Newsgroup: it.hobby.scacchi
Titolo: Articoli di enciclopedie sugli scacchi...

Ogni tanto ne penso qualcuna... delle mie :-)
Oggi pensavo che sarebbe bello raccogliere, in diversi post, articoli di
enciclopedie che parlano di scacchi...
Non mi riferisco ai soliti articoli "generici", con qualche notiziola
scoppiazzata qui e là, ma ad articoli "sostanziosi" e documentati, ad esempio
sugli scacchi in determinate culture, società, religioni, ecc. ecc.
Per fare un esempio, posto l'articolo "Chess" della prestigiosa "Encyclopedia
Judaica", pubblicata nel 1972 dalla Keter Publishing House (Gerusalemme) in 16
volumi e poi aggiornata periodicamente con supplementi.
E' una vera "summa" sul nostro gioco nel pensiero guidaico!
Mi piacerebbe anche vedere articoli simili sugli scacchi nel mondo arabo, in
Cina, in Giappone, ecc. ecc.
Alla prossima...
Ivo
-----------------------------
Da "Encyclopedia Judaica", Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem, 1972
CHESS. The Jewish contribution to chess on an appreciable scale dates from the
middle of the 19th century. There is no basis for the claim that Jews invented
chess, or that King Solomon played the game, as is related in the Midrash
(Ginzberg, Legends 4, 172-3). Nor was chess known to Jews in the talmudic
period, which ended before the game could have reached them from Persia. This
view is generally maintained despite Rashi's identification of nardeshir with
chess, in his comment on Ketubbot 61b. All that can be inferred from Rashi's
rendering of nardeshir, a game probably played with dice, as ishkukei, is that
the commentator was familiar with some word cognate to the French Mchecs.
Ishkukei is the same name used by Judah Halevi when he refers in his book Kuzari
to the game as an intellectual exercise (pt. 5:20, "6th Principle"). Moritz
Steinschneider suggests in his Schach bei den Juden (1873) that Jews first
became acquainted with chess in the tenth century. He mentions a tenth century
convert, Ali of Taberistan, who recommended the game for its therapeutic value,
and Moses Sefardi (11th century), baptized as Petrus Alfonsi, who in his
writings described chess as a knightly virtue. In the tenth century, Arabs
introduced the game, which they called shatranj into Europe via Spain, and by
the eleventh century it was widely played by Jews in that country and in
Provence. The Persian-Arabic nomenclature for the pieces was known to at least
one member of a famous Spanish family, Bonsenior Ibn Yahya, whose description of
the game is preserved by Leone Modena (Ma'adannei Melekh, 16th century; with
French translation as DMlices Royales, 1864). It seems that Abraham Ibn Ezra
(12th century) knew the game. An excellent verse description of the game
attributed to him has been preserved by Leone Modena (translated into English by
Nina Davis in her Songs of Exile, 1901). The metrical and verbal skill of the
original suggests Ibn Ezra as author but the main difficulty about ascribing it
to him is the reference to the double pawn move. The reference may, however, be
an interpolation, and Steinschneider doubts the ascription to Ibn Ezra. The
invention of printing crystallized the rules of chess and helped to terminate
the evolutionary stale of the game. Nevertheless local varieties survived in the
East and in Europe into the 19th century. A study of the Persian-Arabic names of
the pieces used by Ibn Yahya, and retained in modern terminology, provides a key
to the development of the terms for chessmen in various countries and languages.
[...]
Chess Playing among Jews
There were diverse views among Jewish scholars as to whether the playing of
chess should be encouraged. Maimonides, in his commentary on the Mishnah (Sanh.
3:3), expresses disapproval of chess when it is played for money and couples it
with nard ("backgammon"), which is played with dice. The halakhah disapproved of
chess as time-wasting, an attitude paralleled in Byzantine and Canon law. When
the game first began to become respectable, it was a pastime for invalids and
women. In fact, Israel Abrahams suggests (Jewish Life in the Middle Ages (1896),
ch. 22), that it developed as a woman's game. But there was no unanimity on this
subject in this period. Kalonymus condemned the game, while Menahem ben Solomon
Meiri and the Sefer Hasidim in casual references seem to express approval.
