Playing cards from Finland

Above: fantasy double-ended cards printed by Weilin & Göös, Helsinki, late 19th/early 20th-century. Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Above: non-standard Lyxspelkort playing cards for Finland, c.1930s, chromolithography by F. Tilgmann.

Above: Turun Linna Playing Cards, made in Finland, c.1960. The court cards feature people from Finnish history. Later editions were made by Piatnik for Finland. The cards are barrel-shaped, 52 cards + 2 jokers. The backs show Turku castle, one of the largest surviving medieval buildings in Finland.

Above: deck depicting Napoleonic characters on the court cards. Reverse: blue/white advert for Vesipuisto Lahnajärvi. 52 barrel-shaped + 2 jokers + blank card.

Above: Finnair souvenir playing cards made by Tactic.

Above: Finnair playing cards by Piatnik.

Above: Finnair playing cards by Tactic.

Playing cards arrived in Finland during the centuries when the country formed part of the Kingdom of Sweden, and early Finnish packs naturally followed Swedish traditions. After Finland became an autonomous Grand Duchy within the Russian Empire in 1809, Swedish remained an official administrative language alongside the growing use of Finnish. Consequently, many Finnish playing cards and their wrappers are bilingual, reflecting the country's dual linguistic heritage rather than foreign manufacture. Finland declared independence in 1917, but the influence of earlier Swedish and Russian administrations continued to be reflected in official terminology and taxation.

During the nineteenth century, Finnish players had access to both imported and locally produced cards. Packs arrived from Sweden, Germany and Russia, while Finnish printers gradually established their own production. Despite Finland's political union with Russia, Finnish playing cards generally followed Swedish and Central European rather than Russian artistic traditions.

Above: Pergament Spelkort wrapper by F. Tilgmann, Helsinki in Art Nouveau (Jugendstil) style. The image of a stylish modern woman reflects commercial graphic design around 1900–1915. The wrapper also reflects Finland's bilingual commercial culture at the time, when Swedish remained the dominant language of many established businesses despite the country's growing Finnish national identity. Bibliothèque nationale de France.

A pricelist by G. O. Wasenius of Helsinki from the 1850s includes ‘fine, engraved’ playing cards and ‘seconds’ for half the price, indicating that playing cards were already an established commercial product in mid-nineteenth-century Finland, almost certainly imported as well as available from local suppliers.

Finnish packs generally employ the international French-suited pattern. The most common court indices are the numerals 13, 12 and 11 for King, Queen and Jack respectively, although some packs use the initials K, R and D (Kuningas, Rouva, Poika/Dam depending on language), or K, D and S, reflecting Finnish and Swedish linguistic conventions.

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.

See also: Vegas Nite Roulette

Above: “Big Face” playing cards by Tactic, Finland, 2015. The box text is all in English, as are the indices on the court cards (K,Q,J) and Aces (A). Images courtesy Matt Probert.

Above: Finland souvenir playing cards by Tactic.