr^lu-
kvseei*' of the poet Stef&n Olafsson (edition of 1885, i, 230-231):
FSmnuuma flokkamir
Og kerlinga kniD«,
Tf6 nA taki A^in yflr
TTmfeiMn luuis.
I>6 n« taki AljAii yflr,
Ef l>a« er wtt,
A« ^ar ad komin Gryla,
Sem geta dngyir aatt.
The two concluding lines of the first stanza may be rendered: ''Though now
the vagrant-round goes beyond everything."
Forhasringur is included in J6n Olafsson's vocabulary of games, but his
explanations throw little light upon its character. He tells us that It is a
very difficult diversion, but one frequently indulged in. The name, as Olafur
DavlQsson thinks, comes from the Danish word ''^ forhjosring'''' [''verkehe-
ren'*J, as it is written in the latest Danish orthography, forkasring (compare
the Danish " forkert," meaning '* perverted," *' up-side-down," '* topsy
turvy"), because the pieces are played, as it were, in the wrong direction.
The game is said to be Icelandic, although the name is a Danism; and
Eggert Olafsson declares out and out that forkasringur is not known in
foreign countries (''Reise igjennem Island" i, p. 50). Oi janstork, in this
game, we have already treated. In the '< Sigurhr6sshugvekjur " (''Religious
meditations") of the Reverend J6n J6nsson (Hdlar 1797, p. 33) we find the
phrase: "Qu9 tebler Igka sem Forkimring vid Maiienn i ^essum Heime,*''
"Qod plays as at forkjsering with man in this world." Magnus Stephenson,
in his "Minnisver!) ti5indi" (1797, i., p. 335), scoffs at this phraseology and
says that it is most likely that, when two such unequal persons play to-
gether, man suffers a **big monk" with mar. According to this, if taken
literally *'^ forhjoering must have had its *'*'st&ri mukurJ'^ Finally, BJdrn
Hallddrsson asserts that the verb fortaka means '' to move the men to the
outermost line in the game of forkieringV' This, our author tells us, com-
prises all that he has discovered in regard to this game, which seems to
him to have now disappeared from Iceland. Hallgrlmur P^tursson names
it, and so does the poet Bjarni X^6r5ars8on, in a lyric:
Myrkra eykor mAla ]iing,
Menn >egar ottam tntm,
I^andinn letknr /ortaring
, Fyrir Ik sem ^Aga.
This may be freely translated: "When people are playing falsely with their
words, so that they make the ambiguity of their speeches increase, the devil
is playing forkosring for the liars." Of course the reader will notice that
this game, so far from being Icelandic, is the French "revertier," the Ger-
man "verkehren," or "verkehrspiel," which latter name is given to it in
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^56 CBESS IN ICELAND
the three editions of the ^'Dansk spillebog'* tcom 1786 to 1829. The name
used in Icelandic is therefore purely Danish, or a Danish rendering of the
Qerman.
Besides the games already described, J6n Olaflsson briefly alludes to two
foreign ones, tiktak and trokodil. The writer we are summarizing says that
both are probably no longer practiced in Iceland ; the former is of course,
trictrac^ the other being toccategli. These, likewise, are described with tol-
erable fullness in the Danish '* Spillebog,'' just cited, in all its editions.
The two are treated as one game in the text, the differences being explained
in the notes. The matter seems to be taken in a nearly or quite complete
form from the ^^Neueste anleitung wie die trictrac- und toocategli-spiele
recht und wohl zu spielen'* (Niirnberg 1773), in which the games are also
treated together by comparison. The odd word trokodil is a humorous cor-
ruption of **toccategli'' or '^tokkadille" in imitation of the name of the
animal, which is in Icelandic krdkodill; the Icelanders are fond of such
verbal fantasticalities, as they may be called.
The Icelandic name of backgammon, kotra, is undoubtedly derived trom
the French qucUre (or the Latin quatuor) and, with almost equal certainty,
directly tvom that word in its use to represent one of the dice-numbers. It
is possible that the Icelanders were struck by this number as being the
first one having a very different form from their own. They had ds ("ace**),
daus ("deux," "deuce*'), tr^'a ("trois,** "trey*'), each one not unlike the
foreign names, but quatre (also much used in English of old) was noticeably
dissimilar to O'drir; or the regularity of the four-side of the die, with its
four points or dots symmetrically arranged in the four angles, may have
struck the old Icelanders. It is not very improbable therefore that this
term (so common, like all the dice-numbers, in backgammon, in announc-
ing throws, both singles or doublets) may have been conferred on the game.
But, on the other hand, it must not be forgotten that similarly derived names,
"size-ace** in English, "Seis, dos e as** in Spanish, "Doublets** in English
and so on, have been elsewhere conferred on varieties of backgammon.
Moreover, it is somewhere stated that there was in mediaeval Germany a
game styled "quater,'* and another one, bearing precisely the same title
and perhaps allied to it, in England, still played in the XVIIth century.
But proper investigation might easily throw much light on this question of
etymology.
What seems without doubt is that kotra {kvdtra) —the name and the
game— reached Iceland nearly contemporaneously with chess — or perhaps
shortly after. An argument for the precedence of chess is that tafl (that
is "tables**) came in time to be applied to chess and never to kotra. The
latter represented the " tables **of mediaeval literature, and it would be na-
tural that its title should be conferred on backgammon rather than on
chess. It is noteworthy that we have seen, in these last pages, in a fkirly
early romantic saga, the names of tafl (chess), hnettafl and kotra cited in
Juxtaposition, showing that the writer of the saga had no doubt of their
distinct character. Nor does kotra^ least of all of the games which have
been suggested as the real hnefatafl^ bear any resemblance to the saga
game, so &r as it has been described to us. We may therefore almost take
it for granted that we have not yet discovered the true hnefatafl.
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STRAY NOTES 887
Haying deviated from the original design of limiting the scope of the
present worli to the subject of chess in Iceland « its history in that country
and its treatment in Icelandic literature— we take the opportunity, in clos-
ing the first volume, of giving very summarily the principal conclusions,
which may be drawn from the notes we have gleaned in regard to different
table-games, their supposed or probable origin, and the manner and date
of their introduction into Iceland. It must again be repeated that what
has been said in reference to the rise, early development and subsequent
spread of these games (saving only chesfl) is wholly based upon investiga>
tions now in great part first made, and hence necessarily incomplete and
unsatisfactory. An exception to this sweeping assertion of novelty must,
however, be recorded in the case of the labours, admirable for their day,
of the learned Thomas Hyde— the outcome of which may be studied in his
^'Historia nerdiludii, hoc est dicere, trunculorum; cum quibusdam aliis
Arabum, Persarum, Indorum, Ghinensium, k aliarum gentium ludis**
(Ozonii 1694), being the second volume of his remarkable work, "De ludis
orientalibus.** A certain amount of merit is likewise to be assigned to some
of the many slight treatises on Qreek and Latin games, by archaeological
students, usually written in Latin, from the times of the Scaligers down to
the end of the XVIIth century, (see p. 122, noto), but the ignorance of their
authors in regard both to the practical character of games in general and of
the games of tlie Eastern world in particular greatly affects the value and
utility of these optuctUa, In many cases, too, their information would
doubtless, if carefiiUy estimated, be of only a negative weight so Air as the
games in which we are interested are concerned. But in this entire field,
belonging alike to the folklorist and the historian of civilization, and de-
manding the services of linguistic investigators possessing great accuracy,
patience and shrewdness, there is still much to be done. We have, as
stated, confined ourselves wholly to table-games, that is those which are
played on a board or other surAice, on which some peculiar design is
drawn. But even this branch of the subject admits of many subdivisions,
such as line-games, and games of squares or points, games practised with
dice and without, and so on. Historically, the important questions to be
decided, in the case of all these games, are the place and time of their
origin; the method of their development; and the manner, date and direc-
tion of their extension into various parts of the world. This last involves,
naturally, explanations of the relationship, if any, existing between games,
more or less similar in character, practiced in regions remote from each other.
But to all scholars devoting themselves toany of these sul]ject8 a thorough
practical knowledge of the games they are examining, in all their modern
history and present state, is absolutely essential. The following final
notes are set down with diffidence, and the reader will easily enough see
that much work is yet required to make the indefinite results attained defi-
nite, and that many of the conclusions drawn are quite likely, in the course
of time and the progress of research, to be greatly modified:
1. C?ies^ as generally maintained, had its origin in India at a far dis-
tant period. The first documentary contemporary evidence of its existence
(this being the only trustworthy historical testimony) dates from about the
year 600 after Christ, at which period it is thereby shown to have been £a-
miliarly known to the inhabitants of the provinces of Persia adjoining the
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368 CHESS IN ICELAND
Indian frontier. Beyond that time all statements in regard to its chronology,
in that portion of the world at least, are at present the merest sarmises.
It would seem that it spread at an early day to China and Japan, although
there are not lacking writers who contend that the reverse was the case,
and that the game really owes its origin to the former of these empires,
whence it extended to India. But this is not the accepted theory, yet the
records and authorities of the Farthest East still await a thorough and in-
telligent examination. Chess made its entry into Europe at widely distant
points and (if we are to judge only by contemporary evidence) nearly si-
multaneously. These points are in particular Spain and the Byzantine em-
pire, lying at the two extremities of the Mediterranean. The two earliest
mentions of it in both regions occur in the eleventh century— in the case of
Spain, in wills bequeathing costly chessmen and chessboards, and in the case
of the Eastern empire, in the Greek ^'Alexias,*' a life of her father, the em-
peror Alexins Komnenus (1081- 1118), by the princess Anna Komnena; but
equally early is the first recorded date in Italy, namely in a letter of Cardinal
Damiano, written as it would appear, in the year 1061. Historians of chess,
in spite of the occurrence of .these earliest allusions to chess at nearly the
same epoch in three different lands, usually regard Spain as the chief gate,
through which the game made its entry into the European world; this is
partly, perhaps, by reason of its early invasion and long occupation by a
people of Arabic race and speech, and the subsequent intimate intercourse
of these foreign conquerors with their Christian neighbours; yet it should
not be forgotten, in this connection, that a portion of Italy, that is to say
the island of Sicily, was also held by Arabic (commonly styled Saracenic) in-
vaders, and ruled by Arabic princes, from the middle of the IXth to the
middle of the Xlth century. Yet in the cases of Spain and Byzantium we
know, by abundant philological and other evidence, that chess reached them
directly and immediately from the Arabs ; as to Italy this is not clear. At
any rate it was from Spain and Italy that the game passed to the central and
western regions of Europe. On its march westward Hrom its early Indo-
Perso-Arabic home it underwent various modifications, Just as it did on its
march eastward from India to the shores of the Pacific ocean. Chess came
to Iceland not later than the latter half of the Xllth century, certainly by
the way of England, and probably f^om the English cathedral or conven-
tual sehools (see pp. 7-9).
2. Draughts is a greatly simplified chess, and is hence to be considered
as having its direct and sole origin in that game. It was apparently devised
in Spain (see pp. 92-97) during or before the Xlllth century. It had already
reached England in the XlVth century and could not well have been known
in Iceland much before the XVth, probably somewhat later. It came to the
island — to Judge by the name given it — possibly from Scotland, but more
likely from Norway or Denmark, although it might likewise have made its
way thither from Germany during the time of the trade carried on, especially
after the beginning of the XVth century, between Iceland and the Hanseatic
cities. Icelandic writers have, as yet, given very little attention to the story
of draughts.
3. Morris, ^ This game, as now ascertained (see p. 255, note), followed
the track of chess, coming, so far as Europe is concerned, from the Arabic
world. It, too, seems to have existed, at least in its simplest form, among
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STRAY NOTES 859
the remote populations of easternmost Asia (see Hyde, ii, p. 211 ), but at how
early a time cannot at present be surmised. The earliest positive date in its
history belongs to the tenth century of our era, at which time it was prac-
ticed, with chess and backgammon, in the cities of Arabia (see p. 255, note).
It was, demonstrably, a familiar sport in Spain before the Xlllth century, in
France in the earliest years of the XlVth, and in England before the middle
English period (1200-1500) had completed half its course. Still earlier dates
in all these lands are not unlikely to turn up as the result of f^irther research.
As its Icelandic name (mylna) proves, it must have been carried to the north-
ern island, not by way of France and England, as was the case with chess,
but originally from Italy by the way of Germany, or of Germany and con-
tinental Scandinavia. This occurred doubtless several generations after the
arrival of chess.
4. Fooc- and' geese. — Our investigations lead us to suggest that this
certainly very ancient diversion may possibly be a survival of one of the
several line-games of the Romans (see p. 148). There is no mention of it
either in the codex of King Alfonso or in the treatise on Oriental games of
Hyde; and we have found no trace of it outside of Europe and its colonies.
That it bore the name of vulpes in the works of Latin writers in a very
early period of the Middle Ages, and possibly in a very late period of the
Low Latin age, is a supposition largely founded on the mention of that word,
as the appellation of a game, by John of Salisbury (illO-1182). Within the
last two or three generations efforts have been made to transform into a
fortress the upper arm of its cross, and to confer on it a new nomenclat-
ure. These attempts may have originated in a Catholic country, in which
the cruciform figure was thought to be improperly employed for a mere
sport. The Icelandic title ('' fox-chess '') does not throw much light on the
question of its age in that country, except as an indication that its introduc-
tion was posterior to that of chess. It suggests, too, that its source may
have been England; geese are and have been so rare in Iceland, although
foxes are common enough, that the English name could hardly have been
rendered in its fullness; but a similar statement may be made in regard to
the titles given it in other lands. In considering the provenance of the
Icelandic game, we find certain notable coincidences between it and the
Swedish form of the game, reminding us of the peculiarities characterizing
the most common Icelandic and the most common Swedish varieties of
backgammon (see p. 316). The Swedish game is styled rdfspil (*' fox-game'')
virtually equivalent to refskdk ; while the minor pieces are called in Sweden
fdr ("sheep'') and in Icelandic Idmb ("lambs") — quite unlike the nomen-
clature of the same game in other parts of Scandinavia. Both in the XVIIIth
and XlXth centuries Icelandic writers spoke of refskdk as the most ikmiliar
of all Icelandic table-games; the same remark would have been true also in
nearly the whole of that period, if used of fox-and-geese in any English-
speaking land. Outside of the cities, at any rate, it would not have been
easy to find many youths unacquainted with it, either in Great Britain or the
United States.
Backgammon. — Many doubts, probabilities and possibilities obscure the
story of the genesis and early period of this game. These may perhaps be
partly solved or settled by means of 'events not unlikely to occur within a
reasonable period. One such event would be the publication of the nume-
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3«) CffBSS IN ICELAND
rous diagrams of popular table-games found within the last few years, more
or less rudely incised or scratched on the pavements of porticos, the steps
of public edifices, pedestals of monuments, in excavations made in the Ro-
man forum and elsewhere. Another important source of information would
be opened by the discovery and publication of special Arabic treatises on
the game, such as that ascribed to el-Adlis C'Kitab el nard**), living in
the IXth century, alleged author likewise of the first Arabic book on chess.
His work should have had its successors in the following centuries ; for as
late as the XVIth, a functionary of the chief mosque at Aleppo, who is called
by Hyde Muhammed Sokeiker, a native of Damascus, composed a monograph
on the superiority of chess when compared with nard. It must be borne in
mind that there have been literally no studies in Arabic literature, prosecuted
with especial reference to nard, except those of Hyde, whose CBicilities were
few and limited in comparison with those afforded to the student of the
present day *^,
Let us style the first period in the history of this game the Asiatic (or
pre- Asiatic)), of which we can present the following rough data:
1. Many Latin writers, some of them as early as the first and second
centuries of our era, allude to a game, frequently practised in their day, the
most usual name of which was dtiodecim scriptorum (ludus), or the game of
'' twelve lines. " Tha board (see p. 174) represented twelve lines (or points)
on the side of the board next to each player, and the game was played with
the aid of dice. These are the two certain features of this Roman diversion,
'* At the rUk of fome tt«ratioa w« thall Tentare to point oat here rery brfofly •oino
of th« oisentfal llnot of InTestlgation In any endeavor to IneroMe oor koowledge of the
•oaree and early Mttory of baeksammon, and Ineldentally of other games treated In the
present Tolume : 1. A earefal etady of the traete of ancient Qreek and Latin gamee, of
which we have gWen only a partial list (pp. 121-lfS); and a etady of each dUgrame of Greek
and Latin boards (eoe p. 174) and of such specimens of men or pieces, as may exist In pablie
and priTate arohiBologlcal eolleetlons — the result of the eztenslTo trzeavations and fircqnent
'* finds " of later times. 2. A patient and oomparatlTe study of the so-called *' trial ** codieos
(except ibe portions relfttlug to chess), which are enumerated In the works of Von der Lasa
and Van der Linde (especially in the ** Zar Qesohlchte and Llteratur ** of the former and the
** Qnelienstudlen ** of the latter) and which are preserved In the public libraries of tho
Escorlal near Madrid, Home, Florence, Paris, Uontpelller, London and othor cities, of these,
two no longer rest where they did when seen by the writers Jast mentioned ~ the Barberlnl
**Givis Bononin *' M8 having passed from the Barberlnl library into the Vatican, while the
beantiful Foontalne eodex became, at the late sale of the Foantalne library, the property of
London's chief dealer iu old books (Mr. Qaarltch), who perhaps, still holds It; It mast bo
added that no attempt has ever been made, by any investigator, to examine, with any
care or intelligeuee, the non-chess portions of any of these wonderfU literary monuments.
8. A very close examination of the second volume of 1 homas Hyde*s *' Do ludis orientaii-
bus" (1694), and of the authoriiles he there cites; of both volumes a new odltlon — with
notes aod other literary apparatus — is greatly needed, and it is hoped that, out of regard
to the memory of one of Oxford's great scholars, the Oxford Uaiverelty press will some
day give the world not only this reprint but a well-edited BngUsh translation as well. i. After
Hyde, a search for Persian and Arabic M8S relating to nard in the great European and
Asiatic eolleetlons ; of course this will be a huge task, but it can be aceompllsed far more
easily now than in Hyde's day, and he who sets about it Is sure to receive the willing aid of
many learned orienullsto In all eountrlos ; even a clearly expressed eireolar letter to libra-
rians would be apt to lead to interesting results ~ so little has been done in this direetlon.
6. The perasal of the namerons essays of Karl Himly, relating to the Uble-games of Rastern
Asia, all admirably written, and published, during the last few years, chiefly in the **Zeit-
schrlft der deoUohen morgeniandisehen Gesellschaft'* and the *' Deutsche Schaehseltang **.
The author spent several years as a member of the Qerman consular servlee iu the Far Bast,
and made excellent use of the great opportnnltieo he ei^oyed In that poettlon.
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STRAY NOTSSi 361
which hjkve oome down to ut. Some arehsBologiaia assert that & game re-
sembling it, or identical with it, existed in ancient Greece. Both the Greelc
and Roman games are mentioned under varying appellations^ and the dis-
cussion of them and of other classic sports of the same character, gave rise
to a considerable erudite literature (to which we have alluded) some two or
three centuries ago. But there are as yet no noteworthy treatises, prepared
in the light of moderi^ exploration and research, which relate to this theme.
2. There exists a tract written in Persian (in the Pahlavi character),
probably in the Vllth or early part of the Vlllth century, giving an account
of the arrival of chess in Persia, to which it had been brought from India,
and also of the transmission of a game styled ardecTishtr fjrom Persia to
India (see p. 169). This latter game was played with fifteen white and fifteen
black men, on a board or table, and with the help of dice. About the
year 800 an Arabic writer ascribes the invention of both this game and chess
to India, and informs us additionally that the former was played on a board
of twelve points, or houses. In 947 an authoritative Arabic historical cyclo-
paedia corrects the statements of the preceding writer, and states that the
game (properly called nard) was the invention of a Persian king. In the
Xth-XIth century the Persian poet, Firdusi, in his great epic, reprodaoes
the original legend of the Pahlavi tract with some amplifications (see p. 170).
Thus a game answering the description of our backgammon (played with
the assistance of dice on a board having twelve points and demanding the
use of fifteen men by each player) was known in Persia as early as the Yllth
century, and less than two centuries later was mentioned by arable writers.
3. But apparently the oldest known allusion to this Persian game yet
discovered is that in the Hebrew *^ Talmud'* ^ that monument of Jewish lore
and tradition «- but portions of which were completed before the middle of the
VI th century. In the ^'Megara,'* or letter section of the ^* Talmud,** we are
told of a game bearing the name of nerdshir^ and there seems to be little
doubt that this is the equivalent of the Arabic nerd {nard^. The date we
thus obtain, would be one involving a notable period of time before the
earliest literary reference to chess ~ nearly one century at least, and possibly
more than two centuries, for the compilation of the *^ Megara** was carried
on through portions of the lYth-VIth centuries. This fact does not, however,
render it at all probable that nard is really older than chess; but it gives
another and a more northwesterly locality to the Persian nard at a very
early date — a locality, too, which is nearer the Mediterranean. The ^^ Me-
gara '* was compiled, partly in Palestine and partly in Babylonia.
4. What, if any, were the relations between the old Roman or Greco-
Roman backgammon-like games and the old Persian game of a similar ehar^
acter % In reference to this query it is wise to remember that an ancient
legend attributes the invention of dice to the Lydians, which if it mean
anything, signifies only that the most ancient peoples of the Mediterranean
received these gaming implements from Asia Minor or the parts adjacent.
They might also have received from that same region, or, in other words
from that great tract south of the Black sea, including the valley of the
Euphrates-Tigris, in which so many of the world's very oldest nations ori-
ginated and ran their careers, any games with which dice wore connected.
