In the second half of the 14th century merchants introduced what was then commonly called Saracen cards into medieval Europe. Those who had survived the bubonic plague moved to cities, where they formed a new class of merchants and craftsmen the urban bourgeois. Once the poverty and prejudice of the dark era eased, trade, guilds, and universities began to revive, and new scientific perspectives were discovered along with the time for leisure, play, and pleasure.
During the early Renaissance, books, cards, and paintings were manufactured by hand. A community of art and science appreciators formed and became the primary factor in the spread of card games across Italy. By late th century many illustrated card manual manuscripts had appeared in a number of key cities in several countries, including Viterbo near Rome in Italy, in Paris, and in Barcelona. Thanks to traveling artists and scholars, the popularity of the game steadily grew: in the early 15th century a single craftsman sufficed to satisfy the card requirements of a city; but by mid century there was need in multiple fulltime shops.
Because this was a somewhat foreign form of amusement, not everybody embraced it. Some felt it threatened the fabric of society s mores and morals. They saw it as a game where gamblers and bettors were in cahoots with the devil. During the protestant Reformation cards were rather dramatically referred to as devil pictures.
In spite of or because of this, the popularity of cards persisted. Even Mary, Queen of Scots was a major bettor and enjoyed the game, shockingly, even on Sunday. The compleat Gamester was published in the late 17th century in London, relating details of more than a dozen games and their basic strategies. Particular facilities casini were established in Venice for aristocrats and courtesans especially for card games. From these Venice casini, a game called primero found its way all over Europe and was transformed into poker some time later.
In time, women as well as men, farmers and merchants as well as courtesans and nobles were able to enter the games and found symbols of themselves represented in the cards. A Swedish deck that became very much the rage, was comprised of these suits in order of ranking: sun, king, queen, knight, dame, valet and maid. Those ribald Florentines played with cards that pictured nude dames and dancers, with the dancers being the low suit.
There was no standard number of cards or designs in a deck at that time. The number of cards could vary from 36 to 40 to 52. The suits of the time were symbolic of wealth, tasty victuals, military defense, and sports popular with the court. These were coins, cups, sabers, and clubs. Signs familiar to us were in use in France in the 15th century: in red, Couers (Hearts) stood for the church, carreaux (a rectangular floor tile) represented the merchant class; in black, there were piques (spear and arrow heads) depicting state authority, and trefles (trefoil clover leaf) as a sign of the farmers. Some brave soul at one point along the way ditched the vice royals for queens.
After a period of time, the deck of cards that we know today took form. 52 cards with ranks comprising 4 distinct suits. The suits include Spades, Diamonds, Hearts, and Clubs with the Ace, King, Queen, and Jack counting for ten and the rest of the cards, 2 through 10, being counted at their face value.
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