Similar dissension existed among Christian authorities. Men as different as
Peter Damiani and Jan Hus condemned it. On the other hand, many popes played it.
There is a legend of a Jewish father who recognized a pope as his son by a move
that the latter played. Gradually, however, opposition to the game abated, both
among Jews and Christians. Thus, when games were generally condemned by the
rabbis of Cremona, after the plague of 1575, chess was excluded from the
indictment. Similarly, in an opinion given by the rabbi of Ancona in 1718, chess
was sharply distinguished from gambling games and time-wasting games. The later
authorities, with the exception of Elijah de Vidas and Elijah ha-Kohen of Smyrna
(Shevet Musar, 1712), all seem to approve of chess. Modern rabbinic opinion,
expressed in Lampronti's Pahad Yizhak, Abraham Abele Gombiner's Magen Avraham,
and by Moses Isserles, holds that chess is a proper pastime for the Jew, as long
as it is not played for money. On this principle, chess may be played on the
Sabbath. It should not be inferred from this that there is any extant valid
rabbinic authority against professional chess, although Maimonides' views remain
influential. Therefore, it has always been possible for an intellectual and
pious Jew to learn Torah and play chess. Indeed, players as great as Akiva
Rubinstein, Aaron Nimzovitch, and members of the Chajes family have emerged from
yeshivot. In fairness it should be added that professional chess involves a
mental effort that leaves little energy for scholarship. Moses Mendelssohn
unwittingly anticipated chess as a vocation when he said: "For a game it is too
serious, and for a serious occupation, it is too much of a game" ("Fuer Spiel
ist es zu viel Ernst, fuer Ernst zu viel Spiel"). It is believed that
Mendelssohn's friendship with Lessing originated in their games of chess. The
governments of the U.S.S.R. and similar authoritarian societies encourage
players such as the engineer Mikhail Botvinnik and the musician Mark Taimanov
who can more properly be described as professionals or players by vocation than
as amateurs. Thus it is not surprising that averages as well as standards, in
the modern game, have been raised. In the Marxian formula, quality emerges from
quantity, and this applies to Jewish as well as to other Soviet chess players.
The growth of European interest in chess, whether as game, art, or science,
seems to have traveled from the Iberian Peninsula to Siberia. It was in the 19th
century that a Jewish name appeared in French chess: Aron Alexandre (1766-1850).
Little is known about his play, but his writings survive (EncyclopMdie des
Echecs, 1837). By the middle of the century, Jewish names began to emerge
frequently as chess was established in the salons of Paris, which were
frequented by German and Russian Jews, and in London and Berlin. The Jewish
masters of this period included: Johann Jakob Loewenthal, a Hungarian refugee
settled in London; David Harrwitz (1823-1884), in Paris; Bernardt Horwitz
(1807-1885), one of the Berlin Pleiades settled in Paris; and Ignaz Kolisch
(later Baron von Kolisch) a Viennese merchant banker and a Rothschild protMgM. A
number of writers emerged from this group. They include: S. Alapin (1856-1923)
and Ernest Karl Falkbeer (1819-1885), who invented counter-gambits; Leopold
Hoffer (1842-1913), whose books are still read; and Shimon Abramovich Winawer
(1838-1920), a Polish Jew, whose variation of the French defense was
successfully revived by Alekhine and Botvinnik. Another prizewinner was Samuel
Rosenthal (1837-1902). Greatest was Wilhelm (William) Steinitz, who was world
champion from 1866 to 1894. Steinitz' writings constitute a major contribution
to chess theory. His theories were accepted as basic by such great theoreticians
as Emanuel Lasker, Siegbert Tarrasch, Savielly Grigorievich Tartakover, and
Nimzovitch. Steinitz also distinguished himself at blindfold chess. In the 20th
century two Jewish players, George Koltanowski and Mikhail (Miguel) Najdorf,
established a remarkable record by playing more than 50 blindfold chess games
simultaneously.