5. There is supposed to be a subtle signification to most ancient histor-
ical myths. It seems quite likely that the Pahlavi-Firdtlsl legend, relating
46
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362 CHESS IN ICELA ND
to the genesis of chess and nard, simply mean^ that chess came to Persia
trom the south (India), and that nard went to India from the north (Persia
or elsewhere). Bven in days very far baclL a OreeJL game, or a game from
the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, might have made its way to Persia
by the travelled commercial paths, or by means of the great military expe-
ditions like that of Alexander the Great in the IVth century before Christ;
or it might have been brought back to Persia by the^return of the Persian
expeditions against Oreece at a still earlier date. The conclusion, perhaps a
fantastic one, to which all this leads, is that the true birth-place of the
game which we know as backgammon, may have been the European or
Asiatic lands bordering on the more easterly portion of the Mediterranean —
the territory, in short, lying between the Tiber and the Tigris, which at
earlier or later periods was overrun by the armies, dotted by the colonies
and penetrated by the commerce of Greece and Rome. Its character might
have been more or less changed when it had reached Persian or other distant
regions, just as chess has undergone various modifications in its migrations
from the east to the west.
The next period of backgammon may be styled the mediseval European
period, or that of the game of tables. In relation to this stage of its history,
from which the modern era of the game is developed historically, we may
add to our present notes the following ones:
6. The remaining notable question, not of easy solution, concerns the
real relations between the nard of Perso- Arabia and the tables {ludus tabu-
larum) of the European Middle Ages. It is true, as already stated, that, in
the existing state of our knowledge, there is nothing of strict historical
evidence, nothing in the names of the various games played in the Middle
Ages, or in more recent times, on the backgammon board, nor in the technical
terminology employed in those game^, which indicates any connection with
the Perso-Arabic game. We cannot, therefore, rely on philology to aid us
here, as we can in the cases of chess and morris. Nevertheless the descrip-
tion, not very detailed, it is true, of the old Asiatic game, when compared
with the description, still vaguer indeed, of the duodecim scripta, must lead
to the opinion that the modern European backgammon far more nearly re-
sembles the former than the latter. It is not improbable, as we have learned
elsewhere, that when the Saracenic and Moorish conquests brought nard, as
they brought chess to the Mediterranean lands, new technical terms were
borrowed from those already in use in a game, or in games of a similar
character. This would be more likely, perhaps, were the game from the ftir
east first established or known in Itaiy. This is shown by the fact that
morris retained its Arabic name in Spain, but on reaching Italy received
a Low Latin name — that of a Latin counter, or coin, of the same form as
the men or pieces with which it was played (see pp. Ill and 119). On the
Latin duodecim seripta board the lines or points were arranged in a different
manner, so that it had the look of a single board (see p. 174), but on the
nard they were so drawn as to give the appearence of a double board, or of
two boards joined vis-a-vis together. This may account for the use of the
plural of the Latin tabula (" table "), that is tabuUe, as the title of the newly
introduced diversion. ,The employment of this word, in an age in which the
Latin language was still in such general use in its original home, is a strong
argument in favor of the belief that nard first naturalized itself, on crossing
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STRAY NOTES
the Mediterranean, on the soil of Italy. If that should ever prove to be the
case it might affect the relations, so far as the game of tables is concerned,
supposed to exist between the earliest Spahish and the earliest Italian doc-
uments treating of the game. We might then consider that the Alphonsine
MS borrowed much of its information trom the North Italian writers, or their
predecessors. What might strengthen that opinion would be the peculiar
character of many of the romance « technical terms used in all those early writ-
ings. But many of these suggestions are merely surmises, which at best can
only be regarded as possibilities ; much further investigation is needed before
any of them assume the character of probabilities.
7. Whether the Asiatic game, then, were first introduced by the Arabic
invaders into Italy or into Spain, its name became tables — a generic term
including all the varieties played with the same implements (board, men and
dice). Spain, Portugal, France and England adopted the original plural form,
simply vulgarising it (tablas, tabolas, tables) ; Italy and some other countries
chose to give it in their vernaculars a singular form. Derivatives of tabu 1»
(in its sense as the title of the mediaeval nard) are found in all the languages
of Europe, evincing the wide extent of the domain in which the game was
practiced. In many tongues these derivatives are still in use. It is an im-
portant fact that Greece, Turiiey and the other nationalities (even those in
which the Arabic tongue is the medium of intercourse), which lie along the
shores of the eastern Mediterranean, adopted the Latin name for backgammon,
whereas they all call chess by a more or less corrupted form of its Arabic
appellation. In a later time, in some countries, fashion or other accidental
cause, made one particular variety of tables so prominent that the old name
as a general term, went out of vogue, and the name of the popular variety
took its place. Thus the variety styled todas tablas in Spain in the Xlllth
century, which involved the carrying of all the men around all the tables
back to their original starting-point, became the principal and favorite form
of the game in England, and in that land, during the XYth or XYIth cen-
tury, the appellation backgammon (that is, '* back game ") came into univer-
sal use, and tables was forgotten. In the German nationalities it can hardly
be said that any general modern name for the game as yet exists, the two
or three principal varieties each having its own special appellation. The
same is true of the Scandinavian lands. They have lost the word tables^ but
have not supplied its place.
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INDEX
(AbbreTiatioos: A. S. =ss Anglo-Saxon; Alph. cod. w Alph. MS. ss Alphon-
Bine codex; Arab. =: Arabic; B. M. cod. = British Museum codex; B. S.
cod. =5 Bonus Socius codex; Boh. = Bohemian; C. B. cod. = Civis Bo-
noniee codex; Gat. s= Catalan; cf. = confer; Chin. = Chinese; Dan.
=3 Danish ; Engl. = English ; Flem. = Flemish ; Fr. = French ; Germ.
=s German ; Hoist, dial. = Holstein dialect ; Hung. = Hungarian ; Icel.
= Icelandic ; Ind. =s Indian ; Ital. = Italian ; Jap. = Japanese ; Lat.
= Latin ; M. Engl. =s Middle English ; M. Or. = Modern Greek ; M. H.
G. =3 Middle High German ; M. Lat = Mediseval Latin ; O. Engl. s= Old
English; 0. Fr.= Old French; O. Fris. = Old Frisian; O. Germ.V=01d
German ; O. H. G. =: Old High German ; Pers. = Persian ; pi. = plural;
Pol. = Polish; Port = Portugese; Prov. = Provon^l; Russ. = Russian;
Sansk. == Sanskrit; Siam. = Siamese; sing. = singular; Span. == Spanish;
Swied. = Swedish; Turk. = Turkish.
The characters d^ ce^ d, are to be found under a, 6 under o, and u under u.
The Icelandic letter f is to be found at the end of the index.)
Aas (pZ. azen, Dutch), 272, 277.
Aas (Engl.)> 280.
Aa&je (Dutch), 274.
Abbatre du bois (Pr.), 179.
Abel, king of Denmark, 12.
Abenstein, G. W. von, (pseudonym),
264.
Abpaschen, zu, (Germ.), 246.
Abraham ibn Esra, 119.
Absalon, archbishop of Lund, 8.
Acaddmie des Jeux, 290, 274; editions
in Holland, 275.
Academies des jeux, 105, 107, 191, 259.
Accomodo (Ital.), 236.
Acconcio (Ital.), 236.
Accords, Etienne Tabourot des, 179.
Ace (Engl.), 279-280, 304, 366.
Acedrez(alcedrez, Span*)* ® iPf- ^ran-
de-acedrez).
A0alvar9ur, 23.
Addison, Joseph, 279, 285.
Adelung, Johann Christoph, 128.
Adietro, V (Ital.), 221.
•Adli, el, 172, 360.
Afbrengen (Dutch), 278.
Affidatus (Lat.), 210.
After-game, 285, 292, 298.
Agathias Scholasticus, 172, 229, 234.
Agricola, Johann, 256.
Ain helga (the holy riyer), 9.
AJedrez (Span.), 89, 90, 99.
Albert!, le nouvel, 113, 128, 148.
Alberti,* Leandro, 213.
Albo, 252.
Alcedrez, see Aoedrez.
Alchome, 126.
Alcmena, 234.
Alco 252.
Alea (p{. alese Ut), 80, 83, 84, 86, 87,
1(H, 171, 280 ; difference between
alea and aleae^ 87.
Aleator (Lat.), 81, 87.
Aleo, 252.
Alexander II., pope, 87.
Alexander VI., pope, 213.
Alexander the Great, 362.
Alferezza (Span.), 95.
Alfiere (Ital.), 4.
Ami (0. Engl.), 4, 54, 65.
Alfln (0. Engl.), 4, 54, 65.
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INDEX
Alfonso v., king of Aragon, 198.
Alfonso VI., king of Aragon, 198.
Alfonso X., the wise, king of Leon
and Castile 78, 87, 88, 94, 97, 98,
103, 104, 128, 147, 158, 160, 167-
168, 189, 191, 197-198, 201, 253, 255,
293, 299, 300, 342, 359.
iElfric (Orammaticus), abbot, 75.
Algorismus, 247, 334.
Alkotra (Icel.), 341^ 352.
All, alia (allor, Swed.), 313314, 315-
316, 320.
Aller, s'en, (Pr.), 181.
Allibone, Samuel Austin, 287.
AUir, allar, 511 (Icel.), 339, 348.
Allori, Angelo, 223.
Alms-ace (Engl.), 282.
Alphonsine codex, 87-89, 98-99, 144,
160, 167-168, 191, 197, 198, 201, 253-
255, 257, (extract) 299-300, 330, 363.
Alphyn (alphin), see alfln.
AlquCTque (Span.), 89, 98, 99, 100,
102, 108, 116, 120, 138, 144, 253-
254; etymology 103, 255; earliest
Arabic history, 255.
Alquerque de doce (doze), 99, 254.
Alquerque de nueve,.98, 254.
Alquerque de tres, 254.
Althing, 1, 7.
Alveolus (Lat.), 80.
Alveus (Lat.), 229.
Am's ace (Engl.), 282.
Ambassi (Ital.), 191, 214, 223, 239.
Ambes (0. Fr.), 215.
Ambesaas (0. Engl.), 190, 281.
Ambcsace, 281.
Arobesas (Fr.), 176, 180, 241, 266, 310,
319; etymology 190; popular in
English, 28L
Ambezatz (O. Fr.), 282
Ambi gli assi (Ital.), 235, 239.
Ambo (lUl.), 239.
Ambrosoli, Francesco, 113.
Ambs-ace, 281, 282.
Amelung, Friedrich, 132, 133.
Ames-ace, 281.'
Amesas (ambas as, ambas; B. S. <& C.
B. cod.), 206, 210.
Ammenhausen, Jakob von, 91.
Ammenhausen, Konrad von, 91.
Ammiral, king, 16.
Amundi jarl, 21.
Amys ase (O. Engl.), 281.
Anacharsis, Voyage d\ 177, 234.
Anderson, Joseph, 333.
Andresen, Hugo, 72.
Andr^sson, OuOmundur, (Qudmun-
dus Andrese), 43, 47.
Angolo di quiete (riposo, Ital.), 239.
Annaler for nordisk Oldkyndighed,
49, 156, 309, 343, 354.
Annals of gaming (1775), 288. '
Anne, queen of England, 35, 214.
Anno Boleyn, queen, 280.
Annual Register (1793), 291.
Anspach, Margravine of, see Craven,
Lady.
Antiquaries, Royal Society of Nor-
thern, see Royal Society of Nor-
thern Antiquaries.
Anton, Friedrich, 269.
Antonini, Annibal, 234.
Anweisung zum verkehren, 261-262.
Arabian Nights, 4.
Aramanthes (1733), 127.
Arason, GuBmnndur, bishop of H61ar,
(St. OuOmundur), 13-14, 342, 343,
Arason, Jdn, bishop of Hdlar, 142,
338, 345.
Archaeologia (1832), 156.
Archseoiogical Museum, Reykjavik,
4, 156, 167, 344, 347.
Archiv der spiele (1819-21), 129.
Ardachsher (ArdachsMr, Ardcshcr)
Babakan, king, 170, 171, 172.
Ardachshir (game), 169, 361.
Ardeshir (ardachshir), 171.
Arfll (Span.), 4.
Aristotle (Aristotile), 217-218.
Arnamagnsean Collection, 24, 29, 138,
143, 331, 336.
Arnamagnsean Commission, 334.
Arna Magnseus, ^^e MagnAsson, Ami.
Arnason, J6n, 138, 339, 346.
Arnaud, Giuseppe, 113.
Arngrimur, abbot, 1^ 343, 344.
Arnkell, 49.
Arndrsson, Kolbeinn ungi, 333-334.
Arons saga, 8.
Arras, Gantier d\ see Gautier.
Artaxerxes (Ardachshir), 169, 170.
Arthur, king, 77, 250.
Art Journal (1859), 161.
As (Icel., also &ss), 334, 337, 356 ; Asar
allir, 339, 348.
"Ac 242 279.
As (Lat.), 206, 210, 242; (Germ.) 241;
(Engl.), 279; (Dan.) 310; etymolo-
gy, 242, 279.
As (coin), 185.
As og daus (Icel.), 348.
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INDEX
367
As, tous les, (Fr.), 180.
Agalto (Span.), 101, 147, 152, 153, 156.
AschaflTcnburg, 251.
Ascham, Roger, 292.
AsdiB (Icel.), 337, ^18.
Ases (Span.), 194.
Ashton, John, 72, 79.
Asmundarson, Valdimar, 335.
Ass (Oerm.), 241.
Ass (Icel.), see As.
Ass (Swed.) 313, 316.
Assalto (Span.), 147, 151, 196.
Assaut (Pr.), 147, 151, 152.
Assissimi (Ital.), 235.
Asso (Ital.), 235, 239.
Atjan (Icel.), 343, 355.
Attains (Asiaticas), 252, 346.
Auchinleck MS., 77.
Aufgemaclite muhle (Germ.), 128.
Aufln (0. Fr.), 65.
Auga (Icel.), 336.
Augnatala (Icel.), 339.
Augustus, duke of Brunswick- Lune-
burg. 111.
Augustus Csosar, 83, 84.
Aukavinningar (Icel.), 341, 350.
Aums-ace (0. Engl.), 282.
Ausdoppeln, zu, (Germ.), 248.
Auspaschen, zu, (Germ.), 246.
Auswurfeln, zu, (Germ.), 246.
AveranI, J., 122.
Ayenblte of Inwyt, 77, 78.
Aysmes, Jean, 114.
Az {pi. azes. Port.), 197.
Azar (Port.), 195 ; (Span.), 253.
'ACapti, 307.
'ACapt, 171, 307.
Azar-pigado (Span.), 253.
Azzardo (ItaU), 82, 234, 308.
B., F. W., (translator), 2.
B., T., 125.
Baand (Dan.), 310.
Back, 283.
Back-game, 3, 79, 159, 283-2»4, 292, 363.
Backgammon, 79, 80, 86, 88, 90; ety-
mology, 157-159, 171 ; the historic
periods of, 173-174 ; French, 175-
191 (English in France, 183);
Spanish, 192-195; Portugese, 1»-
197 ; notes on back-gammon por-
tions of some old MSS, 197-216;
lUlian, 216-239; German, 239-
271 ; no history hitherto possible,
269; Dutch, 271-278; English, 278-
305 (etymology, 283; in old age,
293-294; method of play, 303-305);
in Slavic lands, Russian, Polish,
and Bohemian terms, 303-306;
Hungarian, 306 ; Greek, 307-308 ;
in Southern Mediterranean lands,
308-309; Danish, 309-311; Swedish,
- 312-331 (striking resemblance be-
tween Icelandic and Swedish, 316;
svenskt br&dspel, 320-328) ; neces-
sity of investigation in Norway,
328-329 ; whence it came to Ice-
land, 329; Icelandic, 338-353 (back-
gammon-proverbs, 339, 346-347;
formulas to win, 339, 346 ; method
of play, 339-341, 348-352; among
Icelandic students at Copenhagen,
351); when it came to Iceland,
356; origin and history, 359-363
(essential lines of investigation,
360).
Backgammon, a, 291, 305.
Backgammon, a pantomime charade
(1889), 305.
Backgammon, or the Battle of the
Friars (poem, 1734), 300-302.
Backgammon, Russian, 158, 266, 267,
285, 288, 293, 295, 303.
Backgammon, to, 291.
Backgammoned, 316.
Baculi (Lat.), 119.
Baggamon, 159, 2^.
Baidaq (Arab.), 56.
Baijut, see Bet.
Bak (Dutch), 277.
Bakjan (Swed.), 318.
Bakspel (Dutch), 277.
Baldovinatti, 205.
Baldurshagi <Balder's garden), 27-29.
Baldrac (C.B. cod.), 207, 208, 209, 210.
Balestro (Ital.), 221.
Ballerini, Brothers, 86.
Baltische Schachbliitter, 132.
Balzac, Honore de, 179.
Bambini (Ital.) 191, 238.
Band {jpU bande. Germ.), 259, 266, 267.
Band (j)/. bandon, Dutch), 274, 277.
Band (Swed.), 315, 318, 322, 323.
Bande (Pr.), 229.
Bar, 292.
Bar, to, 293.
Bar (= false die), 292, 293.
Baralie (B. M. cod.), 164, 166, 167, 208.
Barbauld, Mrs. Anna Letitia, 79.
Barberini, Library of Prince, 199, 201,
204, 360.
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366
INDEX
B&rbeyrac, Jeaa, 234, 235..
Barbier, Jo., 96.
Bard (0. Engl.), 293 (otymology).
BirOur, 15-16.
BaretU, Giuseppe Marc* Antonio, 225.
Barili (0. Fr.), 216.
Barjavel, C. P. H., 177.
Bar-point, 292.
Barred, 293.
Barthdlemy, Jean Jacques, abbd, 1T7,
234.
Bartinelli, Maurizio, 216, 218,233, 235.
Bartsch, Karl, 71, 73.
Basch (Germ.), 216.
Basset, 79, 283.
B&stya (Hung.), 65.
Battre k faux (Fr.), 182.
Bazzoni, Alessandro, 26.
Bear, to, 285, 289-290, 293, 304, 316.
Beaumont, Francis, 285.
Becher (Germ.), 259.
Bccq de Fouqi^res, Louis, 122, 230.
Beiiiie (Germ.), 132.
Bekor (Dutcli), 273, 277.
Bele, king, 25-28.
Beiagi, king, 228.
Belagernngsspiel (Germ.), 154.
Bcl&gringsspel (Swed.), 153.
Belejringspil (Dan.), 147, 156.
Bellini, Bernardo, 225.
Bonecke, Georg Friedrioh, 90.
Benedictis, Job. Jac. de, 211.
Benoit de Sainte-More, 72, 78, 113.
Bera lyrir, aU, (Icel.), 66.
Berggren, Jakob, 308.
BergI)6r8Son, GuOmundur, 40.
Berkeley, Lady Elisabeth, see Craven,
Lady.
Berlenc (0. Fr.), 249.
Bernard!, Andrea, 212-213.
Bernardo da Parigi, 171.
Berni, Francesco, 223, 224.
Berry, due do, 114.
Bert (Icel.), {cf. litla bert and stora
bert), 2, 6.
Besas (Fr.), 176, 190, 281.
Beset (Fr.), 180, 281, 319; etymology,
190.
Bet {pi. baijut, Arab.), 86, 160, 171.
Bethelas (C. B. cod.), 207, 209, 214.
Beurt (Dutch), 272.
Bezet (Fr.), 190, 241, 266, 310.
Bickelspiol (Germ.), 248.
Biera (Pol.), 306.
Bierka (Pol.), 306.
Bilderdijk, Willcm, 273.
Billberg, Gustaf Johan, author of
«' Handbibliothek fbr sallskapa-
nttien," 317.
Binda, att, (Swed.), 315.
Binding, 299.
Binio (Lat.), 241.
Binnenbak (Dutch), 277.
Bishop, 4, 94.
Biskup (Icel.), 2, 4, 38, 40, 49, 54, 61.
Biskupa s5gur, 7, 8, 14, 338, 339, 341,
343, 344.
Biskupsped (Icel.), 54, 56.
BJarnarson, Pall, 141, 343.
Bjdrkd, 312.
Bj5rn, 25-32.
BjOrnerode, E., 2.
Blackley, William Lewery, 27.
Blancandin, 73.
Blank (Fr.), 270.
Blasa bort, att, (Swed.), 154.
Blasen (Germ.), 305.
B160s6tt (Icel.), 3, 6.
BlOndal, LuQvik, 31-32.
Bl^ndal, Sigfiis, 38, 161.
Bloss (Germ.), 259.
Blot, 290 (origin), 291, 294, 299, 305.
Blot (Dan.), 310.
BlotU (Swed.), 315, 323.
Blotta, att, (Swed.), 315.
Blowth, 282.
Board, 70, 92.
Boccaccio, Giovanni, 71, 82.
Boddatafl (Icel.), 4.
BOOvarsson, t^orgils (skarOi), 12-13,
56.
Bonde (Swed.), 27, 315.
B6ndi (Icel.), 157.
Bonnivard, Fran^^ois de, 179.
Bonsenior ibn Ja'lija, 119.
Bonstetten, Charles Victor de, 179,
Bonus Socius, 97, 104, 105, 110, 113,
128, 199, 200 201, 212, 215.
Bonzurgemhlr (Burzurgmihr), 228.
Bord (Swed.), 315.
Bordado, Arnaldo, 196.
Borgia, Cesare, 212.
Bortslaa, at, (Dan.), 311.
Bossolo (Ital.), 228, 236.
Bosworth, Joseph, 74, 75, 92.
B6t61fur, bishop of H61ar, 1314, 53.
Bouf royal (Fr.), 254, 256.
Boveries, 299.
Boy's Own Book (1889), 141, 303-305.
Bracciolini, Francesco, 224.
