01-032 Table-played playing cards

01-032
Table-played playing cards

I have bought 4 packs of playing cards from Amazon at a cost of USD 12.79. They are not ordinary playing cards. The manufacturer is “Bee”. The cards are printed in USA, in top casino quality. And most importantly, they are used.

Table-played playing cards

On Amazon, a box of 12 pack brand new “Bee” playing cards only costs USD 24.99. Why should I spend more than 3 bucks on a pack of used cards, when a pack of brand new cards would just cost me 2 bucks? The reason is, these cards are the real deal. The cards are real Vegas casino playing cards that actually been used by official dealers at popular Las Vegas casinos.

Cards are printed by the US manufacturer "Bee"

Casinos have to periodically remove playing cards from circulation to prevent gamblers from using marks on them to gain an advantage. Ideally, all playing cards must be replaced at the end of each 8 hours shift. But in practice, the dealers have all the rights to replace the cards whenever they feel necessary, which can be as frequent as half an hour. You can imagine after a day of operation, there would be millions of used playing cards heading to landfill.

The pack is resealed with a label saying
the deck was actually played on casino table

Some casinos collect those used cards, clip the corners or stamp a hole straight through the center of the deck to show that they have already been used in play. This helps to reduce fraud, and it is also a way to show that the pack of cards was used at a genuine table in an official game. Each card receives the same treatment equally, which makes these playing cards useful for gaming outside of their original homes.

Cards are in French suits with jumbo-sized corner index

The used cards, and their boxes, are then sent to local community centers. Inside, people manually sort the 52 cards in order, seal them with a label and resell the cards to the second hand market. Table-played playing cards are not only cards with a story behind. Purchasing them can also help the local community.

Tabled-played playing cards are in French-suit with jumbo-sized index on four corners, allowing a much easier gameplay on casino tables. Cards are for real money business so their qualities are always the topmost. Jokers are removed as there are no rooms for them in the Vegas.

Casino logo is printed on the backside

My packs are from 3 different casinos of Las Vegas – Golden Nugget (1946), Atlantis (1972) and South Point (2005). Two of these casinos are even older than me.

The decks can be used to play any games that do not require a Joker. But as the cards are from casino tables, why don’t we use them to play Blackjack? 

General Information

Player	2 to 10
Playing Time	30 mins
Age	8+
Year Released	1700
Designer	(Public Domain)
Publisher	Bee
Family	Betting and Bluffing, Push your luck
Score	4.7 (Board Game Geek)

Specifications

Card size	Poker size (63mm x 88mm, 2.5" x 3.5")
Deck size	52 cards
# of suits	4 – diamonds (♦), clubs (♣), hearts (♥) & spades (♠)
Details	For each suit, there are: 1x A 1x 2 1x 3 1x 4 1x 5 1x 6 1x 7 1x 8 1x 9 1x 10 1x J 1x Q 1x K  And there are no Jokers.

Gameplay

Where to buy?

Amazon.

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01-031 Swiss 1JJ Tarot

01-031
Swiss 1JJ Tarot

Today, I am going to introduce the 7^th, and also the last, tarot card deck that still being used for game playing. The card deck is called Swiss 1JJ Tarot.

Swiss 1JJ Tarot

Swiss 1JJ Tarot deck is an Italian suited pack with 78 cards. The deck is derived from the Tarot de Besançon, which itself comes from the Tarot of Marseilles. This is also the reason behind the similarities between the Swiss 1JJ Tarot deck and the Tarot of Marseilles deck. Though, there are some minor changes on the trump suit.

As other Latin-suited tarot deck, the deck consists of 4 suits namely, swords, batons (or wands), cups & coins (or Pentacles), as well as the additional suit of trumps. Changes are mainly on two of the cards. The trump 2 “Popess” and the trump 5 “Pope” of the Tarot of Marseilles are substituted by the figures of Juno and Jupiter respectively.

