In Portugal, while we use the French/English cards, we still called them by the old names (Spanish/Italian).
We call clovers paus (sticks, clubs), pikes are called espadas (swords), diamonds is ouros (gold, coins) and hearts are called copas (cups).
I always found weird how the names had nothing to do with the symbols themselves. Now I understand.
Huh, now that you mention it, almost the same for Greece except for diamonds being more like “checkered” and for swords-sticks being the other way around for some reason. Also always thought it was weird!
I heard about this, and I was excited to pick up a different style when I went to Germany. I got there, and all of the cards used the standard, international suits. No one knew what I was talking about.
You should have asked for bavarian cards/ bayrische Karten and they would have probably known. They are not widely used in the north though.
The German suite is most common in east Germany. west Germans use the french deck, or if they’re playing German card games they use the tournament German deck (which is just the french deck with different colours)
Geographical east, not political East though, Bavaria very heavily uses the German deck. You don’t play Bavarian Schafkopf with a french deck. That’s just weird. I personally also find it weird to play mau mau or Schnautz (Schwimmen) with a French Deck. Doesn’t mean though, that we don’t use the French deck. You don’t play poker or rummy or cribbage for example with German cards. That’s equally as weird.
Huh? The German deck is also known as bavarian cards and they are very common in most of the German South. I’m from swabia and here you use different cards for different games.
Can you even play Schafskopf with the French deck??
Actually in France we have both design!
The second one is rarer but you can see it on the “Tarot de Marseille”
It’s a different set of cards, in this form there called “lames” (blades) or “arcanes” (arcana)
The set is divided in 4 colors also called family: “épée” (sword), “coupe” (cup, but think of it as the same type of cup as the saint grail), “bâton” (club) and “denier” (it’s an old coin)
This compose the 52 “arcanes mineurs”
In addition there also 22 “arcanes majeurs” called “atouts”
And it is usually recognize because it’s the base of the Tarot use for divination
But now it’s generally used to play the eponymous game of “Tarot”, a very good and very old game that me and my friend played a lot at uni
And with “both” from what it looks like you mean the french and italian styles.
Yes but also not only, we have MANY more design of tarot card, especially when considering “atouts/arcanes majeurs” as here a deck of tarot is an object of play but also an object of collection
Here an example
