2-799-005 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Automaton Chess Player, 1845. A machine '...invented in the year 1769. by Wolfgang de Kempelin...the concealed player was seated immediately under the chess board of the Automaton...the reverse of this chess board, which formed part of the ceiling of his narrow cell, was an exact representation of the chess board above, but to the side presented to the imprisoned player at every one of the sixty four squares was suspended, by the finest silk, a tiny metallic ball...as the chess men with which the Automaton played above had each of them a magnet inside, the moment any one of them was placed upon a square it attracted the little ball attached to the corresponding square below and fixed it to the board, so that...thirty two (the number of the pieces) of the balls beneath would be drawn up close to the under chess-board, while the other thirty two would remain suspended...'. From "Illustrated London News", 1845, Vol VII.