As the 19th century advanced, more Jews appeared in the top rank of tournament
and match play: Isidor Gunsberg, Max Weiss (1857-1927), Erich Cohn (1884-1918),
Berthold Englisch (1851-1897), Rudolf Charousek, David Markelovich Janowski, and
Jacques Mieses (1865-1954). All were prizewinners in the big international
events. The outstanding figure was Dr. Siegbert Tarrasch, a preeminent
tournament player, who won seven great events. His status as a theoretician was
such that he was acclaimed "Praeceptor Germanorum."
Above them all towered Emanuel Lasker, a mathematical philosopher as well as a
chess giant. If Steinitz is the chess player's theorist, Lasker is the chess
player's chess player. His doctrine was the importance of effort; Kampf
("Struggle," 1907), is the title of one of his books. His immense talent was
most clearly revealed in the matches in which he defended his world championship
title for 28 years. In 1921 he finally lost the title to the Cuban player,
Capablanca. The number of Jewish players continued to grow in the 20th century.
In the early years there were the Austrian Carl Schlechter (1874-1918) a
drawing-master, the German Jacques Mieses, the Serbian Boris KostiB (1887-1963),
and Edward Lasker (1885-1981) of Berlin and the U.S.-a friend and fellow student
of Emanuel Lasker. Then came the MmigrM Russians, or Russian Poles, Ossip
Bernstein (1882-1962), Savielly Tartakover, and Akiva Rubinstein, a genius who
might have risen to world championship but for the exigencies of World War I.
Great players between the World Wars are Rudolf Spielmann (1883-1942), Richard
RMti, Julius Breyer, Aaron Nimzovitch, and Salo Flohr of Czechoslovakia, a child
prodigy and a refugee from a Russian pogrom. In the 1930s there emerged in the
U.S., among others, Isaac Kasdan (1905-), Samuel Reshevsky, who began his chess
career as an eight-year-old in Poland, and Reuben Fine, a Capablanca-type player
who retired from the game to study psychology. Several of the names mentioned
above are important in chess theory. Tarrasch perfected the statement of the
Steinitzian logic. Rubinstein nearly perfected it in play. Breyer, Tartakover,
Nimzovitch, and Alekhine are responsible for restating and refining the theory.
Tartakover's Hypermoderne Schachpartie (1924) and Nimzovitch's Mein System
(1925), though a collection of clever ideas, are source books for the theory of
the fluid center, the fianchetto, blockade theory, and other technical aspects
of development.
Meanwhile Soviet Russian Jews were becoming prominent: Ilya Kan (1909- ),
Grigori Yakelovich Levenfish (Loewenfisch; 1889-1961), Mikhail Iudovich (1911-
), and Abraham (1878-1943) and Ilya Rabinovich (1891-1942) of Moscow and
Leningrad. Eventually, in the mid-1930s, Mikhail Botvinnik of the U.S.S.R. drew
a match with Flohr, and shared a first prize with Capablanca in 1936. In the
later 1930s, the teams of the Slav countries and of the Russian MmigrMs in
France and Belgium were almost entirely composed of Jewish players. New names
included: Paulin Frydman (1905-) of Warsaw; Andre Amolodovich Lilienthal (1911-)
and LFzl\ Szabo (1919- 	) of Hungary; Arthur Dunkelblum (1906- ) of Belgium;
Vladimir VukoviB (1898- 	) of Yugoslavia; Salo Landau (1903-1943) in
Holland; and J. Zuckerman (1903-1940) in France. Some of these fell victim to
the war and the Holocaust. A few survived because they were taking part in a
tournament in Buenos Aires when World War II broke out. The absence of Jews from
many East European teams in postwar Olympiads was a reminder of the Jewish
tragedy. The only exceptions are the Hungarian survivors, Szabo, E. Gereben
(1907- ), and Lilienthal. The last-named took refuge from the Nazis in his
native U.S.S.R. Nevertheless, the Yugoslav and Czechoslovak teams are believed
to contain many players of Jewish origin. At the Tel Aviv chess Olympiad in
1964, many Jews, Samuel Schweber among the best of them, appeared on a number of
South American teams. Western Europe is no longer dominated by Jewish players,
as it was before World War II. Germany, Scandivania, Spain, and Italy have never
had many Jewish chessmasters. Some of the European masters escaped to Israel,
and chess was developed there by players such as Joseph Porath (1909- ), Menahem
Oren (1901-1962), Moshe Czerniak, Aryeh Mohelever (1904-), Joseph Aloni (1905-
), Rafi Persitz (1934- ), and others who fostered a high standard.
