Last updated Distribution of French (blue) and Swiss (orange) playing cards in Switzerland and Liechtenstein.
Parts of Swiss German speaking Switzerland have their own deck of playing cards. They are mostly used for Jass, the "national card game" of Switzerland. The deck is related to the various German playing cards. Within Switzerland, these decks are called German or Swiss German cards.
Swiss German is any of the Alemannic dialects spoken in the German-speaking part of Switzerland and in some Alpine communities in Northern Italy bordering Switzerland. Occasionally, the Alemannic dialects spoken in other countries are grouped together with Swiss German as well, especially the dialects of Liechtenstein and Austrian Vorarlberg, which are closely associated to Switzerland's.
Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a sovereign state situated in the confluence of western, central, and southern Europe. It is a federal republic composed of 26 cantons, with federal authorities seated in Bern. Switzerland is a landlocked country bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. It is geographically divided between the Alps, the Swiss Plateau and the Jura, spanning a total area of 41,285 km2 (15,940 sq mi). While the Alps occupy the greater part of the territory, the Swiss population of approximately 8.5 million is concentrated mostly on the plateau, where the largest cities are located, among them the two global cities and economic centres of Zürich and Geneva.
A playing card is a piece of specially prepared heavy paper, thin cardboard, plastic-coated paper, cotton-paper blend, or thin plastic that is marked with distinguishing motifs and usually used as one of a set for playing card games, performing magic tricks and flourishes, for cardistry, and in card throwing. Playing cards are typically palm-sized for convenient handling, and usually are sold together as a deck of cards or pack of cards.
The Brünig-Napf-Reuss line forms a geographical boundary in traditional Swiss culture (Kulturgrenze). Running from the Brünig Pass along the Napf region to the Reuss, it partly separates western and eastern varieties of High Alemannic, although some places east of the line belong to the western dialect group. The line runs across the cantons of Lucerne and Aargau.
The canton of Schaffhausen, also canton of Schaffouse is the northernmost canton of Switzerland. The principal city and capital of the canton is Schaffhausen. The canton's territory is divided into three non-contiguous segments, where German territory reaches the Rhine. The large central part, which includes the capital, in turn separates the German exclave of Büsingen am Hochrhein from the rest of Germany.
The canton of St. Gallen, also canton of St Gall, is a canton of Switzerland. The capital is St. Gallen.
For the purposes of Jass, the numbered cards (six to nine) have no point value, the banner has a value of ten points, the picture-cards Under, Ober, König have values of two, three and four points, respectively, and the As has eleven points. The reduction to 36 cards (eliminating card values two to five) and the use of a male Ober instead of the "Queen" (perhaps related to the "Knight") is not unique to the Swiss deck but also found in a variety of German decks. Both "acorn" and "bells" are suits also found in German decks, while "shields" and "roses" seem to be unique to Switzerland.
The queen is a playing card with a picture of a woman on it. In many European languages, the king and queen begin with the same letter so the latter is often called dame (lady) or variations thereof. In French playing cards, the usual rank of a queen is between the king and the jack. In tarot decks, it outranks the knight which in turn outranks the jack.
A knight or cavalier is a playing card with a picture of a man riding a horse on it. It is a face card and is called caballo in Spanish playing cards and cavallo in Italian playing cards. In these decks, it ranks between the knave and the king within its suit. Among French playing cards, the knight (chevalier) can only be found in tarot decks. In Latin and French suited tarot decks, the knight ranks between the knave and the queen.
A less common deck is the 48 card set containing the 3s, 4s, and 5s and is used to play the Karnöffel variant Kaiserspiel.
Karnöffel is a trick-taking card game which probably came from the upper-German language area in Europe in the first quarter of the 15th century. It first appeared listed in a municipal ordinance of Nördlingen, Bavaria, in 1426 among the games that could be lawfully played at the annual city fête. This makes the game the oldest identifiable European card game in the history of playing cards.
Kaiserspiel, also called Kaisern or Cheisärä, is a card game, usually for 4 or 6 players, that is played in parts of Switzerland using a variant of the standard Swiss playing cards with 40 or 48 cards. It is a descendant of Karnöffel, the oldest known card game in Europe. It is sometimes misleadingly called Kaiserjass, although it has nothing to do with the Jass family of games that are popular in Switzerland.
Face cards
Early form of the "single image" variant of the deck, printed c. 1880 by J. Müller Cie, here showing the three face cards of Eicheln (acorns). The 1920s "double image" design which is now standard was directly based on this one.
