Read The Penguin Book of Card Games: Everything You Need to Know to Play Over 250 Games Online
Authors: David Parlett
Winning six straight of is a lurch (jan) and earns two strokes. It is
possible for the outcome to be a no-score draw.
Rank of cards The pack consists of ‘live’ cards, which may be
played to tricks, and ‘duds’, which may not (in Swedish respectively
spelbara and odugliga korte). The top three live cards are cal ed
matadors (makdo-rar) and have individual names. Live cards rank
from high to low as fol ows. Those equal in face value beat one
another in the suit order shown (clubs highest):
- - - Jack Spit
-
- - Eight Dull
- -
- King Brus
Nines
Aces
-
Jacks
Sixes
The Sevens are winners, as explained below. Al others – Tens,
Queens, and unlisted Eights and Kings – are duds.
Play Eldest starts by laying, face up on the table, any Sevens he may
hold. Each of these counts by itself as a won trick. He then leads a
live card to the first trick. Each in turn thereafter must, if possible,
play a higher live card than any so far played, otherwise pass.
Whoever plays highest wins the trick, turns it face down, and leads
to the next. Before leading, he may similarly lay out Sevens,
counting each as a won trick. If a player on lead has no live card,
the turn passes to the left until somebody has one, which must then
be led.
Score Play ceases when one side has won six tricks, including any
declared Sevens. That side scores 1 stroke, or 2 for the lurch. If
neither has won six tricks when no live cards remain to be led, a
side with five tricks scores 1 stroke if one of its members holds K.
Game is six strokes.
Comment The ef ect of dud cards is to distribute playing hands of
unequal length, while camouflaging the number of live cards in
each player’s hand. Duds might as wel be discarded before play
begins, but this would spoil the fun. Certain cards other than
matadors also have individual names, of varying degrees of
formality and propriety. The 9 is commonly cal ed plågu, literal y
‘torment’, because it may force the play of a matador when its
holder would have preferred to hold it back til later. The A is
cal ed grodbal en, ‘frog’s scrotum’, which makes no apparent sense
at al .
Stýrivolt
4 players (2 × 2), 48 of 52 cards
The national card game of the Faeroe Islands has been played there
for over 200 years and probably originated in Denmark 100 years
before that. It is now severely in decline, but fortunately has been
wel documented. The fol owing is based on John McLeod’s
website description, which benefits from comments by Jogvan
Basrentsen, and on Anthony Smith’s translation of an article by
Basrentsen. Dr Smith also had the benefit of playing the game at
Torshavn in 1996.
Terminology The Faeroese word stikkar I render by the related
English word cognate ‘sticker’, in the archaic sense ‘slaughterer’.
Karnifl obviously derives from Karnöf el. The Nines of the chosen
suit are each cal ed ryssa, meaning ‘mare’; in fact, the 9 is cal ed
Hoygardsryssa, ‘hay-yard mare’. The so-cal ed ‘postmen’ (postar,
pavstar) represent a corruption of, or pun on, the word for ‘pope’.
Picturesque as these and other terms are, I employ them sparingly,
as the game has quite enough other complications to be get ing on
with.