Playing Cards are believed to have originated in China and then spread to India and Persia. From Persia they are believed to have spread to Egypt during the era of the Mamluk Sultinate, and from there into Europe through both the Italian and Iberian peninsulas in the second half of the 14th century.
The game of playing cards was in vogue in West European countries by around 1375…
The history of playing cards in Western civilisation commences around 1370-1380. Out of an apparent void, a cluster of references in early literature (inventories of possessions, edicts, city chronicles and account books) emerges pointing to the sudden arrival of playing cards, principally in Belgium, Germany, Spain and Italy and very soon afterwards we hear of them being banned or controlled by the authorities.
As well as the literary evidence, we can also look at contemporary illustrations of card playing. Dice and certain board games were already long-established; playing cards were a new addition to the repertoire of gaming pastimes. Unlike their Islamic predecessors, in which depictions of the human image were forbibben for religious reasons, Western playing cards carried images of real people on the court cards. The emotional response to the these colourful images, the suit symbols, players’ perceptions of the imagery of the pack, patterns of logic, thought and other areas of behaviour all contributed to the rapid rise of a new and inter-related economy of playing card manufacture and consumption, employment opportunites, forms of entertainment, political and legal reactions etc as playing cards were assimilated into Western culture.
They also were a contributing factor to anti-social behaviour on account of the dishonesty or cheating which occurred in the less-reputable gaming houses. This led inevitably to bans and prohibitions as preachers demonised the game and the authorities devised ways to regulate the new craze. At the same time, we learn that upper classes and nobility enjoyed courtly games and also spent sums of money at gambling with impunity.
Werever in Western Europe man turned his eyes, he was confronted by the majesty of the church. Everything he did was approved or disapproved, blessed or cursed, interpreted and solemnised by the Church. He was baptised by it, married by it and buried by it. He called on angels, saints and martyrs for help, visited shrines and holy wells, made oaths on sacred relics. The Church dominated men’s minds and imagination.
Generally-speaking, all the different religions prohibited what they saw as sinful games, idolatory, alcohol, etc but people got around it privately. For example the situation in Muslim Spain seems to have been the same as in Far Eastern countries, in that gambling games were officially forbidden but were enjoyed in private, and so weren’t documented in history because the scribes were devout observers of the religious injunctions.
When playing cards arrived in Europe in the late 14th century, the Church took a strict, prejudicial view on what it saw as lewd, frivolous, fickle or dishonest behaviour. Members of the clergy would certainly not approve of card playing if it had anything to do with gambling or fortune telling. Moralising tracts were published expressing disapproval of gambling as a mortal sin which might offend God and destroy lives, sometimes reaching the invective of fundamentalism.
The early engravers and print makers made devotional images for pilgrims as a cheaper alternative to paintings or books. Many of these craftsmen also turned their hand to manufacturing playing cards to earn extra income. Stock images from the repertoire of devotional imagery might be adapted to serve as playing card symbols. However, playing cards have not always been amicable bedfellows with the church.