The Devil's picture-booksVan Rensselaer, John King, Mrs.
History
The Devil's picture-books
Van Rensselaer, John King, Mrs.
Playing cards -- History
The three suits are not only marked by the emblems of pips, but, like
the Hindostanee cards, the backgrounds are vividly painted in some
uniform colour upon which the design is displayed, and this colour
marks the suits distinctly even when the emblem is omitted, which in
some cases is done either by design or accident. The white suit is
headed by a King mounted on an elephant, and a Vizir on a bull. There
are no emblems on these two cards by which to distinguish the suit.
The ten pip cards show tiny figures of men clothed in loosely fitting
red garments and wearing red turbans on their heads. These figures
are represented kneeling, with their hands clasped in the attitude of
prayer. They are dotted over the surface of the cards and grouped as
the corresponding pips are in the other suits, and generally face each
other, except in number eight, in which all the figures look the same
way and to the left side. Another suit is distinguished by a dark-blue
ground, on which small yellow disks, surrounded by circles of red, are
painted. This suit may correspond with a “moon” suit mentioned by Mr.
Chatto among the Hindostanee cards, and it is also noticeable as it
closely resembles the “money” used as an emblem on Italian and Spanish
cards. The court cards of this suit show a man mounted on a tiger and
bearing the distinctive emblem uplifted in his right hand. The position
of this man is closely copied on the Spanish cards, although in them he
is represented on horseback. The second honour shows two tigers seated
on a cross-legged bench gazing over their shoulders at two attendants,
who wave what appear to be staves or fans. Between these tigers is a
large “moon-face,” which seems to mark the suit. If this be the case,
it would point to the origin of the money emblem. The pips on the rest
of the suit are carelessly executed circles, and the features, which
would show it to be intended for the moon, are omitted. The outline
of this mark may have been followed on the cards that were first
introduced into Europe, and may readily have become changed during the
lapse of years. The “moon” mark on the Hindostanee cards has gradually
extended both East and West, one that closely resembles it being found
on the Chinese cards, and partly followed on the wooden cubes of the
Alaska Indians.
[Illustration: Plate 6.]
The green suit bears emblems which recall the _carreaux_ of the French
cards, and are even more like one of the marks used by the Apache
tribe of North American Indians by which to distinguish one of their
suits. The diamond-shaped pip on the Cashmere cards is painted red
and ornamented with stripes and dots of pink. The court cards show a
Vizir on a white horse, bearing the pip in his right hand, and a Sultan
attended by two slaves, who also carries the emblem of the suit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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