Traité des Amateurs

It contains a great number of beautifully played games, together with much solid information, and it is matter of regret that the scarcity of the book, prevents its being more generally used by the Chess student.

Philidor, who lived in London, took no part in writing the Traité des Amateurs (which embodies many criticisms and comments on his earlier book).

George Walker, in his translation of the Traité for the Chess Player's Chronicle in 1846,[4] states: In making up the work before us, it is understood that the great masters above named produced most of their games and examples, by playing them over, experimentally and repeatedly, with each other; consulting upon the moves in committee, and noting down the details and variations contingent upon each result.

The natural consequence of this develops itself in the practical character of the Treatise; presenting, indeed, fully as much the complexion of a vast collection of first-rate games, played out, mostly even to the closing Checkmate, as that of a general work on the subject of Chess.

From the beginning the authors distance themselves from Philidor's Analyse du jeu des Échec,[7] arguing that the variations reported by the celebrated French master are more instructive than correct.

Nevertheless, the games analyzed in the text can be regarded as typical examples of the understanding of chess during the Enlightenment, and the group was much closer to Philidor than to the Italians Ercole del Rio, Lolli or Ponziani of the Modenese school.

Correct play on both sides maintains this equilibrium, and leads to a drawn game; therefore, a player can win only as a consequence of an error made by the opponent.

According to this concept, it was the stronger player's higher imagination and combinative power (or, in other words, his Wille zur Macht) which decided the outcome of the game; this was explained by Richard Réti.

[12] Traité des Amateurs, however, also differs from Philidor—not concerning the general idea of the "natural laws" of the game, but on the evaluation of White's move advantage.

According to Philidor (as reported in the Traité), White's initial advantage was enough to guarantee, with perfect play, the win of the first player.

The games of the Traité des Amateurs are rare, and cannot be found in common chess databases like ChessBase, 365chess,[14] chessbites[15] or chesslab.

However, they appear periodically in the chess literature of the time and consequently it is possible to provide some details on their lives and playing styles.

I learned the moves, played with Bernard, who had succeeded Philidor as the sovereign of the board; lost the first day, the second, the third, and beat him even-handed on the fourth; since which time I have never advanced or receded.

Chess to me has been, and is, a single idea, which, once acquired, cannot be displaced from its throne, while the intellect remains unimpaired by sickness or age.

[22] Although (as already mentioned) only one game of Bernard survives, there is evidence in the literature that his play was more brilliant (which means more inclined toward tactical complications) than that of the other amateurs.

[24] While some sources indicate Bernard was the strongest player between the death of Philidor and the arrival of Deschapelles, others[25] prefer Carlier: M. Bouncourt est contemporain de Philidor; il n'a jamais joué avec ce grand artiste, mais il a fait la partie de ses éléves, Carlier, Bernard et Léger.

An argument cited to support this choice is that Philidor (as reported by Lewis)[32] said, "(Verdoni) c'est le premier joueur en Europe après moi".

There is the possibility that the presumed dominance of Verdoni over the other amateurs is due to the fact that we have information about his play while Bernard, Carlier and Leger have almost fallen into oblivion.

Walker states clearly that these players were the "chief in skill", but not the only members of La Société des Amateurs.

[36] Additionally, in an article first published in The Chess World we can find the following sentence: With Bernard, Carlier, Verdoni, Leger and the rest of the Amateurs our chess Count stood upon the footing of intimacy[37] which also indicates that La Société des Amateurs was composed of other players beside those known.

G. Walker reported these games[41] with a brief note explaining that De Beaurevoir acquired a reputation in France for his skill at chess.