Justin Corfield Bücher

"Most of the chess players in 1939 came from countries which would be hugely changed by war: Germany, Poland, Bohemia-Moravia (Czechoslovakia), France, Britain, Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Palestine. And there were few players whose lives were not totally affected by the conflict. In 1939, the Americans refused to turn up because they did not regard the money offered as adequate; an I.R.A. bomb scare nearly caused a British player to miss his train; the wife of one player was involved in a major literary controversy which was rocking Guatemala; and the voyage to Buenos Aires helped influence a novella by Stefan Zweig. The tournament began on the day that the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed, with the final round starting on the day Germany invaded Poland. By that time three of the English team had left, anxious to get across the Atlantic before the U-boats started attacks. And the day before the last round, with the final matches to decide whether the Germans or the Poles would win the Olympiad, the Soviet Union invaded Poland. By this time, the weaker teams had found themselves relegated to a second league, competing for a cup which turned out not to exist. The tensions around the start of World War II were replicated in Buenos Aires, with many of the chess players choosing to remain in South America rather than return to Europe being engulfed by war. Three English players became code-breakers at Bletchley Park, and of the other players, one died in a Buenos Aires lunatic asylum, one was murdered in the Holocaust, one served in the Wehrmacht, and another perished in a Soviet gulag; with the winner of the Women's Championship was killed in a V-1 attack on London. Using archival resources from around the world, and visits to Argentina and Uruguay, this book is the first to detail the machinations of the Buenos Aires Chess Olympiad which reflected, in so many ways, the political situation in 1939"--Back cover

Ephesus, in modern-day Turkey, was one of the great cities of the ancient world, and the location of the Temple of Artemis, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. A largely Greek city, it attracted large numbers of pilgrims going to the temple, traders and visitors. Alexander the Great captured Ephesus, and Hannibal fled there after being forced to leave Carthage; and in 88 BC, members of the Roman population were massacred in what became known as the Asiatic Vespers. Romans who went to Ephesus include Sulla, Cicero, Mark Antony and Cleopatra, and Strabo. The city has an important place in Christianity with Mary, the Mother of Jesus, settling there, and St. Paul also visiting Ephesus on two occasions. In AD 262, an earthquake destroyed much of the city, and a Gothic invasion soon afterwards heralded a decline which was already underway as the harbour was silting up. Nevertheless the Fourth Ecumenical Council was held in Ephesus in AD 431. Work by a British engineer and archaeologist in the 1860s led to the uncovering of the site of the Temple of Artemis, with the site of the House of the Virgin Mary identified in 1891. Soon afterwards Austrian archaeologists began to excavate the site, and work by them and others continues to the present day, with the city now attracting many tourists. This book is the first encyclopedia of Ephesus and it contains more than 360 illustrations.

The island of Elba, off the west coast of Italy, has a documented history going back to ancient times with the Jason and the Argonauts and poet Ovid being one of its most famous early visitors. The Emperor Augustus closed down the iron industry but this started again in medieval times providing much employment until 1945. Controlled by Pisa and then Genoa, but regularly attacked by North African corsairs, it was placed under Spanish and Austrian rule, becoming a part of France in 1802. In 1814-15, Napoleon Bonaparte became the island's ruler, staying on Elba for 296 days, and remains Elba's most famous resident. Victor Hugo grew up on Elba, and Alexandre Dumas set part of his book, The Count of Monte Cristo on a nearby island. Elba was bombarded briefly in World War I. It was bombed by the Germans in 1943, and again by the Allies in the following year. At the end of World War II the steelworks were closed down and five years later a decision was made to develop the tourist industry which now employs much of the island's population. This book has more than 220 illustrations.

This is an annotated bibliography of fiction set in Medieval Britain and published from the fifteenth century to the present day. It covers more than 3,000 books set in Arthurian Britain, during the Saxon / Viking period, the Norman Conquest, and through the time of Robin Hood, the Hundred Years' War, and to the end of the Wars of the Roses in 1485. Around 2,000 of the entries are illustrated with covers of the books (all in colour), and there are three indices covering authors, titles, and also locations where the novels are set.

Mdina, the old capital of Malta, has a documented history going back to ancient times. The apostle Paul (later St. Paul), on his way to Rome, after being shipwrecked on Malta, went to Mdina where he cured the father of the Roman governor Publius. Later when Malta was captured by the Arabs, and then by the Normans, Mdina remained the administrative centre of the island. From medieval and early modern times, the nobility established their family seats in the city, but when the Knights of St. John took possession of Malta in 1530, they established their capital at Birgu, and after the Great Siege of Malta in 1565, Valletta became their new capital. However the seat of the archbishop remained at St. Paul's Cathedral in Mdina, built on the site of the palace of Publius. The population of the city of Mdina, known officially as Citta Vecchia or Citta Notabile, declined dramatically, and now is around 300. However it attracts large numbers of tourists every day, especially for the Medieval Mdina Festival around April each year.

This book is a history of chess in Geelong, Australia, and it includes appendices listing officials of the Geelong chess Club, and the results of inter-school competitions in the 2000s and the 2010s

The Republic of San Marino traces its origins back to Saint Marinus who established a settlement in AD 301. It has managed to maintain its independence since then in spite of a Papal attempt to annexe it in 1739. San Marino gave refuge to Giuseppe Garibaldi, and after Italian Reunification, San Marino's independence was assured. Its system of government, having two captains regent each serving for six months, and unable to stand again for five years, has ensured stability, although there was a political crisis in 1957 which resulted in the overthrow of the Communist government, the first elected Communist government in Western Europe. San Marino has long been a popular tourist destination, and is well-known around the world for its postage stamps.

This bibliography contains details of 3135 books, magazine and newspaper articles, and manuscript sources on the Burma Campaign. It is supplemented by a chronology of the main events of the Burma Campaign, and also indices of subjects, military units, and names.

This book provides a detailed guide to genealogical sources in Corfu, Paxos, Levkas, Ithaca, Cephalonia, Zante and Cerigo for the time that they were occupied by the British from 1815 to 1864 as the Ionian Islands. Most of the book contains transcripts of cemeteries on those islands. There is a detailed index.