Author: Philipp Stamma (c1705-1755) from the library of Lothar Schmid Year: 1777 Publisher: J. V. Schoonhoven Place: Utrecht Description: xxxii+163 pages with half-title and engraved title. Small octavo (7 1/2" x 4 1/2" bound in half white leather with spine labels in brown with gilt letter over marbled boards. From the library of Lothar Schmid. (Van der Linde I, 380; Linde - N. 425; Kieler Schachkat. 3243) First Dutch edition. Philipp Stamma, an Assyrian native of Aleppo, Ottoman Syria, later resident of England and France, was a chess master and a pioneer of modern chess. His reputation rests largely on his authorship of the early chess book Essai sur le jeu des echecs published 1737 in France (English translation: The Noble Game Of Chess 1745). This book brought the Middle Eastern concept of the endgame to the attention of Europe and helped revive European interest in the study of the endgame. Stamma was a regular at Slaughter's Coffee House in St Martin's Lane, London, a center of 18th-century English chess, and was considered one of England's strongest players. He was defeated quite handily by Philidor in a famous match in 1747, which marked the beginning of Philidor's rise to fame. Lothar Maximilian Lorenz Schmid (10 May 1928 - 18 May 2013) was a German chess grandmaster. He was born in Radebeul near Dresden into a family who were the co-owners of the Karl May Press, which published the German Karl May adventure novels. He was best known as the chief arbiter at several World Chess Championship matches, in particular the 1972 encounter between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky at Reykjavic. He was also an avid collector of chess books and paraphernalia. It was reputed that he owned the largest known private chess library in the world, as well as a renowned collection of chess art, chess boards and chess pieces from around the globe. Condition: Lothar Schmid's bookplate to front pastedown. Interior slightly toned. Binding corners bumped and boards heavily scuffed else a good to very good copy. A sought-after edition