Facts and Speculations on the Origin and History of Playing Cards

by William Andrew Chatto

FOOTNOTES:

[ [1] Bibliothèque curieuse et instructive, tom. ii, chap. xii. Des Principes des Sciences et des Arts, disposé en forme de Jeux. Trevoux, 1704.

[2]

Ita vita est hominum quasi cum ludas Tesseris:

Si illud, quod maximè opus est jactu, non cadit,

Illud quod cecidit fortè, id arte ut corrigas.

Terent. Adelph. act. iv, sc. 7.

"Ludo Tesserarum Plato vitam comparavit, in quo et jacere utilia oportet, et jacientem uti benè iis quæ ceciderunt."— Plut. Op. Mor. Epist. ad Paccium.—Etudes historiques sur les Cartes à Jouer, par M. C. Leber, p. 63.

[3] In a paper entitled, l'Origine du Jeu de Piquet, trouvé dans l'Histoire de France sous le règne de Charles VII. Printed in the Mémoires pour l'Histoire des Sciences, &c.—Trévoux; in the vol. for May, 1720, p. 934-968.

[4] In a dissertation "Du Jeu de Tarots, où l'on traite de son origine, où l'on explique ses allégories, et où l'on fait voir qu'il est la source de nos Cartes modernes à jouer," &c. This dissertation is contained in his Monde primitif, analysé et comparé avec le Monde moderne.—Dissertations mêlées, tom. i, p. 365-394. Paris, 1781. It is not unlikely that he was led to make this discovery from the notices of a philosophic game of the ancient Egyptians, quoted by Meursius, in his treatise De Ludis Græecorum, p. 53. Lugduni Batavorum, 1622. A summary of Court de Gebelin's conceits on the subject of Tarots is to be found in Peignot's Analyse de Recherches sur les Cartes à jouer, p. 227-237.

[5]

He shall have a bell, that's Abel;

And by it standing one whose name is Dee,

In a rug gown; there's D and Rug, that's Drug;

And right anenst him a dog snarling er;

There's Drugger, Abel Drugger. That's his sign.

And here's now Mystery and Hieroglyphic!

The Alchymist, act ii.

[6] See an image of Isis, horned, with the infant Horus on her knee; and note, that antiquaries have not settled why the Virgin Mary is sometimes represented with the crescent on her head. Isis was the protectress of seafaring people; and her image, as we learn from Petronius and other writers, was frequently placed in ships.

[7] The hand occurs frequently in Egyptian hieroglyphics: it would be superfluous to tell the learned reader what it means. The hand holding a hammer, in the hieroglyphic usually known as the Blacksmiths' Coat of Arms, is sufficiently explained by the motto,

"By Hammer and Hand,

All Arts do stand."

[8] Versuch, den Ursprung der Spielkarten, die Einführung des Leinenpapieres, und den Anfang der Holzschneidekunst in Europa zu erforschen. Von J. G. I. Breitkopf. 4to. Leipzig, 1784.

[9] Researches into the History of Playing Cards; with Illustrations of the Origin of Printing and Engraving on Wood. By Samuel Weller Singer. 4to. London, 1816.

[10] Tome deuxième de l'année 1836. 'Origine Française de la Boussole et des Cartes à jouer.' Fragmens d'un ouvrage sous presse, intitulé, 'Histoire du Drapeau, des Couleurs, et des Insignes de la Monarchie Française,' &c. Par M. Rey. Livre X—Universalité des Fleurs de Lis.

[11] Etudes historiques sur les Cartes à jouer. Par M. C. Leber. Originally printed in the sixteenth volume of the 'Mémoires de la Société royale des Antiquaires de France,' and subsequently published separately. Paris, 1842.

[12] "... Ce n'est pas l'affaire de quelques années, ni des travaux, ni des sacrifices d'une seule vie, que de rassembler tant de chétifs débris, de pièces égarées, souillées, mutilées, informes, et dont la découverte n'est plus souvent qu'un caprice du hasard, une bonne fortune plutôt qu'une bonne action. Il faut donc attendre que cette œuvre du temps et de la persévérance soit accomplie."—Etudes Historiques, p. 60.

[13] Catalogue des Livres imprimés, Manuscrits, Estampes, Dessins, et Cartes à jouer, composant le Bibliothèque de M. C. Leber, tom. i, p. 238. Paris, 1839. This library, the Catalogue of which consists of three volumes, now belongs to the city of Rouen. The cards are described in the first volume, pp. 237-48.

[14] With the Latins, Ludere par impar; with the Greeks, αρτιαζειν; ραιζειν, αρτια η περιττα. "Nempe ludentes, sumptis in manu talis, fabis, nucibus, amygdalis, interdum etiam nummis, interrogantes alteram divinare jubebant, 'αρτια η περιττα'; paria, nempe, an imparia haberent."—Meursius, de Ludis Græcorum, p. 5, edit. 1622.

[15] Fortune is a parvenue, in the Olympian circle,—of great means, but no family:

Di chi figluola fusse, ò di che seme

Nascesse, non si sa; ben si sa certo

Ch'infino à Giove sua potentia teme.

Macchiavelli, Capitolo di Fortuna.

[16] Dr. Thomas Hyde is inclined to think that the game of Astragali was known from the time of the general Deluge.—De Ludis Orientalibus. Oxon. 1694.

[17] The ancient Greek game of Astragali or Astragalismus—the Tali of the Romans—appears to have been played in a manner similar to that described in the text. The names given to the different casts are to be found in Meursius, De Ludis Græcorum, under the word ΑΣΤΡΑΓΑΛΙΣΜΟΣ.

[18]

Πεσσοισι προπαροιθε θυραων θυμον ἐτερπον,

Ἡμενοι ἐν ῥινοισι βοων οὑς ἐκτανον ἁυτοι. —Odyss. A. 107.

The word used by Homer, ρεσσοι,—which properly means the pebbles or pieces employed in the game,—is here translated tables; a term, which having now become nearly obsolete as signifying draughts, may be used to denote an ancient cognate game.

It might be plausibly urged by a commentator fond of discovering Homer's covert meanings, that the poet intended to censure the games of Astragalismus and Petteia,—the former as a cause of strife, and the latter as a fitting amusement for idle and dissipated persons, like the suitors of Penelope. In the twenty-third book of the Iliad, v. 87, Patroclus is represented as having killed, when a boy, though unintentionally, a companion with whom he had quarrelled when playing at Astragali or Tali:

... παιδα κατεκτανον Ἀμφιδαμαντος,

Νηπιος, οὐκ ἐθελων, ἀμφ' ἀστραγαλοισι χολωθεις.

It is not unlikely that an ancient piece of sculpture, in the British Museum,—representing a boy biting the arm of his companion, with whom he has quarrelled at Tali—relates to this passage.

[19] See a work by the late Mr. James Christie—more generally known to the world as an auctioneer than as a man of learning and of great research—entitled "An Enquiry into the ancient Greek game supposed to have been invented by Palamedes antecedent to the Siege of Troy; with Reasons for believing the Game to have been known from remote antiquity in China, and progressively improved into the Chinese, Indian, Persian, and European Chess." London, 1801.

[20] Julius Pollux, Onomasticon, lib. ix, cap. 7.

[21] "As the military groundwork of the game of cards, and its similarity to chess, cannot be denied; so a closer examination of this affinity may readily lead to the origin of the change in their figures and colours."—Breitkopf, Ueber den Ursprung der Spielkarten, s. 30.

[22] "Le traducteur du Poëme de la Vielle, en décrivant les Echecs, s'exprime ainsi;

'La Reyne, que nous nommons Fierge,

Tient de Venus, et n'est pas Vierge;

Aimable est et amoureuse.'" &c.

—L'Origine du Jeu des Echecs, par Mons. Freret. Hist. de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. v, p. 255.

[23] "Comme c'est un jeu militaire, il y a dans chaque couleur un roi, un officier supérieur ou capitaine, nommé Ober, et un bas-officier appelé Unter. On appelait encore de nos jours dans l'Empire, où les mots François ne sont pas en vogue, les officiers supérieurs Oberleute, et les bas-officiers Unterleute"—Heineken, Idée Générale d'une Collection d'Estampes, p. 241. Leipsic, 1771.

