The Penguin Book of Card Games: Everything You Need to Know to Play Over 250 Games (107 page)

trick-winner may declare a final meld. Strict rules of trick-play then

apply: fol ow suit and head the trick if possible, otherwise trump if

possible. Winning the last trick counts 5 as usual. Game is 1500

points.

Grevjass (Grivjass)

4 players (2 × 2), 32 cards

This variety of Jass is played in the Faeroe Islands, though it is less

popular than Sjavs. The fol owing account derives from researches

conducted by Dr Anthony Smith.

Preliminaries Four players sit ing crosswise in partnerships use a

32-card pack ranking and counting as fol ows:

†J †9 A K Q (J) T (9) 8 7

20 14 11 3 2 1 10 0 0 0

The trick-points total 146, consisting of 60 in trumps, 27x3 in

plain suits, and 5 for winning the eighth trick (if play gets that far).

The trump Jack is cal ed Jass, the trump Nine Mariet a.

Object To be the first side to correctly claim to have reached 100

points for tricks and melds, which may take one or two deals.

Scores are translated into chalk-strokes, equivalent to game-points.

Deal The player drawing the lowest card deals first, but subsequent

deals are made by the winner of the last trick in the previous deal.

There are two ways of dealing, depending on whether the player at

dealer’s right cuts the pack or merely thumps it with his fist. If he

cuts, he shows the bot om card of the top half to determine trumps

before the dealer completes the cut. Dealer then deals eight cards

each in batches of 3-2-3. If he thumps, the bot om card is shown for

trump and the pack is dealt out in batches of eight. Either way,

dealer gets the trump-determining card.

Melds Each in turn, starting with Forehand, may declare any of the

fol owing melds:

Sequence of three 20 points, of four 50 points, of more 2 strokes.

Four Jacks 1 stroke, Queens 2, Kings 3, Aces 4 strokes.

Sequence order is AKQJT987 in al four suits including trumps. A

sequence of five or more, or four of a kind, being worth at least 100

trick-points, wins the stated number of strokes without further play

– unless, however, a member of that partnership bids vol (to win

al eight tricks: a slam), in which case play proceeds for a score of 4

strokes if successful. Melds are scored only by the partnership of the

player declaring the best meld. For this purpose the best is that

scoring most, or (if equal) that containing the most cards, or that

containing the highest-ranking cards.

Play If no one scores 100 for melds, Forehand leads to the first

trick. To the lead of a trump you must fol ow suit if you can, unless

the only trump you have is the Jass, in which case you may renege.

To a plain-suit lead you may either fol ow suit or play a trump, as

you please; and if unable to fol ow suit you may either trump or

discard.

Stikk (marriage) A player holding the King and Queen of trumps –

a stikk – scores 20 upon playing the second of them to a trick. (One

account says this applies only if the declarer wins that trick, but this

is unprecedented. More likely it is annul ed if the declarer, or his

partnership, fails to win a single trick.)

Score The side first correctly claiming to have reached 100 in play

wins a single stroke, or a double if the other side has less than 51

(when they are said to be in jan). Winning al eight tricks scores 4

strokes. If neither side reaches 100, the points for tricks and melds

are carried forward and the winner of the last trick deals next. Play

up to any agreed number of strokes.

Comment As in al Jass games, the top Jack is a most powerful

card. If it fails to capture a high counter, or remains in the hand of

an opponent when the other side has reached 100, the Jass is said

to have ‘gone in his socks’.

Don’t forget…

Play to the left (clockwise) unless otherwise stated.

Eldest or Forehand means the player to the left of the dealer

in left-handed games, to the right in right-handed games.

T = Ten, p = players, pp = in fixed partnerships, c = cards,

† = trump,

= Joker.

12 Karnöffel family

Karnof el is the oldest known card game. Its rules were thought to

be lost beyond recovery until the late twentieth century, when

researchers discovered a game that almost exactly fit ed its

description being played in one ortwo remote val eys of

Switzerland underthe name Kaiserspiel, or Kaiserjass. (Not an ideal

title, as Kaiser also applies to other, unrelated games.) Since then,

further exploration has opened up a whole family of related games

stil played throughout northern Europe.

So now we can introduce and explore a fascinating group of

trick-taking games distinguished by several peculiar habits. One

isthat players need not fol ow suit but are free to play any card they

like. Another is that, instead of a trump suit in the usual sense of

the word, certain individual cards have special names and act as

quasi-trumps, or enjoy particular powers of their own. Some,

especial y Sevens, always win the trick, but only when led; some

win onlywhen played from other positions and are powerless when

led; some only beat other specific cards; and some are total y

powerless, serving only to pad the hand out so that no one can tel

how many power cards the other players hold. Another amusing

feature (though not unique to this family) is the practice, in

partnership varieties, of signal ing the holding of certain high cards

to one’s partner by means of codified nods, winks and grimaces,

ideal y made when the other side is not looking. This does not

constitute ‘organized cheating’, as some believe: it is merely a

system of conventions, like opening ‘Two clubs’ at Bridge to denote

a hand worth 23 points.

Because Karnof el itself is first mentioned some 10 years before

the invention of real trumps (in Tarot games), it may be that some

the invention of real trumps (in Tarot games), it may be that some

of these features go right backto games played when cards first

reached Europe, around 1360, and that the invention of a trump

suit may have been inspired by the concept of individual cards with

special powers.

Karnöffel (Kaiserspiel, Kaiserjass)

4 players (2 χ 2), 40 cards

The oldest identifiable card game is first mentioned in Bavaria in

1426 under the name Karnof el, which rhymes more or less with

‘kerfuf le’ (appropriately), means a hernia (literal y), and was then

a rude word for a cardinal (scandalously). A low-class game of

soldiers and peasants, it is early recorded because regularly banned

by legal and ecclesiastical authorities, who vehemently objected to

its satirical promotion of an anarchic world order. Certain cards

were given names, such as the Pope, the Devil, and the Kaiser, and

those one would normal y expect to be highest were beaten by

Twos and Fours and bolshie-looking Jacks.

The Swiss game now cal ed Kaiserspiel seems closer to its

original than any other member of the family, and the fol owing is

based on current practice at several localities in Nidwalden, south

of Lake Lucerne. It has long been played with Swiss-suited cards in

default of the medieval pack, which partly explains why the game

was not recognized earlier. Although 36-card Swiss-suited packs are

readily obtainable from specialist suppliers, the 48-card version

required for Kaiserspiel maybe harder to find. In case this inhibits

you from sampling its peculiar delights, several other games of the

same family fol ow which are (or were) played with French-suited

cards.