CESSOLIS, JACOBUS de.

The Game of Chess.

      CHESS. - Translated and Printed by William Caxton c. 1483, Reproduced in facsimile from the copy atTrinity College, Cambridge, with an introduction by N. F. Blake. London, The Scolar Press, 1976. 4to. (176) p.With illustr. in the text. Original rough hessian cloth, spine with leather titlelabel. Limited to 500 copies, of which this is copy number 73. 'The Game of Chess' is an English translation of the original Latin text by Jacobus de Cessolis under the title of 'Liber de Ludo Scaccorum'. This work, which was itself based on 'De Regimine Principum' by Aegidius Romanus, was written in the late 13th or early 14th century and was very popular - numerous manuscripts of it survive. There were two separate translations into French made about the middle of the 14th century, one by Jean de Vignay and the other by Jean Farron or Ferron. A further French version which is a conflation of these two translations was made, and it is from this conflated text, of which at least three manuscripts survive, that Caxton made his translation into English. This facsimile edition is a reproduction of England's first printer William Caxton's (1421-91) second edition of the Game of Chess. The second edition contained illustrations, the first edition of 1474 contained none. At the time it was published probably about 1483 it was one of the earliest printed books to have illustrations and it is also one of the earliest printed books in English on the subject of chess.