In many of my Regency books, my characters find themselves at parties where gambling and card-playing is a part of the entertainment. The Chinese invented playing cards around the 9th century, and cards made their way to Europe via Islamic merchants from Egypt around 1360. At this time, playing cards were made by hand and carefully painted, making them a luxury item for the rich. In 1377, Paris banned card games on workdays as card-playing was so widespread that the city felt it necessary to implement rules to keep the players in line. By the 15th century, cards became a favorite pastime of the upper classes. German wood-block printing was also invented in the 15th century, which lowered the production cost of playing cards. The price of cards fell further in the 1480s when the French began to paint the cards using stencils.
Playing cards were not only a way to pleasantly pass the time. They allowed more players to participate in the game, unlike chess or backgammon. According to historical accounts, women enjoyed playing cards more than men. Card playing was associated with gambling and seduction, which became widespread in literature and paintings. Due to gambling, and in some cases, reprobate behavior, church and civic authorities denounced card playing. Authorities placed bans against card-playing, believing it disruptive since it was often accompanied by drinking and gambling, which brought “cheaters and charlatans to the table.”
In the 17th century, the French government noticed the wide swath of gambling taking place over a card table and decided they wanted a piece of the action. King Louis XIV’s finance minister Cardinal Mazarin turned the Palace of Versailles into a card-playing gambling house. Other countries charged a tax on card manufacturers and cracked down on playing card forgers, which was punishable by death. In 1765, England began to tax playing card sales.
The international, universally recognized deck of cards has 4 suits to represent the 4 seasons, while the hearts, diamonds, spades, and clovers represent the 4 elements, air (spades), fire (clubs), water (hearts), and earth (diamonds). There are two black suits and two red suits representing the four solstices numbered 1-10. The three court cards, king, queen, and the jack (or knave), are notionally equivalent to 11, 12, and 13, although they are not numbered. The 12 royals represent the 12 months. The 13 cards in each suit represent the 13 weeks in each season and the lunar cycles. The ace represents the number 1. A standard deck of cards contains two or more jokers, depicting a court jester. The joker first appeared in American decks in 1867 and was adopted by Britain in 1880. The number of playing cards represents 52 weeks in a year.
Playing cards are used for games, magic tricks, and divination. Throughout history, they have come in a variety of different designs and scenes. They were considered fine art at times and bawdy at other times. They were informative to those in divination, and some believed they contained code-bearing propaganda from the Freemasons. Views of playing cards differed depending on the culture they came from. Playing cards were popular with soldiers as they were easy to carry. The first cards Europeans came into contact with had four suits, a chalice, a sword, a baton, and money, which is similar to current tarot decks, which include suits of cups, pentacles, coins, and swords. Germany changed the suit cards to hearts, acorns, bells, and leaves, while France and England went with hearts, spades, diamonds, and clubs, known as French playing cards, which includes the king, queen, and jack.
The face cards remained relatively unchanged for centuries. The British and French decks feature the same four legendary kings; King Charles or possibly Charlemagne (hearts), King David (spades), Julius Caesar (diamonds), and Alexander the Great (clubs). The queens, Pallas (spades), Judith (hearts), Rachel, or possibly Agnes Sorel (diamonds), and Argine (clubs), did change in different countries. For example, the Spanish replaced the queens with mounted knights. The jacks or knaves are said to be Ogier the Dane, legendary knight of Charlemagne (spades), La Hire, a comrade in arms to Joan of Arc (hearts), Hector, mythological hero of the Iliad (diamonds), and Judas Maccabeus or Lancelot (clubs).
Card games played in Regency England include whist, vingt-et-un, cribbage, and faro. I’m sure there are more, but these were the games most often played in salons. Cards were played at home, parties, gentlemen clubs, and gaming hells at every level of society.
During WWII, American soldiers were given specially made paying cards to help Allied prisoners escape from German POW camps. The deck became known as the “Map Deck.” When the cards were soaked in water, they would peel apart to reveal hidden maps that allowed prisoners to escape to safety.
A special thank you to: https://www.scienceabc.com/eyeopeners/why-are-there-52-cards-deck-4-suits-13-king-queen-ace.html, https://www.britannica.com/topic/playing-card, https://theplayingcardfactory.com/facts, https://judeknightauthor.com/tag/card-games-in-the-regency/, https://bicyclecards.com/article/a-map-inside-the-cards/
