Early 19th Century English Playing Cards (small format)
complete 32/32 piquet
Published by Hunt & Sons, London, England, c.1830
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Deck: Hunt & Sons English playing cards.
Standard pattern HB5, complete Piquet deck of 32 stencil-coloured woodblock smaller playing cards (French suits), single-figure courts and Old Frizzle ace of spades in reduced size, with wide borders, and faint Superfine stamp on ace of clubs.
Several traditional features have been changed in this unusual piquet pack: the jack of hearts and king of diamonds both have a hand shown lower than usual and holding a slanted weapon, the jack of diamonds is missing his left hand (usually holding his sword), the queen of hearts holds a tulip, and the jacks are all clean-shaven. Apparently, this Hunt & Sons type A7a small Old Frizzle ace of spades is the only one of its type recorded.
Provenance: Collection of Dudley Ollis.
Card Dimensions: 8.4 cm X 5.6 cm
Deck Identifiers:
· Style: English Standing Courts
·Courts: standing
·Pips: one-way pips
·Suits: English suit markers
·Indices: no indices
·Paper: pasteboard
·Corner: square
·Reverses: dotted blue wiggly lines
CONDITION: very good condition, some light spotting (mainly to pip cards), ace of clubs spotted, versos, each card 84 x 56 mm. (see photographs)