Brachet, A., 85, 241, 256.
Brftde (Swed.), 315, 322, 328.
Digitized by
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INDEX
969
Bra49pel (Swed.), 312, 314, 315, 320-
329.
BiiidBpelsbiigare (Swed.), 313.
Br&dspelsbord (Swed.), 320, 322.
BragOa-Migus saga, see Migus saga.
Bramhall, John, archbishop, 282.
Brand, John, 74.
Brant, Sebastian, 251, 281.
Braet (Dan.), 310.
Br^I, Auguste, 122.
Bredoaiile (Fr.), 180-181, 190, 258, 268,
311.
BredouiUe, en, 181, 190.
Bredoaiile, grande, 176, 177, 181, 190.
BredouiUe, petite, 190.
. Bredoailler (Fr.), 190 (etymol.).
BreiOQ0rO, Sigur9ur, 29.
Bremen za Bey erstedt, Oerichts waiter
von, 265.
Bret (Germ.), 256.
Breton de los Herreros, Manuel, 192.
Bretspil (aerm.), 92.
Brettspiel (Germ ), 3, 7, 70, 178, 256,
259.
Brettspielstein (Germ.), 306.
BricJL (= man at games), 156.
Bricka (pi. brickor ; Swed.), 315, 316,
317, 318, 319, 320, 322, 323, 324, 325.
Briem, dlafur Gunnlaugsson, 41.
Brikke (Dan.), 310.
Brikkerund (Dan.), 310.
British Museum (MSS on Ubles), 161-
167, 191, 202, 212, 295.
Bro (Swed.), 319.
Brockhans Konversations-Lexikon,
256-257.
BrOgft (Icel.), bO, 57.
Bronzino, see Aliori, Angelo.
Brooke, Henry, 151.
Brouncker, Lord, 79.
Brouwer, P. A. S. Limburg, 273.
Brown, Tom, 284.
Bruder Rausch, 245.
Brug (Dutch), 277-278.
Brunet y Bellet, Jos^, 89, 90, 99, 101,
102, 147, 189, 201.
Brunor, 73.
Brut, 76, 191.
Bruun, Chr., librarian^ 53.
Bruun, Malte Conrad, 310.
Bruyn, Cornells de, 273.
Bryi^61f8d6ttir, RagnheiSur, 40.
Bry^julfsson, Gisli, 18.
Bi-yta, att, (Swed.), 315, 317.
Biial6g, 338, 345.
Buch der spiele (1900), 267-269.
Buf (or biif. Germ.), 88, 256, 257, 258.
Buf, la, (C. B. cod.), 207, 208, 209, 210.
Buf de as (du, terne, quaterne, cine,
sin), 210, 214, 257.
Biif. regal (Germ.), 256.
Buft. (Span.), 158, 206, 208, 255, 257.
Baf)8L cortesia, 88, 253, 255.
Bufia de baldrac, 88, 253, 255.
Buff (C. B. cod.), 214.
Buffa (B. S. cod.), 206.
Buffe (0. Fr.), 215.
Buffe des as (deus, tiernes, quaternes,
sines; O. Fr.), 216.
Buffo (Ital.), 257.
Bugge, Sophus, 47.
Buitenbak (Dutch), 277.
Bulenger, Julius Casar, 115, 119, 122.
145, 179.
Bund (Germ,), 259, 268.
Biirgerhucke (Germ.), 261.
Biirgerwinkel (Germ.), 261.
Burgmaier, Johann, 82, 85.
Burton, Robert, 303.
Bury, Richard de, 203.
Bushels, 117, 120.
Butler, Samuel, 282, 284.
Buuren, W. van., 277.
BtLzurgmihr (Vazurjmihr), vizier, 170,
228,229.
Byron, Lord, 179, 284.
Byskup, see biskup.
Cab (Span.), 88, 253.
Caballus (Lat.), 5.
Caccia (Ital.), 290.
Calcagnini, Cello, 84, 122, 171, 230.
Calculus (pZ. calculi, Lat.), 84, 229.
Camarzo (Ital.), 223.
Camden Society, the, 288.
Gampo (p^campi, IUI.),219, 221, 236.
Canis martins, 171.
Cannello (Ital.), 236.
Canterbury, 8.
Canterbury Tales, 77, 78.
C;antu, Cesare, 226, 227, 228, 231.
Canute the Great, king, 7, 9-10, 54,
56, 58, 332.
Canute V., king of Denmark, 10-11.
Capocohia (Ital.), 221.
Cardanus, Girolamo, 171.
Carducci, Giosu^, 226.
Carloman, emperor, 23.
Carme (pL carmes, Fr.), 176, 180,
(etymol.) 190-191, 241, 310.
(Barnes (Fr.), 190, 241.
47
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370
INDEX
Carrera, Pietro, 99, 100, 101, 103.
C&rry, to, 290.
Cartwrigbt, Peter, 88.
Cartwright, William, 286.
Casa (pL case, Ital.), 171, 220, 225,
227,238.
Casa (Port.), 197; (Span.) 254.
Casa de descan^o (Port.), 197.
Casa de repoaso (Port.), 197.
Casar (Port.), 197.
Caesar, C. Julius, 119.
casar, Julius, (pseudonym), 264.
Ctesar Octavianus (Riario), 211.
Casaubon, Isaac, 145.
Case, la, (Pr.), 178, 183.
Caselle (Ital.), 148.
Cashlan gherra (Irish), 121.
Cast (noun), 279.
Castiglione, Baldassare, 336.
Castle, 54, 65.
Castro (Cat.), 100, 101.
Catch-dolt {see also ketch-dolt), 286,
300.
Cater (0. Engl.), 280.
Caterpoint, 280.
Catertray, 280.
Catrang (Sansk.), 169.
Catter (0. Engl.), 280.
Caturanga (Sansk.), 169, 309.
Cavaliere (Ital.), 5.
Cavallo {pi, cavallos. Port), 5, 196.
Caxton, William, 4, 278, 280.
Caze (case) du cinq (Fr.), 176.
Caze (case) du diable (Fr.), 176.
Caze (case) de Tecolier (Fr.), 176.
Caze (case) fausse (Fr.), 176.
Cazes (cases) alternes (or rateau, Fr.),
176.
Cederschimd, Oustaf, 23, 143, 345.
Centlivre, Mrs. Susannah, 282.
Century Dictionary, 88, 118, 152, 195,
283-284, 285-286, 289, 292, 305.
Ceroar la liebre (Span.), 254.
Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de, 90.
Cessolis, Jacobus de, 59, 90, 278, 315.
Chambers, Ephraim, 293.
Chanson de Parise la duchesse, 73.
Chanson de Roland, 71.
Chanson du trictrac, 230.
Chaquete (Span.), 183, 188, 192-194;
etymology, 194.
Charlemagne {see also Karlamagnus),
243, 344.
Charles 1., king of England, 151, 286.
Charles IV., king of France, 235.
Charles V., emperor, 198.
Charles VI., king of Prance, 113.
Charles XII., king of Sweden, 301.
Chaucer, Qeoffirey, 3, 78, 96, 278, 279,
280,281.
Check, 5.
Checker-board, 93.
Checkers, 152.
Checkmate, 5.
Checkyr (O. Engl.), 80, 93.
Chekere (= chessboard), 77.
Che-loo (Chin.), 121.
Cheque (Port.), 196.
Chequers (checkers), 74, 93.
Cherubino, Giovanni Battista, 99.
Ches (0. Engl.), 77, 78.
Chess, 3, 19, 60, 345 ; in Iceland la
theXVIIIth century, 2-3; Icelandic
names of pieces and chess terms,
3-7, 43-61 ; tshen came to Iceland,
7-9; in the Sagas, 9-24; in Ice-
land in the XVIth and XVIIth
century, 3343 ; in the IXth cen-
tury (an Icelandic book on chess),
61-68; story about chess in Grims-
ey, 68-69; origin of Russian
cheas, 132-133; among Icelandic
students at Copenhagen, 351;
notes on origin and history of,
357-358.
Chess and Draughts, 92-97.
Chess bibliography. Northern, 311.
Chess Monthly, 1, 9, 25.
Chess-queen, 93.
Che8s-player*s Chronicle (1841), 156.
Chess-tables, 3.
Chesse (0. Engl.), 3, 77, 78, 80.
Chesses, 77.
Chester Plays, 278, 280.
Chevalier (Fr.), 5.
Child, Francis James, 279.
China (Ital.), 191, 238, 239.
Chiuso (Ital.), 239.
Chosrau Andsharvan, king, 169.
Chosroes, see Chosrau.
Chouette, trictrac k la, (Fr.), 182.
Christie, John, 122, 145.
Christina, queen of Scandinavia (the
Union of Kalmar), 314.
Cibber, Coiley, 79, 159.
Cicero, M. Tuliius, 229.
Cicognini, Andrea Giacinto, 224.
Cioognini, Jacopo, 224.
Cine (cinques, cinque, C. B. cod.), 206,
210.
Cinciacos (Span.), 103.
Cinco (Span.), 255.
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INDSX
371
Cinka (pi. cinkor, Swed.), 313, 321.
Cinqua (Swed.), 313.
Cinque (Germ.), 241 ; (Engl.) 279-280,
304.
Cinquina (Ital.), 235.
Citolini, Alessandro, 223.
Givis Bononise, 97, 104, 105, 128, 201-
214, 220, 360.
Claassdn, Peder, see Friis, Peder
Claasstfn.
Clemencin, Diego de, 90.
Cleveland, John, 282.
Click-clack, 126, 128.
CocheriB, Hippolyte, 204.
Cochonnet (Fr.), 183.
Codex Exonianas, 74.
Codille (Dutch), 278.
CodruB, 242.
Coelho, Adolpho, 187, 195.
Coin de repos (Fr.), 184, 317, 326.
Collegio di Spagna, 198.
Colon na. Guide, 78.
Colours of morris men, 254.
Columbus, Christopher, 89.
Comparetti, Domenico, 122, 174-175,
231.
Compleat Angler and Compleat Ga-
mester, 287.
Compleat Gamester, 88, 151, 159, 188,
259, 260, 282-283, 284, 285, 286,
290, 291, 292, 303, 329; its biblio-
graphy 287-288; backgammon sec-
tion of 1754, 295-300.
Componho (Port.), 197.
(Conning- piece, 74.
Constantinople, 345.
Constitutiones, 80.
Continuation, 270.
Contrabuff (Germ.), 254, 256.
Contraenvite (Span.), 194.
Contrajan (Germ.), 261 ; (Dan.), 311.
Contre-jan (Fr.), 189.
Contre-Jan de deux tables (Fr.), 181.
Contre-jan de m^s^as (Fr.), 176, 181.
Contro-jan (Ital.), 239.
Copernicus, N., 84.
Copo de couro (Port), 196.
Copped-crown, 100, 121.
Coppiati (JUL), 220.
Ck>rneiUe, Thomas, 188.
Cornet (Fr.), 279.
CornwalUs, Sir William, 285.
Corriere (Ital.), 239.
Corsini, Bartolommeo, 224.
Corvinus, Gottlieb Sigmund, 127.
Cosimo 1., duke of Tuscany, 200.
Cotgrave, Handle, 80, 119, 123, 188,
190, 282, 285, 286.
Cotta, Lazzaro Agostino, 219.
Cotton, Charles, original editor of
*• Compleat Gamester," 259, 287-
288.
Coureil, de, 228.
Courier (Fr.), 183.
Courlr la poule (Fr.), 176, 184.
Courrier-spiel (Germ.), 91, 92.
Court Gamester, 288.
Covarrubias, Sebastian, 102, 120.
Cowper, William, 225, 290.
Crane, Thom^ Fredrick, 243.
Cravatte (Fr.), 177.
Craven, Lady, 232.
Crop, John, 302.
Crux (Lat), 105.
Cuadernas (Span.), 194.
Cuatros (Span.), 194.
Culin, Stewart, 74, 122.
Cupes (0. Engl.), 278.
Currier-schach (Germ.), 92.
Cursor Mundi, 77.
Cynk (0. Engl.), 281.
Cynningstan (A. S.), 74.
Cyril, Saint, 119.
Cyrus, king of Persia, 149.
Da5ason, J6n, 346.
Dade al-nerd, 171.
Dado {pi. dadi, Ital.), 71, 84, 86, 223,
228, 234.
Dado (pi. dados. Span.), 98, 194-
195.
Dados (Port.), 195.
Dadus (Lat.), 70, 84, 171.
Dam (Swed.), 154; (Dutch), 271.
Dama (Ital.), 95, 106.
Dama (Russ.), 306.
Damare (Ital.), 228.
Damas (Span.), 93, 95, 100, 120; (Port.),
196.
Damas de honor (Port.), 197.
Dambrett (Germ.), 93.
Dambrikke (Dan.), 310.
Dambrod (Scotch), 96.
Dame (Germ.), 93.
Damenbret (Germ.), 127.
Damenspiel (Germ.), 95.
Dames (Fr.), 95, 176.
Dames avall^es (Fr.), 171.
Dames rabattues (Fr.), 171, 177, 184,
188, 235, 239, 255, 300, 342, 353.
Damespiel (Germ.), 93, 99.
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372
INDEX
Damino (DamUnus), Pietro, bishop,
86, 87, 358.
Damiano (the Portugese), 86.
Damka (Rubs.), 906.
Damm (Dan.), 96.
Dammen (Dutch), 271.
Dammen (Germ.), 257.
Damschijf (Dutch), 272.
Damspil (Dan.), 96.
D4in dismal) ur (Icel.),,354.
D4ndima0ur (Icel.), 354.
Dindimannstafl {also D&numannstafl,
Icol.), 343, 352, 354 355.
Dangeau, Mme. de, 179.
Dannemand (Dan.), 354.
Dante Alighierl, 82, 198.
D&numal^ur (Icel., see also Litli d&nu*
maBur and St6ri d&nnmaQur), 354,
355.
D4numannstafl {also D^ndimannstafl,
Icel.), 343, 354-:»5.
Daqq (Arab.), 308.
Darell, 78.
Darmesteter, Ars^ne, 186. 189.
Darys (Arab.), 255.
Datua (Lat.), 71.
Datz (Prov.), 72.
Daus (Germ.), 241-242; (Dan.), 310; ety-
mology, 242.
Daus {also dauss, Icel.), 3:)4, 337, 339,
347, 348, 356.
Dausz (Germ.), 241.
Dauszes (Germ.), 245.
DaviOsson, 6lafur, 20, 39-40, 56, 138,
140-141, 142, 156, 338, 347-355.
Davies, Rowland, 288.
W (Fr.), 71.
Wbredouiller (Pr.), 258. .
Dee {pi. dees, 0. Engl.), 278, 279.
Deguileviile, see Gnileville, G. de.
Dekker, Thomas, 79, 289, 293.
Del^n, Carl Erik, 313.
Delille, Jacques, 228, 230, 231.
Delingslist (Dan.), 311.
Delphin {pU delphins. Port.) 196.
Demi-caze (Fr.), 176.
Des (0. Engl.), 278.
IWs (Pr.), 71.
Deschampes, Eustache, 113.
Deschapelles, Le Breton, 96.
Desjardins, Mme., see Villedieu,
Mme. de.
Destruction of Troy, 78, 95.
Deuce (Engl.), 279-280, 304, 337, 356.
Deus (B. S. & C. B. cod.), 206, 210;
(Engl.), 280; (O. Fr.), 337.
Deutsche Schaohzeitung, 121, 360.
Deux (0. Pr.), 280, 356.
Dewes (0. Engl.), 280.
Dey (0. Engl.), 278.
Deyses (0. Engl.), 282.
Dez (0. Fr.), 71, 278.
Diagramismos, 178.
Diagrammismus, 100, 101* 228.
Diccionario enciclopedico Hispano-
americano, 192-193.
Dice, 58, 71, 75, 79, 81, 83, 191, 278;
in Sweden, 312; in Iceland 331-
338, 346.
Dice, to, 247.
Dice-box, 74, 75, 92, 279.
Dice-combinations: real and peroep-
j tible, 321-323.
Dice-games, 191.
Dice-pips, 279-282.
I Dice-proverbs, Icelandic, 837.
i Dicing, 78-79.
Dick-dack (Germ.), 254.
Dickedack (Germ.), 158, 256.
Dicked&cket (Garm.), 256.
Dickens, Charles, 291.
Die, see dice.
Dieterioh, see Tbeodoric.
Dieux (deux), tous les, (Fr.), 176.
Diplomatarium Norvegicum, 53.
Dis (loel.), 337, 339, 348.
Dise (0. Engl.), 281.
Dobbel (Dan.), 309, 310, 334, 335.
Dobbel (Dutch), 272, 277.
Dobbel (Swed.), 313, 314.
Dobbela (0. Fris.), 247.
Dobbelaar (Dutch), 272.
Dobbelaarg (Dutch), 272.
Dobbelaarster (Dutch), 272.
Dobbelbeker (Dutch), 272.
I Dobbelbord (Dutch), 272.
! Dobbelbroder (Dan.), 309.
Dobbelen (Dutch), 272.
Dobbelhoorn (Dutch), 272.
Dobbelkrues (Dutch), 272.
Dobbelsteen (Dutch), 272, 277.
Dobbeltafel (Dutch), 272.
Dobbla (Swed.), 247, 313, 314.
Dobblare (Swed>., 313.
Dobblerska (Swed.), 313.
Doble (Dan)., 247, 809, 310.
Doblelag (Dan.), 309.
Doblelaug (Dan.), 309.
Dobler (Dan.), 309.
Doblet (game; Alph. cod.), 87, 88,
1^, 254, 299L300, 342.
Doblia (O. Fris.), 247.
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INDEX
373
Docadiglium (Ital.), Hi.
Dodici (Ital.), 191, »3,
Doeblot (Dutch), 277.
Doited, 300.
Domina (Lat.), 95.
Domus (Lat), 206, 210.
Donadiu y Puignan, Delfln, 187, 189,
194.
Donaldson, 78.
Doppeldoublette (Germ.), 261.
Doppeler (Germ.), 247.
Doppelmuhle (Germ.), 107, 130.
Doppeln, zu, (Germ.), 247-248, 334.
Doppelwurf (Germ.), 245.
Doppelzwei (Germ.), 270.
Doppiottl (Ital.), 235, 237-238.
Double deux (Fr.), 180, 266.
Doublet (Fr.), 258.
Doublet (pL doubletter, Dan,), 311.
Doublets (game), 80, 88, 159, 171, 286,
288, 299-300, 342, 353, 356.
Doublette (Germ.), 266.
Douce, Francis, 88, 295.
Dous (Germ.), 241.
Dozy, Reinliart, 5, 255.
Draft, see draughts.
Drag (Swed.), 96.
Draghtes (0. Engl.), 78, 95,
Draughts, 3, 4, 57, 74,90, 97, 100, 119 ;
origin of, 93-95; early treatises
on, 93, 95; in Iceland, 96; Rus-
sian, 305; origin and whence it
came to Iceland, 358.
Draughts, Polish, 96, 196.
Drengenes egen bog (1868), 141.
Drepa, a5, (Icel.), 66, 340.
Drepskik (Icel.), 66.
Dres (Germ.), 241, 242.
Drie (Germ.), 249.
Drie (Dutch), 272.
Driehock (Dutch), 277.
Driestlken (Dutch), 133.
Driestrtcken (Dutch), 120.
Drinks, 300, 303.
Droste, Ck)enrad, 272.
Dr6ttkv»tt (dr6ttqv8Btt), 33-34.
Drottning (Icel.), 2, 4, 48, 49, 54, 61.
Drottningarm&t (Icel.), 6.
DrottningarpeD (Icel.), 54, 56.
Dryden, John, 281, 290, 293.
Du (G. B. cod.), 210.
Dubbel (dubbelen, Dutch), 272, 277.
Dubbel-qyarn (Swed.), 137.
Dubbla, att, (Swed.), 247.
Dubbla (Swed.), 316.
Dubblen (Hoist, dial.), 247.
Dubblet (pi. dubbletten, Dutch), 272.
Dubblet (Engl.), 283.
Dubl (Icel.), see Dull.
Dubla (Icel.), see Dufla.
Dubletter (Swed.), 314.
Ducange, Sieur Charles Dufresne, 61,
73, 80, 114.
Duces, 281.
DuetU (Ital.), 235. .
Duetti (lUl.), 191, 238.
Dufl (Icel.), 334, 335, 336, a^.
Dufla, aS, (Icel.), 247, 339.
Duflan (Icel.), 331.
Duflari (Icel.;, 339.
Duini (Ital.), 191, 223, 282.
Duino (lUl.), 214.
Duodecim scripU, 171, 173, 197, 360,
362.
Duodena scripta, 177, 178, 228.
Duos (C. B. cod.), 210.
Du Paget, Mile R., 26.
Duplan (Icel.), see Duflan.
Dupelmulen (Germ.), 120.
Duplus (Lat.), 247.
Durer, Albrecht, 82.
D'Urfey, Thomas, 284.
Dus (Swed.), 313, 316, 330.
Dusen (dusar) par (Swed.), 313, 316,
321.
Dutu (Sansk.), 172.
Dycke, 291.
Dyse (0. Engl.), 78, 80, 95, 281.
Earlb, John, 286.
Early English Text Society, 77, 78.
EatvarSur konungur, see Edward.
Echard, Laurence, 291.
^cole (Fr.), 176, 178, 180, 319.
Echiquler, en, (Fr.), 186.
Ecke (Germ.), 259.
Bcrire, trictrac «i, (Fr.), 176, 182, 184,
319.
Edda, Elder, (Ssamundar Edda), 1, 8,47.
Edgeworth, Maria, 288.
ESlarson, Pdttleifur, 11.
Edward (confessor), king of Eng-
land, 10.