[24] It would appear that the etymology of this name was a matter of great uncertainty even among people of oriental race. According to some, it was Sad-rengh, the hundred turns, or wiles of the players; according to others, it was Sad-rangi, the hundred vexations of the game. A third derivation was from Shesh-rengh, six colours, as if each of the six orders of pieces had been distinguished by a separate colour.—Hyde, De Ludis Orientalibus. Par. 1. Historia Shahiludii, cap. De Nomine Shatrangi. Oxon. 1694.

[25] That the suits of cards were formerly distinguished by an emblem which was suggestive of a particular colour, as well as representing a particular form, is certain. The Germans still call two of their suits Roth and Grün—red and green—and the emblems are a heart and a leaf.

[26] Observations on the Antiquity of Card-playing in England. In the Archæologia, vol. viii.

[27] "Edward the First, when Prince of Wales, served nearly five years in Syria, and therefore, whilst military operations were suspended, must naturally have wished some sedentary amusement. Now, the Asiatics scarcely ever change their customs: and as they play at cards, though in many respects different from ours, it is not improbable that Edward might have been taught this game, ad quatuor reges, whilst he continued so long in this part of the globe."—Archæol. viii, p. 135.

[28] "Après souper venoient en place les beaulx Evangiles de bois, c'est-à-dire force tabliers, ou le beau flux, ung, deux, trois."—Rabelais, livre i, chap. 22.

[29] The following verses relating to this point are quoted by Peignot, in his Analyse de Recherches sur les Cartes à Jouer, from a poem intituled "La Magdeleine au Désert de la Sainte-Baume en Provence, Poëme spirituel et chrétien, par le P. Pierre de St. Louis, religieux Carme." Lyons, 1668.

"Voila quant à l'église: allons à la maison

Pour voir après cela si ma rime a raison.

Les livres que j'y voy de diverse peinture,

Sont les livres des Roys, non pas de l'Escriture.

J'y remarque au dedans différentes couleurs,

Rouge aux Carreaux, aux Cœurs, noir aux Piques, aux Fleurs;

Avecque ces beaux Roys, je vois encore des Dames,

De ces pauvres maris les ridicules femmes.

Battez, battez les bien, battez, battez les tous,

N'épargnez pas les Roys, les Dames, ni les FOUS."

[30] "The b and v in Persian are constantly used for each other; one instance will suffice—the plural of na-eeb, a viceroy, is equally pronounced nu-vaub and nu-baub, or, according to our pronunciation, nabob."—A Personal Narrative of a Journey from India to England, by Captain the Hon. George Keppel, vol. ii, p. 89. Second edit. 1827.

[31] "Naipe, carton, &c. Tamarid quiere que sea nombre Arabigo, y lo mismo el Brocense; pero comunamente se juzga que se los dio este nombre por la primer cifra que se las puso, que fue una N y una P, con que se significaba el nombre de su inventor, Nicolao Pepin: y de ahi con pequeña corrupcion se dixo Naipe."—Diccionario de la Academia Españolo, edit. 1734.

[32] Istoria della Citta di Viterbo, da Feliciano Bussi, p. 213. Roma, 1743. The passage relating to cards appears to have been first pointed out by Leber, in his Etudes Historiques sur les Cartes à jouer, p. 43. "Though we have no information respecting the precise date of Covelluzzo's birth or death," says Mons. Leber, in a note at p. 17 of Mons. Duchesne's Précis Historique, "it is yet certain that this chronicler, whose name is properly Giovanni de Juzzo de Covelluzzo, wrote in the fifteenth century, and that what he relates about cards being brought into Viterbo in 1379, was extracted from the chronicle of Nicholas de Covelluzzo, one of his ancestors, who, as well as himself, was an inhabitant of Viterbo, and who possibly might have resided there at the period when cards were first introduced."

[33] Mahmoud, the Gasnevide, first invaded Hindostan in a.d. 999.

[34] "χαρταριον; Gallicum, quartier; scutulum quadratum. Extat. apud Codinum de Offic. aulæ Constantinop. χαρτιον, idem quod χαρταριον."—Meursii Glossarium Græco-Barbarum, 4to, Lugd. Batavor., 1605.—Quartier de bois. A quarter, or square piece of timber.—Cotgrave's French and English Dictionary.

[35] "Cayer. A quire of written paper; a piece of a written book, divided into equal parts."—Cotgrave. The cayer appears to have been synonymous with the pecia of monkish writers. It may be observed that from chartar, a Persian word literally signifying 'four-strings,' the Rev. Stephen Weston has traced the descent of κιθαρα; cithara; chitarra; and guitar. To these derivates the old English gittern may be added."—Specimens of the Conformity of the European Languages, especially the English, with the Oriental languages, especially the Persian. By Stephen Weston, B. D. 12mo, 1802.

[36] It may be here noted that the word Wuruk or Wuruq, used by the Moslems in Hindostan to signify a card, signifies also the leaf of a tree, a leaf of paper, being in the latter sense identical with the Latin folium. See Richardson's Arabic Dictionary, word "Card;" and the word "Wuruq"' in the list of terms used at the game of cards as played at Hindostan, given in a subsequent page.

[37] Should I be told that the correct word for "four" in Hindostanee, is chatur, chatta, or cattah,—not chartah,—and be required to account for the ρ in χαρτης, supposing the latter word to be derived from the same root, I should answer by giving a case in point—the derivation of quartus from quatuor,—leaving others to assign the reason. I subjoin here, by way of contrast, a different etymology of carta—Epistola, a letter. "Quieren algunos que este nombre Castellano, Carta, se derivasse de la ciudad de Carta insigne por aver sido cuna de la reyna Dido, y atribuyen à esta ciudad la etimologia, por aver sido la primera que dio materia en que las Cartas se escriviessen."—Seneca impugnado de Seneca, &c. Por Don Alonzo Nuñez de Castro, p. 220, 4to. Madrid, 1661.—Is there any evidence to show that the form of ancient Carthage was Square?

[38] "Im Arabischen heist Nabaa: er hat einen leisen Ton, wie die Zauberer thun, von sich gegeben; davon Naba, die Zaubertrommel, und Nabi, ein Prophet, Wahrsager, herkömmt. Eichhorn erklärt, in der Einleitung zum A. Testamente, die hebräischen Worte Nabi, Nabüm, durch göttliche Eingebung, und durch Leute, die durch göttliche Eingebung handeln."—Ueber den Ursprung der Spielkarten, s. 15.

[39] Heineken, Idée Générale d'une complète Collection d'Estampes, p. 240. Leipsic, 1771.

[40] The Abbé Bullet, previous to the appearance of his little book on Cards, in 1757, had commenced the publication of a Celtic Dictionary. In the former there are many traces of his mind having acquired a bent from his Celtic researches. He finds the origin of the term as or ace in the Celtic as; and in the same language he finds the true meaning of the names of the Queens of Clubs and Hearts, Argine and Judith. Argine is formed of ar, la, the, and gin, belle, beautiful; and Judith is a corruption of Judic,—which is formed of jud, a queen, and dyc, twice. Both those queens, according to his fancy, are intended to represent Anne of Bretagne, wife of Charles VIII and Louis XII. According to Père Daniel, Argine is an anagram of Regina, and is meant for Mary of Anjou, wife of Charles VII; and Judith is not the heroine of the Old Testament, but the wife of Louis-le-Debonnaire. Though those doctors disagree, yet each appears to have equally good reasons for his opinions. The consequence is that we can put no faith in either.

[41] The Abbé Rive, grounding his opinion on an interpolated passage in Guterry's French translation of Guevara's Epistles, ascribes the invention of cards to the Spaniards, and places it about the year 1330. With respect to the origin of the name Naipes, he adopts the N P etymology of the Spanish Academy. The Abbé's brochure on cards is entitled 'Eclaircissements Historiques et Critiques sur l'Invention des Cartes à jouer.' Paris, 1780.