Trumps number 1 to 5

Popess is replaced by Junon & Pope is replaced by Jupiter

The deck was first published in the 1830s by the Swiss businessman Johann Georg Rauch. In 1965, AGMüller issued a reprint of the deck and named it as 1JJ. The "1" simply being a number within the product line and "JJ" the replacement of 2 trumps by Juno and Jupiter. Now, most people use the term “1JJ” to refer to this particular tarot deck.

The other trumps look exactly like those in the Tarot of Marseilles deck

Trump 21 "The World" and "The Fool",
which is the largest trump in this game.

Different from the other 3 Latin-suited tarot decks, the Tarocco Piemontese, the Tarocco Bolognese and the Tarocco Siciliano that I have introduced previously, Swiss 1JJ Tarot is not used for gaming in Italy. The deck only survives in a few villages of South Switzerland as a gaming deck. Those places include Visp in the southwest and the Romansh speaking region in the southeast. The deck is for playing Troccas, in the Romansh speaking region, and Troggu, in Visp. Despite its less popularity in card playing nowadays, Swiss 1JJ Tarot deck is still widely available. Because of its similarity to the Tarot of Marseilles deck, many tarot readers use the Swiss 1JJ Tarot deck for divinity purpose. This is the reason of keeping this ancient deck alive.

Pip cards of the 4 suits

The pattern of Swiss 1JJ Tarot deck is in public domain and technically anyone can print. Depends on the printer, the deck comes in different languages, such as English, French and German. People mainly use the French version to play games. However, there is a more localized Romansh version available to purchase online.

Court cards of the 4 suits

My deck is an English version printed by AGMüller in Belgium. The deck comes with an instruction booklet which teaches how to interpret the meaning of each card in tarot reading. Tarot card game is not mentioned in the booklet at all. 

General Information

Player	2 to 8
Playing Time	30 mins
Age	?
Year Released	1830?
Designer	(Public Domain)
Publisher	AGMüller
Family	Trick-taking
Score	5.9 (Board Game Geek)

 Specifications

Card size	50mm x 83mm
Deck size	78 cards
# of suits	5 – Swords (spade), Batons (bastoni), Cups (coppe), Coins (denari) & Trumps
Details	The deck is in Italian suit. Cards are all numbered in Roman numerals, except the Fool card. Trump consists of 22 cards, which bears similarity to the trump suit of Tarot of Marseilles. There are no Jokers. An instructions booklet for divination reading is included.

Game Play

Where to buy?

Etsy.

 

In the previous posts, I have introduced the 5 different suits of traditional playing cards, namely the French-suited, the Spanish-suited, the German-suited, the Italian-suited & the Swiss-suited. I have also introduced 7 different tarot decks that are still used for gaming today, which includes the Tarot Nouveau, the Industrie und Glück, the Adler Cego, the Tarocco Piemontese, the Tarocco Bolognese, the Tarocco Siciliano & the Swiss 1JJ Tarot. And thanks to Tarocco Siciliano, we still be able to have a glimpse on the now extinct Portuguese-suit.

But it seems that we have reached the end of our journey on traditional playing card decks, or at least traditional “Western-style” playing card decks. In the future posts, I will introduce some other special deck of playing cards. Or maybe I will revisit some dedicated card games that I played with my son during the pandemic. Stay tune and I hope you have enjoyed this page.

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01-030 Tarocco Siciliano

01-030
Tarocco Siciliano

In the previous posts, I have introduced 2 of the 3 surviving Latin-suited tarot decks that are still used for gaming in Italy, the Tarocco Piemontese and the Tarocco Bolognese decks. Today, we are looking into the third one, the Tarocco Siciliano.

Tarocco Siciliano

Tarocco Siciliano is originated from the capital city of Sicily Island, Palermo. History of the deck can be dated back to early 17^th century. It is used to play Sicilian tarocchi nowadays.