Edward IV., king of England, 175.
Edward VI., king of England, 88,
286.
Egilssott, SyeinbJOrn, ^, 49, 50, 337.
Egyszem (Hung.), 306.
Eichstorff, P. L. F. G. von, 26.
.Einarsson, H&lfd&n, 836.
Einarsson, J6n, 334.
Digitized by
Google
374
INDEX
Eingelskt tickiack (Icel.), 341, 352.
Eiriksson, J6n, 2, 47.
Eirikur, archbishop of Throndtgem, 8.
EU, 242, 279.
Elephant, 4, 54.
Elis saga ok R6samandu, 17, 73.
EUefin (Icel.), 340, 348.
EUideilar, 141.
Ellis, F. S., 243.
ElU stelpur, a5, (Icel., game), 341,
342-343, 352, 353-354.
Embden, Ephraim van, 95.
Emperadop (Span.), 87, 88, 253.
Encydop^die m^hodique, 228.
Encyklop&die der spiele, 209-271.
Enfilade (Fr.), 264, 270.
Engelmann, Emil, 26.
English tictac, 352.
Enter, to, 305.
Entrare'(Ital.), 221.
Entry table, 295.
Ephodseus, see Prophiat Daran.
EptirkOst (Icel.), 341.
Equinal (Span.), 88, 253.
Braklias (a poem), 243. ,
Eric III. Ploaghpenny (Plovpenning).
king of Denmark, 11-12, 249.
Brlingsson, ^orstelnn, 139, 141.
Ermenga, queen, 23.
Erodoto, see Herodotus.
Es (Germ.), 241.
Es (pU esser, Dan.), 310.
Escaques (Span.), 88, 254.
Esc^s (0. Fr.), 71.
Eschac (0. Fr.), 194.
Eschacs (0. Fr.), 71.
Eschas (0. Fr.), 73.
Eschays (Prov.), 72.
Eschas (0. Fr.), 71, 72, 120.
Eschez (0. Fr.), 71.
Eschiquiers (0. Fr.), 114.
Esci^s (0. Fr.), 73.
Escorial, 87, 98, 191, 192, 198, 253.
Eskes (0. Fr.), 73.
Eskies (0. Fr.), 73.
Eso (Boh.), 304.
Ess (Germ.), 241.
Ess, see Ass (Swed.).
Esse (Germ.), 241, 249.
Essen par (Swed.), 321. ^
Estienne, 115.
Eszlingen, Schnlmeister von, 158, 256.
Etherege, Sir George, 285.
Etienne (Stephanius), Henri, 81.
EtU (Swed.), 313.
Exeter MS., 74.
Eymundus (Amundl), 23.
B^yrbyggja saga, 49.
Eyvttr, 347.
Fabbib, 301-302.
Facciolati, Giacomo, 234.
Fagiuoli, Giovanni Batista, 224.
Failes (fayles), 88, 255, 295.
Faikener, B., 122.
Fallas (Span.), 87-88, 253, K>5. 295.
Palle, ale, (0. Fr.), 216.
Pallum, ad, (Lat), 210, 214.
Falso, in, (lUl.), 221.
: Filt (Swed.), 315, 819, 320,
F<, Oppet, (Swed.), 317.
Fantacci, 199-200.
; F&r (Swed.), 153, 359.
F»ra, ad, (Icel.), 66.
i Faereyjar {cf, Feroe), 36.
I FsringarUfl (Icel.), 142, 143, 352.
I Fwrltafl (Icel.), 141, 142, 143.
Fars-och morsband (Swed.), 315, 324,
327.
F&stningsspel (Swed.), 153-154.
Fayles, 88, 167, 159, 256, 286; ety-
mology, 159; method of play, 295.
Faylis, 88, 164.
Faylys, 164, 166, 167, 295.
Feast of St Michel, 9.
Feld (felt, Dan.), 310, 311.
Femma (Swed.), 313.
Femmen, femmer (Dan.), 310.
Feo, Giacomo, 212.
Ferdinand II., king of Castile, 89.
Feretti, Nicola, 211, 212.
Ferid (Pers.), 171.
Feroe (F»rde), 35-36.
Fers, 20, 60, 93, 95.
Ferstrendur (Icel.), 352.
Festschrift (of Academic Chess Club,
Munich), 104.
Festungs- und belagernngsspiel
(Germ.), 152-153.
Fichets (Fr.), 176, 180.
Ficoroni, Francesco de, 122, 230.
Fielding, Henry, 282.
Fierabras (a romance), 72, 73.
Fierge, 60.
Fil, 4, 54.
Filar (Icel.), see Fill. ^
Filelfo, Francesco, 211.
Filetto (ItaL), 105, 106, 107, 108, 110.
Fill (pf. filar, Icel.), 61, 64-65.
Filo (lUL), 106, 108.
Filo-mulino (lUl.), 106.
Digitized by
Google
INDEX
375
Fimm (Icel.), 337, 339, 348.
Fimum (Lat. ?), 279.
Fingerspiel (Oerm.), 265.
FiDson, Hannes, 53.
Finsen, Yilhj&lmur, 331, 336.
Firdau^ (Firdtlsi), 170, 172, 229, 361.
Firen (Dan.), 310,
Fischart, Johannes, 247.
Five penny moris, 117.
FjOrbaugsgarQur (Icel.), 331, 336.
Fj6rir (Icel.), 356.
FJdsamaSur (Icel.)i 343, 354.
Flateyjarb6k, 318.
Flecha (Port.), 197.
FUche (Fr.), 176.
Fleming, Charlesi 189.
Fleming, Paul, 132, 257.
Fletcher, John, 285.
Florio. John, 280, 282, 290.
F16vent, 142.
Fiaventsaga, 142, 143.
Flyers, 299.
Fly«a, att, (Swed.), 317.
Foix, Gaston de, duke of Nemours,
213.
Fool's mate, 6.
Forbes, Duncan, 92.
Force, 267.
Porcellini, Egidio, 87.
FOrkast (Swed.), 318.
Forkeering, see ForkOBring.
Forkjoering, see Forkoering.
ForkOBring (Dan.), 171, 188, 310, 343,
355.
Forkosringur (Icel.), 341, 343, 350, 352,
355-356.
Fornaldarsttgur NorOurlanda, 24, 54.
Fornmanna sdgur, 11, 336.
Forns^gur SuOurlanda, (17), 23, 344,
345. *
FOrster, W., 73.
Fortaka, a5, (Icel.), 343, 349, 355.
Foscolo, Ugo, 232.
Fobs, H., 26.
Fou (Fr.), 65.
Fountaine, Sir Andrew, 214.
Fountaine codex. 111, 200, 214-216,
360.
Fournival, Richard de, 203.
Fox-and- geese, 3, 101, 107, 138, 140,
144, 146-156 (the board, 147, 152) ;
Italian, 148-149; French, 149-151;
English 151-152; German 152-
153; Swedish, 153-154; IceUndic,
154-156; origin and history, 359.
Fox-and -goose, 156.
Franklin's Tale, 78.
Franz- Josephs Qord, 15.
Franz, Robert, 201.
Frawenspiel (Germ.), 256.
Freccia (Ital.), 237, 238, 239.
Frederick II, emperor, 80, 81, 198, 250.
Frederick V., king of Denmark, 2.
Freidank, Meister, 244, 251.
Freta, a5, (Icel.), 20, 60,
Fretstertuma (Icel.), 20, 45, 56, 60.
Freystafl (Icel.), 4, 142, 143, 156.
Frezza (lUl.), 235.
Fridor, proprietor of a "maison de
jeu," 191.
Fri5})Jdferimur, 30-31.
Fri5pJ6fe8aga, 25, 27, 30, 58.
Friga, juego de la, (Span.), 253.
Friis, Peder ClaussOn, 34-35.
Frisiag (Swed.), 330.
Frithiof (Fri5pj<ifur), 25-32.
Frithiof plays chess, 27-28.
Frithio& saga, 25-26.
Fritillum (Lat), 74, 279.
Frltillus (Lat), 171, 229.
Fritt spel (Swed,), 317, 318.
Fritzner, Johan, 20, 58-61, 143, 337.
Fro8tupingsl5g, 331, 334.
Fr6 (Icel.), 2, 4, 48, 61.
Fruarmit (Icel.), 3, 6.
Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft, 246.
Frue (Dan.), 49.
Fuchs im hiihnerhof (Germ.), 146, 152.
Fuchs und die ganse (Germ.), 152.
Fuchs-und hiihnerspiel (Germ.), 146,
152-153.
FuBryttumit (Icel.), 20, 60.
Fullspel (Swed.), 319.
FuUums, 284.
Fureti^re, Antoine, 234.
Furnivall, Frederik James, 77.
Fyra (Swed.), 313, 316.
Galbnus, Claudius, 217.
Galtason, GuQmundur, 337.
Gamfto (Port.), 90, 187, 195, 307.
Gamara, 172.
Gamen (M. Engl.), 158, 283.
Gamester, see Gompieat Gamester.
Gammen (M. Engl.), 158, 283.
Gammon, 90, 158, 188, 235, 239, 255,
258, 265-266, 267, 270, 178, 283, 293,
Gammon, a, 291, 305.
Gammon, to, 291.
Gamon, see Gammon.
Gandrei5, 346.
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376
INDEX
O&nsespiel (Qerm.), 157.
Ganzeapeel (Datch), 157.
Qaranguet(Pr.), 178, 182, 188, 235,238,
255, 258, 267-288, 270, 320.
Gautier, 71.
Gautier d* Arras, 243.
Gayangos, Pascal de, 253.
Gebunden (Germ.), 259.
Gegqnpuf (Germ.), 158, 256.
Gelli, J., 107, 239.
General-pasch (Germ.), 245, 268.
Genlis, Mme. de, 189.
Gens (Pr. for Jan), 189.
Gentleman's Magazine (1800), 292.
Geoflhrey of Monmouth, 76.
George 1., king of England, 35.
George II., king of England, 214.
Gerard de Rouissillon, 72.
Gest historiale of the destruction of
Troy, 78, 95.
Geste d* Alexandre, 71.
Gettons (Fr.), 120.
Gherhardini, Giovanni, 106, 1«7, 225.
Giacchetto (Ital.), 188, 233, 2:)5, 239.
, Gianuzio, Horatio, 99.
Gildemeister, Johann, 5.
Giles, J. A., 77.
Giles, Saint, in Ilan/, 8.
Gilles, vie de St., 114.
Giovanni d*Andrea, 84.
Girard de Roussilon, 72.
Giratz de Rossilho, 72.
Girella (Ital.), 229.
Gislason, Konr&5, 47, 48, 50, 141, 337,
338.
Giuoclii di nga (Ital.), 99, 100.
Giuoco delLa volpe (Ital.), 148.
Giuoco di muiino (Ital.), 106.
Giuoco di smerelli (Ital.), 106.
Give away (game), 96.
Gizur Jarl, see I^orvaldsson, Gizur.
GleiDarm&t (Icel.), 56, 66.
Glion, 8.
Gloriant, daughter of king Ammi-
ral, 16.
Go-bang (Jap.), 146, 269.
GoOatofl (Icel.). 57, 143, 338, 341, 352.
Gddel, Vilhelm, 44.
Godfrey of Bouillon, 89.
Go5i (Icel.), 338.
Golden Horns, the, 309.
Goldsmith, Oliver, 291.
Golius, Jacobus, 120.
Gollancz, Israel, 75.
Gomen (M. Engl.), 283.
GooUen (Dutch), 272.
Goose-play, 157.
Gorra, Egidio, 73.
Gosse, Edmund, 52.
GOtiska F5rbuadet, 26.
Gotter, Friedrich Wilhelm, 246.
Gottfiried von Strassburg, 17.
Goudie, Gilbert, 333.
Gower, John, 279.
Grac w kostki (Pol.), 304.
Gr&g&s, 331, 335, 336, 338.
Gramma (Lat.), 100, 101.
Grammismus (Lat), 100, 101.
Grand Jan (Fr.), 175, 180-181, 190.
Grand trictrac (Pr.), 175, 184, 260-261,
266-267, 285, 286, 288; method of
play, 296-298.
Grande acedrez (Span.), 88, 253.
Grande bredouille (Fr.), 176, 177, 181,
190.
Grande encyclop^die, 240,
Granguet (Fr.), 258.
Gravenborg, Wirnt von, see Wirnt.
Greco, Gioachlno, 99, 199.
Greenland, 14-16.
Gregorovius, Ferdinand, 86.
Gregory of Toulouse, 85.
Grettir (Asmundarson), 335, 336.
Grettis saga, 156, 335, 336.
Grimm, Jakob, 128, 158, 245.
Grimmeishausen, Hans von, 246.
Grlmsey, a legend about chess in.
Grimsson, J6sef, 61.
Grda, wife of Gizur jarl, 12-13.
Gr5ndal, Benedikt (the younger), 50.
Gronovius Jakob, 122.
Grosse Jan, der, (Germ.), 266.
Grundtvig, Sven, 17.
Gruter, Johannes, 230.
Guarino, Maddalena, 213.
Guarino (Guarinus), Paolo, 201, 211*
213.
Gudbrand bishop, see I^orl&ksson,
Gu5brandur, bishop.
GuOini Jarl tjlfnadrsson, 10.
Gu9mundar saga d^ra, 345.
Gu9mundar saga g65a, 13-14.
GuBmundsson Sigur5ur, 4, 156, 338,
342, 344, (347), 353.
Gu5mundur, see I^orvaldsson, Gu6-
mundur d:^i.
GuDmundur (of Glasisvellir), 24.
GuVmundur, Saint, see Arason, Gu5«
mandur.
Guerini, see Guarino.
Guess, Joachim Michael, 2.
Digitized by
Google
INDEX
377
Quessard, F., 73.
Guicciardioi, Luigi, 199-200.
Guileville, GuilLaume de, 114.
Guinicelli, Guido, 198.
Guirguiesca (Span.), 253.
Guirini, see Guarino.
GulapingBldg, 247, 334.
Galip6riB saga, 49.
Gampelzheimer, Georg, 256.
Gannar (of Greenland), 15-16.
Guy of Warwick, 77.
GyOa, daughter of GuOini Jarl, 10.
Gy6a, sister of Ulfur jarl, 10.
ToXXoc, 171.
Habn, Alban von, 145, 152, 241, 267,
271.
H&kon the good, Haraldsson, king of
Norway, 334.
H&kon the old, H&konsson, king of
Norway, 18, 17.
Halatafl (Icel.), 58, 156.
Hale, Thomas, 290.
Halfdans Sdner, 81.
Hall, Hubert, 78.
Hall, John, 303.
Hallam, Henry, 223.
Hallddrsson, Benedikt, 33.
Halldbrsson, Bjdrn, 46, 47, 55, 337,
343, 348.
Hallgrimsson, J6nas, 37.
Haelungi (loel.), 343, 354.
Hamel, van, 114.
Hampden, John, 170.
Hand-bibliothek fSr sailskaps-nOJen
(1839), 122, 137, 153, 317.
Handbook of Games (1890), 290, 291.
Handling Sin, 77.
Harald, jarl of the Orkneys, 8.
Harald (Guftinason), king of Eng-
land, 10.
Harald har»r«Ji, SigurtJsson, king of
Norway, 15.
Haravyaya (a poem), 168.
Harboe, Ludvig, bishop, 53.
Hardioanute (HOrtJaknutur), 9.
Hare-hunt, 98.
Haretavl (harespil, Dan.), 157.
Haromszem (Hung.), 306.
Harrowing of Hell, Tho, 190, 281.
Hast (Swed.), 4.
Hatzfeid, Adolph, 186, 189.
Haufen, der, (Germ.), 270,
Haus (Germ.), 260.
Haussddrffer, 241.
Hayn, Gottfried, 264.
Hazard, 82, 248, 253, 278, 279, 308.
Hazardours, 278.
Hazardspil (Dan.), 335.
Hazarth (Hezar), 248.
Hei9reks saga, see Hervarar saga.
HeimaborO (Icel.), 339, 348.
Heimam&t (Icel.), 3, 6, 56, 66.
Heimskringla, 9, 10, 333.
Heimskringla (Icelandic paper in Win-
nipeg), 336.
Heinrich, Carl, 313.
Heldri menu (Icel.), 66.
Helga river, se4 Ain helga.
Helgason, Ami, 349.
Helgason, Helgi, 61.
Helgi, king, son of Bell, 25.
Helgisetur, 14.
Helling, Hans, 264, 266-267.
Helt, Vilhelm, 310.
Henisch, Georg, 247-248.
Hem (Swed.), 316, 322.
Hemifr&n (Swed.), 322, 324.
Hemingsson, T61i, 11.
Hemspel (Swed.), 316, 317, 319, 324, .
327.
Henneberger, 247.
Henrietta Maria, queen of England,
151.
Henry II., king of England, 10.
Herauspaschen, zu, (Germ.), 246.
Hermes Trismegistus, 228, 234.
Hermundur, 344.
Herodotus, 234.
Herold und Wahlstab, publishers,
265.
Heros, Johann, 244.
Hervarar saga, 2, 24, 54, 56, 58.
HervarlJur, 24.
Hervey of Alton, Mrs., 292.
Hesychius of Alexandria, 81, 171.
Heydebrand und der Lasa, Tassilo
von, see Lasa, T. v. H. u. d.
Heywood, John, 289.
Hildebrand, Hans Olof H., 312.
Hildebrandus, cardinal, 87.
Hilding (Hildingur), 25-32.
Hlldur, 31.
Himly, Karl, 309, 360.
Hirtungur, jarl, 18, 45, 56.
Hising (an isle), 332, 333, 348.
History of Beryn, The, 281.
Hit, a» 290-291, 305.
Hit, to, 290-291, 305.
Hj&lmsviQarr, 11.
Hjaltalin, J6n A., 333.
Digitized by
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378
INDEX
Hneftibort (Icel.), 16.
Hnefatafl (Icel.), 2, 3, 4, 16, 25, 30,
31, 44, 48, 54, 57, 58, 69, 70, 97,
143, 145, 146, 156, 258, 312, 329,
345, 356.
Hnefatafla (Icel.), 156.
Hnefl (Icel.), 48, 50, 58, 258.
Hneftafl (Icel.), 4, 15-16, 49, 50, 57, 58,
156.
Hneftafla (Icel.), 50.
Hnettafl (Icel.>, 3, 4, 49, 154, 155, 156,
312, 345, 356.
Hnettafla (Icel.), 58.
Hnottafl (Icel.), 3, 4, 154, 155, 156, 157.
Hobbes, Thomas, 190, 282.
Hoek (Dutch), 277.
Hoffmann, Konrad, 72.
Hoffmanswaldau, Christian Hofman
von, 246, 256.
H61ar (HdlastaSur), 13-14, 33, 69.
Holger Danske, 16.
Holstein Chronicle, 249.
Holz (Germ.), 259, 268.
Hombre, \\ 259, 260, 262, 263, 264.
Homer, 234.
Hone, William, 124.
Hop-scotch (merelle), 103, 106, 111, 112.
H5r9aknutnr, see Hardicanute.
HOrgirdalur, 333.
Herman, William, 280.
Horn (Swed.), 315.
Hornasksekja (Icel.), 343, 354.
Hornaskella (Icel.), 342, 343, 354.
Howell, James, 159, 284, 285.
Hoyle, Edmund, 259, 288.
Hoyle, 107, 151 ; Hoyle's Games 259,
289.
Hozoon, C, 275.
Hrafns saga Sveinbjarnarsonar, 8.
Hraukur (Icel.), 49.
Hra V kostky (Boh.), 304.
Era ve vrhcaby (Boh.), 306.
Hringur, see Ring, king.
Hr6iskelda, see Roskilde.
Hr6k8kipta, a^, (Icel.), 66.
Hr6kskipti (Icel.), 61, 62-63, 66.
Hr6ksmAt, (Icel.), 6, 20, 45, 55, 56.
Hr6kspe5 (Icel.), 56.
Hr6k8vald (Icel.), 47, 48, 50, 55, 57.
Hr6kur (Icel.), 2, 4, 44, 45, 48, 49, 50,
54, 55, 56, 61.
Hr61Air, 19.
Hucke (Germ.), 259, 260, 266, 267.
Huff, to, 305.
Hugo von Trimberg, 244.
Huk (Germ.), 258.
Huk (Dan.), 311; (Swed.), 317, 319,
323, 326, 327.
Huke (Germ.), 259.
Hund og barer (Dan.), 157.
Huni (Icel.), 157.
Hunn (Icel.), 58.
Hub (Swed.), 315, 316, 317, 326, 327.
Husrum (Swed.), 317.
Huus (bus, Dan.), 311.
Hvammur (in BreiUifjttrtJur), 343.
Hvilovr&n (Swed.), 319.
Hyde, Thomas, 96, 100, 101, 102, 111,
114, 118, 119, 120, 121, 123, 133,
145, 170, 171, 172, 173, 179, 188,
189, 235, 285, 286, 288, 289, 299,
307, 353, 357, 359, 360.
Hylt^n-Cavallius, Gunnar Olof, 314.
Hyrningur (Icel.), 157.
Ibn Esra, A., see Abraham ibn Esra.
Ibn Ja'hja, B., see Bonsenior ibn
Ja'lvja.
Ibn-Kalikan, 172.
Iceland: chess in the XVlIIth century,
2-3; names of chess-pieces and
chess terms, 4-7, 43-61; when
chess came to, 7-9; chess in the
XVIth and XVIIth century, 33-43;
chess In the XlXth century (the
Spilabdk), 61-68; draughts in, 96,
358; morris (mylna) in, 138-144;
fox-and-geese (refiskik) in, 154-
157; dice in, 331-338; resem-
blance between baok*gammon in
Iceland and in Sweden, 316; back-
gammon (kotra) in, 338-353; other
table-games similar to backgam-
mon in, 342-343,353-356; whence
and when backgammon camo to,
329,356.
