 |
Business | Industries | Finance | Tax |
| Index: > A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
|
|||||
| First Prev [ 1 2 3 4 ] Next Last |
In early games the kings were always the highest card in their suit. However, as early as the late 1400s special significance began to be placed on the nominally lowest card, now called the Ace, so that it sometimes became the highest card and the Two, or Deuce, the lowest. This concept may have been hastened in the late 1700s by the French Revolution, where games began being played "ace high" as a symbol of lower classes rising in power above the royalty. The term "Ace" itself comes from a dicing term in Anglo-Norman French, which is itself derived from the Latin as (the smallest unit of coinage). Another dicing term, trey (3), sometimes shows up in playing card games.
Corner and edge indices appeared in the mid-1800s, which enabled people to hold their cards close together in a fan with one hand (instead of the two hands previously used). Before this time, the lowest court card in an English deck was officially termed the Knave, but its abbreviation ("Kn") was too similar to the King ("K"). However, from the 1600s on the Knave had often been termed the Jack, a term borrowed from the game All Fours where the Knave of trumps is termed the Jack. All Fours was considered a low-class game, so the use of the term Jack at one time was considered vulgar. The use of indices changed the formal name of the lowest court card to Jack.
This was followed by the innovation of reversible court cards. Reversible court cards meant that players would not be tempted to make upside-down court cards right side up. Before this, other players could often get a hint of what other players' hands contained by watching them reverse their cards. This innovation required abandoning some of the design elements of the earlier full-length courts.
The joker is an American innovation. Created for the Alsatian game of Euchre, it spread to Europe from America along with the spread of Poker (although its use in poker has largely faded). Although the joker card often bears the image of a fool, which is one of the images of the Tarot deck, it is not believed that there is any relation. In contemporary decks, one of the two jokers is often more colorful or more intricately detailed than the other, though this feature is not used in most card games. The two jokers are often differentiated as "Big" and "Little," or more commonly, "Red" and "Black." In many card games the jokers are not used. Unlike face cards, the design of jokers varies widely. Many manufacturers use them to carry trademark designs.
The primary deck of fifty-four playing cards in use today, called Anglo-American playing cards, includes thirteen ranks of each of the four English suits, spades (♠), hearts (♥), diamonds (♦) and clubs (♣); reversible Rouennais court cards; and two often distinguishable Jokers, with one being more colorful than the other. Each suit includes an ace, depicting a single symbol of its suit; a king, queen, and jack, each depicted with a symbol of its suit; and ranks ten through two, with each card depicting that many symbols (pips) of its suit. Modern playing cards carry index labels on opposite corners (rarely, all four corners) to facilitate identifying the cards when they overlap.
The fanciful design and manufacturer's logo commonly displayed on the Ace of Spades began under the reign of James I of England, who passed a law requiring an insignia on that card as proof of payment of a tax on local manufacture of cards. Until August 4, 1960, decks of playing cards printed and sold in the United Kingdom were liable for taxable duty and the Ace of Spades carried an indication of the name of the printer and the fact that taxation had been paid on the cards. The packs were also sealed with a government duty wrapper.
Though specific design elements of the court cards are rarely used in game play, a few are notable. The jack of spades and jack of hearts are drawn in profile, while the rest of the courts are shown in full face, leading to the former being called the "one-eyed" jacks. When deciding which cards are to be made wild in some games, the phrase, "acey, deucey, one-eyed jack," is sometimes used, which means that aces, twos, and the one-eyed jacks are all wild. The king of hearts is shown with a broadsword behind his head, leading to the nickname " suicide king". The Ace of Spades, unique in its large, ornate spade, is sometimes said to be the death card, and in some games is used as a trump card.
Playing cards are usually a standard size called bridge size. Some decks are somewhat wider and are called poker size. Larger or smaller decks are available, but are used mostly for card tricks.
Some decks include additional design elements. Casino blackjack decks may include markings intended for a machine to check the ranks of cards. Many casino decks have four indicies instead of the usual two. Many decks have large indicies, largely for use in stud poker games, where being able to read cards from a distance is a benefit and hand sizes are small.
German and Austrian suits may have different appearances. For instance, many German decks have yellow or orange diamonds and green spades. Many southern Germans and Austrians prefer decks with hearts, bells, leaves, and acorns (for hearts, diamonds, spades, and clubs), as mentioned above.
An Anglo-American four-color deck exists. It has different colors for its suits, but it is not in wide use.
When relevant, most modern card games follow the bridge ranking of suits, i.e. spades are highest, followed by hearts, diamonds, and clubs. A common mnemonic to recall this ranking is reverse alphabetical order.
When giving the full written name of a specific card, the rank is given first followed by the suit, e.g., "Ace of Spades". Shorthand notation may list the suit first "A♠" (as is typical when discussing poker) or list the suit first (as is typical in listing several cards in bridge) "♠AKQ". Tens are sometimes abbreviated to T.
500, and some other games, require extended standard decks with extra spot cards (in the case of 500, 11's, 12's, and red 13's).The standard 54-card deck is also commonly known as a poker deck or—in Japan—a Trump deck, to differentiate it from "dedicated" card games such as UNO or Froop! , or other dynamic card decks like Hanafuda.
| Politics | Business | Finance |
 |
 |
 |
|