British Jewish players include: Gerald Abrahams (1907- ), known for the
"Abrahams Defense" and as the author of The Chess Mind (1951), Technique in
Chess (1961), and other books on chess; Victor Buerger (1903-), born in Latvia;
Harry Golombek (1911- 1994), three times British champion, chess correspondent
of the Times, official of the FMdMration Internationale des Echecs and editor of
some well-known collections of games; David Joseph (1896- ), famous in the end
game field; and the very strong part-Jewish player, Victor Wahltuch (1875-1960).
The British championship has been won by Ernest Klein (1910- ), originally from
Vienna, Dr. Stephan Fazekas (1898-1967), who came from Czechoslovakia, and
Daniel Abraham Yanofsky (1925- ), a brilliant Canadian amateur who won against
Botvinnik. The ex-Russian master, O. List (1887-1964), also played for Britain.
In the first official contests between the U.S.S.R. and the western world after
World War II, the radio matches of 1946, the United Kingdom team had five Jewish
players, the Soviet team five out of a total of ten players and the United
States seven. In general, after World War II, Jews came to dominate the American
chess scene. They include: the veteran Edward Lasker, Israel Horowitz
(1907-1973), Abraham Kupchik (1892- ), Arthur Bisguier (1929- ), Fred Reinfeld
(1910-1964), Arnold Denker (1914- ), Imre Konig (1901-), who came from
Yugoslavia; Herman Steiner (1905-1955), one of several Hungarian players of the
same name; Reshevsky, Fine, and in the 1960s, Robert "Bobby" Fischer. Canada was
dominated by Daniel Abraham Yanofsky and Australia by Lajos Steiner (1903- ) and
Gerald Koshnitzki. Outstanding players in South Africa were Kurt Dreyer, David
Friedgood, and Wolfgang Heidenfeld, who later moved to Ireland.
Undoubtedly, one of the greatest phenomena in modern chess was the rise of
Brooklyn-born Bobby Fischer, who was only 13 when he began to rank as a leading
player. Until 1968 circumstances prevented him from challenging the world
champion, though some of his international performances were great. His
contemporaries were the Latvian Mikhail Tal and David Bronstein from Moscow, who
drew a match for the world championship. Julio Kaplan (1951- ) of Latin America
emerged as one of the leading juveniles of the late 1960s.
Jewish world champions include first Steinitz, who held the title for 25 years,
until it was wrested from him by Emanuel Lasker, who held it from 1894 to 1921.
Even during the periods when the title was held by non-Jews, most of the
finalists were Jews including Rubinstein, perhaps the greatest end-game player
who ever lived, Nimzovitch, and Flohr. In 1948 Botvinnik, a Soviet Jew, won the
title from some of the strongest players in the world, including Reshevsky, and
held it intermittently for nearly 20 years. His challengers were in turn
Bronstein, who drew the series of matches; Vassily Vassilyevich Smyslov (1921-
), a Russian reputed to be partly Jewish, who won the title and lost the return
match; Tal, who also won the title and lost the return, largely through
ill-health; and finally Petrosian, an Armenian non-Jew, who defeated Botvinnik
in 1967. In 1969, Petrosian was defeated by Boris Spassky, son of a Jewish
mother, who emerged as the new star of the chess world. In the zonal tournaments
in which today the challengers for the championship reveal their potential-and
in the great Soviet tournaments-Jews are placed high. Among them are Leonid
Stein (1934-1973), Yefim Petrovich Geller (1925-), the musician Mark Taimanov
(1926-), and Viktor Lvovich Korchnoy (1931- ). Jews are also prominent in the
realm of end-game composition. Some of the best work on end-play is by Reuben
Fine and the Soviet player Levenfish. Other important names in this field are:
RMti, Frederic Lazard (1883-1949), Vladimir Bron (1909- ), Abraham Gurvitch
(1894-1933), David Joseph, and Grochin. In general, the Jewish contribution to
theory has been immense. Steinitz, and after him Lasker and Tarrasch, taught the
chess world the basic strategy of the game, and established chess as a science.