Icelandic Archseological Museunci, 4,
156, 167, 347.
Icelandic Literary Society (Hi5 is-
lenzka B6kmentaf^lag), 30,37, 346.
Icelandic relations with Norway, 316.
Igra ve koste (Russ.), 304.
Igra ve phuke (Russ.), 305.
Ilanz, 8.
Illustrated News (London), 199,
Illustrerad spelbok (1888), 137, 154,
319-326, 328-329.
Imperial, 164, 166, 207, 209, 210, 214.
Ingeborg (Ingibj5rg), 26, 27-29, 31-32.
Interim, das, (Germ.), 256.
Iringur, Jarl of Ireland, 23.
Digitized by
Google
INDEX
379
Irish, 79, 159, 171, 283, 284, 286, 292 ;
origin of, 284-286; two hand
Irish, 285; method of play, 298.
Imerins (Warnerius), 198.
Isabella, queen of Castile, 89.
Isacio PorflrogeneU, 234.
Isidor of Seville, 80, 84, 173, 241-242.
fslendingasaga, 345.
fslendinga8()gur, 51.
islenzk fomkvs^i, 17.
tslenzka B6kmenta£^lag, Hil), 30, 37,
(346).
fslenzka L8erd6m8li&taf&lag, Hi6, 3%.
fsdnd, 17.
ivarr hviti, 10.
Jacobi, Hermann, 168.
Jacobs, Christian Friedr. Wilh., 230.
Jacobus de Cessolis, see Cessolis,
J. de.
Jacquet (Pr.), 178, 183, 188-189, 233,
235, 270, 320.
Jacquet de Versailles, 183, 320.
Jaftitefli (loel.), 2, 6, 24, 49, 50, 56,
58, 66, 341, 352.
Jahn (Germ.), 260.
James, Saint, of Compostella, 8.
J&mlOpande qvam (Swed.), 135.
Jan, 180-181 ; in English, 189 ; in Ita-
lian, 239; in German, 258, 259,
269; in Dutch, 274; in Danish,
311; in Swedish, 317, 325, 328;
in Icelandic, 388, 340, 341, 344,
350, 352; etymology and meaning,
181, 189.
Jan auf drey wurfe (Germ.), 261.
Jan d'ambesas (Fr.), 190.
Jan de deux tables (Fr.), 176, 181.
Jan de m^ztes (m^sdas, Fr.), 176, 181,
190.
Jan de recompense (Fr.), 181, 270.'
Jan de rencontre (Fr.), 175-176, 181.
Jan de retour (Fr.), 181, 190, 283.
Jan de six tables (Fr.), 181.
Jan de trois coups (Fr.), 18).
Jan, den lilla, (Swed.), 318.
Jan, den lille, (Dan.), 311.
Jan, den stora, (Swed.), 318.
Jan, den store, (Dan.), 311.
Jan der belohnung (Germ.), 268, 270.
Jan, der grosse, (Germ.), 266.
Jan, der kleine, (Germ.), 264, 266.
Jan der nicht kann (Germ.), 261.
Jan, grand, (Fr.), 175, 180-181, 190.
Jan i to bretter (Dan.), 311.
Jan paa tre kast (Dan.), 311.
Jan, petit, (Fr.), 175-176, 180-181, 190.
Jan qui ne peut (Fr.), 176, 181.
Jan som ikke kan (Dan.), 311.
Jan von sechs bl&ttern (Germ.), 261.
Jana, aS, (Icel.), 340, 341, 350.
Janband (Swed.), -315, 327.
Janbr&de (Swed.), 318.
Janbricka (Swed.), 317.
Janstork (Icel.), 340, 343, 350, 355.
Janus, 181, 189.
Jaq'ubi, 170.
Jaquet (Fr.), 188-189.
J&rnsiea, 334, 335.
J&tdkkO (Hung.), 306.
Jitmundnr, king, 18-23.
Jean, 181, 189.
Jednojka (Russ.), 304.
Jeremiah, priest, 121.
Jernband (Swed.), 315, 324, 327.
Jeu d*assaut (Fr.), 154.
Jea de dames (Fr.), 103.
Jeu de dde (Fr.), 240.
Jeu de moulin (Fr.), 113.
Jeu de plein (Fr.), 182, 319.
Jeu de renard (Fr.), 148.
Jeu de retour (Fr.), 176.
Jeu du toe (Fr.), 182.
Jeu de tourne-case (Fr.), 183, 320.
Jeu de toute-table (Fr.), 183.
Jeu d'oie (Fr.), 157.
Jeu ordinaire (Fr.), 176.
Jeu Saint Marry (Fr.), 114.
Jochumsson, Matthias, 27-29.
JQfhrc^ (Icel.), 142.
Jogo da gamSo (Port), 187.
Jogo das (de) taboias (Port.), 178, 195.
John, to, 189, 260.
John, king of Scandinavia (Union of
Kalmar), 314.
John XII., pope, 86.
John of Salisbury, 77, 161, 359.
Johnson, Charles, editor of the '«0>m-
pleat Gamester,*' 287*288.
Johnson, Samuel, 284.
J6n, 38.
Jonas, Arngrimus, see J^xussoo, Ara-
grimur.
Jonas, Runolphus, see J6nsflon, Run-
6ltaT,
J6nas8on, J6nas, 48.
J6nasson, SigurBur L., 30, 349.
Jones, Sir William, 43, 118, 145.
Jones, Willim, 78.
J6n8b6k, 884, 336, 339, 346.
Digitized by
Google
380
INDEX
Jonson, Ben, 88, 151, 285, 295.
J6n88on, Arngrimar, 46-47.
J6n88on, Bjorn, k SkarQsi, 47.
Jdnsson, Eirikar, 50, 55, 337.
J6n88on, Finnur, bishop, 47, 343, 354.
J6n88on, Finnur, professor, 10, 335.
J6n8Son, OuQmundur, 343.
J6nsson, J6n, author of ** Sigarhr688-
hagvekjar,** 343, 355.
J6ns8on, J6n, (of Helgavatn), 142.
J6n88on, P&U, bishop, 8.
J6nsson, Ran61fUr, 47.
J6nsson, Ssemundar, 8.
J5rgensen, S. A., 311.
Journal Asiatique, 5.
Jovellanos, Oaspar Melchior de, 192.
Juego de cercar de liebre (Span.), 98.
Juego de la rifa (Span.), 253.
Juego de marlota (Span.), 253.
Juego de piedras (o tabla8,Span.), 119.
Juegos de las tablas (Alph. MS.), 253.
Juegos de raya (Span.), 99.
Julian6(J&taiundur, Lo96vikuR), king,
18.
Julianus Antecessor, 80.
Julius Africanus, 80.
Junker, (Qerm.^ 260, 269; (Dan.) 311;
(Swed.) 317, 318, 319.
Justinian, 173.
K., H. D., 274-275.
K., I. O., 261, 273-274.
Ka*b (Arab.), 308.
K&lund, Kr., 47.
Kark, el, (karik, Arab.), 103.
KarlamagntSis {see also Charlemagne),
18, 345.
Karlamagniis saga, 16, 56, 344.
Karnamak, 169, 170.
Kast (loel.), 336, 339.
Kast (Swed.), 313, 320; in proverbs, 313.
Kasta, a», (Icel.), 331, 337, 338, 339.
Kasta, att, (Swed.), 313.
Kastb&gare (Swed.), 313.
Kaste ind, at, (Dan.), 311.
Kasteel (Dutch), 65.
Kastning (Swed.), 313.
Katter (Germ.), 241.
Kaupab&ikur (in ''J&rnsiSa*'), 334.
Kaupab&lkur (in the Norwegian
"LandslOg"), 331, 335.
Kazirmirski, 256.
Kerkwerder, Henrick, 12.
Kersey, John, the younger, 280.
Ketch-dolt (^e^oZ^o catch-dolt), 283» 286.
Ketszem (Hung.), 306.
Keyser, Rudolf, 47, 336.
Khana (pi. khanaha, Pers.) 171.
Kil (Swed.), 315, 319, 320.
King, 4, 5, 94.
Kingo, Thomas, bishop, 37.
Kingsley, Charles, 151.
Kirk, al, (Arab.), 255.
Kitab el-gh&ni, 172, 255.
Kitab el-nard, 172, 360.
Klappqvam (Swed.), 141.
Kleine Jan, der, (Qerm.), 264, 266.
Kleine mtihle (Oerm.), 122.
Kllcker (Qerm.), 246.
Kluge, Friedrich, 257, 258.
Kluitman, P., 277.
Knapping, 284.
Knitafl (Icel.), 343.
Knight, 5, 94.
Knight*s chess, 346.
Knight's tour, 210.
Knutur konungur, see Canute V.
Knutur riki (Canute the great), 9, 56.
Knytlinga saga, 10-11.
Koczka (Hung.), 306.
Koczka ikUk (Hang.), 306.
Koczkasorleg (Hung.), 306.
Koczkaveta (Hung.), 306.
Koczk&z (Hung.), 306.
Koczk&zik (Hung.), 306.
Koczk&zni (Hung.), 306.
Koczk&zUt (Hung.), 306.
Koczkjat^k (Hung.), 306.
KoczkO (Hung.), 306.
Koczni (Hung.), 306.
KoOr&nsson, Hrani, 9.
Koker (Dutch), 277.
Kolbeinn, see Arndrsson, Kolbeinn
ungi.
see Tumason, Kolbeinn.
K6lbing, Eugen, 17-19, 30, 76.
Koldewey, Karl, 15.
Kolonymos ben Kalonymos, 172.
Koma inn, aB, (Icel.), 340.
Komnena, Anna, 358.
Komnenus, Alexius, emperor, 358.
Kongspe5 (Icel.), 54, 56.
Kongur (konungur, Icel.), 4, 61.
Konrad, son of the emperor, 345.
Konrad von Wurzburg, 252.
Konril^s saga keisarasonar, 344, 345.
Kontr&r puff (Swed.), 319.
Kontr&re puff, der, (Oerm.), 254, 256,
270.
Digitized by
Google
INDEX
381
Konnngahella, 332.
Konung8-8kagg^j&, 336, 339.
Konangar (kongar, Ioel.)« 2, 4, 48.
Kopar i alio (Icel.), 342, 352.
Kopf, der, (Qerm.)i 270.
KoprJ&U (Icel.), 342, 352.
Kornett (Swod.), 313.
Koste (RasB.), 303-304.
KoBtka (Pol. and Boh.), 303-304.
KoBtkir (Boh.), 304.
KoBtk&rstvi (Boh.), 304.
Koatkovati (Boh.), 304.
KoBtoke (Rubb.), 303.
Kotra(game, Icel.), 4, 142, 338-353,356.
Kotra (Icel.), 337, 339, 348.
Kotrubor9 (Icel.), 339, 342.
Kotrumenn (Icel.), 339, 346.
Kotnitafl (Icel.), 4, 339.
KotfutaflBkaBBi (Icel.), 339.
Kotruvera (Icel.), 339, 346.
Kotangatafl (Icel.), 341, 352.
Krabok (Siam.), 74.
Kroeber, A., 73.
Kr6karef8 saga, 14-16, 57.
Kr6karefB rimur, 16.
Kr6ka-Refar, 14-16.
Kronspel (Swed.), 316, 317, 324, 327.
KroBsmylna (Ic^l.), 139, 140, 141.
Ko^tta, 307. .
Eoptotiai 807.
Kopsorrjptoy, 307.
KoPtorfi<;, 307.
Ko^ttyzixbif 307.
Kopt6a>, 807.
Kubia (Hebrew), 171.
Kopoc, 171, 307, 308.
Karz, Hinrich, 91.
Kurze puff, der,' (Qerm.), 214, 256.
Kv&tra (Icel., see also kotra), 343,
344, 356.
Kv&trutafl (Icel.), 344, 345.
Kvennabrekka, 15.
Kvennkotra (Icel.), 34I, 352.
Kverkatak (Icel.), 340, 349.
Kvotra (Icel., see also kotra, the
game), 343, 344.
Kvotra (Icel., see also kotra, dlce-
namber), 337.
Kwater (Qerm.), 249.
La Borde, Leon de, 112, 114.
La Braydre, Jean de, 179.
La Came de St. Palaye, 61.
Lacerda, Job^ de, 90, 195. |
LadronoB (Span.), 101.
La iBla, Josd Francisco de, 192.
Laing, Samuel, 332.
Lain (Icel.), 64, 66.
La Marini^re, D., 299, 287.
Lames (Pr.), 176.
Lancio (Itol.), 220.
Lan90 (Port.), 197.
Landn&ma, 52, 53.
Landaldg Magni!iss lagabntis, 335.
Lane, Edward William, 308.
L&ng puff (Swed.), 319.
Lange puff, der, (Germ.), 166, 245, 254,
256, 267-268. 270.
Ungi hryggur (Icel.), 341, 350, 351.
Langi mukur (Icel.), 316, 341, 343,
350, 351, (355).
La Peyronie, Qaulthier de, 2.
Laquet (Alph. MS.), 88, 189, 192, 253.
Larchey, L., 73.
LarouBse, Pierre Athanase, 178, 186,
293.
Larsson, Ludvig, 25, 30.
Lasa, Tassilo von Heydebrand und
der, 61, 64, 91, 97, 98, 99, 103, 104,
109, 113, 121, 128, 146, 200-201,
202, 203, 208, 210, 211, 213, 214,
215, 360.
Lascaris, Ck)nst., 211.
Latimer, Hugh, 88, 286.
Latrunculi (Lat), 47, 59, 122.
Lauf&B, 33.
L&ufer (Germ.), 4.
LanrentiuB Gallicus, see Lorens, Mre.
Lauterberg, 250.
Layamon, 76.
Lecceto, 86.
Le Due, Viollet, 113. ,
Lefevre, Jean, 204.
Legatura (Ital.), 236.
Legna (Ital.), 239.
Legrand, ISmile, 307.
Leika, a9, (Icel.), 48, 49, 50,.
Leikslok (Icel.), 49.
Leikur (Icel.), 49, 66.
Leikvisa (Icel.), 141.
Leinburgy Gottfried, 26.
Leo X., pope, 213.
Leofric, bishop, 75.
Leppur (loeL), 57, 66.
Lessing, Gotthold Ephrairo, 225, 248.
Le Strange, Guy, 255.
Uvare (lUl.), 221.
Lever, Charles James, 291.
LewlB, island, 156.
Digitized by
Google
382
INDEX
Lewis, William, 99.
Lexioogr&phera, Among the, 43-61.
Li*b et taula (tawla, Arab.), 92, 157,
908.
Libro de laa tablas (Alph. MS.), 253,
254.
LiUa, 42.
Liljenberg, Abele von, 246.
Lilla Jan, den, (Swed.), 318.
Lille Jan, den, (Dan.), 311.
Limperial, see Imperial.
Limpolding, see Lympoldyng.
Lincoln, 7.
Linde, Antonius van der, 3, 5, 20, 36-
37, 48, 56, 58, 60, 61-65, 72, 86, 87,
88, 91, 92, 93, 95, 96, 97-99, 104, 105,
121, 122, 133, 160, 172, 173, 189,
191, 200, 201, 203, 204, 211, 212,
214, 215, 262, 264, 274-275, 346,
360 ; Dr. van dcr Linde and the
Spilab6k, 61-68; on the Compleat
Gamester literature, 287-288.
Line-games, 97, 109, 3S9.
Linienspiel (Qerm.), 98.
Liten qvarn (Swed.), 136.
Litla bert (loel.), 3, 6.
Litli dinnmaSur (Icel.), 343, 354.
Litll meistori (Icel.), 341, 851.
Littrd, Maximilien Pattl l^mile, 61, 85,
111-112, 183, 185, 186, 188, 189, 190,
191.
L5ber (Dan.), 4.
Loccenias, Johan, 44.
Locichart, John Gibson, 284.
Lo56vikus (J&tmundur, Jtilian6), king,
18-23.
Lagma5ur, 76.
Loka, a5, (Icel.), 189.
L6mb (Icei.), 154, 165, 369.
Lombard game, 164, 166.
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 86,
82, 132.
Ldpare (Swed.), 4.
Lopez, Ruy, 111.
Loptsson, J6n, 8.
Lord's prayer, (339), 346.
Lorens, Mre, 77.
Lorris, Gaillaume de, 71.
Lorzen (Germ.), 256.
l^seth, B., 73.
Losing game, the, (draughts), 96.
Louis IX., saint, king of France, 240,
250.
Louis XIV., king of France, 178, 179,
319.
Louis XV., king of France, 96.
Lowell, James Russell, 282.
Lowndes, William Thomas, 287.
Lucena, 95.
Lucretius, Q. Garus, 222.
Ludi optativi (B. 8. cod.), 206.
Ludns alearum (ale», Lat.), 83, 84,
104, 205.
Ludus Anglicornm (M. Lat.), 161-162,
166.
Ludus calculorum (Lat.), 83.
Ludus duodecim scriptoram (Lat.),
177, 229, 360.
Ludus latrunculornm (Lat.), 34, 49,
59, 96, 145.
Ludus latrunculornm (a book), lU.
Ludus Lombardorum (M. Lat), 164,
166.
Ludus marellorum (M. Lat.), 101, 105,
106,205.
Ludus Saactl Mederici (M. Lat), 114.
Ludus scacchicus, 49.
Ludus scaccorum, 47, 104, 205.
Ludus Ubularum (M. Lat), 70, 80, 84,
90, 173, 307, 330, 362.
Ludus taxillorum (Lat), 83, 84.
Luna (Lat), 105.
Lund, 8.
Lupo e pecore (Ital.), 148.
Lurch, 190, 254, 258, (etymol.) 289.
Lurching, 163, 166.
Lurtsch (Germ.), 158, 254, 256, 258,
(origin) 289.
Lurtschen (Germ.), 256.
Lurtschspiel (Germ.), 254, 256, 289.
Lurzspiel (Germ.), 256.
Lusus alearis, 335.
Lusus temarias (Lat), 121.
Luther, Martin, 198, 242, 317.
Lydgate, John, 281.
Lydians, 149, 234.
Lyly, William, 280.
Lympoldyng, 168, 166.
Machiavslli, Nioool6, 224.
McNeill, G. P., 76.
Madden, Sir Prederickt 72, 76, 156,
157, 332.
Madrelln (M. Lat), 119.
Madrellum (M. Lat), 115.
Madrid Historical Society (Real Aea-
demia de la Historia), 258.
Ma6ur (jpL menn, Icel.), 48.
Magalotti, Lorenzo, 223.
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INDEX
Magical formulas (for backgammon),
339, 316.
Magnus, Olaus, (on dioe-play) 314.
Magnus, Saint, earl of the Orkneys,
333, 336.
Magnus Briksson, king Of Sweden,
314.
Magntis H&konsson ^^agabsetir,** king
of Norway, 331, 334, 335.
Magnt!i8Son, Ami, (Arna Magnaus),
47, 347.
Magn6sson, Eirikur, 10, 25, 40, 42.
Magntisson, FInnur, 47.
Magnt!isson, Hallur, 41.
Magniisson, S&mur, 12-13.
Magnt!i8son, I^orsteinn, 38.
M&gus saga, 16, 18-23, 44, 56.
Biahdi, caliph, 172.
Mahl (Germ.), 260.
Mains (Engl.), 72, 79.
Maintenon, Mme. de, 179.
Maison acaddmiqne, la, 259.
Maison des Jeux academiques, 149.
Majoret (C. B. cod.), 210.
Mai (Qerm.), 260.
Malet, Pierre, 95.
Malmosdi (Hung.), 133.
MalmstrOm, Joh. Aug., 26.
Malom (Hung.), 133.
Malon^&tek (Hung.), 133.
Malte-Brun, see Bruun, M. G.
Mandragorias, 118.
M&nga (Swed.), 316.
Mannos MS., 251.
Manning, Robert, (Robert de Brunne),
77,278.
Mannsk&k (Icel.), 4.
Manntafl (Icel.), 4.
Mano (Ital.), 109, 219, 220, 235.
M&nsson, Peder, 312, 314.
Manuel des peschiez, 77.
Manuscripts on tables, 161-167, 191,
197-216, 360.
Mar (Icel.), 338, 341, 343, 344, 346, 351,
355.
M&r9 (Arab.), 289.
Marches!, Sigismondo, 213.
Marcia (Ital.), 236.
Marcio (Ital.), 221.
Mar9arson, Markus, 12-13.
Marella (marelle, Ital.), 100, 101.
Marella (M. Lat), 115.
Marelle (Fr.), 112; — triple, — qua-
druple, — quintuple, 138.
Marelles, see mdrelles.
Marellier (marelier, Fr.), 114.
Margaret, queen of Scandinavia
(Union of Kalmar), 314.
Margot la fendue (Fr.), 176.
Mariage (Fr., card-game), 350.
Marias (Icel., card-game), 350.
Marini^re, see La Marini^re.
MarkvarOur, 23.
Marl, 124, 125, 126.
Marlin, 117.
Marlota, Juego de, (Span.), 253.
Marmion, Shaekley, 151.
Marquardt, Joachim, 229.
Marquera (Swed.), 318.
Marqniren (Germ.X 961.
Marro (Span.), 93, 99, 100, 101, 102.
Marry, Saint, 114.
Marsch (Germ.), 261 ; (Dan.) 311.
Marsilius, king, 345.
Martialis, Marcus Valerius, 80.
Martin, king of Aragon, 89.
Massmann, H. P., 73, 90, 91.
Mas'udi, 170.
MAt (Arab.), 5.
MM (Pers.), 5.
M&t (Icel.), 5, 24, 38, 39, 44, 48, 50, 63.
