Playing cards from Finland
Playing cards from Finland. Finnish cards have a relatively short history, presumably because the country only finally broke loose from Russian influence in 1920.
Finnish cards have a relatively short history, presumably because the country only finally broke loose from Russian influence in 1920. The Finns differ from the rest of the Scandinavians in ethnic background and language, but Finland belonged to Sweden for several hundred years, and since a reconciliation with Sweden was made, many decks are bi-lingual.
A pricelist by G. O. Wasenius of Helsinki from the 1850s includes ‘fine, engraved’ playing cards and ‘seconds’ for half the price.
The most common form of indices is 13, 12, 11, 10, 9... etc. but in some cases the indices are: K, R and D or K, D and S.
Traditional Happy Families card games like Pekka-Peli have been played by Finnish children for decades. A new culturally aware version of this traditional card game, called Reshuffle, has recently been created by Reetta Hiltunen.
There are various Finland Souvenir packs, as well as several special packs published by Finnair, Image style magazine, Vesipuisto, etc.
See also: Vegas Nite Roulette
By Simon Wintle
Member since February 01, 1996
Founder and editor of the World of Playing Cards since 1996. He is a former committee member of the IPCS and was graphics editor of The Playing-Card journal for many years. He has lived at various times in Chile, England and Wales and is currently living in Extremadura, Spain. Simon's first limited edition pack of playing cards was a replica of a seventeenth century traditional English pack, which he produced from woodblocks and stencils.
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