1. “Mad Chess” with a Mad Dwarf Jester

Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter 1
2. Table of Contents 7
3. List of Illustrations 9
4. Acknowledgments 15
5. Introduction. A Passion for Games 17
6. Part I: Chess and Luxury Playing Cards
7. 1. “Mad Chess” with a Mad Dwarf Jester 75
8. 2. Changing Hands. Jean Desmarets, Stefano della Bella, and the Jeux de Cartes 93
9. Part II: Gambling and Games of Chance
10. 3. “A game played home”. The Gendered Stakes of Gambling in Shakespeare’s Plays 119
11. 4. “Now if the devil have bones,/ These dice are made of his”. Dice Games on the English Stage in the Seventeenth Century 139
12. 5. The World Upside Down. Giuseppe Maria Mitelli’s Games and the Performance of Identity in the Early Modern World 157
13. Part III: Outdoor and Sportive Games
14. 6. “To catch the fellow, and come back again”. Games of Prisoner’s Base in Early Modern English Drama 183
15. 7. Against Opposition (at Home). Middleton and Rowley’s The World Tossed at Tennis as Tennis 203
16. Part IV: Games on Display
17. 8. Ordering the World. Games in the Architectural Iconography of Stirling Castle, Scotland 221
18. 9. The Games of Philipp Hainhofer. Ludic Appreciation and Use in Early Modern Art Cabinets 249
19. Index 277