The Penguin Book of Card Games: Everything You Need to Know to Play Over 250 Games (188 page)

play have been exposed. For this purpose cards rank from Two low

to Ace high.

Play The trump turn-up belongs by right to the dealer, so if it is an

Ace the dealer wins without further play. If it is not an Ace, but is

high enough to interest anyone else, they may of er to buy it from

the dealer, and the dealer may haggle about it, or auction it, or

keep it, as preferred.

Each in turn, starting with the player to the dealer’s left – or, if

the turn-up was sold, to the purchaser’s left – turns up the top card

of his own stack. This continues in rotation, but omit ing the player

who currently possesses the highest trump. If and when a trump is

turned that is higher than the one previously showing, the player

who turned it may of er it for sale at any mutual y agreeable price,

or refuse to sel it. Either way, play continues from the left of, and

subsequently omit ing, the possessor of the highest trump.

Furthermore, anyone at any time may of er to buy not necessarily

the best visible trump, but any face-down card or cards belonging to

another player. The purchaser may not look at their faces, but must

place them face down at the bot om of his stack and turn them up

in the normal course of play. (The timeto indulge inthis pieceof

speculation is when you currently own the highest trump and

want oprevent someone else from turning a higher.)

End The game ends when al cards have been revealed, or when

somebody turns the Ace, and whoever has the highest trump wins

the pot.

Optional extras

1. Anyone turning up a Five or a Jack adds a chip to the pot.

(This looks like an Irish addition – see Twenty-Five.)

2. A spare hand is dealt and revealed at the end of play. If it

contains a higher trump than the apparent winner’s, the pot

remains untaken and is added to that of the next deal.

Other notable banking games

Faro

Reportedly so-cal ed from the likeness of one of the kings to a

Pharaoh, this classic banking game originated in eighteenth-century

France and spread eastwards to Russia, westwards to America.

Casanova, when not more pleasurably engaged, played Faro

wherever he went, and by the nineteenth century it had become the

world’s most widespread casino game. In the twentieth century it

has largely been ousted by Blackjack and Baccara.

There is a single layout of thirteen cards, one of each rank, suits

being irrelevant. Punters place stakes on individual ranks to turn up

in their favour as the banker deals. They can arrange them in

various dif erent positions to represent combinations of two or

more ranks, and can bet negatively. The banker, after rejecting the

top card of the pack (cal ed soda, possibly from French sauter),

turns cards from the pack in twos, the first of each pair being

placed at his left and winning for the bank, the second at his right

and winning for the punters – unless it matches the rank of the first,

in which case, of course, the banker wins. The last card, cal ed hoc,

is not played. Winning punters can let their bets ride in hopes of a

third or fourth card of the same rank turninguplater, earning

apparentlytremendousbutinfactunfavourable pay-of s.

Basset

seventeenth-century forerunner of Faro, first mentioned as played

by Catherine of Braganza, wife of Charles I . It was a more

cumbersome game, in that a separate thirteen-card staking layout

was required for each player.

Stuss (Jewish Faro)

The enormous popularity of Faro in the United States led to the

development of this simpler and more informal variant. It may stil

be encountered in low-class American gambling joints.

Trente et Quarante (Rouge et Noir, R & N, Thirty-and-Forty)

This more genteel activity may stil be encountered in French

casinos, but is declining in popularity because of its low house

percentage. Of uncertain age, it was certainly known in 1650 and

may have been introduced by Mazarin. A staking layout enables

punters to bet on which of two rows respectively marked red and

black wil come closer to 31, or that the first card dealt wil or wil

not match the colour of the winning row, or both. The banker first

deals cards face up in a row marked rouge, then again to a row

marked noir, stopping each row when it reaches or exceeds a point

of thirty-one, and paying of accordingly. Punters may also bet that

the first card dealt wil be of the same colour as the winning row

(couleur), or of the opposite colour (inveise).

Staking layout for Trent et Quarante. The tail eur (dealer) is assisted

Staking layout for Trent et Quarante. The tail eur (dealer) is assisted

by one or more croupiers.

A ful survey of informal banking games belongs less to a survey of

card games than to that of gambling, if not to the annals of crime.

For more complete descriptions of banking games, ancient and

modern, see especial y Carl Sifakis, The Encyclopedia of Gambling

(1990). Entries include Ace-Deuce-Jack, Ambigu, Bango, Banker &

Broker, Chase the Ace (or Minoru, after a race-horse of Edward VI ),

Easy Go, Farmer’s Joy, Lansquenet, Monte Bank, Play or Pay, Shoot,

Skin, Spanish Monte, Three-Card Monte, Tripoli, Ziginet e, and

many others that I may have missed.

Don’t forget…

Play to the left (clockwise) unless otherwise stated.

Eldest or Forehand means the player to the left of the dealer

in left-handed games, to the right in right-handed games.

T = Ten, p = players, pp = in fixed partnerships, c = cards,

† = trump,

= Joker.

24 Original card gamesinvented

by author

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

Anonymous (and untrue)

Why bother to invent a new card game when thereare hundreds of

good ones already in existence?

TheonlypossibleresponsetothisistoadaptGeorgeMal ory’sanswer to

the question, ‘Why bother to climb Everest?’ and reply, ‘Because it

isn’t there.’

Some of the fol owing first appeared in Original Card Games

(London, 1977) and others in Jaime Poniachik’s Spanish translation

of it (Anarquay Otros Juegos de Cartas, Madrid & Buenos Aires,

1993), though al have been further modified in the light of

extensive play. Two others appear in their appropriate places in

the preceding chapters: Ninety-Nine because it has been so widely

published elsewhere that it presumably now counts as a real game;

and Contract Piquet because it needs the context of its original

model to aid comprehension.

Although most are based on traditional features such as trick-

taking and Poker combinations, al exploit some novel twistinthe

mechanism of play, and al , to a greater or lesser degree, are games

of skil . Most have short and simple rules, and none requires more

than a single pack of cards.

Abstrac

2 players, 24 cards

What could be simpler than a game of perfect information where

you deal the cards out in a row and then pick them up one by one?

CardsUse a 24-card pack consisting of AKQJT9 in each suit.

StartShuf le the cards thoroughly and deal them al out, face up,

with just enough overlap to enable each card to be identified. For

example:

ObjectTo take cards that form scoring combinations (sets and

sequences) but without taking more cards than absolutely necessary.

PlayNon-dealer examines the layout and decides whether to play

first or second. If second, dealer must play first. You each in turn

draw either one, two or three consecutive cards from the top end of

the row until none remain. (The top end is the one with the ful y

exposed card – A in the il ustration.) You must place the cards you

take face up on the table before you, clearly arranged by suit and

rank, so your opponent can always see what you have taken so far.

ScoreThe scoring combinations are sets of three or more cards of

the same rank and sequences of three or more cards of the same

suit. Any individual card may, if possible, be counted twice, once in

a set and once in a sequence. Your score for the deal consists of two

part-scores multiplied together. First, for combinations, score as