Oh Hell or Contract Whist is a trick-taking card game of British origin in which the object is to take exactly the number of tricks bid. It was first described by B. C. Westall around 1930 and originally called Oh! Well. It was said to have been introduced into America via the New York clubs in 1931. Phillips and Westall describe it as "one of the best round games."
Whist is a classic English trick-taking card game which was widely played in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although the rules are simple, there is scope for strategic play.
All Fours is a traditional English card game, once popular in pubs and taverns as well as among the gentry, that flourished as a gambling game until the end of the 19th century. It is a trick-taking card game that was originally designed for two players, but developed variants for more players. According to Charles Cotton, the game originated in Kent, but spread to the whole of England and eventually abroad. It is the eponymous and earliest recorded game of a family that flourished most in 19th century North America and whose progeny include Pitch, Pedro and Cinch, games that even competed with Poker and Euchre. Nowadays the original game is especially popular in Trinidad and Tobago, but regional variants have also survived in England. The game's "great mark of distinction" is that it gave the name 'Jack' to the card previously known as the Knave.
Écarté is an old French casino game for two players that is still played today. It is a trick-taking game, similar to whist, but with a special and eponymous discarding phase; the word écarté meaning "discarded". Écarté was popular in the 19th century, but is now rarely played. It is described as "an elegant two-player derivative of Triomphe [that is] quite fun to play" and a "classic that should be known to all educated card players."
Solo whist is the English form of Weizen, a simple game of the Boston family played in the Low Countries. It is a trick-taking card game for four players in which players can bid to make eight tricks in trumps with any partner, or a solo contract playing against the other three players. Thus it combines both partnership and cut-throat play. Scoring is with small stakes won or paid out on each hand.
Ombre or l'Hombre is a fast-moving seventeenth-century trick-taking card game for three players and "the most successful card game ever invented."
Preferans or Russian Preference is a 10-card plain-trick game with bidding, played by three or four players with a 32-card Piquet deck. It is a sophisticated variant of the Austrian game Préférence, which in turn descends from Spanish Ombre and French Boston. It is renowned in the card game world for its many complicated rules and insistence on strategical approaches.
Twenty-five is the Irish national card game, which also underlies the Canadian game of Forty-fives. Charles Cotton describes its ancestor in 1674 as "Five Cards", and gives the nickname five fingers to the Five of Trumps extracted from the fact that the Irish word cúig means both 'five' and 'trick'. It is supposed to be of great antiquity, and widely believed to have originated in Ireland, although "its venerable ancestor", Maw, of which James I of England was very fond, is a Scottish game.
Put, occasionally Putt, is an English tavern game first recorded in the 16th century and later castigated by 17th century moralists as one of ill repute. It belongs to a very ancient family of trick-taking card games and bears close similarities a group known as Truc, Trut,Truque, also Tru, and the South American game Truco. Its more elaborate cousin is the Catelan and Spanish game of Truc, which is still much played in many parts of Southern France and Spain.
Bostogné, Boston or Boston Whist is an 18th-century trick-taking card game played throughout the Western world apart from Britain, forming an evolutionary link between Hombre and Solo Whist. Apparently named after a key location in the American War of Independence, it is probably a French game which was devised in France in the 1770s, combining the 52-card pack and logical ranking system of partnership Whist with a range of solo and alliance bids borrowed from Quadrille. Other lines of descent and hybridization produced the games of Twenty-five, Préférence and Skat. Its most common form is known as Boston de Fontainebleau or French Boston.
The following is a glossary of terms used in card games. Besides the terms listed here, there are thousands of common and uncommon slang terms. Terms in this glossary should not be game-specific, but apply to a wide range of card games played with non-proprietary packs. It should not include terms solely related to casino or banking games. For glossaries that relate primarily to one game or family of similar games, see Game-specific glossaries.
Court piece is a trick-taking card game similar to the card game whist in which eldest hand makes trumps after the first five cards have been dealt, and trick-play is typically stopped after one party has won seven tricks. A bonus is awarded if one party wins the first seven tricks, or even all tricks. The game is played by four players in two teams, but there are also adaptations for two or three players.
Tippen, also known as Dreiblatt, Dreikart, Drei Karten, Dreekort, Kleinpréférence or Labet, is an historical German 3-card, plain-trick game which was popular as a gambling game for three or more players. The Danish version of the game was known as Trekort and more elaborate Swedish variants include Knack and Köpknack. It appears to be related to the English game of Three-Card Loo. It was banned as a gambling game in some places.
Triomphe, once known as French Ruff, is a card game dating from the late 15th century. It most likely originated in France or Spain and later spread to the rest of Europe. When the game arrived in Italy, it shared a similar name with the pre-existing game and deck known as trionfi; probably resulting in the latter becoming renamed as Tarocchi (tarot). While trionfi has a fifth suit that acts as permanent trumps, triomphe randomly selects one of the existing four suits as trumps. Another common feature of this game is the robbing of the stock. Triomphe became so popular that during the 16th century the earlier game of trionfi was gradually renamed tarocchi, tarot, or tarock. This game is the origin of the English word "trump" and is the ancestor of many trick-taking games like Euchre and Whist.
Mistigri, historically Pamphile, is an old, French, trick-taking card game for three or four players that has elements reminiscent of poker. It is a member of the Rams family of games and, although it is a gambling game, often played for small stakes, it is also suitable as a party game or as a family game with children from the age of 12 upwards.
Bester Bube, also Fiefkort mit 'n besten Buren, is an historical German card game for 3–6 players played with a Piquet pack. It is one of the Rams group of card games characterised by allowing players to drop out of the current game if they think they will be unable to win any tricks or a minimum number of tricks. It may be an ancestor of Five-Card Loo.
Maw, formerly also Mawe, was a Scottish card game for two players, popularised by James I, which is ancestral to the Irish national game of Twenty-five as well as the Canadian game of Forty-fives. Maw appears to be the same as Five Cards, a game described by Charles Cotton in the 17th century. The game disappeared from the literature after the period of the English Commonwealth, only to emerge in Ireland in the 19th century in new forms for two or more players and known as Five and Ten, Spoil Five and Forty-Five. These new variants are still played today, the latter has evolved into the Canadian game of Forty-fives.
Bête, la Bête, Beste or la Beste, originally known as Homme or l'Homme, was an old, French, trick-taking card game, usually for three to five players. It was a derivative of Triomphe created by introducing the concept of bidding. Its earlier name gives away its descent from the 16th-century Spanish game of Ombre. It is the "earliest recorded multi-player version of Triomphe".
Penneech or Peneech, sometimes called Penicth, is an unusual historical English card game for two players played with hands of seven cards. English point-trick games are rare anyway, but the unique feature of this game is that the trump suit changes with each trick. Parlett describes it as a "jolly little two-hander".
Call-ace Whist or Danish Whist is a card game for four players playing in variable partnerships. It is the most popular form of Whist in Denmark, where it is often just called "Whist". It has a well developed bidding system and has imported from the traditional Danish game of Skærvindsel the feature of determining the partnerships by 'calling an ace'. John McLeod records that there is also a version of Danish Whist in which there are fixed partnerships.
