Photos shared with us from the Getty Center in Los Angeles show a French book of chess problems from the late 1400s, now on display in the museum's exhibition "The Making of a Medieval Manuscript". The pages are more than 600 years old, and the two chess diagrams on them are still sharp.
What is on the pages
The open spread is labelled Two Chess Problems. Each page carries a painted board framed in gold, with the pieces drawn in red and gold, and a block of French text below. The Getty lists it as a Book of Chess Problems (in French) from Northern France, late 1300s, artist unknown, Ms. Ludwig XV 15 (83.MR.185), fols. 26v-27.
The museum shows it to explain how a manuscript was made. The label reads:
Two Chess Problems. Northern France, late 1300s. Artist: Unknown. Text: Book of Chess Problems (in French). "This manuscript is written and painted on parchment made from calfskin. All traces of hair follicles have been removed by laborious scraping and pumicing by the parchment maker. A careful repair, barely visible on the edge of the right-hand page, was made to prepare the folio for writing."
The label is repeated in Spanish alongside the English.
Book from 13th century!
In a 2020 write-up, the Getty describes this book as a copy of Bonus Socius, believed to have been written by Nicholas de Saint-Nicholai in Lombardy in the second half of the 13th century. The Getty calls it the oldest compilation of chess problems from medieval Europe, with 204 problems, each with a diagram and an explanation of the moves that lead to the end of the game. The Getty's copy is the French version, made in the late 1300s. A catalogue entry on Arlima, the French medieval literature archive, also lists the manuscript as a French version of Bonus Socius containing only the chess problems.
The Making of a Medieval Manuscript is on at the Getty Center until 14 March 2027.
