Can someone - who have studied the games of Greco - maybe give a qualified guess about what his rating was? Thanks!

I'm stumped! The problem I have with trying to come up with a rough rating is the fact that the game has changed greatly from a strategic and tactical standpoint. I pulled up a game from 1620 and it started out: 1. e4...e5 2. Nf3...Nc6 3. Bc4...Bc5 4. c3...Nc6 5. d4...exd4 6. cxd4...Bb6 7. e5...Ng8 8. d5...Nce7 9. d6...Nc6. There is no Castling nor is there any modern tactical play. This makes it hard to come up with a realistic rating. I'm going to do further research and see if anyone else has done rating approximations for 17th Century players. Great posting, thanks!

Thank you, Hugh...! I can't wait to hear what you come up with!

Greco was probably not a strong player.  He collected his games, he did not play them.  I don't think he would be master strength.  Chessmetrics goes back to 1843, and strong players were 2300.  My best guess is that he was 2000 strength at the most.  Most of his traps have been repeated throughout the years by lower rated players, not knowing they have already been published.  I've written over 30 chess books on traps and miniatures, and many of Grecos "games" can be found played by novice players today.

billwall, if you have studied his games, how would you estimate his rating (assuming he actually played in like that) was? 1000? 1500? 2000? 2500? Or something else? What's your best guess?