The reigns of Offa and Egbert seem not improbable ones in
which chess might have become known among us, the scholar
Alcuin from his long sojourn and domestication with Charlemagne
and his family, by all of whom he was revered and beloved, was
familiar with that monarch's tastes and amusements. He was in fact
his preceptor in the sciences. By arrangement with Charlemagne he
paid a visit to his native country, England, during the years 790
to 793 A.D., he probably knew chess and was familiar with the
celebrated chess men which the Emperor valued so much, and
have been reported on in our own times, and he seems the least
unlikely person to have noticed and assisted in encouraging a
judicious practice of it in England. Offa also corresponded with
Charlemagne. Egbert took refuge at his Court before he began to
reign and was well received, and for a time served in the
Emperor's army, and that those kings may have known of
the royal game, through Alcuin, or even direct is not impossible
or even improbable.
H. T. Buckle, the author and historian, (born 1822, died at
Damascus in 1862) foremost in skill among chess amateurs,
satisfied with the evidence of Canute's partiality for the game
thought it very probable that it might have been known before
the commencement of that monarch's reign (1016), and suggested
perhaps a century earlier.
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