The Under corresponds to the Jack or Knave. The Under of trumps becoming the highest card in the game can be traced to the 15th-century game Karnöffel. The face cards in the 1920s Müller design show twelve individual characters, which have remained unchanged since. The sequence Under, Ober, König depicts social stratification, the Under characters are working class, depicted as a fool or jester (Schellen), a messenger or scribe (Schilten), a peasant (Rosen) and a soldier or page/servant, while the Ober characters are shown as clerks or overseers/officers, while the kings are crowned monarchs (three of them seated, the king of Rosen is shown standing). The four Under characters hold their suit symbol facing downward, the Ober and König characters hold it facing upward (with the exception of Eicheln Ober and Schilten König, whose suit symbols are hovering in the top left corner without their holding it as they are holding a pipe and a cup instead, respectively).
A jack or knave is a playing card which, in traditional French and English decks, pictures a man in the traditional or historic aristocratic dress generally associated with Europe of the 16th or 17th century. The usual rank of a jack, within its suit, plays as if it was an 11. As the lowest face card, the jack often represents a minimum standard — for example, many poker games require a minimum hand of a pair of jacks in order to continue play.
Social stratification is a kind of social differentiation whereby members of society are grouped into socioeconomic strata, based upon their occupation and income, wealth and social status, or derived power. As such, stratification is the relative social position of persons within a social group, category, geographic region, or social unit.
Five characters are shown as smoking. All but three characters are shown with "blonde" (yellow) hair, the exceptions being Schilten Under, Schellen Ober (both with "grey" hair) and Schellen Under (hair not visible due to his fool's cap).
Schellen
Schilten
Rosen
Eicheln
Under
a "fool" character facing the viewer, smoking a pipe. Schellen-Under also came to be used as a term for a "cripple", or for scary Fasnacht characters in Lucerne dialect.[1]
left profile, a messenger wearing a tasseled cap and holding an envelope, with a quill pen tucked behind his ear
left profile, smoking a pipe, wearing a tasseled cap
left semi-profile, wearing a beret cap
Ober
left profile, wearing a tasseled cap, smoking a pipe
left profile, the only bare-headed character, wearing a cloak and smoking a cigarillo or cigarette
left profile, tasseled cap
right semi-profile, tasseled cap, holding his pipe in his hand while exhaling smoke
König
left semi-profile, forked beard
left semi-profile, beardless, holding a cup
left semi-profile, beardless
left semi-profile, long beard
History of production
The earliest references for playing cards in Switzerland date back to the late 1370s when they were sweeping through Western Europe. In 1377, the Dominican friar Johannes of Basel wrote the earliest description of playing cards in Europe. He described the most common deck as consisting of four suits each with 13 ranks with the top three depicting a seated king, an upper-marshal who holds his suit symbol up, and an under-marshal who held it down which corresponds to the current court cards. Aces must have disappeared very early since there are no surviving aces with Swiss suit marks. It was far easier to print a 48-card deck with two woodblocks than one with 52 cards. The Deuce was promoted above the king around the late 15th-century to become the new ace. The current suit-system emerged during the 15th-century around the same time as the German suit-system after much experimentation such as feathers and hats instead of acorns and roses. Unlike the Germans, the Swiss have maintained the Banner 10 after the mid-16th century. During the 17-century, ranks 3 to 5 disappeared from most decks save for those used to play Kaiserspiel.[2]
Basel was an early center for manufacturing packs. Two identical decks from around 1530 were independently discovered in 1998 and 2011.[3] This predecessor went through various stages of evolution during the following centuries. Johannes I Müller of Diessenhofen printed an early such deck in 1840. His successor Johannes II Müller was the owner of the Müller company in Schaffhausen which printed a "single image" variant of the deck in c. 1880, from which it derived the "double image" design which is now standard in c. 1920.
Since the introduction of this deck, the various manufacturers of this deck can only be distinguished in minor design details, and in some cases by the company name printed on the aces of Schellen and Schilten. In this design, a central rectangle on the aces of Schellen and Schilten were used for the text "Schaffhausen & Hasle" (the location of the presses) and "Spielkartenfabrik", respectively. [4] Also in the 1920s, a nearly identical design was produced by Hächler und Söhne of Zürich, indicated as "HASO" on the ace of Schellen. In designs derived from the 1920s Schaffhausen one, the ace of Schellen is still used to attribute the design to the original design, while the ace of Schilten is used to indicate the present manufacturer. The "single image" version survived into the 1950s, but became increasingly rare after 1920.