[42] "Mappa, dit Papias, togilla, (c-est-à-dire, touaille, nappe); Mapa etiam dicitur Pictura vel Forma Ludorum, unde dicitur Mapamundi. Un vieux glossaire latin-français de la Bibliothèque de Saint-Germain-des-Prés, cité par Ducange, reproduit et explique ainsi ce passage précieux, en le traduisant: 'Mapamundi, mapemunde; et dicitur a Mapa, nappe ou picture, ou form de jeux.'"—Mélanges d'Origines Etymologiques et de Questions Grammaticales. Par M. Eloi Johanneau, p. 40. Paris, 1818.

[43] The description alluded to will be found at p. 41.

[44] The sex of the Company appears to be a matter of interest even with the ladies of Affghanistan. "At night the ladies of Mahomed Shah Khan, and other chiefs who were travelling in our company, invited Mrs. Eyre to dinner. She found them exceedingly kind in manner and prepossessing in outward appearance, being both well-dressed and good-looking. They asked the old question as to the gender of the Company."—Lieut. Eyre's Journal of Imprisonment in Affghanistan.

[45] "Apropos de bottes,"—"Now you speak of a Gun:" Moore, in his Life of Sheridan, observes that but a very imperfect report of Sheridan's celebrated speech on the impeachment of Warren Hastings is preserved. The following piquant passage relating to the East India Company, as then constituted and acting, occurs in a report of the speech published in an old Magazine, for February, 1787. "He remembered to have heard an honourable and learned gentleman (Mr. Dundas) remark, that there was something in the first frame and constitution of the Company, which extended the sordid principles of their origin over all their successive operations, connecting with their civil policy, and even with their boldest achievements, the meanness of a pedlar and the profligacy of pirates. Alike in the political and the military line could be observed auctioneering ambassadors and trading generals; and thus we saw a revolution brought about by affidavits; an army employed in executing an arrest; a town besieged on a note of hand; a prince dethroned for the balance of an account. Thus it was they exhibited a government which united the mock majesty of a bloody sceptre, and the little traffic of a merchant's counting-house, wielding a truncheon with one hand and picking a pocket with another."

[46] It is expressly stated that the cards of one of the packs are made of canvas, in a memorandum which accompanies them. This is the pack which is said to be a thousand years old. On first handling them they seemed to me to be made of thin veneers of wood.

[47] Though Mahometans might object to paint figured cards, it appears that they do "tolerate" them, and that very amply, by using them. See a description of the Gunjeefu, or cards used by the Moslems, at page 41.

[48] In a note to the article on Whist, in the Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 48, previously referred to, this pack of cards is noticed, and the suits are thus enumerated: "While this article was in the press, we have been favoured with a sight of two packs of cards in the possession of the Royal Asiatic Society: and, as truth is more strange than fiction, one of these, consisting of Ten Suits, certainly does represent the Ten Avatars or incarnations of the Vistnou, or Vishnava, sect.... The suits are:

• 1. The Fish.
• 2. The Tortoise.
• 3. The Boar.
• 4. The Lion.
• 5. The Monkey.
• 6. The Hatchet.
• 7. The Umbrella (or Bow.)
• 8. The Goat.
• 9. The Boodh.
• 10. The Horse.

"The Dwarf of the 5th Avatar is substituted by the Monkey; the Bow and Arrows of the 7th by the Cattashal or Umbrella, which gives precisely the same outline; and the Goat there, as often elsewhere, takes the place of the Plough."

On the pack of eight cards, which was probably one of those previously noticed in the present volume, the writer of the article makes the following observations: "The other pack has eight suits, of eight cards and two court cards each; eighty in all. [The number of cards, inclusive of the honours, in each suit, is twelve, as has been previously observed.] The Parallelogram, Sword, Flower, and Vase, answer to the Carreau, Espada, Club, and Copa of European suits: the Barrel (?), the Garland (?), and two kinds of Chakra (quoit) complete the set."—The Sword is plain enough, and so is the parallelogram. The Flower and the Cup, I confess, I have not been able to make out; and I question much if the Parallelogram—which in another pack, subsequently described, represents a royal diploma or mandate—be the original of the Carreau or Diamond on European cards. The "two kinds of Chakra" are simply two circular marks.

[49] Engravings of those subjects, as well as their description, will be found in 'Religions de l'Antiquité, considerées principalement dans leurs formes symboliques et mythologiques; ouvrage traduit de l'Allemand du Dr. Frederic Creutzer, par J. D. Guigniant.' Planches, premier cahier, p. 11, 8vo; Paris, 1825.

[50] "Espèce de roue enflammée, symbole de la force vivante qui pénètre et meut l'univers."

[51] The Institutions of Moses and those of the Hindoos compared. By Joseph Priestly, LL.D. p. 56. 8vo. Philadelphia, 1799.

[52] Beshbur.

[53] Kumbur.

[54] The names of the suits are thus explained: Taj, a crown. Soofed, white, abbreviated from the original appellation, zur-i-soofed, a silver coin; figuratively, the moon. Shumsher, a sabre. Gholam, a slave. Chung, a harp. Soorkh, red, or zur-i-soorkh, gold coin; figuratively, the sun. Burat, a royal diploma, or assignment. Quimash, merchandize.

[55] In cutting for the deal, Taj is the highest suit, and the rest have precedence, after that suit, in the order above recited.

[56] "By an oversight of the engraver, a native Bengalee artist, the Moon in No. 2, Plate I, is represented as crescent instead of full. [The error has been faithfully retained in our fac-similes.] The price of the pack was two rupees."

[57] "In the Dictionary Hindostanee and English, edited by the late Dr. Hunter, the names of the Eight Suits of Cards are to be found under the word Taj, the name of the first suit."—On the authority of a gentleman of eminent attainments in Hindostanee literature, I am informed that there is no Sanscrit word for Playing Cards.

[58] A particular account of the mode of playing the game of "L'Hombre à trois," will be found in the first volume of the 'Académie des Jeux.' The author observes, "Il est inutile de s'arrêter à l'etymologie du jeu de l'hombre; il suffit de dire que les Espagnols en sont les auteurs, et qu'il se sent du flegme de la nation dont il tire son origine." According to the same authority, "La Quadrille n'est, à proprement parler, que l'hombre à quatre, qui n'a pas, à la verité, la beauté, ni ne demande pas une si grande attention que l'hombre à trois; mais aussi faut-il convenir qu'il est plus amusant et plus recréatif."

[59] Barrington's Observations on the Antiquity of Card-playing in England.—Archæologia, vol. viii, 1787.

[60] Chung is also the Chinese name for a kind of harp.—In three other packs of Hindostanee cards, of the same kind, which I have had an opportunity of examining, the harp occurs both in the honours and the numeral cards. I suspect that the bird has been substituted through a mistake of the native artist who engraved the cards. In one of the packs just alluded to, the cards are not circular, but rectangular, like European cards, but of much smaller size. In another pack of Hindostanee cards which I have seen, the marks in all the eight suits are birds; in four of the suits, they are all of the same form—something like that of a starling—but differing in their colour; in three others they are all geese, and of the same colour, so that the suit is only to be distinguished by the ground on which they are painted. The mark of the eighth suit is a peacock.

[61] These are still the marks of the suits in Spain: "Copas, Espadas, Oros, y Bastos." The "Oros," literally golden money, are also called Dineros, that is, money in general. The same marks are also to be found on old Italian cards, and the names for them were, Coppe, Spade, Danari, and Bastoni. The discrepancy between the names, Spades and Clubs, and the marks of these suits, in English cards, will be noticed in its proper place.

[62] Religions de l'Antiquité; traduction Française de Guigniant.

[63] Von Hammer's Mines of the East.

[64] This is Mr. Colebrooke's conclusion. Sir John Malcolm gives a different account, the correctness of which may be very justly doubted, both as regards the present time and the past: "The four divisions of Hindoos, viz. the priests, soldiers, merchants, and labourers, appear to have existed in every human society, at a certain stage of civilization; but in India alone have they been maintained for several thousand years with prescriptive vigour."—Essay on the Bhills (Beels) by Sir John Malcolm, in the Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. i, p. 65, 1824.

[65] Innocentio Ringhieri, Cento Ginochi liberali et d'Ingegno, p. 132. 4to. Bologna, 1551.

