Philipp Stamma (c.1705–1755), a native of Aleppo, Syria, later resident of England and France, was a chess master and a pioneer of modern chess. Stamma was a regular at Slaughter's Coffee House in St. Martin's Lane (London), a center of 18th century English chess, and was considered one of England's strongest players.
His reputation rests largely on his authorship of the early chess book The Noble Game Of Chess (published 1737 in France; English translation 1745). This book brought the Middle Eastern concept of the endgame to the attention of Europe and helped revive European interest in the study of the endgame.
Stamma was defeated quite handily by Philidor in a famous match in 1747, which marked the beginning of Philidor's rise to fame.
Stamma's book introduced algebraic chess notation in an almost fully developed form before the now obsolete descriptive chess notation evolved. Philidor's writings had more influence after his his victory over Stamma, and the descriptive system based on Philidor's approach was dominant for a long time.
He died in London in 1755, with two sons surviving him.
Interested in Stamma's mate see here