Suggestions?

Do you really mean 8086, or are you looking for the slightly more modern x86? (e.g. a pretty big supset over the original 8086 instruction set)

even a primitive will do since there hasn't been a sea-change, I surmise. However, a more modern architecture will be more preferable. What's gonna be a good start on a clean slate?

The 80286 introduced new modes and a huge range of new instructions, and that has continued. There has been considerable change.

http://www.intel.com/design/pentiumii/manuals/24319002.PDF

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&as_qdr=all&q=assembly++site%3Awww.intel.com+filetype%3Apdf&btnG=Search&meta=

Actually, you caught me flying by the seat of my pants, Dennis. You're right. 286, or perhaps 386 on was a break-through shift. I'd read that in a gentle tutorial of some sort earlier.

Thanks. Is that "Intel Architecture, Software Developer’s Manual" good for a start? Am I gonna be able to grok it assuming I am a programmer for long, and passionate and shitz about programming but never done assembly before?

Thankz Again.

There hasn't been a sea change? Yes, I think there really has.

The original 8086 used segmented addressing, which lead to all sorts of complications in code generation.

These days, the primitive segmented addressing modes are just a distant memory and the 386 heritage has a flat 32 bit model with support for protected addresses and virtual memory.

Bow down. Sorry. I was too fast in that. There has, there has. I stand corrected.