[66] The Life of St. Francis Xavier, by Father Bouhours: translated by John Dryden, pp. 71, 203, 697.

[67] "The 6th October, [1592] they met with a Malacca ship of 700 tons, which, after her main-yard was shot through, yielded.... They found on board fifteen pieces of brass cannon, 300 butts of Canary and Nipar or Palm-wine, with very strong raisin wine; all sorts of haberdashery-wares, as hats, red knit caps, and stockings of Spanish wool; velvets, taffeties, camblets, and silks; abundance of suckets, rice, Venice glasses, counterfeit stones (brought by an Indian from Venice, to cheat the Indians), Playing Cards, and two or three packs of French paper." The prize was taken in the Straits of Malacca; and the articles of European manufacture appear to have been brought to Malacca by the Portuguese.—The Naval Chronicle; or Voyages of the most celebrated English Navigators, vol. i, p. 392. 8vo. 1760.

[68] Burnes's Travels into Bokhara, vol. ii, p. 169. Second edit. 1835.

[69] Card-playing appears to be a very common amusement in Hindostan.—"I could remind or perhaps inform the fashionable gamesters of St. James's Street, that before England ever saw a dice-box, many a main has been won and lost under a palm-tree, in Malacca, by the half-naked Malays, with wooden and painted dice; and that he could not pass through a bazaar in this country [Hindostan] without seeing many parties playing with cards, most cheaply supplied to them by leaves of the cocoa-nut or palm-tree, dried, and their distinctive characters traced with an iron style.... At the corner of every street you may see the Gentoo-bearers gambling over chalked-out squares, with small stones for men, and with wooden dice; or Coolies playing with cards of the palm-leaf. Nay, in a pagoda under the very shadow of the idol, I have seen Brahmins playing with regular packs of Chinese cards."—Sketches of India: written by an Officer for Fireside Travellers at Home, pp. 68 and 100. Fourth edition, 1826.

[70] For the reference to the Ching-tsze-tung, and the explanation of the passage relating to cards, I am indebted to Mr. S. Birch, of the British Museum.

[71] "Second Mémoire sur les Relations politiques des Rois de France avec les Empereurs Mongols," dans le Journal Asiatique, de Septembre, 1822, p. 62.

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CHAPTER II.
INTRODUCTION OF CARDS INTO EUROPE.

At what period Playing Cards first became known in Europe,—whether as an original invention, or introduced from some other quarter of the world,—has not yet been ascertained. From the silence, however, of all authorities by whom we might expect to find them distinctly named if they had been in common use, it may be fairly concluded, that, though they possibly might be known to a few persons before the year 1350, they did not begin to attract notice nor come into frequent use till towards the latter end of the fourteenth century. Packs of cards are distinctly mentioned by the name which they still retain in France—Jeux de Cartes—in an entry made in his book of accounts, about 1393, by Charles Poupart, treasurer of the household to Charles VI of France. Considering, then, this entry as an established fact in the history of cards, I shall now proceed to lay before the reader some of the grounds and evidences on which it has been asserted that cards were well known in Europe before that period.

Several writers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, in discussing the lawfulness of card-playing, gratuitously assuming that the game was included under the general term Alea, [72] have spoken of cards as if they had been known from time immemorial. The easy mode of deriving aliquid de aliquo by means of a comprehensive genus, is of frequent use with those decisive characters who delight in settling cases of conscience with a strong hand; and who, enveloped in the dust of the Schools, lay vigorously about them, both right and left, with weapons borrowed from "the old Horse Armoury of the Fathers," and re-ground, for present use, on the Decretals. He who can discover cards, implicitè, as Olearius has it, [73] in St. Cyprian's tract, De Aleatoribus, or in the injunctions against gaming in the canons of any Council or Synod previous to 1390, will have no difficulty in finding "Roulette" and "E or O," implied under the general term Tabulæ. Having thus indicated the value of the hypothetic evidence in favour of cards being known in early times,—because the game was subsequently comprehended under a schoolman's definition of the term Alea,—it may be left to pass for what it is worth.

Mons. Eloi Johanneau's proof that cards were known in the eleventh century, from the testimony of Papias, previously noticed, neither requires, nor indeed admits of serious refutation. If it could be shown that the word Naipe or Naibe was ever used in Spain or Italy to signify a painted cloth or a picture, before it was used to signify a Playing Card, its affinity with Nappe and Mappa might be admitted to be clearly established. John of Salisbury, who was born in the early part of the twelfth century, says not a word in his work 'De Nugis Curialium'—on the Trifling of Courtiers—which might indicate a knowledge of cards, although one of the chapters is especially devoted to an examination of the use and abuse of gaming. [74] Had cards formed one of the common pastimes of the courtiers of his age, it is highly probable that he would have mentioned them, by some name or other, so as to distinguish them from the other games which he enumerates.

The 38th canon of the Council of Worcester, held in 1240, contains the following prohibition: "Prohibemus etiam clericis, ne intersint ludis inhonestis, vel choreis, vel ludant ad aleas vel taxillos; nec sustineant ludos fieri de Rege et Regina, nec arietes levari, nec palæstras publicas fieri:" that is, "We also forbid clergymen to join in disreputable games or dancings, or to play at dice; neither shall they allow games of King and Queen to be acted [fieri], nor permit ram-raisings, nor public wrestlings. " [75] Ducange, who quotes the passage in his Latin Glossary, under the word Ludi, is inclined to think that the game de Rege et Regina—King and Queen—might have been the game of cards. There are not, however, any just grounds for entertaining such an opinion. The conjecture seems to have been suggested merely from the circumstance of there being a King and Queen in the cards with which the writer was most familiar; but had he known that no Queen is to be found in the earliest European cards, he probably would not have made so bad a guess. Besides, looking at the context, there can scarcely be a doubt that the games—not game—of King and Queen were a kind of mumming exhibitions which the clergy enjoyed as spectators, not as performers. Payments to minstrels and mummers for their exhibitions for the amusement of the monks, and eke of the lord Abbot himself, are not of unfrequent occurrence in the account books of old monasteries. In the same clause, the clergy are enjoined not to allow of ram-raisings nor public wrestlings—sports in which they were as unlikely to appear as actors as in the games of the King and Queen. What may have been meant by ram-raising—arietes levari—the curious reader is left to find, if he can, in the pages of Strutt and Fosbroke.

The next passage, supposed to relate to Playing Cards, which demands attention, is that which occurs in the Wardrobe accounts of Edward I, anno 1278, and which has been already quoted in the first chapter. It appears necessary to give it here again, together with the Hon. Daines Barrington's remarks on it, in the chronological order of evidences adduced in favour of the antiquity of Card Playing in Europe. "The earliest mention of cards that I have yet stumbled upon, is in Mr. Anstis's 'History of the Garter' (vol. ii, p. 307), where he cites the following passage from the Wardrobe rolls, in the sixth year of Edward the First: 'Waltero Sturton ad opus regis ad ludendum ad quatuor Reges, viii.s. v.d.'; from which entry Mr. Anstis, with some probability conjectures, that Playing Cards were not unknown at the latter end of the thirteenth century; and perhaps what I shall add, may carry with it some small confirmation of what he supposes."

The simple fact that the game of cards was known, both in France and England, by the name of the Four Kings, long before we had any special dissertations respecting its origin, is of more weight, in corroboration of Anstis's supposition, than Mr. Barrington's supplemental conjectures. The first question to be determined, is the identity of the game of cards, and that of the Quatuor Reges; but, without adducing the slightest evidence, he assumes the fact, and then proceeds to speculate where Edward might have learnt the game. But even admitting that cards were meant by the term Quatuor Reges, it is just as likely that Edward learned the game from his Queen, Eleanor of Castile, as that he learned it from the Saracens in the Holy Land; for, admitting it to be of Eastern origin, and that Europeans first obtained a knowledge of it from the Saracens, or a people of Arab race, it may be fairly supposed that Spain would be one of the countries in which cards would be earliest introduced. In the cards now in use in England, there are certain peculiarities in the names of two of the suits, as compared with the marks, which seem to intimate that we obtained our first knowledge of the game from Spain, although subsequently we might import our cards from France.

