Breitkopf, who is decidedly of opinion that cards are of Eastern invention, and of great antiquity, considers that the name Naibe, or Naipes, by which they were first known to the Italians and the Spaniards, is derived from an Arabic word--_Nabaa_--signifying divination, foretelling future events, fortune-telling, and such like. In this opinion he says he is confirmed by the exposition of the Hebrew word _Naibes_, which he seems to think cognate with the Arabic Nabaa.[38] He, however, produces no evidence to show that cards were known either to the Arabians or the Jews by the name of Naibe, and from a subsequent passage in his work, it is evident that the conjecture was suggested merely from the circumstance of cards being occasionally employed for the purposes of fortune-telling. Heineken, who contends that cards were invented in Germany, alleges the name--_Briefe_--given to them in that country in support of the presumed fact. "Playing Cards," he observes, "were called with us _Briefe_, that is _letters_, in Latin, _Epistolæ_, and they are called so still. The common people do not say, 'give me a pack of cards,' but 'a _Spiel Briefe_' (un jeu de lettres); and they do not say 'I want a card,' but 'I want a _Brief_' (a letter). We should, at least, have preserved the name _cards_, if they had come to us from France; for the common people always preserve the names of all games that come from other countries."[39] This argument is contradicted by the fact of cards having been called _Karten_ in Germany, before they acquired there the name of _Briefe_; and this very word _Briefe_, which is merely a translation of the Latin _Chartæ_, is presumptive evidence of the Germans having obtained their knowledge of cards from either the French or the Italians, with whom the name cards, when "done" into Latin, had the same meaning as the German word _Briefe_.