The deck is heavily influenced by the Tarocco Bolognese and the Minchiate. Its trump suit follows mostly the pattern of the Tarocco Bolognese, with exceptions of a few unique cards to the deck. For example, trump 0 “Miseria” and trump 4 “Constanza” are unique to the deck. Trump 14 “Vascello” is from the Minchiate. And Jupiter replaced the angel to cast down judgement on Trump 20.

The Fool and the lowest trump "Miseria"
Both cards are unnumbered.

Other trumps are numbered

Below are the cards of the trump suit, listed in order:

• 20   Jupiter (Giove)
• 19    Atlas (Atlante) or the Globe (Palla)
• 18    Sun (Sole)
• 17    Moon (Luna)
• 16    Star (Stella)
• 15    Tower (Torre)
• 14    Ship (Vascello)
• 13    Death    
• 12    Time      
• 11     Hanged Man
• 10    Wheel    
• 9      Chariot  
• 8      Love       
• 7      Justice   
• 6      Fortitude      
• 5      Temperance 
• 4      Constancy (Constanza)
• 3      Emperor
• 2      Empress
• 1      Mountebank (Bagotti) or the Young Men (Picciotti)
• (0)   Destitution (Miseria) or Poverty (Poverta)

* Brackets indicate the card is not numbered. 

The extinct Portuguese-suited deck

The other 4 suits are the swords (spade), the batons (bastoni), the cups (coppe) and the coins (denari). However, the design is not totally Italian. The deck uses Spanish pips of knobbly cudgels and straight swords like other southern Italian decks. It also intersects the swords and clubs on the pip cards. This design is actually called the Portuguese pattern. Portuguese-suited deck is now extinct and Tarocco Siciliano is only surviving playing card deck that preserved the pattern.

Pip cards of the swords, the batons, the cups and the coins.

Only the coins suit has number 4.

The intersecting of swords and batons represent the Portuguese pattern.

Ordinary Portuguese-suited playing cards are now extinct.

But the pattern survived in this tarot deck.

Tarocco Siciliano produced today is in a shortened form, with ranks 1 to 4 of the pip cards removed from each suit, with the exception of Coins which have a 4. Therefore, the deck currently uses 63 cards, one more than the Tarocco Bolognese. Some deck also contains the 1 of Coins. This card is mostly not used for gaming but for the tax stamp. 

The Ace of coins

This card is included only for taxation purpose.

Is Tarocco Siciliano worth buying?

Similar to the situations of Tarocco Piemontese & Tarocco Bolognese, you can play all tarot games with a deck of Tarot Nouveau. Tarocco Siciliano deck has less cards and lacks corner pips. However, if you want to play those traditional Sicilian tarot games in a more traditional way, you would like to play with a deck of Tarocco Siciliano. The cards are beautifully printed and not expensive at all. So, it is up to you if you want to add this deck to your collection. But for just playing games, it is not necessary to buy. 

Court cards of the four suits.

They are all unlabelled.

And the "Jacks" are female.

General Information

Player	3 to 4
Playing Time	?
Age	?
Year Released	?
Designer	(Public Domain)
Publisher	Modiano
Family	Trick-taking
Score	?

Specifications

Card size	50mm x 83mm
Deck size	64 cards
# of suits	5 – Swords (spade), Batons (bastoni), Cups (coppe), Coins (denari) & Trumps
Details	The deck is in Portuguese suit. Pip cards are not numbered, valued from 5 to 10. The Coins also have a 4. The 4 face cards are King (re), Queen (donna), Knight (cavallo) and female knaves (donne), all being unlabeled. Trump consists of 21 cards, which bears similarity to the trump suit of Tarocco Bolognese. Some deck contains the 1 of Coins for taxation purpose. There are no Jokers.

Game Play

Before I can find any video showing the game play of Mineo, please refer to the rules on Pagat:

https://www.pagat.com/tarot/sicilian.html

Where to buy?

Etsy.

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