Rubinstein may be said to have demonstrated this science in his beautiful play.
To Réti, Nimzovitch, and Tartakover the world owes the refinement of strategic
theories. As far as the literature of chess is concerned, masterpieces on
opening technique have been produced by Russian Jews, including Yuri Lvovich
Auerbach (1922-).
[Gerald Abrahams]
The year 1972 was of great importance in the history of chess. For the first
time in 36 years, with the victory of Robert (Bobby) Fischer over Boris Spassky,
the World Championship passed out of Russian hands and, for the first time in
160 years (i.e., since Paul Morphy), the chess world was dominated by an
American. In addition, the match was more spectacular, and the superiority of
the victor more pronounced than is usual in World Championships, and aroused
unprecedented interest in the game among the general public.
Fischer qualified as one of the challengers by winning the Palma Interzonal
Tournament in 1970 (15 wins and 7 draws out of 23 games). Thereafter, he won
three qualifying matches, against Taimanov (6-0), Larsen (6-0) and former title
holder Petrosian (6 1/2-1 1/2). The final against Spassky took place at
Reykjavik and ran from July 11 to September 1, 1972. Fischer commenced by losing
a game. Next, he forfeited a game by failing to appear (a rare occurrence in
championship matches). Thereafter, he began to gain the upper hand, winning the
match by 12 1/2-8 1/2 (7 wins, 11 draws, and 3 losses, including one by
default). However, Fischer lost the World Championship in 1975 when he refused
to play the challenger Vassily Karpov. Karpov gained the right to challenge by
defeating Viktor Korchnoy in the final qualifying round by a score of 12 1/2-11
1/2.
Three of the 7 participants in the British Chess Championship held in August
1974 were Jewish: William Hartstone, the title holder; Jonathan Mester, a
17-year-old student; and Michael Stean.
During 1974 Israeli chess was strengthened by the arrival of V. Liberzon, a
Soviet Grand Master. In the championship of Israel he shared first place with
the veteran International Master M. Czerniak. Liberzon won the Venice
International Chess Tournament in November 1974. In the Olympiad held at Nice an
Israeli team won the second section. Since then, Israeli chess has been further
strengthened by the arrival from the U.S.S.R. of Grand Master Leonid Shumkovitch
(b. 1923) and Roman Djindjihashvili. The 22nd Chess Olympiad was held in Haifa
in 1976. In the Olympiad of Buenos Aires (1978) Israel finished 5th/6th,
together with Rumania. Gerald Abrahams, in his Not Only Chess (1974), devotes a
whole section, entitled A Talent of Jews, to their propensity for chess, giving
reasons for their prominence in this game. 
[Gerald Abrahams/Editorial Staff Encyclopaedia Judaica]
Leading Jewish Masters of Chess
ABRAHAMS, GERALD, British lawyer, chess master, and writer on chess.
BERNSTEIN, OSIP SAMOILOVICH, Russian-French chess master.
BOLESLAVSKI, ISAAC, Russian chess grandmaster.
BOTVINNIK, MIKHAIL, Soviet chess master.
BREYER, JULIUS (GYULA), Hungarian chess master.
BRONSTEIN, DAVID, Russian chess grand master.
CHAROUSEK, RUDOLPH, Hungarian chess master.
CZERNIAK, MOSHE, Israel chess master.
FINE, REUBEN, U.S. chess master and psychoanalyst.
FISCHER, ROBERT (BOBBY), U.S. chess grand master.
FLOHR, SOLOMON MIKHAILOVICH (SALO)
GELLER, YEFIM PETROVICH, Russian chess master.
