An author of our own country produces a passage cited from a wardrobe computus made in 1377, the sixth year of Edward I., which mentions a game entitled, "the four kings;" [954] and hence with some degree of probability he conjectures that the use of playing-cards was then known in England, which is a much earlier period than any that has been assigned by the foreign authors. It is the opinion of several learned writers well acquainted with Asiatic history, that cards were used in the eastern parts of the world long before they found their way into Europe. [955] If this position be granted, when we recollect that Edward I. before his accession to the throne resided nearly five years in Syria, it will be natural enough to suppose that he might have learned the game of "the four kings" in that country, and introduced it at court upon his return to England. An objection, which indeed at first sight seems to be a very powerful one, has been raised in opposition to this conjecture: it is founded upon the total silence of every kind of authority respecting the subject of card-playing from the time that the above-mentioned entry was made to 1464, an early period in the reign of Edward IV., including an interval of one hundred and eighty-six years. An omission so general, it is thought, would not have taken place, if the words contained in that record alluded to the usage of playing-cards. A game introduced by a monarch could not fail of becoming fashionable; and if it continued to be practised in after times, must in all probability have been mentioned occasionally in conjunction with other pastimes then prevalent. But this silence is by no means a proof that the game of "the four kings" was not played with cards, nor that cards did not continue to be used during the whole of the above-mentioned interval in the higher circles, though not perhaps with such abuses as were afterwards practised, and which excited the reprehension of the moral and religious writers. Besides, at the time that cards were first introduced, they were drawn and painted by the hand without the assistance of a stamp or plate; it follows of course that much time was required to complete a set or pack of cards; and the price they bore no doubt was adequate to the labour bestowed upon them, which necessarily must have enhanced their value beyond the purchase of the under classes of the people. For this reason it is, I presume, that card-playing, though it might have been known in England, was not much practised until such time as inferior sets of cards, proportionably cheap, were produced for the use of the commonalty, which seems to have been the case when Edward IV. ascended the throne, for in 1463, early in his reign, an act was established on a petition from the card-makers of the city of London, prohibiting the importation of playing-cards; [956] and soon after that period card-playing became a very general pastime.
The increasing demand for these objects of amusement, it is said, suggested the idea of cutting the outlines appropriated to the different suits upon separate blocks of wood and stamping them upon the cards; [957] the intermediate spaces between the outlines were filled up with various colours laid on by the hand. This expeditious method of producing cards reduced the price of them, so that they might readily be purchased by almost every class of persons: the common usage of cards was soon productive of serious evils, which all the exertions of the legislative power have not been able to eradicate. [958]
Another argument against the great antiquity of playing-cards is drawn from the want of paper proper for their fabrication. We certainly have no reason to believe that paper made with linen rags was produced in Europe before the middle of the fourteenth century, and even then the art of paper-making does not appear to have been carried to any great perfection. It is also granted that paper is the most proper material we know of for the manufacturing of cards; but it will not therefore follow that they could not possibly be made with any other; and if we admit of any other, the objection will fall to the ground.
XXI.—CARD-PLAYING FORBIDDEN.
Card-playing appears to have been a very fashionable court amusement in the reign of Henry VII. In an account of money disbursed for the use of that monarch, an entry is made of one hundred shillings paid at one time to him for the purpose of playing at cards. [959] The princess Margaret, his daughter, previous to her marriage with James IV., king of Scotland, understood the use of cards. She played with her intended husband at Harbottle Castle; the celebration of their nuptials took place A. D. 1503, she being then only fourteen years of age. [960] Catherine of Spain, the consort of prince Arthur, afterwards married to Henry VIII. his brother, is said in her youth to have been well acquainted with the art of embroidery and other works of the needle proper for ladies to know, and expert in various courtly pastimes; and she could play at "tables, tick-tacke or gleeke, with cardis and dyce." [961]
The universality of card-playing in the reign of this monarch is evident from a prohibitory statute being necessary to prevent apprentices from using cards except in the Christmas holidays, and then only in their masters' houses. [962] Agreeable to this privilege, Stow, speaking of the customs at London, says, "from All-Hallows eve to the day following Candlemas-day, there was, among other sports, playing at cards for counters, nails, and points, in every house, more for pastime than for gain." [963] But this moderation, I apprehend, was by no means general, for several contemporary writers are exceedingly severe in their reflections upon the usage of cards, which they rank with dice, and consider both as destructive to morality and good order. [964]
XXII.—CARD-PLAYING CENSURED BY POETS.
Henry VIII. preferred the sports of the field, and such pastimes as promoted exercise, to sedentary amusements; his attachment to dice he gave up at an early part of his life; and I do not recollect that Hall the historian, who is so minute in describing the various sources of entertainment pursued by this athletic monarch, ever mentions cards as one of them: I am, indeed, well aware that Shakspeare speaks of his "playing at primero with the duke of Suffolk;" and it is very possible, that the poet might have had some authority for so doing. Sir William Forrest, who wrote at the close of his reign, and presented a poetical treatise entitled The Poesye of Princylye Practice, to his son Edward VI., speaks therein of the pastimes proper for the amusement of a monarch, and says, he may after dinner indulge himself with music, or otherwise
Att tables, chesse or cardis awhile himselfe repose;