M&ta, aS, (Icel.), 2, 5, 50.
Matador (Germ.), .270.
Match, 132.
Mate (at chess), etymology, 5; various
sorts in Icelandic chess, 3, 6-7,
56, 60, 62-63, 68.
Mate (Port.), 196.
Materes (Lat.), 119.
Mathieson, John (J6n), 53.
Matilda, 345.
Matlas (Gaelic), 119.
Matras (Gaelic t), 119.
Mattho (lUl.), 85.
Matto (Ital.), 45.
M&tzner, Eduard Adolf Ferdinand, 77.
Maurer, Konrad v.on, 15, 51| 143, 338.
Mauro, Giovanni, 224.
Mayes, 125.
Mayores, Juego de, (Span.), 253.
Mazzatinti, Giuseppe, 211, 213.
Medericus, Saint, 114.
Medesano, Girolamo, 212.
Medici, Gosimo de\ il vecchio, 200.
Medici, Giovanni de\ 213.
Medio -azar (Span.), 253.
Medio-emperador (Span.), 87-88, 253,
255.
Megara, 361.
Meini, Giuseppe, 106.
Digitized by
Google
384
INDEX
Meistari (Icel., see also Litli meistari),
317, 341, 350, 351.
Melbye, Johan Christian, 311.
Melniza (Rubs.), 133.
Mel8te5, Bogi Th., 7.
Manage, Gilles (Egidio), 191, 234.
Menn {singl, maBur, Icel.), 2, 4, 48, €6.
Menocohio Jacopo, 235.
Menoret (C. B. cod.), 209, 210.
Mensa, 252.
Mercier, see Mearsius.
Merourius, see Hermes.
Mereau (Fr.), 113.
Merel (Fr.), 113, 114.
Mdrelle quintuple (Fr.), 117, 149.
Merellen (Germ.), 129.
Merelles (Fr.), 85, 94, 97-146 (names of
men, 105; etymology, 111-112;
phrases, 114), 223, 245.
Merelli {pL Lat.), 104,
Merils, 126.
Merimde, Prosper, 228, 231, 271, 300.
Merlin (G. B. co.dO« 207, 209, 210.
Merrels, 126.
Merrills, 145.
Messeasjan (Dan.), 311.
Metastasio, Pietro Bonaventura, 225.
Mettre k cuire (Fr.), 121.
Meule (Germ.), 120.
Meung, Jean de, 71.
Meursius (Mercier), J., 122, 145.
Meyer, Paul, 72.
Meyers Konversations-Iiezicon, 129,
256-257.
Michel, Francisque Xavier, 71, 114.
Michel of Northgate, Dan, 77, 78.
Michelant, Henry, 71, 73.
Middleton, Thomas, 279.
Midsummer Nighfs Dream, 125-126.
Mikj&ls-messa, 10.
MikligarQur (= Constantinople), 345.
Mill, parallel, 128.
Miller, J. 0., 26.
Milton, John, 231, 285, 286.
Mine, la, (Fr.), 72.
MinnisverB tlBindi (1797), 343, 355.
Minoret (C. B. cod.), 207, 210, 214, 216.
Minoreto curto (C. B. cod.), 214.
Minoretta (Ital.), 171.
Minoretto (Ital.), 209, 220, 222, 225,
235.
Minoretus (C. B. cod.), 209.
Mirza Kasem, 5.
M5biu8, Theodor, 49.
Modius (Lat.), 120.
Molbech, Christian, 309-310.
Molenspel (Dutch), 128, 133.
Molesworth, Robert, viscount, 35-37.
MoH^re, Jean Baptiste Poqueline, 187.
Mdlle (Dan.), 128, 134.
Mdllespil (Dan.), 128.
Mondino (Remondino Bolognese), 198.
Monked, 316.
Monte (lUl.), 221, 236.
Montero, Pedro Ruiz, 93.
Montfleury, Jacob Antoine, 191.
Monthly Magazine (1814), 292.
Mor (Icel.), 338, 344, 346, 351.
Mora (Itol.), 222, 265, 269.
Morality des enfants de Maintenant,
113.
Morals, 117, 126.
Moris, 126.
Morisco (Span.), 117.
MorkinsJLinna, 58.
Moro (Span.), 117. •
Morris, 3, 85, 91, 97-146, 215, 254;
etymology. 111, 117-118; Russian,
Dutch, Bulgarian, and Hungarian,
133; Danish, 134; Swedish, 134-
138 ; Icelandic (mylna), 138-144
(introduction in Iceland and ori-
gin, 142-144); early existence in
Europe, 144; colours of men, 254;
origin and outlines of history,
%8^9.
Morris, Richard, 77, 78.
Morris, William, 10, 25, 335.
Morris-men, 98.
MOrukiri jarl, 10.
Moscherosch, Johann Michel, 256.
Mesons (0. Fr.), 216.
M6t8td9uma9ur (Icel.), 66.
Motteuz, Peter Anthony, 281.
MOUuls saga, 18.
Moulidars, T. de, 115, 149-150, 176,
180, 183, 189, 300.
Move, 96.
Mucchio (Ital.), 236.
Mu hammed Sokeiker (Sukaiker), 172,
360.
MUhle (Germ., see also Kleine mlihle
and. Aufgemachte miihle), 99, 127-
128, 269.
Miihlenspiel (Germ.), 98, 127, 128.
Muhlespjel (Germ.), 128, 129.
Miihlspiel (Germ.), 245.
MAkur (Icel., see also Munkur, Langi
miikur and Stutti mt]Lkur), 316,
341, 350.
Digitized by
Google
INDEX
385
Mulespiel (Germ.)« 98.
Mulinello (Itol.), 106, 107; — doppio
107, 108-109, 144; — triplo, 108,
lia; — quadpuplo, 109, 110.
Mulino (It&l.), 106 ; etymology, 120.
Manch, Peter Andreas, 47, 332, 336.
Munk (Swed.), 316, 827.
Munkur (Icel., see also Mukur), 316,
350.
Murayi (Arab.), 171.
Murray, James Augustus Henry, 77.
Mylis (B. M. cod.), 164, 166, 167.
Mylna (Icel.), 3, 97, 138-144 (origin,
142-143), 359.
Napoleon I., 46.
Napping, 284.
Nard, 86, 144, 168, 169, 170, 171-174,
239, 255, 308, 309, 361, 362, 363.
Nard-tables-backgammon, 70.
Nardat (Arab.), 255.
Nardsher, 171.
Narfl, 347.
Nathan ben Jechiel, 172.
Nation, The, 170.
National Library, Florence, 199, 202.
National Library, Paris, 105, 204.
National Library, Reykjavik, 203,
204, 346.
Neckam (Neckham), Alexander, 9,
23, 76.
Negenstekken (Dutch), 134.
Negdnstiken (Dutch), 133.
Negenstrekken (Dutch), 134.
Negenstricken (Dutch), 120.
Nerd (nard), 144, 361.
Nerdiludus, 118, 119.
Nerdshir (Hebrew), 170, 172, 361.
Nettafl (Icel.), 58.
Neue kdnigliche Thombre, das, 241,
259-264, 265, 269, 273, 311.
Neueste anleitung (1773), 264-265,
356.
New English Dictionary, 278, 292,
293.
Newardasher (Pers.), 170.
Nicholas de (Saint) Nicholai, 104,
110, 113, 200-201.
Ni0ar6s, see Throndl^em.
Nief (Scotch), 58.
Nieve (Scotch), 58.
Nine-men-morris, 3, 85, 99, 118, 123,
125, 126, 127, 130, 134, 205, 254 ;
the boards 131.
Nine men's morals, 117.
Nine penny marl, 124-125.
Nine penny miracle, 117.
Nine penny moris, 117.
Nine pin merells, 117.
Nine pin miracle, 117.
Noailles, due de, 179.
Nobody and Somebody (1592), 292.
N5ldeke, Theodor, 169, 170.
Nolhac, Pierre de, 199.
Nomokanon, 133.
Non-Juror (1716), 79.
Nonius Marcel lus, 119.
Nord und Sud (1897), 248, 252.
NorOanfari (1874), 343, 354.
Nordisk Skaktidende (1874), 36.
Norges gamle love, 331, 335.
Norman, Albert, 134.
North, Christopher, (pseudonym),
see Wilson, John.
North, Roger, 292.
Northbrooke, John, 78.
Norway, Icelandic relations with,
316 ; necessity of investigation in
backgammon of, 328-329.
Noughts and crosses, 117, 122, 127,
129, 136.
Ntd^i-a, 307.
Nulochen (neun Idcher f Germ.), 120.
Nuscirvan, king, 228.
Ny och fullst&ndig svensk spelbok
(1847), 316.
Nye og fuldstaendig dansk Spiilebog
(1786), 311, 356.
Nyeste dansk Spiilebog (1829), 311,
356.
Nyrop, Kristofer, 73.
Oaks, 79, 283.
Observationsband (Germ.), 271.
Occleve, Thomas, 96.
Oddgeir (Holger Danske), 16.
Odin, 2, 26-28, 248.
Ofanfelling (Icel.), see Ofanfelling-
artofl.
Ofonfellingartafl (Icel.), 341, 342, 352,
353.
dfverband (Swed.), 315, 324.
Oga {pi, Ogon, Swed.), 313, 320.
Olaf the Lap-king (Olafur skautkon-
ungur), king of Sweden, (332-
333), (336), 348.
6lafs kongs tofl (Icel.), 341, 352,
353.
49
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Google
INDEX
Olaft saga helga (St. Olafii saga), 7, 9,
10, 44, 50, 56, 332, 333, 336.
Olafeson, Eggert, 2-3, 6, 62, 63, 338,
343, 346, 350, 353, 355.
dlaftoon, QaDmundur, 47.
Ola&son, Helgi, 47.
Olafisson, J6n, (fr& Qrunnavik), 61,
138, 139, 140, 142, 143, 155, 156,
340, 341, 342, 343, 348, 350, 352,
353, 354, 355, 356.
OlaflBSon, Magniis, 33-34, 42,-43, 47, 59.
dlafsson, Stef&n, 20, 37-43, 347, 355.
dlaAir helgi Haraldsson, king of
Norway, 9, 332, 333, 336, 339, 346,
348.
Olaus Magnus, see Magnus.
Olave, Saint, see 6lafur helgi.
Oil, allir, allar (Icel.), 339, 348.
Omero, see Homer.
Ooge (Dutch), 272, 277.
Ordonantie op*t verkeeren, 262, 263,
273-75.
Origines Danic», 53.
Orkneyinga saga, 333, 336.
Orleans, due d\ 114.
Orms Snorrasons Book, 44.
Orn, 24, 56.
Orsini, Fulvio, 199.
Oshkaka-kurido (Sansk. f), 172.
Ostabla (ostahla, Boh.), 306.
Ost&bla (Hung.), 306.
Ost&blajatek (Hung.), 306.
Ost&blakarika (Hung.), 306.
Ostabl&t jatszanl (Hung.), 306.
Ostiblaz (Hung.), 306.
Ostoli, Antonio, 213.
Otho I. the Qreat, emperor, 86, 250.
Otto, Meister, 243.
Otway, Thomas, 280, 286.
Oudin, Caesar, 119.
Ourche (Fr.), 289.
Outremeuse, J, d\ 73.
Overbrengen (Dutch), 277.
Ovid, 121, 122, 123, 144, 203, 204, 229,
242.
Oxford English dictionary, 328.
Pahlavi, 168, 361.
PatamMe, le, 113.
Palamedes, 122, 138, 145, 172, 234.
Palamedes redivivus, 111.
Pallavicino, Pietro Sforza, cardinal,
223.
Pilsson, Bjarni, 2-3.
Pilsson, P&lmi, 15.
Panquist (Span.), 253.
Panton, 78.
Pappe with a Hachet (1589), 280.
Par (Swcd.), 316.
Par con as (Span.), 253.
Pardee, Julia, 288.
Pardon, 291.
Paretja (Span.), 194-195.
Pareji (pareja) de entrada (Span.), 88,
253.
Pariglia (ItoL), 221.
Parini, Giuseppe, 225-228, 230, 232,
234, 271, 300.
Paris, 7.
Paris, Gaston, 23.
P&ros (Hung.), 306.
Partie (Pr.), 49, 184; (Germ.), 258.
Partie double (Fr.), 184.
Partitus (Lat), 104.
Parva tabella (Lat.), 122.
Parzival, 247.
Pas (Boh.), 304.
Pasch (Germ.), 245-246 (etymol. 245),
266.
Paschen, zu, (Germ.), 245, 246.
Paschendise (Germ.), 245.
Paschwurfel (Germ.), 246.
Pasovati (Boh.), 304.
Pasquier, Etienne, 179, 187, 234.
Pass (Hung.), 306.
Passage du pent (Pr.), 176, 177. •
Passedifije (Dutch), 272.
Passe-dix (Fr.), 245, 272.
Pat (Fr.), 6.
Paternoster, 339, (346).
Patin, Gui, 185.
Patt (Germ.), 6.
Patt (Icel.), 6, 48, 57, 66.
Patta (Ital.), 6.
Paume carle (carde, B. M. cod.), 163-
164, 166.
Pausanias, the geographer, 234.
Paw, Joh. Corn, de, 229.
Pawn, 5, 6, 27, 56, 94.
Payne, William, 95.
PeSo, see peSes.
Pe^a (Port.), 196.
PeB (Icel.), 2, 4, 5, 44, 45, 48, 50, 56,
61, 341, 352.
Pedes (M. Lat), 5, 85.
Pedina (pi, pedine, Ital.), 5, 86, 228,
235-236,237.
Pedites, 119.
PeWingur (Icel.), 44, 48.
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Google
INDEX
387
PeOmaQur (Icel.), 45, 48, 56.
PeDrlftnit (Icel.)t ^f ^*
PeCrifup (Icel.), 3, 6, 56, 63, 66.
PeOsm&t (pe5m&t, Icel.), 6, 22, 45, 56, 61.
PeOsvald (Icel.), 57.
Peilke (Qerm.), 132.
Pdlerinage de T&me, le, 114.
Penny Gyclopsadia, 289.
Penny Magazine (1841), 302-303.
Pedes {sing, pefto. Port.), 196.
P4on (Span.), 5, 56.
Peplingur (Icel ?), 48.
Pepys, Samuel, 79.
Perkins, William, 95.
Perraalt, Charles, 189.
Persias, Aulus... Flaccus, 281.
Iltaot^a, 307.
Iltoottoy, 307.
niao»o}ia, 307.
Ileaotorf^ptov, 307.
Iltootott^g, 307.
nsoatoTtxo^, 307.
ntootoo), 307.
Otooog, 307.
Peter, Saint, and the player, 250.
Peter the Great, czar, 301.
Petit jan (Pr.), 175-176, 180-181, 190.
Petite bredoaille (Fr.), 190.
Petrarch, Francis, 82-84, 199, 230, 232,
315.
Petro, Paschalis de, 122.
Petteia, 145.
nrcTsia, 229.
Pettie (Fr.), 115.
PMur, bishop of Roskilde, 8.
PMur postuli (St. Peter), 15.
Pdtursson, Ami, 339, 346.
Pdtarsson, Hallgrimur, 37, 140, 141,
142, 338, 342, 343, 345, 352, 353,
354, %5.
Pfaffe Amis, 244.
Pfeifen (Germ.), 305.
Pfeiffer, Franz, 90.
Pfeil (Germ.), 270.
Philidor, FranQOls Andrd Danican, 96.
Philip III., king of France, 77.
Phuke (Russ.), 305.
Plant (Ital.), 229.
Piooolomini, Alessandro, 187.
Piedras (Span.), 119.
Pietropaulo da San Chirico, 187.
Pll (Pers.), 66.
Pil ipl. pilar, Swed.), 315, 319.
Pilate, Pontias, 244.
Pille (Dan.), 310.
Pion (Fr.), 5, 85.
Pion (Dutch), 277.
Pion coiffS (Fr.), 63.
ntovt, 307.
Piozzi, Mrs., 284.
Pip, 279-282.
Pipdla, a», (Icel.), 342, 352.
Piprjill (Icel.), 341, 342, 352.
Piprj6la, ad, (Icel.) 342, 352.
Pirgus (pyrgus, Lat), 74.
PiyAdah (Pers.), 56.
Pizzi, I., 229.
Pjes (Swed.), 315.
Plato, 228, 234.
Plautus, 119.
Playe of the Chesse (1471), 278.
Plein (Fr.), 178, 182, 190, 206, 235,
258, 319.
Plenum, ad, (B. S. cod.), 206, 210.
Plinius (the elder), 229.
Plummer, Charles, 52.
Plutorch, 234.
Poang (Swed.) 313.
Poe, Edgar Allan, 41.
Point (Fr.), 86, 97, 258, 279, 311, 313.
Polacker (Swed.), 315, 324.
Polar chess, 1-9.
Polerio, Giulio C;esare, 99.
Polish draughts, 96, 196.
Poll! (Ital.), 148.
Polycraticus, 77.
Pontos (Port.), 196.
Poon* (paonnet, 0. Fr.), 85.
Pop (Pol.), 4.
Pope, Alexander, 151, 225, 231.
Porter, Henry, 290.
Powell, F. York, 52, 53.
Pregos (Port.), 196.
Prise, en, (Fr.), 56.
Probus, 219.
Procaocina (lUl.), 221.
Prophiat Duran, 172.
Protokollstriktrak (Swed.), 319.
Provincial (B. M. cod.), 164, 166.
Puff, (Germ.), 88, 157, 158 160, 174,
206, 252, 266, 270, 305; (Swed.),
319; etymology and history, 158«
256, 257-258.
Puff, der kontr&re, (Germ.), 254, 256,
270.
Puff, der kurze, (Germ.), 214, 256.
Puff, der lange (Germ.), 166, 245, 254,
256, 267-268, 270.
Puff, kontrJir, (Swed.), 319.
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INDEX
Puff, l&ng, (Sweil.)i 319.
Puffbret (Germ.), 257, 267.
Puffen (Germ.), 236, 257.
Puffspiel (Germ.), 253.
Punga, aB, (Icel.), 44.
Pungur, (Icel.)i 44.
Punt (Dutch), 277.
PuD^e (Dutch), 277.
Purges (M. Gr.), 65.
Purgus (Lat ?), 171.
Ho^o^f 74.
Pyrgus (Lat), 74, 92, 229.
Pythagoras rythmomachie, 111.
QiRKAT (Arab.), 255.
Quaderni (Ital.), 191, 223.
Quadratus (Lat), 105.
QuadreUi (lUl.), 238.
Quadrio (Lat.), 241.
Quaerne (0. Pr.), 215, 216.
Quaritch, Bernhard, 360.
Quart (Swed.), 316, 322.
Quartaner (Swed.), 319, 322.
Qnater (game), 159.
Qnater (quatre, Pr.), 210,241, (etyraol.)
242, 280, 310, 356.
Quaterna (C. B. cod.), 210.
Quaterna (Ital.), 235, 239.
Quaterne (Pr.), 180, 319.
Quatemes (G. B. cod.), 210.
Quaternio (Lat), 241.
Quatemo (Lat.), 242.
Quatra (Icel., see also kotra), 344.
Quatre (Engl.), 279-280, 304, 356.
Quatre flls d*Aimon, 23.
Quatro (Span.), 255.
Quatter (Germ.), 241.
Quatuor (Lat), 241, 310, 313, 356.
Quba, el, (Arab.), 171.
Queen, 94, 95.
Queen's chess, 95.
Queen's game, 80, 95, 171, 286, 299-
300,353.
Querque, al, (Arab.), 255.
Quina (Span.), 194.
Quinconce (Fr.), 185.
Quine (qnines, Fr.), 176, 180, 210,
241; etymology, 191.
Qnini (lUl.), 191, 223.
Quinio (Lat), 241.
Quinola, Giovanni, 229.
Quinque (Lat), 310.
Quinques (C. B. cod.), 210.
Quintilianus, M. Fabius, 229.
Qvarn (Swed.), 135; liten — , 136.
Qvarnspel (Swed.), 135.
Qyart (Swed.), 313.
Qv&tra (Icel., see also kotra), 345.
Rabattrb (Fr.), 184 {cf. Dames ra-
battues).
Rabbiosa, alia, (lUl.), 91.
Rabelais, Francois, 179, 189, 247,
281, 289.
Raber, Vigil, 244.
Rsldlein, 246.
Raffel (Swed.), 313.
Raffia, att, (Swed.), 313.
R&fspel (Swed.), 153, 359.
Rahbek, Knut Lyne, 309.
Rainha (Port), 196.
Rask, Rasmus Kristian, 46-47, 48, 53.
Rateau (Fr.), 176.
Ratha (Sansk.), 55.
Ratherius of Verona, 86.
Ratnakara, 168.
Redi, Francesco, 223.
Refsk&k (Icel.), 3, 141, 146-156, 157,
359.
Etegal (Germ.), 158.
Regalbuff (Germ.), 254, 256.
Reginaldus (R6gnvaldur), 23.
Regineta, 188, 286.
Reginula, 188, 286.
Reglement voor het triktrakspel, 277.
Regnard, J. F., 178, 190.
Roi (Port), 196.
Roinmar von Zwetor, 243, 249, 250-
251.
Reiter (Germ.), 5.
Reita, a», (Icel.), 340, 348.
RoiUrtfO (Icel.), 339.
Reitur (Icel.), 24, 44, 48, 339, 348.
Rekompensejan (Germ.), 268, 270.
Renard (Fr.), 148-149.
Renard et les poules (Fr.), 149.
Etenaud (de Montaubon, Rdgnvald-
ur), 23.
Renctus de Moliens, 114.
Rendemdlle (Dan.), 134, 141.
Rendsbnrg, 12.
Renette (Fr.), 188, 286, 288.