GUNSBERG, ISIDOR, British chess master and journalist.
JANOWSKI, DAVID MARKELOVICH, French chess master.
KASHDAN, ISAAC, U.S. chess master.
KOLISCH, IGNAZ VON, Austrian chess player.
KOLTANOWSKI, GEORGE
KORCHNOY, VIKTOR, Russian chess master.
LASKER, EMANUEL
LEVENFISH (Loewenfisch), GRIGORI YAKELOVICH, Russian engineer and chess master.
LOEWENTHAL, JOHANN JAKOB, Hungarian chess master.
MIESES, JACQUES (JACOB), German-British chess master and journalist.
NAJDORF, MIKHAIL
NIMZOVITCH, AARON
RESHEVSKY, SAMUEL HERMAN
RéTI, RICHARD
RUBINSTEIN, AKIVA
SPASSKY, BORIS
SPIELMANN, RUDOLF, Austrian chess master.
STEIN, LEONID, Russian chess master and journalist.
STEINITZ, WILHELM
TAIMANOV, MARK YEVGENYEVICH, Russian chess master and musician.
TAL, MIKHAIL
TARRASCH, SIEGBERT
TARTAKOVER, SAVIELLY
----------------------

 FISCHER, ROBERT (BOBBY), U.S. chess grand master.
Mi pare di ricordare chiaramente una lettera di Fischer indirizzata a
questi signori, in cui con belle parole richiedeva di essere rimosso da
tale lista ed essi risposero accontentandolo.
Che data ha questo articolo?
-- 
Posted via Mailgate.ORG Server - 
http://www.Mailgate.ORG

 sugli scacchi in determinate culture, società, religioni, ecc. ecc.
Ottima idea! Allora prendo il primo volume della nuova enciclopedia della
Repubblica, e guardo subito la lista dei collaboratori: perbacco! Alla voce
giochi c'e' Adolivio Capece! Allora troverò un sacco di voci! Allora decido
di comprarla tutta.
Siamo alla A, cerco Alekhine, nulla. Vabbè, aspetto gli altri volumi... F,
Fischer, nulla. Mah, ci saranno solo quelli moderni. K, Kasparov, Karpov,
nada. Si sarà limitato agli italiani? Mariotti, nulla. E così fino alla
zeta. Solo alla voce scacchi 3 o 4 righe che ci spiegano che sono un gioco e
che sono governati dalla fantomatica FIDS.
L'unico personaggio che ho trovato è Philidor, ma naturalmente solo per la
musica: non c'è accenno alcuno al nostro gioco.
Mi chiedo per quali giochi Capece abbia contribuito a quest'opera.
Alex

Che data ha questo articolo?
1972
Saluti
Ivo


Mi permetto di dubitare che sia del 1972.
Che io sappia, solo Nostradamus ha previsto che Fischer avrebbe perso il 
titolo nel 1975 contro quel tale Vassily.
Come puo' un articolo del 1972 contenere della preveggenza sul match non 
giocato? :-)

giocato? :-)
In effetti l'edizione originale dell'enciclopedia è del 1972, ma poi ci sono
stati gli aggiornamenti, credo fino al 1995-96 :-)
Saluti
Ivo

musica: non c'è accenno alcuno al nostro gioco.
sono omonimi o è lo stesso Philidor?
togli 'prove' per il mio e-address

 sono omonimi o č lo stesso Philidor?
E' lo stesso Philidor. Oltre che scacchista e' stato uno
dei padri dell'opera-comique francese. Insomma, un
capoccione.
ciao, edo

Grazie dell'articolo molto interessante, però mettendo Fischer 
tra i giocatori ebrei evita di menzionare che nel frattempo 
Fischer è diventato più antisemita di Hitler... Potrà pure 
essere ebreo secondo la legge ebraica, ma dubito che molti 
ebrei lo considerino uno di loro. 
A proposito, non sapevo che Tarrasch fosse stato ebreo, avevo
sempre dato per soontato che fosse un prussiano DOC! 
Ciao,
Marco
