Database of Chess Bibliography
The comprehensive bibliographical recording of the entirety of chess literature in a database is certainly a very ambitious undertaking, which can only be realized to a large extent and in a reasonable time by means of a worldwide network. The initiator of this idea was the Dutch collector Jurgen Stigter, whose appeal led to the formation of the "Amsterdam Group" in November 2002.
A first version of an operational database was finally realized in November 2014 by our member Per Skjoldager. At the bi-annual meeting at the auction house Klittich-Pfankuch in November, he presented the first version of “Tobiblion” for the present attendees.
The status of the database project anno 2018 is that we now have two major fields of operations which are available to all members of CH&LS.
The first major area of the database is based on the Klittich-Pfankuch catalogues 40 to 83. The auction database corresponds to the descriptions of the lots in those catalogs and represents approximately 38.000 entries. The lots are illustrated with images from auction 53 and onwards. It is possible to the user to search the database on various search criteria. The database represents an invaluable tool to all collectors who wants to learn more on prices and content. The second major area is the bibliographical part of the database. The bibliography is a so-called descriptive bibliography which is aiming to describe collectable books in text and images. In due time, we will grow the database to its full potential, but at the moment we are focusing on finishing a few categories.
The categories we are working on are the following: Status as per June 1, 2023.
- Bibliographies
- Tournament & Congresses
- Magazines
- Biographies
Our aim is to describe the entries therein, in terms of bindings, dust jackets, title page, number of pages, publication year, place and much more. It is an invaluable tool to the collector who wants to know how a perfect copy should look like. If you are in doubt if a certain tournament book was published with a dust jacket or not, you should take a look in Tobiblion.
Magazines, is a special category which aims to describe the individual volumes within each magazine. Apart from the features mentioned above, it also focuses on covers, plates and indexes. For now, we have started with the most common magazines, but we would like to expand this category to cover all magazines over time.
Below you can find the status in numbers for each category.
Bibliographies
This bibliography contains 417 items, including all 166 items from the L/N catalogue, 169 items from the Kieler Schachkatalog, and 60 items from the Betts catalogue. References are also made to other relevant works i.e. Sakharov, Lusis, Soukup and others. 117 entries are fully described in text and images corresponding to 28,1 percent.
Tournament & Congresses
This bibliography contains 2836 items, played from 1851 to 2000, including all 705 items from the L/N catalogue, 107 items from the Kieler Schachkatalog, and 438 items from the Betts catalogue. References are also made to other relevant works i.e. Sakharov, Lusis, Soukup and others. 1125 entries are fully described in text and images corresponding to 39,7 percent.
Biographies
This bibliography contains books on the life and games of Robert James Fischer (1943 - 2007), the eleventh world champion and universally acclaimed as one of the greatest players of all time. Match Books, games collections and books on tournaments in which Fischer played a major role have also been included. 48 of 82 entries are fully described corresponding to 58,5 percent.
Magazines
This bibliography contains the magazines found in the below table.
| Title | Country | Fully Described |
No. of Items |
Percent completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Chess Bulletin | USA | 8 | 61 | 13,1 % |
| American Chess Magazine | USA | 4 | 4 | 100 % |
| British Chess Magazine | England | 86 | 121 | 71,16 % |
| Chess (wood) | England | 43 | 52 | 82,7 % |
| Chess Player's Chronicle | England | 8 | 45 | 17,8 % |
| Chess Review | USA | 38 | 38 | 100 % |
| Chess World | Australia | 23 | 23 | 100 % |
| Deutsche Schachblätter | Germany | 30 | 64 | 46,8 % |
| Deutsche Schachzeitung | Germany | 70 | 138 | 50,7 % |
| Deutsches Wochenschach | Germany | 9 | 38 | 23,6 % |
| Kagans Neueste Schachnachrichten | Germany | 13 | 13 | 100 % |
| Laskers' Chess Magazine | USA | 5 | 10 | 50,0 % |
| Schachwelt (Die) | Germany | 3 | 3 | 100 % |
| Šachová svět | Czech Republic | 3 | 3 | 100 % |
| Šachový týden | Czech Republic | 3 | 3 | 100 % |
| Skakbladet | Denmark | 90 | 97 | 92,8 % |
| Tidskrift för Schack | Sweden | 88 | 107 | 82,2 % |
| Wiener Schach Zeitung | Austria | 23 | 40 | 57,5 % |
| 547 | 860 | 63,6 % |
If you are a member of CH&LS and wants to have access to the Tobiblion project, you should contact per@skjoldager.eu and ask for your personal password.
Summary since our last report is:
- Bibliographies: 0 additional entry. 3 descriptions have been added.
- Tournament & Congresses: 8 items have been added. 56 descriptions have been added.
- Biographies: 0 items has been added. 0 descriptions have been added.
- Magazines: 0 items have been added. 55 Descriptions have been added.
Data status: 2023-06-01