FIRST PLAYING-CARDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 106, 6 May 1936, Page 8

FIRST PLAYING-CARDS.

Playing-cards were invented about th-J year 1390, in order to amuse Charles VI., then Kin? of France, who was subject to fits of melancholy. The inventor proposed to represent the four classes of men in the kingdom. The clergy wore represented by hearts, for which reason the Spaniards —who took tho cards from the. French —used, instead of a heart, n copa or chalice. The nobility and military were represented by the points of spears, and tho Anglo-Saxon ignorance of the meaning of the fig-tire led to them being called "spade?." Diamonds stood for citizens, merchants and tradespeople, not because of their connection with the precious stones, but because the carreaux, the red marks that appear upon the cardi ( were intended to represent tho square stone tiles of which the houses of the middle class were built. The figure we call a "club" was originally a clover leaf, and alluded to peasants' and farmers. Spanish cards bear a. stave or basto in lieu of the French clover leaf, and it « probably because of this that we refer to the suit as "clubs."