Before any kind of poker could take place, the cards had to be invented. This happened in China in the 10^th century, but it is possible that similar game tools existed prior to that. The cards were made out of thin paper at that time. It is said that Emperor Mutsung played cards with his wives on New Years Eve the year 969. Around 1370 the card playing reached Europe, but it took until the 18^th century until card playing became common in Europe. The name comes from the latin word charta that means “piece of paper”. Previously it was very important that the card that had the highest value was the King. But since the One, also called the Ace, in many games could be both the highest and the lowest card it was eventually the Ace that became the card with the highest value, depending how it was played of course.

This was co-related to the French Revolution that took place in the 18^th century, when people wanted to make a point out of the fact that someone that appeared to be at the bottom of the hierarchy climbed to reach a place above the monarchy. For an amount of time, the Jack, Queen and King was portrayed as symbols in the fight for freedom. (Like Equality, Freedom, etc.) The Joker is an American addition, and is only used in a few card games. Even if the face of the Joker looks a bit dodgy, it has no connection to the meaning of the card. The joker isn’t included in the 52 cards.

The kind of deck that is used the most today is the French-English one, with 52 cards made out of plastic. These are divided into equal amounts of cloves, hearts, clubs and diamonds and comes descending from 1 (Ace) to 10, followed by Jack, Queen and King. How the cards are coloured and portrayed varies a lot. It is possible to find everything from strict black and white to pornographic. The most common deck of cards is coloured in black and red. Companies often put their logo on the back of the cards, otherwise the brand of the card company can be placed there, if there isn’t a pattern. What is important is that the cards look identical on that side.

There are also Spanish decks of cards, Italian decks of cards and so on. In game such as Falling a particular kind of cards are being used. But cards are almost always made to fit a grown persons hands.

Cards are of course not only used when one wants to play poker and different kind of games, but also when you do tarot, for example. Magicians uses cards in their repertoires and finally cards can come in handy if you get the urge to do a patience or build a card house.