Seeing that chess was known in the East by a term signifying the Four Kings, and that it was a favorite amusement with the higher classes in Europe in the reign of Edward I, there can scarcely be a doubt that this was the game to which Walter Sturton's entry relates. If cards were indeed known in Europe in the early part of the reign of Edward the First, the silence respecting them, of all contemporary writers, for about a century afterwards, must be admitted as conclusive, though negative, evidence of their not being in common use. Petrarch, though he treats of gaming in one of his dialogues, never mentions them; and though Boccacio and Chaucer notice various games at which both the higher and lower classes of the period were accustomed to play, yet there is not a single passage in the works of either, which can be fairly construed to mean cards.

From the following passage, which occurs in a work on the 'Government of a Family,' in manuscript, composed by Sandro di Pipozzi, [76] in 1299, it has been concluded by Breitkopf that cards were at that period well known in Italy: "Se giucherà di denaro, o cosi, o alle carte, gli apparecchieria la via, &c." Zani, however, opposes to the authority of the manuscript, the negative evidence of Petrarch, who flourished at a subsequent period, and who, he thinks, would not have failed to have mentioned cards if they had then been known among the various games which he enumerates in the first dialogue of his treatise 'De Remediis utriusque Fortunæ.' [77] Mons. Duchesne also remarks, in his 'Observations sur les Cartes a jouer,' that, as the copy of Sandro di Pipozzi's work, cited by Taraboschi, and examined by Zani, is not of an earlier date than 1400, there is reason to believe that the express mention of cards in it, was the interpolation of a transcriber. That such interpolations were frequently made both by printers and transcribers, will appear evident from the following observations on several works, both printed and manuscript, which have been cited in proof of the antiquity of card-playing in Europe. [78]

The Abbé Rive, who ascribes the invention of cards to Spain, endeavours to show that they were known there in the early part of the fourteenth century. The evidence of this is, according to his statement, to be found in the Statutes of the military order of the Band, promulgated by Alphonso, King of Castile, where there is a passage expressly forbidding the members to play at cards. Whether cards are expressly mentioned in any old Spanish manuscripts of the Statutes in question, has not been ascertained; but of all the different editions, original and translated, of Guevara's 'Golden Epistles,' the work from which the Abbé Rive obtained his information, the first in which cards are expressly named, is that of the French translation by Gutery, published at Lyons in 1558. [79] As the word is not to be found in the original Spanish editions, nor in the Italian translations made from them, there cannot be a reasonable doubt of its being an interpolation of Gutery, who probably thought that a general prohibition of gaming necessarily included cards; and thus, "par conséquent," the Abbé Rive is furnished with positive evidence that the game of cards was common in Spain in 1332. Another authority, referred to by the Abbé Rive in favour of the antiquity of Spanish cards, is of the same kind. In a collection of the 'Laws of Spain,' printed in 1640, he finds the following passage in an Ordonnance issued by John I, King of Castile, in 1387: "We command and ordain that none of our subjects shall dare to play at dice or at cards (Naypes) either in public or in private, and that whoever shall so play, &c." [80] There can, however, be no doubt that the word cards (Naypes) is an interpolation; for it is not to be found in the same Ordonnance as given in the collection entitled 'Ordenanças Reales de Castilla,' printed at Medina del Campo, 1541. In this earlier edition, playing at dice and tables for money is indeed forbidden—"de jugar juego de dados ni de tables, a dinero"—but cards are not mentioned.

Jansen, in his 'Essai sur l'Origine de la Gravure en Bois et en Taille-douce,' cites the four following verses from the romance of Renard le Contrefait, pointed out to him by the late Mons. Van Praet, in evidence of cards being known in France at least as early as 1341, the year in which the romance was finished:

"Si comme fols et folles sont,

Qui pour gagner, au bordel vont;

Jouent aux dez, aux cartes, aux tables,

Qui à Dieu ne sont délectables."

The manuscript containing the verses as they are here given is in the Bibliothèque du Roi; but certainly it is not of earlier date than 1450; while in another manuscript, of the same romance, apparently about a hundred years older, also preserved in the Bibliothèque du Roi, the word "Cartes" is not to be found in the corresponding verse, which is as follows:

"Jouent à geux de dez ou de tables."

Meerman [81] imagined that he had discovered a positive date for the early use of cards in France, in the work known as the Chronicle of Petit-Jehan de Saintré, but which was, in fact, written by Antoine de Lassale, in 1459. [82] Saintré had been one of the pages of Charles V, and on his being appointed carver to the King on account of his good conduct, the governor of the pages is represented as giving them a lecture on their bad courses: "Observe your companion here, who, through his good conduct, has acquired the favour of the King and Queen, and of all; while you are dicers and card-players, keeping bad company, and haunting taverns and cabarets." [83] The fact of the work having been composed in 1459, however, renders it of no authority on the question; and even if it had been written by Jehan Saintré himself, there cannot be a doubt that the term "Cartes" is an interpolation.

The term "joueux de cartes," card-players, is indeed to be found in the earliest printed editions of the work, and also in a manuscript preserved in the Bibliothèque du Roi; but then this manuscript does not appear to be of an earlier date than the latter end of the fifteenth century, and there is also reason to believe that it is the identical manuscript from which the work was first printed. The word Cartes, however, is not to be found in a manuscript copy of the work in the library of the Sorbonne, nor in another in the library of St. Germains. The latter is much older than either of the others. Mons. Duchesne says that, in 1583, it belonged to Claude d'Expilly, and that these two verses, which show that it was even then considered an old manuscript, are written in the first folio:

"Ce livre soit gardé, non tant pour sa beauté,

Que pour le saint respect de son antiquité."

"From this examination," says Mons. Duchesne, "we may conclude that the word Cartes is an interpolation made by a transcriber a century later: consequently it cannot be admitted as a proof that cards were known in 1367." [84]

In an edition of William de Guilleville's allegorical poem, entitled 'Le Pelerinaige de l'Homme,' [85] printed at Paris by Verard in 1511, the following verses, in which cards are named, were pointed out to me by my friend Mr. N. Hill, of the Royal Society of Literature, to whom I am greatly indebted for much curious and interesting information relating to the Origin and History of Playing Cards.

At folio xlv, a, Oysivete tempts the pilgrim to quit the right way by recounting to him the pleasures enjoyed by those who place themselves under her guidance:

"... Je meyne gens au bois,

Et la leur fais-je veoir danseurs,

Jeux de basteaulx et de jougleurs,

Jeux de tables et déschiquiers,

De boulles et mereilliers.

De cartes, jeux de tricherie,

Et de mainte autre muserie."

At folio lxxii, a, Quartes—for so the word is there spelled—is noticed as a prohibited game:

"Mains ieux qui sont denyez,

Aux merelles, quartes, et dez," &c.

As there was reason to suspect that the word Cartes or Quartes, in the printed copies of De Guilleville's poem, was an interpolation, the same as it was found to be in other works examined by M. Duchesne, M. Paulin Paris, assistant-keeper of the manuscripts in the Bibliothèque du Roi, was requested by a friend of Mr. Hill, to compare the printed text with that of the earliest manuscript copies of the poem preserved in the collection under his care. The result of the collation was that the suspected words had been interpolated. The following is a translation of a portion of M. Paulin Paris's letter on the subject.

"I have compared the verses of our MSS. of the Pilgrimage of Human Life with the printed editions, and have found the latter very inexact. Cards are neither named nor alluded to in the MSS.; and in them the first passage, pointed out by your friend Mr. N. Hill, stands thus:

Ja leur fais je veoir baleurs,

Gieux de bastiaux et de jugleurs,

De tables et de eschequiers,

De boules et de mereliers,

De dez et d'entregsterie,

Et de mainte autre muserie.

MS. 6988, fol. 44, verso.
(No. 2), fol. 47, verso.

"The other passage referred to is, in both MSS. as follows:

Tant l'aime que je en suis sote,

Et que en pers souvent ma cote,

A mains jeux qui sont devées,

Aux merelles, tables, et dez."