Renner, der, 244, 252.
Rennihestur (Icel.), 139, 140, 141.
Renout van Montalbsen, 23.
Repos (Fr.), coin de, 184, 317, 326.
Reprise (Fr.), 181, 292.
Resenius, Peder, 47.
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INDEX
Reverquier (Fr.), 258, 288.
Revertier (Pr.), 182, 185, 233, 235, 255,
258, 267, 260, 270, 288, 320, 321,
355.
ArchsBological Museum, see Ar-
chaeological Museum.
Reykjavik National Library, see Na-
tional Library.
Reymond, L L. A., 231.
Reynard the Pox, 243.
Riario, Cesare, bishop, 213.
Riario, Oirolamo, lord of Forli, 213.
Riario, Octaviano, 212, 213.
Richardson, Samuel, 79.
Richter, Karl, 122.
RiddarapeU (Icel.), 56.
RiddaraskAk (Icel.), 346.
Riddari (Icel.), 2, 4, 5, 7, 49, 50, 56,
61, 341, 352.
Ridder (Dan.), 5.
Riddles, 2, 58.
Rifa, Juego de la, (Span.), 253.
Rifa upp, 9J6, (Icel.), 340, 348.
Riga (Ital.), 100, 101.
Riga di tre (3-men-morri8), 100, 101.
Riese, 229.
Rimar, 29.
Rinaldi, G. Domenico, 202.
Ring (Hrlngur), liing, 25-32.
Rit pess islenzka L»rd6msli8taf&-
lags, 335.
RJiifa skAk, a5, (Icel.), 47.
Robert, duke of Normandy, 72.
Robert, the monk, 17.
Robert de Brunne, see Manning, Ro-
bert.
Robert of Gloucester, 76, 281.
Robertns Monaohus, 80.
Roc (0. Pr.), 56, 61, 85.
Rocar (Port.), 196.
Rocca (Roccha), Angel o, bishop,
84-85.
Rocco (Ital.), 55.
Roch (Pers.), 49.
Roch (ruch), 54.
Roc (a bird), 4.
Rtfgnvaldur, son of Araundi Jarl,
20-23, 56.
Rogsmatt (hr6ksm&t), 45.
Rohand, 19.
Roi ddpouilM (Pr.), 6.
Rokh (rukh, Pers.), 55, 85.
R6maborg, 15.
Roman de Aiol et Mirabel, 73.
Roman de Brut, 76, 250.
Roman de Gerard de Rouissilon, 72.
Roman de la Rose, 71, 346.
Roman de Rou, 72.
Roman de Tristan, 73.
Roman du Comte de Poitiers, 71.
Romance of Sir Tristrem, 76.
Romanes reenoontrat, los, (Span.), 88,
253.
Romans d'Alexandre, see Geste
d' Alexandre.
Romulus, 234.
Rook, 4, 55.
Roque (Span.), 55.
Roque (jd. roques. Port.), 196.
Rosenblut (Rosenplut), 243.
Roskilde, 8, 9, 10.
Rfisselsprung (Germ.), 210.
Rotella (Ital.), 229.
Rotha, see ratha.
Rotundus (Lat.), 105.
Rowbothum, Jamos, 4, 65.
Rowley, William, 279.
Roxburghe Club, 77.
Royal jeu do Thombre (1685), 259.
Royal Society of Antiquities, 76.
Royal Society of Northern Antiqua-
ries, 11, 47, 49, 50, 156.
Ruckjan (Germ.), 259, 266.
Rudbeclc, Olof, 44.
Rugman, Jdn^ 44, 47.
Ruhe-ecke (Germ.), 259, 266.
Ruicjan (Dan.), 311.
Runic letters, 346.
Ruodlieb, 91.
Russian backgammon, 158, 266, 267,
285, 288, 293, 303 ; method of play,
295.
Russian chess (origin), 133.
Russian game, 268.
Sabblin, 133.
Saccheri, Girolamo, 227, 228.
Sacchettl, Francesco, 82.
Sachs, Hans, 158, 244, 255, 256, 279.
Safadi, al-, 235.
Saka (Siam.), 74.
Sakkt&bia (Hung.), 306.
Salemann, K. G., 169.
Salmasius, Claudius, (Claude de Sau-
maise), 145, 177, 179, 188, 229, 286,
288.
Salmond, 308.
Salv&, 103, 194.
Salyio, Alessandro, 99.
SamsOe, Johan, 31.
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990
INDBX
S»mundar Edda, see Edda, Elder.
Saemundur the learned (hinn fr66i), 8.
SamvOrp (Icel.), 339, 348.
San Chirico, Pietropaulo da, 187.
Sanae (G. B. cod.), 210.
Sanders, Daniel, 245, S46, 248.
Sanlago de Compostella, 8.
Sanne and Sannes, see Sonnes.
Sardo, Alessandro, 234.
Sasaanians, 170.
Saul, Arthur, 97.
Sanmaise, Claude de, see Salraasius.
Savage, Richard, 291.
Sbaraglino (Ital.), 171, 195, 216-222,
223, 224, 225, 226, 228, 233, 235;
etymology, 218, 225.
Sbaraglio (lUl.), 171, 195, 209, 220,
222, 225.
Sbaraiare (I^lOi ^l-
Sbarail (C. B. cod.), 207, 209, 210.
Sbaraill (C. B. cod.), 209, 210, 214.
Sbaraille (C. B. cod.), 209, 210, 214.
Sbaraillin (C. B. cod.), 209, 210.
Sbaraino (Ital.), 214.
Sbarainum (Ital.), 171.
Sbarelle (C. B. cod.), 214.
Sbarrato (lUl.), 218.
Scacarius (Lat.), 80.
Scacchi (lUl.), 82, 173, 217, 228.
Scacchi (= points, lUl.), 86, 160.
Scacchia (Scacheis), 4, 34.
Scacchiere (Ital.), 84, 86.
Scaccho, 85.
Scaccus (Lat), 74, 80, 87.
Scach (Hebrew), 85.
Scacheis, see Scacchia.
Scachs (Span.), 89.
Scaci (Lat), 80.
Sc&hhari (0. H. O.), 194.
Scfthman (0. H. G.), 59.
Scahzabel (0. Oerm.), 91.
Scaligers, the, 357.
Scarcar asino (Ital.), 223.
Scaricalasino (Ital.), 106, 128.
Sssevola, 84.
Schaak (Dutch), 271.
Schaaken (Dutch), 271.
Sch&cher (Germ.), 43, 59, 194.
Schachspiel, current oder das welsch,
(Germ.), 91.
Schachtafel (Germ.), 91.
Schachzabel (Germ.), 91.
Schachzagel (Germ.), 91.
Schachzeitung, Deutsche, 121, 360.
Schade, 0., 244.
Scha&agel (Germ.), 91.
Schecher (Germ.), 33.
Scheler, Auguste, ^, 111, 112, 189.
Schijf (Dutch), 272, 277.
Schiller, Benjamin, 263.
Schimmel, 273.
Schley, Ludolph, 26.
Schmeller, Joseph Andreas, 90.
Schmid, J. C. von, 246, 256.
Schmidt, Johann Wolfgang, 95.
Scholar*s mate, 6.
Schdnhardt, G., 122.
Schdning, Gerhard, 2.
Sohule (Germ.), 250.
Schiilerband (Germ.), 271.
SchulD^eister von Eszlingen, 158, 256.
Schusserspiel (Germ.), 246.
Schuster (Germ.), 259, 266-267, 311,
318.
Schustern (Germ.), 259.
Schwob, Marcel, 122.
Scommate, 44.
Scoperta Uvola (Ital.), 221.
Scott, Sir Walter, 19, 29, 76, 284.
Scottish Text Society, 76.
Scripta duodecim, see Duodecim
scripta.
Scutum (Ut), 1(».
Sedrenz (= schatrandsch, Pers.), 66.
Segno (Ital.), 219, 220.
Seller, Fr., 91.
Seis dos e as (Span.), 87, 253, 330,
356.
Selenus, Gustavus, (pseudonym), see
Augustus, duke of Brunswick-
Luneburg.
Selenus contractus, 111.
Sena (Ital.), 191, 238, 239.
Senftleben, Andreas, 122.
Senio (Lat), 241.
Sennes, see Sonnes.
Senslbla t&rningkombinationer
(Swed.), 321-323.
Seoni (Ital.), 2^.
Servois, G., 73.
Ses (Dan.), 310.
Sess (Germ.), 241-24St.
Sesz (M. H. G.), 241.
Setja upp, a6, (Icel.), 339.
Sett (or sdtt, Icel.), 348.
Severino, M. A., 122.
Seymour, Richard, editor of ^^Gom-
pleat Gamester,'' 287-288.
Sex (Icel.), 337, 339, 348.
Sex (G. B. cod.), 210; (Swed.) 313.
Digitized by
Google
INDBX ,
391
Sexa (Swed.), 313, 316.
Sezen, sezer (Dan.)i 310.
Sez-eu (game ; Swed.), 329-330.
Seztiofem (Swed.), 316, 321.
Seztiofjrra (Swed.), 316, 321.
Seztlotre (Swed.), 321.
Seztiotv& (Swed.), 322.
Sforaa, CaUrtna, 212-213.
Sfona, Oaleazzo, duke, 212.
Shioh, see Shih.
Shaftesbury, earl, 35.
ShAh (Pers.), 5, 59.
Shahiludium, 119.
Sh&hmAt, 5.
Shakespeare, William, 28, 71, 79, 124,
125, 126, 279, 280, 281, 285.
ShakhmatnikI, 133.
Shashechna igra (Russ.), 305.
Sh&shka (Russ.), 305, 306.
Shaski (sing, shaska, Russ.), 93.
Shatranjat (Arab.), 255.
Sherwood, Robert, 190, 282.
Si (G. B. cod.), 210.
Sibotos von Neuenburg, 91.
Sice, 242, 281.
Sice-ace, 282.
Sice>ace (game), 283, 286, 300, 329.
Sidere (Pers.), 123.
Sienes (0. Fr.), 215.
Sighvatsson, t^6r5ur, 8.
Sighvatur, see Sturluson, Sighvatur.
Sigtryggur (Kr6ka-Refur), 15.
SigurOsson, Ami, 30, 31.
Sigur5sson, Jdn, 17, 47, 52.
SigurOsson, dgmundur, 41.
SigurSur m&lari, see Oubmundsson,
Sigur5ur.
Sigurhr688hugvekjur, 343, 355.
Simplicissimus, 246.
Simrock, Karl, 248.
Sines (B. S. & C. B. cod.), 206, 210.
Sink, 242, 280.
Sinka (Swed.), 313, 316, 321, 322.
Sis (B. S, cod.), 206; (Germ.) 241;
(Engl.) 281; (Dan.) 310; Swed.)
313.
Sisenna, L. Cornelius, 119.
Six, 279.
Sixtus IV., pope, 213.
Size (Engl.), 304.
Size-aco, (Engl.) 88, ^6.
Skag-taffll, 35.
Sk^k (Icol.), 3, 5, 9, 24, 34, 43, 47,
48, 49, 50, 52, 54, 59, 142.
Skdk og mki (Icol.), 5, 48, 66.
Sk&ka, aO, (loel.), 2, 5, 33, 43, 47,
48, 50, 54.
Skika og m4ta, aS, (Icel.), 5.
Sk&kboH) (loel.), 9, 16, 47, 48, 50, 52.
SxaKi, 173.
Skakka, 44.
Sk&kma5ur (p/. skikmenn, Icel.), 2,
33, 47, 48, 49, 50, 54, 59.
Skikmit (Icel.), 44.
Skakmat (Dan.), 44, 48.
Sk&ksleikar (Icel.), 49.
Skakspil i detgamie Norden, Om, 156.
SkAktafl (Icel.), 3, 7, 9, 16, 24, 44, 50,
52, 57, 59, 66, 91.
SkakUvl (Dan.), 310.
Skaktidende, Nordisk, 36.
Sk&kus, 33.
Skaldic lays, 1.
Skilholt, 7.
Skallagrimsson, Egill, 51.
Skeat, Walter William, 97.
Skelton, John, 96.
Skifva (Swed.), 322.
Skola (Swed.), 319.
Sktlilason, PorlAkur, bishop, 47.
S1&, att, (Swed.), 313, 315, 317, 323.
Sl& in, att, (Swed.), 317.
Slaan (Dutch), 273, 278.
Slagen ur br&det (Swed.), 317.
Smaakhorn^e (Dutch), 272.
Smarelli (Ital.), 120.
Smerelli (lUl.), 106.
Smith, Magnt^s, 37.
Smollett, Tobias George, 284.
Snorrason, Ormur, 44.
Socinus, Marinns, 84.
Sagur Su5urlanda, 17 (cf. Fornsdgur
Su6urlanda).
Solis, Ottaviano, 224.
SoliUire, 147.
Somaise, see Salmasius.
Sonn^s (sonnez, Pr.), 176, 178, 180,
(etymol.) 191, 241, 310.
Sophocles, 234.
Sorokin, 133.
S5toft, Nicolai Bierfreund, 32.
Souhaider (souheidier, 0. Fr.), 216.
Soumille, B. L., abbd, 175-176, 177,
184,
Souter, Daniel, 122, 145.
Spana, a9, (Icel.), 141.
Spaniol, 246.
Spel (Dutch), 272.
Spela in, att, (Swed.), 317.
Spelbord (Dutch), 271.
Digitized by
Google
392
INDEX
Spenna upp, lO), (loel.)) 139-141.
Speraii (lUl.), 171.
Sperainum (Ital.)i 171.
Speraionum (Ital.)« 171.
Sperando (Ital.), 171.
Spets (p{. spetsar, Swed.)« 319.
Spielmarke (Germ.), 266.
Spilabdk (1858), 61-68.
Spilan (loel.), 335.
Spillebog for btirn, 156.
Sponda (Ital.), 229.
Spr&ngjan (Swed.), 317, 325, 328.
Springare (Swed.), 4.
Springer (Dan.), 4.
Square, 86, 94, 97.
Stalder, F. J., 248.
Stanislaus Leczinsiiy, king, 96.
Stanz (sUns, Icel.), 2, 6, 48, 50, 57.
Staunton, Howard, 199, 200.
Stein (Germ.), 259, 270.
Steinschneider, M., 173.
Stella (Lat), 105.
Stephanins, Stephan, 47.
Stephanus, see Etienne, Henri.
Stephens, George, 25.
Stephensen, Magnus, 343, 355.
Sterzingerspiele, 244.
Stieler, Caspar von, 127, 128, 248.
Stip (Dutch), 272.
St6ra bert (Icel.), (3), 6.
Stora Jan, den, (Swed.) 318.
Store Jan, den, (Dan.) 311.
St6ri d&numa9ur (Icel.), 343, 354.
Stdri meistari (Icel.), see Meistari.
Storm, Gustav, 35, 47.
Stormjan (Swed.,) 319.
Story of Frithiof, 25-32.
Stray Notes 33-363.
Streep (Dutch), 271.
Street, 75.
Strieker, der, 243
Stridslag, Peder Manssons, 312, 314.
Strohmeyer, Fritz, 71, 73.
Strong, William, 26.
Strutt, Joseph, 118, 123, 124, 125, 151-
152, 303.
Strdbeck, 62, 91.
Stubbs, William, 77.
Sturlunga saga, 8, 9, 13, 15, 49, 56,
333, 334, 337, 344, 345.
Sturluson, Sighvatur, 333-334.
Sturluson, Snorri, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 34,
51, 332, 333.
Sturluson, I^drCur, 12, 343.
Sturz, Heinrich Friedrich, 246.
Stiirzinger, J. J., 114.
Stutti mukur (Icel.), 316, 341, 350, 351.
SuOurlandasogur, 44 {cf, Fornsdgur
SuOurlanda).
Suidas, 81, 234.
Surtees Society, the, 278-279.
Susan, H. C, 275.
Sveinbjarnarson, Hrafn, 7-8.
Sveinn, 21.
Sveinn Jarl QuOinason, 10.
Sveinsson, BrynJ61fur, bishop, 47.
Svend (Sweyn, Sveinn), king of Den-
mark, 10-11.
Sverrir, king of Norway, 8.
Svikamylna (Icel.), 139, 140, 141, 142,
143.
Swift, Jonathan, 277, 303.
Synk (0. Engl.), 280.
Synke (0. Engl.), 280.
Synod of Elvira, the, 133.
Syse (0. Engl.), 281.
Szem (Hung.), 306.
Taarn (Dan.), 4, 54, 65.
Tabella (Lat), 80.
Tabl (Icel.), see Tail.
Tsebl (A. S.), 310.
Tabl4 (Hung.), 306.
TapXa, 81.
Tablas (Span.), 70, 89, 98, 255, 307,
363.
Tablas, las quinze, (Alph. MS.), 253.
Tablas reales (Span.), 157, 159, 192-
193.
Tabid (Russ.), 305.
Table-game, 345; origin and history
of table-games 357-363 (MSS. on,
360).
Tables, 3, 4, 7, 9, 16, 19, 57, 70, 71, 72,
73, 74, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 84, 90,
91, 94, 105, 114, 157-175 (Spanish,
167-168), 259, 282-283, 291, 328, 330,
331, 345, 356, 362, 363 ; latest use
of name 159 ; boards of, 160-161,
162 ; tables and chess, 168.
Tables and HnefaUd, 69-92.
Tables MSS., 161-167, 191, 198-216, 295,
360.
Tables of Toledo (Tables Tolletanes),
78.
Tables rabattues (Fr.), 80, 171.
TapXi, 307-308.
Tablier (Fr.), 72, 176.
Ta^idicY), 80-81.
Digitized by
Google
INDBX
Ta^ioxYipioVy 80-81.
TapXtcK-fic 80, 81.
Tablizare (Lat.)i 80.
TapXt4a>, 80, 81, 307.
Taboa (Port.), 195.
Tabola (Port.), 195.
Tabolas (Port.), 70, 90, 157, 159,
363.
Taboleiro (Port.), 195,
Tabolerium (Ital.), 85, 230.
Tabourot, Etienne, see Accords, B. T.
des.
Tabula (pi. tabulae, Lat.), 3, 57, 70, 73,
74, 75, 77, 80, 81, 84, 90, 92, 173,
207, 229, 230, 306^ 308, 314, 328,
330, 362, 363.
Tabula (tabulae, Port.), 195.
Tac (Ital.), 228.
TachUritus, 169.
Tacitus, Corneiius, 58^ 74, 240, 249.
Tafel (Oerm.), 270.
Taefel (A. S.), 70, 74, 75, 92.
Tjefelstan (A. S.), 70, 75.
Tafl (Icel.), 3, 4, 7, 16, 24, 44, 48, 49, 50,
57, 70, 74, 92, 95, 141, 142, 314,
328, 33], 334, 335, 336, 337, 345,
352, 356.
Taefl (A. S.), 310.
Tafla (pi. t6flur, loel.)), 44, 58, 339,
342.
Tseflan (Ueflian, A. S.), 70, 75.
TaflbortJ (lcel.)f !«, 44, 52, 57.
TaflbragQ {jpU taflbrdg5, loel.), 44,
51, 57.
Tafldsemi (Icel.), 49.
Tsefle (A. S.)„ 75.
Taefle crseft (A. S.), 75.
TaBflere (A. S.), 75.
Taflf^ (Icel.) 44, 57.
TaflmaOur (pU taflmenn, Icel.), 44, 49,
51, 57, 64, 66.
Tafipungur (Icel.), 49, 50, 57.
Taflspeki (Icel.), 44, 57.
Taflvisa (Icel.), 141, 362, 354, 365.
Taflvisur, 38.
Taaflung (A. S.), 75.
Tafvel (Swed.), 314, 315, 328.
Tafvelbord (Swed.), 314.
Tafvellek (Swed.), 314.
Taga fullt med ^n (Swed.), 326.
Taga ut, att, see Uttaga.
Taibhleas (Qaalic), 70, 92.
Taiplis (Erse), 92.
Taka t%, a5, (Icel.), 340.
Talmud, 172, 173, 361.
Talon (Fr.), 176, 180, 270, 1871, 277
316. '
Talus (Lat.), 80, 84, 337.
Tanntafl (Icel.), 16.
Taol (Celtic), 92.
Tsarling (tserlingk, Dutch), 271.
Tarlton, Richard, 285.
Taerning (Dan.), 310, 382.
Taming (Swed.), 313, 814, 320, 332.
TserningbflBger (Dan.), 310.
T&mingbagare (Swed.), 313.
Ta,rningbord (Swed.), 313.
T&rningkappa (Swed.), 313.
Tserningfald (Dan.), 310.
Tserningdie (Dan.), 310.
T&mingspel (Swed.), 313.
T&rningspelare (Swed.), 313.
Tsarningspil (Dan.), 310, 343.
Tserningspiler (Dan.), 310.
Taeuelbrede (A. S.), 76.
Taukati (Arab.), 171.
Taul (Armorican), 92.
Taula (Arab.), 308 (see also Li'b et
taula).
Taulas (Prov.), 72.
Taule (0. Fr.), 216.
Tauler (Span.), 89.
Taules (Span.), 89.
Tauli (tawuli, Turk.), 171.
Taulier (0. Fr.), 216.
Taos (Germ.), 241.
Tausz (Qerm.), 241.
Tavella (B. S. cod.); 105.
Tavl (Dan,), 50, 70, (origin) 310.
Tavlbord (Dan.), 310.
TavlbrjBt (Dan.), 310.
Tavleleg (Dan.), 50.
Tavlleg (Dan.), 310.
Tavogliero (Ital.), 220.
Tavola (Ital.), 86, 92, 107, 109, 160, 171,
221,236.
Tavola di mulino (Ital.), 106.