From the 1930s onward, the number of manufacturers increased. There was Walter Scharff Co. ("WASCO", Ennetbaden), 1930;[5] "Bernina, Dauer-Jasskarten" (Otto Hauser-Steiger, 1939-1946), and others. The Swiss discounter Migros began selling playing cards in the 1940s. Their cards were only identified by an image of a crossbow on the ace of Schellen. Since they are otherwise identical to the Hächler Söhne ones, it is likely that this company produced for Migros.
More recently, cards were produced by Fotorotar (1985), Grolimund (Coloroffset R. Grolimund, Bern. M. Rhyn, Laupen), SwissCard (Toffen near Berne, 1997), Carlit (Carlit + Ravensburger AG, Würenlos, 2000s), Grob Druck AG (Amriswil, "www.jasskarten.com"), among others. Swiss AGMüller, the company continuing the original "J. Müller Cie" which came up with the 1920s design, was acquired by Belgian company Cartamundi in 1999. A number of German producers also made Swiss German decks for the Swiss market (Berliner Spielkarten, Nürnberger Spielkarten, VASS Leinfelden), as did the Italian company Dal Negro of Treviso.
There have repeatedly been novelty designs of the traditional deck, but all of these were short-lived, and intended as humorous or designed for a special purpose. There have been "feminist" designs which show all the face cards as women (Frauezogg, designs by Elsi Jegen and Susan Csomor), and there have been numerous novelty decks made for marketing purposes where certain cards had an altered design showing a logo or mascot of the company in question; an early "special edition" of the Swiss deck was a "military" version printed in 1915 on the occasion of the World War I mobilization; the suits became "cavalry, artillery, infantry, engineers". Swiss cartoonist Fredy Sigg designed a "cartoon" variant of the deck in 1978. In the 2000s, Austrian and German card producers also came up with "face-lifted", modernized designs for the Swiss deck, but these were not widely sold in Switzerland. AG Müller since its acquisition by Cartamundi in 2000 also came up with various "modernized" variants, sold under the name "Jass Plus". "Playing Cards R Us, Inc" of Orlando, Florida produced a "non-smoking" deck with 52 cards and two Jokers (copied from the Csomor's feminist deck) in a very limited run of 50 decks in 2006. Since 2007, AG Müller has been selling Swiss suited poker sets with 52 cards plus three Jokers.[6] These cards are wider than Jass ones and the pip cards are different; roses and acorns are no longer connected by vines and the shields are uniformly the same. They also use English corner indices for the face cards which meant giving the Queen index "Q" for the male Obers.[7]
"William Tell" set
William Tell as the Acorn Ober
There is also a "Swiss themed" deck of cards, in which each of the eight Ober and Under cards represents a character from Friedrich Schiller's Wilhelm Tell (William Tell himself is Eichel-Ober). This deck was designed in Hungary in 1835 as a means to express resentment against Habsburg Austrian rule since the play was also about a revolt against the Habsburgs. This deck is today known throughout the former Austro-Hungarian empire but it is not in use in Switzerland.
Related Research Articles
In playing cards, a suit is one of the categories into which the cards of a deck are divided. Most often, each card bears one of several pips (symbols) showing to which suit it belongs; the suit may alternatively or additionally be indicated by the color printed on the card. The rank for each card is determined by the number of pips on it, except on face cards. Ranking indicates which cards within a suit are better, higher or more valuable than others, whereas there is no order between the suits unless defined in the rules of a specific card game. In a single deck, there is exactly one card of any given rank in any given suit. A deck may include special cards that belong to no suit, often called jokers.
In a deck of playing cards, the term face card (US) or court card (British) is generally used to describe a card that depicts a person as opposed to the pip cards. They are also known as picture cards, or until the early 20th century, coat cards.
Playing cards have been in Italy since the late 14th century. As Latin suited cards, they use swords (spade), cups (coppe), coins (denari), and clubs (bastoni). All Italian suited decks have three face cards per suit: the fante (Knave), cavallo (Knight), and re (King), unless it is a tarocchi deck in which case a donna or regina (Queen) is inserted between the cavallo and re. Italian suited cards normally only refer to cards originating from northeastern Italy around the former Republic of Venice as the rest of Italy uses Spanish suits, French suits or German suits. Until the late 19th century, Italy was composed of many smaller independent states or under foreign occupation which led to the development of various regional patterns. Italian suited cards are largely confined to northern Italy, parts of Switzerland, Dalmatia and southern Montenegro. Popular games include Scopa, Briscola, Tressette, Bestia, and Sette e mezzo.