As all the different interpolations referred to appear to have been made in good faith,—not for the purpose of showing the antiquity of card-playing, nor with any view of deceiving the reader, but merely to supply what the transcriber, looking at the manners of his own age, felt to be an omission,—they afford good grounds for concluding that, at the time when the several works were first written, cards were not a common game in either France or Spain; for, had they then been well known in those countries, it is just as likely that they would have been mentioned by the original writers as that they should have been interpolated by later transcribers.

In an article on Cards, in the 'Magasin Pittoresque' for April, 1836, an illustration is given, of which the annexed cut is a fac-simile. The writer of the article says that it is exactly copied from a miniature in a MS. of the Cité de Dieu, translated from St. Augustine by Raoul de Presles, who began the translation in 1371, and finished it in 1375. The writer, considering the MS. to be of the same date as the translation, says that the miniature represents persons of distinction of the reign of Charles V. [86] As he adduces, however, no evidence to show that the MS. is of so early a date, his so-called demonstration that cards were well known in 1375, is essentially defective; for, in transcripts of books, nothing is more common than to find, in the illustrations, things which were unknown when the works were first written. The costume, indeed, appears more like that of persons of distinction about the latter end of the reign of Charles VI, 1422, than of the reign of Charles V, 1364-1380. From the kind of cards which the parties are seen playing with, no safe conclusion can be drawn with respect to the age of the manuscript; for it is not positively known what kind of cards were chiefly used in France between 1392 and 1440. But, whatever may be the date of the manuscript, it is evident that numeral cards marked with "pips" and honours, similarly to those now in common use, were known in France at the time when the drawing was made.

The following account of the introduction of cards into Viterbo, in 1379, previously referred to in Chapter I, is here given as it is to be found in Leber's 'Etudes Historiques sur les Cartes à jouer.' "Feliciano Bussi relates, in his 'History of Viterbo,' [87] a work but little known, that in 1379, the epoch of the schism caused by the opposition of the anti-pope Clement to Urban VI, the mercenary troops of each party committed all manner of annoyances and spoliations in the Roman States, and that a great number of cattle, which had been stolen by the marauders, and driven to Viterbo for the provisionment of that city, were there seized, and carried off in a moment. 'And yet,' adds the historian, 'who could believe it! In this same year of so much distress there was introduced into Viterbo the game of cards, or, as I would say, playing cards, which previously were not in the least known in that city;' the words of Covelluzzo, are, folio 28, verso: 'In the year 1379, was brought into Viterbo the game of cards, which comes from the country of the Saracens, and is with them called Naib.'" As the introduction of cards into Viterbo is here directly recorded as a historical fact, there can be little doubt, if the passage in Covelluzzo be genuine, that cards were known to the Italian condottieri in 1379. In the chronicle of Giovan Morelli, of the date 1393, Naibi is mentioned as a kind of game; and, from the context, it has been concluded that it was one at which children only played. [88] At any rate it appears there as a game at which older people might play without reproach. Long after cards were condemned by synods and civic ordinances, as a game of hazard, grave writers allowed that sober, decent people might enjoy the game provided that they played purely for the sake of recreation, and not for the chance of winning their neighbour's money.

Heineken quotes from the 'Güldin Spil,' a book written about the middle of the fifteenth century by a Dominican friar, of the name of Ingold, printed at Augsburg, by Gunther Zainer, in 1472, the following passage relating to cards: [89] "Nun ist das Spil vol untrew; und, als ich gelesen han, so ist es kommen in Teutschland der ersten in dem iar, da man zalt von Crist geburt, tausend dreihundert iar." That is: "The game is right deceitful; and, as I have read, was first brought into Germany in the year 1300." The title of 'Güldin Spil,'—the Golden Game,—appears to have been given to the work by the author, on account of its being a kind of pious travesty of the principal games in vogue in Germany at the period when he wrote: having given each game a moral exposition, that which was formerly dross is converted into gold: the "old man" is put off, and the reformed gambler, instead of idling away his precious time at tric-trac, dice, or cards for beggarly groschen, "goes" his whole soul at the 'Güldin Spil.'

That the author had read somewhere of cards having been first brought into Germany in 1300, may be admitted without question; for to suppose that he told an untruth, would require to be backed by a supplementary conjecture as to his motives for falsifying,—a mode of eliciting the "truth," in frequent use indeed with philosophic historians when discussing questions of great import in the history of nations, but not exactly suitable for determining a trifling fact in the history of Playing Cards. Having admitted the good faith of the author of the 'Güldin Spil,' the next question that presents itself is, whether what he had read about the introduction of cards into Germany was in itself true; it is, however, unnecessary to discuss it here, for even if cards were known in Germany at so early a period, there is no satisfactory evidence of their having been common in that country until about a century later.

Von Murr, who also cites from the 'Güldin Spil' the preceding passage relating to cards, thinks that the epoch assigned, 1300, is at least fifty years too early. [90] He, however, states that he found cards—Carten—mentioned in an old book of bye-laws and regulations of the city of Nuremberg, to which he assigns a date between 1380 and 1384. The word occurs in a bye-law relating to gaming—'Vom Spil'—from the penalties of which the following games are, under certain circumstances, excepted: "Horse-racing, shooting with cross-bows, cards, shovel-board, tric-trac, and bowls, at which a man may bet from two pence to a groat." Whether the date assigned by Von Murr be correct or not, I am unable to determine. His reason for concluding that it was between the years 1380 and 1384, is as follows: "There is indeed no date to this bye-law, but it is written in the same hand as a law relating to the Toll-houses before the New Gate; and at folio 4 there is a precise date, namely the second day before Walpurg's day, 1384." The reason is not a very good one; for, even admitting the identity of the hand-writing in the ordinance relating to gaming, and in the act of 1381 relating to the toll-houses, yet both might have been copied into the book at a subsequent period. It is also to be observed, that, according to Von Murr's own account, the date 1384 occurs in the fourth folio, while the ordinance in which cards are mentioned, is in the sixteenth folio. But though the date assigned by Von Murr to the Nuremberg regulation, may be a few years too early, there is good reason to believe that cards were well known in Germany towards the conclusion of the fourteenth century. According to Mons. Neubronner, administrator at Ulm, (about 1806,) there was in the archives of that city an ancient parchment volume, called the Red Book, on account of its red initial letters, which contained a prohibition against Card Playing, dated 1397. [91]

Having now laid before the reader the principal authorities which have been alleged by various writers,—whether for the purpose of showing the antiquity of card-playing in Europe generally, or with the design of supporting their own opinion as to the invention of cards in some particular country—it is now time to enter on what may be termed the positive history of cards, beginning from the year 1393.

Charles VI of France lost his reason in consequence of a coup-de-soleil, in 1392; and during the remainder of his life continued insane, though with occasional lucid intervals. In either the same or in the following year, 1393, this entry occurs in the accounts of his treasurer, Charles Poupart, or, as he is named by Monstrelet, Charbot Poupart: "Given to Jacquemin Gringonneur, painter, for three packs of cards, gilt and coloured, and variously ornamented, for the amusement of the king, fifty-six sols of Paris." [92] Menestrier, who was the first to point out this passage, concluded from it that the game of cards was then first invented by Gringonneur for the purpose of diverting the king's melancholy; and his account of the invention long passed as authentic in the politely learned world. That the game of cards was invented by Gringonneur is in the highest degree improbable; for the general tenor of the passage in which they are named by Poupart implies that the game was then already known, though from the notice of the gilding and colouring of the cards, it may be supposed that Gringonneur had a special order for them, and that they were not then in general use.

"If," says Piegnot, "Père Menestrier had paid attention to the manner in which the passage is drawn up, he would have perceived that the expression 'for three packs of cards,'—'pour trois jeux de cartes'—clearly announces, from its very simplicity, that cards were already known, and that their invention was of a much earlier date. The writer would not have mentioned so simply a collection of figures, just conceived and painted by Gringonneur on small pieces of paper, and very remarkable, as well from their symmetry and regularity, as from the characters represented on them. " [93]

The Hon. Daines Barrington, in his 'Observations on the Antiquity of Playing Cards in England,' doubts if Poupart's entry actually relates to Playing Cards. He is of opinion that the words "trois jeux de cartes" mean three sets of illuminations upon paper, "carte originally signifying nothing more." If Mr. Barrington had produced any authority to show that, either in the time of Charles VI, or at any other period, "un jeu de cartes" was used to signify a set of illuminations, or that the term ever signified anything else than a pack, or a game, of cards, his doubt would not have had so much the appearance of a starved conceit.