Tavola reale (Ital.), 86, 157, 159, 160,
225, 236-239, 308.
Tavola scoperta (Ital.), 221.
Tavole {pi. lUl.), 70, 82, 84, 85.
Tavoletta (Ital.), 106.
Tavoliere (Ital.), 84, 227, 234.
Tawla 171.
Tawlbwrdd (A. S.), 70, 92.
Taws (Germ.), 249.
Taxillus (Lat.), 84, 207, 209.
Taylor, Bayard, 28.
Tchupur (Ind.), 172.
50
Digitized by
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dM
INDEX
Tebla (Io6l.)f see TeUa.
Teblere (A. S.), 310.
Tebling (Ic6l.)> see Teflin^'.
Teila, a9, (Icel.), 44, 48, 50, 51, 52,
141, 142, 335, 337.
Tefla upp, aO, (Icol.), 5*7.
Teilari (Ic«l.), 337.
Tettdur til eyris (Icel.), 334.
Tefling (Icel.), 58, 335.
Tegn^r, Esaiaa, 25-31.
Teningakast (Icel.), 3dl, 335, 336, 337,
838.
Teningalukka (Icel.), 337.
Teningatdil (Icel.), 343.
Teningsauga (Icel.), 338.
Teningur (Icel.), 332, 334, 337, 338,
339, 342; etymology, 304.
Tenir (Pr.), 180, 292.
Tennengur (Icel.), see Teningur.
Tenningur (Icel.), see Teningur.
Tentos (Port.), 196.
Terentius, 229.
Terna (Ital.), 239.
Ternas (Span.), 194.
Tepne (ternes, Fr.), 176, 180, 183, (ety-
mol.), 190, 191, 206, 210, 241, 310,
319
Terni (Ital.), 191, 223, 235, 238.
Terning (Dan.^, 171 (cf. teeming).
Ternio (lul.), 241.
Terz (C. B. cod.), 210.
Tiooapa, 82.
Tessera {pL tesserss, Lat.;, 84, 171.
Testa (Ital.), 221.
Testa (texta, C. B. cod.), 210, 214, 215.
Teufelsband, 259, 261, 270.
Thackeray, William. Makepeace, 179.
Theodoric the Groat, king of the East
Qoths, 54.
Theuth, 234.
Thomas-a-Becket, Saint, 8, 10.
Thomas of Ercildoune, 76.
Thomas Magister (or Grammaticus),
81.
Thomasin von Zircl&re, 251.
Thomson, Chr. J., 156.
Thomson, James, 225, 291.
Thorarensen, BJarni, 37.
Thorkelin, Grlmur Jdnsson, 47.
Thopiak, St. see I*6rhallsson, I>or-
l&kur.
Thorlaksmas, 7.
Thorpe, Benjamin, 75, 76.
Thorsteinn (I^orsteinn Vikingsson),
Three- men-morris, 97-98, lOO, 107,
121, 122, 126^ 134, 136, 144, 254.
Three- men's morals, 117.
Three Northern Love Stories, 25.
Three penny moris, 117.
Three pin merelles, 117.
Throndhjem, 8, 13-14, 331.
Throw off, to, 289, 293.
Thurm (Germ.), 54, 65.
Tibbins, J., 189.
Ticknor, Georges, 89.
Tick-tock, 79, 88, 157, 158, 188, 256^
258,295, 341; etymology, 159; Exi^-
lish, 283 ; once more common i n
England than trick-track, 2S5 ;
method of play, 298-299.
Tic-tac, 157, 158, 171, 254, 256, 2S8,
303, 352 ; etymology, 188.
Tiest (0. Fr.), 215.
Tik-tak, 188, 271, 356.
TikUkbord (Dutch), 271.
Tiktakken (Dutch), 271.
TikUkker (Dutch), 179.
Tik-Uk-tol (Dutch), 122.
Tiquetaque (Port.), 188, 195.
Tiro (Ital.), 221.
Tit-Ut-to, 127.
T6a (Icel.), 154-156.
Tobler, Adolfo, 71.
Tobna, »al, (Arab.), 123.
Toe (Fr.), 189, 235, 319.
Toe, jeu de, (Fr.), 182, 189.
Tocadilho (Port), 195.
Toccadiglio, 189, 220, 224, 225, 235,
254.
Toccadille, 254, 265.
Toccadilo (corto e lungo, Ital.),
223.
Toccategli, 158, 257, 258, 259, 262, 264,
265, 311, 318, 319, 356.
Tockadill, 319.
Todas tablas (Span.), 88, 188, 253, 255,
293, 294, 295, 363.
Toen (Dan.), 310.
Tokkadilje, 311.
Tokkadille, 182, 257, 258, 267-268, 269,
270, 356..
Tokkategli, 182, 258, 267-268.
Toledo, Tables of, 78.
Tdlfin (Icel.), 339, 348, 352.
Toller, T. N., 74.
Tom Wilson, see Wilson, Tom.
Tommaseo, Niccol6, 82, 86^ 106, 160,
225.
TOnn (Icel.), 304, 332.
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Google
INDEX
Toots, 299.
Topeler (M. H. G.), 249.
Toppeln (M. H. G.), 247, 249.
Topping, 284.
Torfason, Pormdflur, (Torfajus), 35,
47.
Torn (Swed.), 4.
Torqaemada, Antonio, 93.
Tortelii, Mario, 99.
T6sti jarl Guttinason, 10.
Tourne (Fr.), 183, 320.
Tonme-case (Pr.), 183, 235, 320.
Tourner, trictrac i, (Pr.), 182.
Tournes (Pr.), 180, 241, 319.
Tout-i-bas (Pr.), 178.
Toute-table (Fr.), 178, 183, 188, 225,
239.
Toutes-tables (Pr.), 183, 225, 235, 255,
266, 293, 294, 309.
Tower, 66.
Towli (Arab.), see Taula.
Towneley mysteries, 278.
Trai (B. S. cod.), 206.
Trallor (Swed.), 319, 321.
Trappspel (Swed.), 317, 324, 327.
Travanisband (Germ.), 271.
Tray, 280.
Tr^ 304.
Tre ^Swed.), 316.
Trea (Swed.), 313.
Tre-band (Swed.), 320.
Trebejos (Span.), 99, 254.
Treen, treer (Dan.), 310.
Treja (Icel.), 337, 339, 348, 356.
Tree, 210, 241-242, 310, 313, 316.
Tres en raya (Span.), 99, 100, 101, 102,
103.
Treses (Span.), 194.
Trey, 280, 304, 337, 356.
Tria, 105, 255, 313.
Triad codices, 360.
Triad of (table) games, 97, 128, 256.
Tricche tracche, 187, 224'.
Trich-trach, 187.
Trick-track, 157, 158, 188, 254, 285.
Tric-trac, 80, 98, 160, 171, 173, 175188,
224, 225, 228, 229, 233, 234, 235,
239, 258, 259, 262, 292, 303, 318,
356; etymology, 158, 185-187; va-
rious meanings, 185-186.
Trictrac, grand, 175, 179, 184, 260-261,
266-267, 2^, 286, 288, 296-298.
Trictrac & ecrire (Fr.), 176, 182, 184,
319.
Trictrac k la chouette (Pr.), 182.
Trictrac k tourner (Pr.), 182.
Trictracnm, 179.
Trilf-trak, 99, 267-268, 271, 306, 311,
322; origin of game, 319.
Trimberg, Hugo von, see Hugo.
TptoBtov, 105, 120.
Triodium (Lat), 119, 130.
Triquetrac, 179.
Triquetraque, 187, 258.
Triquetraquer, 179.
Triquitraque, 192.
Tripp-trapp-trull (Swed), 117, 122,
129, 135, 136.
Tplg Tpaxo?, 229, 234, (261).
Tristan, 73.
Tristan und Isolde, 17.
Tristram, 17-18.
Tristrams kvaeCi, 17.
Tristrams saga ok fsdndar, 17, 18, 73.
Tristrem, Sir, 17-19, 76.
Trois 279-280, 304, 356.
Troja (Swed.), 313, 316, 322.
Trokodil (Icel.), 356.
Trou (Fr.), 178, 181.
Troy, destruction of, 78, 95.
Tryktrak (Pol.), 306.
Tu^je (Russ.), 304.
Tukati (Arab.), 171.
Tumason, Kolbeinn, 345.
Tunga (pi, tungor, Swed.), 315, 319,
320.
Tunga (Braedratunga), 12.
Turricula (Lat.), 74, 171.
TCis (Germ.), 241, 249.
Tus (Swed.), 313.
Tuz (Pol.), 304.
Tv& (Swed.), 313.
Twee (Dutch), 272.
Twelve-men-morris, 3, 99, 108, 118,
120, 121, 127, 205, 254.
Twyn, Thomas, 83.
Udall, Nicholas, 280.
Udtage, at, (Dan.), 311.
Uhland, Johann Ludwig, 244.
yifnaOrsson, GuOini, see GuDini jarl.
Ulfur, 21.
ijlfur jarl the rich, 7, 9-10, 54, 56.
Unbound, 299.
Ungebunden (Germ.), 299.
Unger, Carl Richard, 16, 47, 332, 336,
344.
Digitized by
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396
INDEX
Unio (Lat.), 241.
UppnAm (Icel.), 12, 13, 50, 50-57, 61.
Uppsetningarreitur (Icel.), 340.
Uppspel (Swed.), 317, 324^ 327.
Urquhart, Sir Thomas, 289.
UtkomumAt (Icel.), 3, 6.
Utspel (Swed.), 327.
Uttaga, att, (Swed.), 326.
Uttagning (Swed.), 316, 319, 326.
Uttekt (Icel.), 340^ 341, 350.
UttekUrbort (Icel.), 840.
v., P. T., 95.
Vald (Icol.), 57.
Valdemar the great, king of Den-
mark, 10-11, 53.
Valdsk&k (Icel.), 54, 66.
ValentinI, Fr., 128.
y^lla, Lorenzo, 211.
Vails, Lorenzo, 93.
Valmaggi, Luigi, 228, 232.
Valpj6fur Jarl Oaltinason, 10.
Vsengjamylna (Icel.), 140, 141.
Varp (Swed.), 313.
Vartafvel (Swed.), 312, 314.
Vartavl (Dan.), 310.
Var u ghel (Turk.), 123.
Vazurjmihr (Biizurgmihr), vezier, 169,
Veld (Dutch), 277.
Verci, Qiambatista, 235.
Verelius, Olaus, 20, 44-46, 60.
Vergeltungsjan (Germ.), 270.
Verkeer (Plem.), 171.
Verkeerbord (Dutch), 271.
Verkeeren (Dutch), 271.
Verkeerspel (Dutch), 271.
Verkeer^e (Dutch), 272.
Verkehr (Dan.), 310, 343.
Verkehren (Germ.), 188, 255, 257, 259,
262, 263, 288, 317, 318, 320, 321,
343, 355; etymology and origin,
259-260.
Verkehrt (Germ.), 256, 257.
Verkehrtes (Germ.), 256.
Verkehrung (Germ.), 171.
Verkeret (das lang u. das kurz. Germ.),
256.
Verkliga tiirningkombinationer (Swe-
dish), 321-323.
Verpa, aO, (Icel.), 331, 332.
Verpill (Icel.), 331.332, 338.
Verplakast (Icel.), 331, ^36, 338.
Verplastaup (Icel.), 338.
Verquere, 188-189, 286-288, 295-296.
Verquier (Fr,), 171.
Versailles-Jacquet (Fr.), 320.
Vestri-byg5, 15.
Vettori, Francesco, 224.
Vetula, De, 60, 203-205.
Victor Emanuel Library, 106, 199,201,
202.
Vida, Hieronymus (Girolamo), 4, a3-
34, 66.
Vidalin, Arngrlmur J6nsson, see J6ns-
son, Arngrlmur.
Vidalin, P&ll, 47, 335, 339, 346.
Vi515gur (Icel.), 336, 339.
ViCurlSgur (Icel.), 336.
Vier (Dutch), 272, 274.
Viergo (Fr.), 60.
Vigfusson, Guftbrandur, 8, 13, 15, 24,
29, 51-53, 55, 58, 74, 143, 156, 331,
332, 333, 336, 337.
Viglundar saga, 23-24, 56.
VigvartJur, son of Amundi jarl, 22.
Vikingsson, Porsteinn, 26.
Vijf (Dutch), 272.
Villedieu, Mme de, 179.
Villon, Francois, 179, 186, 187, 190.
Vilmundar saga viDutans, 156.
Virgilio, Polidoro, 85, 234.
Virgo (Lat.), 60.
Visconti, F. M., duke of Milan,
198.
Vitruvius, Marcus Pollio, 241.
Vituleo, 301-302.
Vogel, Albert, 86.
Voll, der grosse, (Germ.), 270.
Voll, der kleine, (Germ.), 270.
Volpe (Ital.), 148.
Voltaire, F. M. A. de, 179.
Vrhavka (Boh.), 304.
Vrhcab (Boh.), 306.
Vrhcabnice (Boh.), 306.
Vulpes (VI. Ut.), 148, 359.
Waci, Robert, 72, 76.
Wackernagel, Wilhelm, 91.
Wahlstab, Herold- nnd, publishers,
265.
Walker, Gilbert, 293.
Walton, Izak, 287.
Wander, Karl Friedrich Wilhelm,
248.
Warcab (Pol.), 306.
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INDBX
397
Wapcaba (Pol.), 306.
Warcaby (Pol.), 306.
Waroapnica (Pol.), 306,
Ward, 79.
Warkabnic (Pol.), 306.
Warp (Engl.), 240, 332.
Wartaifvel, see Vartafvel.
Webster, Noah, 118, f:^.
Weissenbach, Placid., 91.
Weorpan (A. S.), 332.
Wepfen, zu, (Germ.), 240.
Werftafel (Germ.), 92.
Wernicke, Christian, 257.
Werpen (Dutch), 272, 277.
Wesenigk, 256.
White, John 0., 146, 192, 201, 214,
253.
Why-not, 299.
Wibold, bishop oi* Cambray, 251.
Wigalois, 90, 91.
Wilfood, P., 300.
William of Waddington, 77.
William the Conqueror, 72.
Wilson, John, (Christopher North),
292.
Wilson, Sir Thomas, 280.
Wilson, Tom, (pseudonym), 136, 154,
319.
Wimmer, L. F. A., 47.
Wirnt von Qravenberg, 90.
Wise, John F., 126.
Within the tables, 283.
Wolfram von Eschenbach, 247.
WoUaston, William, 282.
Worm, Ole (Glaus), 33-34, 42, 47.
Worp (Dutch), 277.
Worptafelspel, 249.
Worsaae, J. J. A., 156.
Wotan, 248.
Wotton, William, 92.
Wright, Thomas, 79, 161, 164, 173,
278.
Wiinsche, August, 248-251.
Wurf (Germ.), 240.
Wurfel (Germ.), 99, 248, 253, 332; ety-
mology, 240.
Wurfelbecher (Germ.), 259.
Wtirfeln, zu, (Germ.), 86.
Wiirfelspiel (Germ.), 240, 248.
Wurfelspiel (= wiirfelspiel), 91.
Wiirfler (Germ.), 240.
WurfUbelle (Germ.), 268.
Wurfeabel (Germ.), 91, 239, 240, 252,
309, 312.
Wupfzabelspiel (Germ.), 251.
Wiirfzabelstein (Germ.), 90.
Wurzabelstftin (Germ.), 90.
Wycherley, William, 290.
Xadrez (Port.), 196.
Yngvaldsson, Jdn, 342.
^ngvar kveisa, II.
Young Hunting (ballad), 279.
Zabal (Germ.), 90, 91.
Zabel (Germ.), 90; not applied to
draughts, 312.
Zabelspiel (Germ.), 70, (zabelspil) 251.
Zabilstein (Germ.), 90.
Zahr, see Z&r.
Zambaldi, Francesco, 82.
Zaples (0. Germ.), 90.
ZAr (Arab.), 82, 307, 308.
Zar (Turk.), 171.
Zara (lUl.), 82, 228, 308.
Zardum (Lat.), 308.
Zipi, 171, 307.
Zdpta, 171, 307.
ZaptCo), 307.
ZapioicaiYvtSi, 307.
Zaptorv}^, 307.
Zatpixiov, 173, 308.
Zdekauer, Lodovico, 84, 86, 230.
Zeh, Johann Eborhard, 264.
Zeitschrift der doutschen morgcnl&n-
dischen Gesellschaft, 5, 168, 309,
360.
Zeno, emperor, 172, 229, 234.
Zes (Dutch), 272, 274.
Zingg (0. Germ.), 241.
Zink, 241, 310, 313.
Zinke (Germ.), 249.
Zoega, Johan, 2«
Zonaras, John, 81, 133,
Zumachen (Germ.), 264, 267.
Zunge (Germ.), 259.
Zupitza, Julius, 77.
Zwei bretspiel (1804), 265-266.
Zweter, Rein mar von, see Reinmar.
Zwickmuhle (Germ.), 132, 134, 146.
t^sTTLBiFUR, See EOlarson, I^^ttleifur.
I^iOrekssaga, 54, 59.
I>J6fobilkur, 334, 335.
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398
INDEX
I>OPbjdrn, 156.
I>6r«ar80D, Bjarni, 343, 355.
^drOarson, BoOvari 12.
P6rOarson, Gunnlaugur, 20, 23.
t^6ri)ar8on, Outhormur, 12.
I>(ir»arson, Sturla, 333, 3ai.
I>orgil8 saga slcarOa, 12-13, 61.
Porgils 8kar9i, see BdDvarsson, t^or-
gils.
I'urhallsson, l^orl&kar, bishop of
Skilholt, (St. Thorlak), 7, 8.
I^orkelsson, J6n, archivist, 20, 30,
37, 52, 142.
I^orkelsson, J<in, rector of the Col-
lege of Iceland, 335, 336.
t^orl&ksson, OuObrandar, bishop, 53.
I^orlaksson, PdrOup, bishop, 47.
t^orsteinn fr69i (Thorstein the lear-
ned), 332-333.
t^orvaldssoD, Gizur (j&rl), 12-13, 56.
^orvaldsson, Ou?(mundur d^ri, 345.
I>r*tefli (Icol.), 6, 50, 56.
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CORRIGENDA
Pag. 9 line 1 For whith read with.
For of read af.
9
line 1
31
» 5
36
10
73
» 32-33
»
73
»
50
»
79
»
21
»
85
»
54
»
85
»
58
»
85
»
59
»
88
»
1
»
88
»
1-2
»
90
»
18-19
»
99
»
50
»
102
»
47
»
122
»
13
»
122
»
27
»
128
»
3
»
140
»
25
»
141
»
3
»
141
♦
16
»
141
»
52
»
147
»
3
»
155
»
37
1 »
155
»
50
1 *
155
»
50
»
156
»
17
»
156
»
29
»
157
»
28
1 »
157
»
32
»
157
»
41
1 »
173
»
2
For Dansk read Nordisk.
Omit and in the earlier edition (ed. Guessard, Pa-
ris 1860), also p. 88. There is otily one edition of
1860^ that by Kroeber afui Servois^ being Vol, IV,
of *' Les aticiens poetes de la Finance*" published
under the direction of F, Guessard,
For Qoria read Qorra.
For Skakespeare^s read Shakespeare's.
For Scherer read Scheler.
For Scherer read Scheler.
For Scherer read Scheler.
For todas, tablas read todas tablas.
For la bufa, cortesia read la bufa cortesia.
For Lacarda read Lacerda.
For Qianuzlo read Gianuzio.
For Corvarrubias read Covarrabias.
For Husbibliothek read Handbibliothck.
For B. Gomparetti read D. Comparotti.
For Steiler read Stieler.
For telfd read tefld.
For Drengernes read Drengenes.
For Gisli Konr&l^sson read KonraD Gislason.
For tre read trd.
For belejringsspel read belejringsspil. •
For Xdti read tttfl.
For Pegar read I>egar.
For \6mh read I5mb.
For Rekjavlk reail Reykjavik.
For hnetafl read hnettafl.
For bondi read b6ndi.
For huni read hiini.
For huni read hiini.
For p. 157 read p. 155.
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400 CORRIGENDA
Pag. 188 line 3-4 For Baron d'Albikir read Baron d'Albrkrae. %
» 228 » 47 For 1899 read 1897.
For Reimar read Reinmar.
For Simplicius read Simplicissimus.
For las quinze Tables read las quinze Tablas.
For Librp de les tablas read Libro de las tablas.
For Buch dor spiel read Buch der spiele.
For skowing r^ad showing.
For konigliche read kdnigUche.
For Harmon read Horman.
For Osway^s read Otway's.
For flyers read flyers.
Omit as now.
For spill-bog read spille-bog.
For upspel read uppspel.
For bad& read b&da.
For 1018 read 1118.
For 1281 read 1262.
For Hdrgadal read Hdrgdrdal.
For teniningakast read teningakast.
For tafi read tafl.
For Formannasdgur read Fornmannasdgur.
For Olaf read Olafr.
For stelpu read stelpur.
For 8t6ri mukar read langi mukar.
»
243
»
15
»
246
»
32
»
253
»
31
x»
254
»
45
»
267
»
26
»
268
»
42
»
269
»
3
»
280
»
27
»
286
»
32
>
299
»
12
»
309
»
15
»
311
»
10
7>
317
»
43
»
321
»
22
»
331
»
14
»
331
y»
16
»
333
5>
47
}>
334
*
44
>>
336
»
9
»
336
»
24-25
»
336
»
35
»
342
»
38
»
355
»
35
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Thia book ahould be retorned to
the Ubr&ry on or before thm last date
a tumped below.
A line of five oenim a day is incurred
by rdtainini it beyond the apecifird
lime*
Piease return promptly.
■ tO;<^iNtgyLUrp [
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