Jass is a trick taking, Ace-Ten card game and a distinctive branch of the Marriage family, popularly supposed to be the progenitor of the American game of Pinochle. It is popular throughout the Alemannic German-speaking area of Europe (German-speaking Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Alsace part of France, Vorarlberg province of Austria, southwestern Germany, beyond in Romansh-speaking Graubünden and in French-speaking area of Switzerland, German-speaking South Tyrol in Italy and New Glarus, Wisconsin.
The Tarot Nouveau, French Tarot Nouveau or Bourgeois Tarot deck is a pattern of tarot cards. As such it differs from those tarot decks used in fortune-telling, such as the Tarot of Marseilles and Rider-Waite decks, in that the Tarot Nouveau is designed solely for playing the various tarot card games for which the 78-card tarot deck was originally devised, such as the game of French Tarot. In the French language, this deck is often called the tarot à jouer or playing tarot. This usage is distinct from cartomancy and other divinatory purposes, for which the tarot is most commonly known outside Continental Europe. This deck is most commonly found in France, Wallonia, Romandy, Québec, and Denmark.
The Swiss 1JJ Tarot deck is a 78-card deck used for the tarot card games Troccas and Troggu and also for divination.
German playing cards are a style of playing cards used in many parts of Central Europe. Playing cards (Spielkarten) entered German-speaking lands around the late 1370s. The earliest cards were likely Latin-suited like in Italy and Spain. After much experimentation, the cards settled into new suits of Acorns (Eichel), Leaves, Hearts (Herz) and Bells around 1450. Closely related Swiss playing cards are used in German-speaking Switzerland. The French suit symbols were derived from the German ones around 1480. German-suited cards spread throughout Central Europe into areas that were once under German or Austrian control. They were also produced and used as far east as Russia until the early 20th century. German-suited decks are not well known all over these countries including parts of Germany itself as they have been undergoing strong competition from French playing cards since the late 17th-century. Traditional card games in which the German suits are used include Skat, Schafkopf, Doppelkopf and Watten.
French playing cards are cards that use the French suits of trèfles, carreaux, cœurs, and piques. Each suit contains three face cards; the valet, the dame, and the roi (king). Aside from these aspects, decks can include a wide variety of regional and national patterns which often have different deck sizes. In comparison to Spanish, Italian, German, and Swiss playing cards, French cards are the most widespread due to the geopolitical, commercial, and cultural influence of France and the United Kingdom in the past two centuries. Other reasons for their popularity were the simplicity of the suit insignia, which simplifies mass production, and the popularity of whist and contract bridge.
Hearts is one of the four suits in playing cards of both the French deck and the German deck. However, the symbol is slightly different: in a French deck and in a German-suited deck.
Leaves are one of the four suits in German-suited decks of playing cards. They correspond to Spades in a French deck. The leaf symbol originates from the Sword symbol of the Latin card decks.
Bells are a suit in playing cards of the German-suited cards. They correspond to Diamonds in a French deck. The suit is usually known in German as Schellen, but is sometimes abbreviated to Schell. Cards are referred to as in a French deck e.g. the "9 of Bells", but in German as "Schellen 9", or the "Unter of Bells".
Shields, also called Escutcheons, are one of the four suits of playing cards within the Swiss deck along with Acorns, Bells and Roses.
An Ace-Ten game is a type of card game, highly popular in Europe, in which the Aces and Tens are of particularly high value.
Blattla is a Bavarian card game for four players, who usually form two teams of two for each deal. It is a simplified version of Schafkopf and Bierkopf and is thus a point-trick game. Unlike those two games, in Blattla the Obers and Unters are not permanent trumps. In order to learn the rules of Schafkopf, it can be an advantage to first become familiar with Blattla. The game is traditionally played with Bavarian pattern cards.
The Banner is a playing card used in Swiss-suited cards.
The Marriage group is a large family of point-trick card games in which the 'marriage' of two cards, usually a King and Queen, plays an important role and attracts a bonus. They are believed to be descended from a German game, Mariagenspiel or Mariage, which dates back to at least 1715. Well-known games in this group include Bezique and the national card games of Austria (Schnapsen), Hungary (Ulti), France (Belote), Switzerland (Jass) and the Netherlands (Klaverjas).
Detlef Hoffmann (ed.), Schweizer Spielkarten vol. 1, "Die Anfänge im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert" (1998).
Max Ruhetal (ed.), Schweizer Spielkarten, vol. 2, "Das Tarockspiel in der Schweiz. Tarocke des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts im Museum Allerheiligen Schaffhausen" (2004).
Alte Schweizer Spielkarten, Berichthaus (1973).
Peter F. Kopp, Einige Streiflichter auf die Geschichte der Schweizer Spielkarten (1975)
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