Though in 1393 cards might have been but little known and seldom played at, except by the higher classes, the game in a short time appears to have become common; for in an edict of the provost of Paris, dated 22d of January, 1397, working people are forbid to play at tennis, bowls, dice, cards, or nine-pins, on working days. From the omission of cards in an ordonnance of Charles V, dated 1369, forbidding certain games and addressed to all the seneschals, baillies, provosts, and other officers of the kingdom, it may be safely concluded that if cards were known in France in 1369, the game was by no means so common as in 1397. Duchesne indeed says that it is between 1369 and 1397, a period of twenty-eight years, that the invention of Playing Cards, or at least their introduction into France, ought to be placed.

Cards having been presented at the court of France for the amusement of the king, and prohibited in the city of Paris, either as too good or too bad for the amusement of working people, appear forthwith to have become fashionable; but, besides the recommendations alluded to, the game possesses charms of its own which could scarcely fail to render it a favorite with gamesters of all classes, as soon as its principles should be known. [94] To ladies and gentlemen who might play, merely as a relaxation from the more serious business of hunting and hawking, dressing and dining, no game could be more fascinating; while to those who might play for gain, what other game could be more tempting? The great infirmity of human nature, with the noble as well as the ignoble, as old stories plainly show, is the too eager desire to obtain money, or money's worth, in a short time and at little cost; and, hence, to risk a certain sum on the chance of obtaining a greater, whether at dice, cards, state lotteries, or art-union little-goes: in the latter, indeed, under the prudent direction of what may be called "handicap" legislators,—from their always coming out strong towards the end of the session, like the beaten horses for a handicap at the end of a race week,—the spirit of gaming is refined, and made subservient to the purposes of pure charity and the promotion of the fine arts. He who devised the game of cards, as now usually played, appears to have had a thorough perception of at least two of the weak points of human nature; for next to man's trust in his "luck," in all games of chance, is his confidence in himself in all games of skill. The shuffling, cutting, and dealing at cards, together with the chance afforded by the turn-up of the trump, place the novice, in his own conceit, on a par with the experienced gamester; who, on the other hand, is apt to underrate his opponent's chance, from his over-confidence in his own skill.

During the middle ages, the clergy, notwithstanding their vows and their pretensions to superior sanctity, appear to have been not a whit more exempt from the weaknesses of human nature than the unsanctified laity; nay, from the history of the times, it would seem that their vows rendered them not only more susceptible of temptation, but more likely to fall. Their preaching pointed one way, and their lives another; and hence the old proverb, "Mind what the friar says, not what he does." The vices of the times are indeed written in the canons of synods and councils, and in the penitentials of bishops directed against the immoralities of the clergy; and from the experience of the past, thus recorded, we have ample proof that clerical vows are not always a certain charm against secular vices. After cards were once fairly introduced, it would appear that the clergy were not long in "cutting in;" for, according to Dr. J. B. Thiers, they were expressly forbid to play at cards, by the synod of Langres, 1404. [95]

Menestrier refers to the statutes of Amadeus VIII, Duke of Savoy, 1430, forbidding all kinds of gaming for money within his territories, though his subjects are allowed to amuse themselves at certain games, provided they play only for meat and drink. [96] "With respect to cards, they are forbidden; nevertheless, they are allowed to women, with whom men may also play, provided that they play only for pins,"—"dum ludus fiat tantum cum spinulis." In this passage a jurist would not construe the word "spinulis"—pins—literally, but would take it to mean any small articles of pins' worth. In France, about 1580, the douceur given by a guest to a waiter at an inn was called "his pins"—"épingles; " [97] and the proverbial phrase, "Tirer son épingle du jeu," seems to allude rather to "pin-stakes," than to the game of "push-pin."

Early in the fifteenth century, card-making appears to have become a regular trade in Germany, and there is reason to believe that it was not of much later date in Italy. In 1418 the name of a card-maker—"Kartenmacher,"—occurs in the burgess-books of Augsburg. In an old rate-book of the city of Nuremberg, the name "Ell. Kartenmacherin" occurs under the year 1433; and in the same book under the year 1435, the name "Elis. Kartenmacherin," probably the same person. In the year 1438 the name "Margret Kartenmalerin" occurs. [98] From those records it would appear that the earliest card-makers and card-painters of Nuremberg were women; and that cards were known in Germany by the name of "Karten" before they acquired the name of "Briefe." Heineken, however, maintains that they were first known in Germany by the latter name; for as he claimed the invention for his countrymen, the fact of the name being derived either from the French or Italian was adverse to his theory.

Nuremberg, Augsburg, and Ulm appear to have been the chief towns in Germany for the manufacture of cards about the middle of the fifteenth century; and, from the following passage, cited by Heineken from a manuscript chronicle of the city of Ulm, ending at 1474, it would appear that the German manufacturers, besides supplying the home market did also a large export business: "Playing cards were sent in small casks [leglenweiss] into Italy, Sicily, and also over sea, and bartered for spices and other wares." [99] It was probably against the German card-makers and painter-stainers that the magistracy of Venice issued an order in 1441, forbidding the introduction of foreign manufactured and printed coloured figures into the city under the penalty of forfeiting such articles, and being fined xxx liv. xii soldi. This order appears to have been made in consequence of a petition from the fellowship of painters at Venice, wherein they had set forth that "the art and mystery of card-making and of printing figures, which were practised in Venice, had fallen into total decay through the great quantity of foreign playing cards, and coloured printed figures which were brought into the city. " [100] The magistrates' order, in which this passage occurs as the preamble, was discovered by an Italian architect, of the name of Temanza, in an old book of rules and orders belonging to the company or fellowship of Venetian painters. Temanza sent an account of his discovery to Count Algarotti, who published it in the fifth volume of his 'Lettere Pittoriche.'

As it has been assumed that the earliest professional card-makers were wood-engravers, and that the engraving of cards on wood led to the execution of other figures, it appears necessary to trace the Briefmaler's progress, and to show how he came to be identified with the "wood-engraver in general." That the early card-makers or card-painters of Ulm, Nuremberg, and Augsburg, from about 1418 to 1450, were also wood-engravers, is founded entirely on the assumption that the cards of that period were engraved on wood, and that those who manufactured them, both engraved and coloured the figures. It is not, however, certain that the figures of the earliest cards, not drawn by hand, were engraved on wood; in the oldest cards, indeed, which I have had an opportunity of examining, and which appear to be of as early a date as the year 1440, it is evident that the figures were executed by means of a stencil. [101] From the circumstance of so many women occurring as card-painters in the town books of Nuremberg between 1433 and 1477, there appears reason to conclude that they, at least, were not wood-engravers.

The name of a wood-engraver proper—Formschneider—first occurs in the town-books of Nuremberg, under the year 1449; and as for twenty years subsequently, it frequently occurs on the same page with that of a card-painter— Kartenmaler—there cannot be a doubt that there was a distinction between the professions, although, like the barbers and surgeons of former times, they both belonged to the same fellowship or company.

