History of Playing Cards

    Playing cards are often not given the credit they deserve. They are plucked off of a shelf because they are inexpensive, fun, and can be used multiple times. In essence, they are viewed as a game for the common people. There is, however, a rich history as to how these games came into existence. 

    Playing cards began in China as early as 1000 AD, under the conjoined name of pai, which, in conjunction with tiles, means “plaque”. Pai games had three major categories: games of a “money-suit system”, games that eventually evolved into a domino-like form, and a wider category that included all other forms of games, from poetry and acting to drinking games. Cards themselves were likely invented after the introduction of paper currency and games quickly evolved to match the new printed material. At this point in their evolution, they resembled thin slips of paper with dots imitating the existing twenty-one dominoes. Later on, wood and ivory were used, resulting in the dominoes we know of today. Common people could not, at this point, afford to purchase the game pieces due to the cost of production. Cards, however, did not disappear altogether. They became known as money cards and were introduced to the design of having four particular suits: coins, strings of coins, myriads of strings, and tens of myriads.

    The new trend spread to the Middle East and Egypt where they developed into a system of fifty-two cards with four new suits (polo sticks, cups, coins, and swords). Playing cards arrived in Italy in the late thirteenth century and quickly scattered throughout Europe gaining the gambling connotation for which they are popularly known. In the thirteenth century, several rules specifically designed against gambling with cards were instituted. French, Latin, and Germanic sets evolved, each with their own set of suits and their own and design.

    Germanic cards in particular developed an imaginative pattern of four suits with no Queen in play. Italian card makers conversely preserved the existence of the Queen for a game called Tarroco, from which Tarot cards evolved. It is the French we owe for the creation of the suits' designs of Hearts, Spades, Clubs, and Diamonds.  In the fifteenth century, once the French suits had been established, card production was expedited through the abandonment of full-color cards. Red and Black were the only colors used, allowing for stencils to be made and mass production to flourish. An interesting thing to note is how neatly playing cards mirrored the history of the time; they continue to feature popular cultural figures today, but in the time of the French Revolution, the tradition of using a King, Queen, and Jack died out in accordance with the unpopularity of the court system.  The Ace, then the lowest card, also gained special importance. When the French accepted Napoleon as emperor, the court system was reinstituted in playing cards.

    In the eighteenth century, when playing cards arrived in the relatively young United States, their format changed yet again with the introduction of the Joker card, derived from a card known as the German Bauer or Americanized “Bower” when immigrants brought a game called Euchre with them from Europe. The numbers on the corners of cards, known as indexes, were also developed for the sake of simplicity. As time continued to pass, the cards were refined with rounded corners, double-ended figure illustrations, and nicer finishes for the paper used. In the nineteenth century in particular, artists began to revive the tradition of making cards ornamental, releasing countless designs featuring artwork, photographs, or even popular culture images.

    Today, the playing card continues to be widely produced and used in games. Thanks to modern production methods, they are often cheap and easy to attain while remaining decorative. New materials like plastic have been introduced into card production. It is safe to assume that as time continues to pass, the playing card will continue to evolve and mirror the society through which it passes.

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