Front cover
Book published 1991 by
Oxford University Press

Globe
Click for site map

You'll never guess what your ancestors did over the card table

Historic card games spade spade spade spade

by David Parlett

 
These pages present (a) histories of classic games such as Poker and Euchre and (b) details of historic games, such as Gleek and Quadrille, that are now only museum pieces. This project was started at the suggestion of John McLeod, who tells me that visitors to his award-winning Pagat website for the rules of card games often inquire after the play of some old game that they have come across in period novels or films or readings in cultural history. People love learning about old games like Poker and Blackjack and the history behind them. Games today such as intercasino free roulette are so popular with the masses that it is no wonder that people are looking back into game history to see where they all came from. Another such example is bingo. With online bingo experiencing a huge surge in popularity in recent years, people are curious as to the history of the game and the original forms in which it was played.

Some of the descriptions first appeared in my Oxford Guide to Card Games (1990, republished as A History of Card Games in 1991), but I've since been revising them in the light of further research and discoveries. If you have any comments, queries, or suggestions for additional entries, do let me know.

In the table below, p = number of players, pp = playing in fixed partnerships, 2-4p = 2, 3 or 4 players, 2/4p = 2 or 4 players (not easily or usually 3).
 
 
Calypso The personal trump game from Trinidad (4pp)
Costly Colours The colourful cousin of Crib (2/4pp)
Euchre A classic American game of European origin (2/4pp)
Gin Rummy The great game of Hollywood and Broadway (2p)
Gleek An old English of tricks and bluff (3p)
Laugh & lie down An hilarious pairing-off game of Tudor England (4/5p)
Loo A once notorious trick-taking gambling game (3-7p)
Losing Lodam The Gargantuan ancestor of Hearts (3-7p)
Maw The five-fingered game of the Gaels (2-7p, 5 best)
Noddy The knavish ancestor of Cribbage (2/4pp)
Patience Origins and history of card solitaires (1p)
Penneech The game that changes trump from trick to trick (2p)
Piquet The aristocrat of card games (2p)
Poker Origins and history of the great American pastime (2-10p)
Pope Joan Introducing "the Curse of Scotland" (3-7p)
Quadrille The courtly ladies' game of 18th century France (4p)
Reversis The 16th-century ancestor of Hearts (4pp)
Speculation Jane Austen's Mansfield Park game (3-7p)
 
Globe
Site map		 Validated HTML 4.01 January 2012 Approved for children by Internet Content Rating Association Balloon
Up page