A few years subsequent to the Formschneider, the Briefmaler occurs; but though his designation has the same literal meaning as that of the Kartenmaler, yet his business seems to have been more general, including both that of the card-painter and wood-engraver. About 1470 we find the Briefmalers not only employed in executing figures, but also in engraving the text of block-books; and about the end of the fifteenth century the term seems to have been generally synonymous with that of Formschneider. Subsequently the latter term prevailed as the proper designation of a wood-engraver, while that of Briefmaler was more especially applied, like that of the original Kartenmaler, to designate a person who coloured cards and other figures. [102]

Though we have positive evidence that, about the year 1470, the Briefmaler was a wood-engraver as well as a colourer of cards; and though it be highly probable that the outlines of the figures on cards were then engraved on wood, and that, from this circumstance, the Briefmaler became also a wood-engraver, yet we have no proof that the earliest wood-engravers in Europe were the card-makers. Von Murr indeed confidently affirms "that card-makers and card-painters were known in Germany eighty years before the invention of typography, and that the card-makers were at first properly wood-engravers, but that, after the art of wood-engraving was applied to the execution of sacred subjects, a distinction was made." [103] He who can thus persuade himself that the germ of wood-engraving in Europe is to be found in cards, will doubtless feel great pleasure in tracing its interesting development; the first term, cards engraved on wood, being assumed, we then have figures of saints with their names, or short explanations, engraved on wood; next block-books consisting of sacred subjects with copious explanatory text; and lastly typography and the press: "ce n'est que le premier pas qui coute." [104]

At what period the art of wood-engraving was first introduced in Europe, or in what country it was first practised, has not been precisely ascertained. Not the slightest allusion is made to its productions by any writers of the fourteenth century; and the earliest authentic date that has hitherto been observed on any wood-engraving, is 1423. A wood-engraving said to contain the date 1418 was indeed discovered at Malines in 1844, pasted in the inside of an old chest; but as the numerals have evidently been repaired by means of a black-lead pencil, both the genuineness and the authenticity of the date have been very justly questioned. The person by whom it was found, the keeper of a little public-house, almost immediately sold it to an architect named De Noter, of whom it was purchased by the Baron de Reiffenberg, for the Royal Library of Brussels, of which he is the conservator, and where it is now preserved. [105]

Before this discovery, the earliest wood-engraving with a date, was the St. Christopher, in Earl Spencer's collection, in which the date 1423, partly in words and partly in numerals—"Millesimo cccc^o xx^o tercio"—is seen engraved in the same manner as the other parts of the subject. The first person who published an account of the St. Christopher, was Heineken. When he first saw it, it was pasted on the inside of the cover of a manuscript volume in the library of Buxheim, near Memmingen in Suabia, within fifty miles of Augsburg, a city which appears to have been the abode of wood-engravers almost from the very commencement of the art in Europe, and in which we find a card-maker so early as 1418. On the inside of the cover, Heineken also observed another cut, of the annunciation, of the same size as the St. Christopher, and apparently executed about the same time. The volume within whose covers those cuts were pasted, was bequeathed to the convent by Anna, canoness of Buchaw, who was living in 1427, but who probably died previous to 1435. The Annunciation, as well as the St. Christopher, is now in the possession of Earl Spencer.

From the time of their first introduction, woodcuts of sacred subjects appear to have been known in Suabia and the adjacent districts by the name of Helgen or Helglein, a corruption of Heiligen, saints; and in course of time this word also came to signify prints or woodcuts generally. It would seem that originally the productions of the wood-engraver were considered as imperfect till they were coloured; and as the St. Christopher, the Annunciation, and others of an early date, appear to have been coloured by means of a stencil, there is reason to conclude that most of the "Helgen" of the same period were coloured in the same manner. In France the same kind of cuts, probably coloured in the same manner, were called "Dominos,"—a name which of itself indicates the affinity of the subjects with those of the Helgen. Subsequently, the word "Domino" was used to signify coloured or marbled paper generally; and the makers of such paper, as well as the engravers and colourers of woodcuts, were called Dominotiers.

Though we cannot reasonably suppose that the cut of St. Christopher, with the date 1423, was the very first of its kind, there is yet reason to believe that the art of wood-engraving was then but little known. As the earliest woodcuts are observed to be coloured by means of a stencil, it would seem that at the time when wood-engraving was first introduced, the art of depicting and colouring figures by means of a stencil was already well known; but as there are no cards engraved on wood to which so early a date as 1423 can be fairly assigned, and as at that period there were professional card-makers established at Augsburg, it would appear that wood-engraving was employed on the execution of "Helgen" before it was applied to cards, and that there were stencilled cards before there were wood-engravings of saints. Though this conclusion be not exactly in accordance with an opinion which I have expressed in another work, [106] it is yet that which, on a further investigation of the subject, appears to be best supported by facts, and most strongly corroborated by the incidental notices which we have of the progress of the Briefmaler or card-painter from his original profession to that of a wood-engraver in general.

Old Stencilled Cards in the British Museum. No. 1 (p. 88.)

Old Stencilled Cards in the British Museum. No. 2 (p. 88.)

The annexed cuts are fac-similes of some of the old cards to which I have alluded at page 83. The originals are preserved in the print-room of the British Museum; and from a repeated examination of them, I am convinced that they have been depicted by means of a stencil, and not printed nor "rubbed off" from wood blocks. They are not coloured, nor cut into single cards; but appear just as they are shown in the fac-similes. They formed part of the covers or "boards" of an old book, and were sold to the British Museum by Mr. D. Colnaghi. Looking at the marks of the suits in those cards, the character of the figures, and the manner in which they are executed, I should say that they are not of a later date than 1440. Though cards of only three suits occur, namely, Hearts, Bells, and Acorns, there can be little doubt that the fourth suit was Leaves, as in the pack described by Mr. Gough, in the eighth volume of the 'Archæologia.' As in Mr. Gough's cards, so in these, there is no Queen; though, like them, there appears to have been three "coat" cards in each suit, namely, a King, a Knight, or Superior Officer, and a Knave, or Servant; in other words, King, Jack, and Jack's Man. The lower cards, as in Mr. Gough's pack, appear to have been numbered by their "pips" from two to ten, without any ace.

That those cards were depicted by means of a stencil is evident from the feebleness and irregularity of the lines, as well as from the numerous breaks in them, which, in many instances, show where a white isolated space was connected with other blank parts of the stencil. The separation seen in the heads of the figures in No. 1 of the fac-similes here given, would appear to have been occasioned by the stencil either breaking or slipping while the operator was passing the brush over it. From the costume of the figures in these cards, I am inclined to think that they are the production of a Venetian card-maker. A lion, the emblem of St. Mark, the patron saint of Venice, and a distinctive badge of the city, appears, as in the annexed cut, in the suit of Bells; and a similar figure, with part of a mutilated inscription, also occurs in the suit of Acorns.

Card-playing appears to have been a common amusement with the citizens of Bologna, about 1423. In that year St. Bernardin of Sienna, who died in 1444, and was canonized in 1450, preaching on the steps in front of the church of St. Petronius, described so forcibly the evils of gaming in general, and of Card-playing in particular, to which the Bolognese were much addicted, that his hearers made a fire in the public place and threw their cards into it. A card-maker who was present, and who had heard the denunciations of the preacher, not only against gamesters, but against all who either supplied them with cards or dice, or in any manner countenanced them, is said to have thus addressed him, in great affliction of mind. [107] "I have not learned, father, any other business than that of painting cards; and if you deprive me of that, you deprive me of life, and my destitute family of the means of earning a subsistence." To this appeal the Saint cheerfully replied: "If you do not know what to paint, paint this figure, and you will never have cause to regret having done so." Thus saying, he took a tablet and drew on it the figure of a radiant sun, with the name of Jesus indicated in the centre by the monogram I.H.S. The card-painter followed the saint's advice; and so numerous were the purchasers of the reformed productions of his art, that he soon became rich. In the Bibliothèque du Roi at Paris, there is an old woodcut of St. Bernardin, with the date 1454, which has been supposed to have been engraved with reference to this anecdote, as the saint is seen holding in his right hand the symbol which he recommended the card-maker to paint. A fac-simile of this figure of St. Bernardin is given in the 'Illustrated London News,' of the 20th of April, 1844, and reprinted in a work recently published, entitled 'The History and Art of Wood Engraving.'

John Capistran, a disciple of St. Bernardin, and also a Franciscan friar, followed the example of his master in preaching against gaming; and his exhortations appear to have been attended with no less success. In 1452, when on a mission to Germany, he preached for three hours at Nuremberg, in Latin, against luxury and gaming; and his discourse, which was interpreted by one of his followers, produced so great an effect on the audience, that there were brought into the market-place and burnt, 76 jaunting sledges, 3640 backgammon boards, 40,000 dice, and cards innumerable. Under an old portrait of Capistran, engraved on wood by Hans Schaufflein, there is an inscription commemorating the effects of his preaching as above related. [108]