Indo-French Ganjifa Playing Cards

Published April 01, 2014 • Updated August 11, 2026

Handmade Ganjifa-style playing cards from India, combining Indian imagery with French suits and Indian court figures.

The cards shown are an Indo-French form of Ganjifa: a distinct Ganjifa pattern that combines French suits with Indian imagery and court figures.

Ganjifa is not a single uniform design. Different deck patterns and regional art traditions produce distinct interpretations, with individual workshops giving familiar patterns their own artistic treatment.

The makers, who are generally family concerns, also produce handmade versions of the Anglo-French-suited pack that is more familiar to us, but often with Indian characters for court cards (see example below). These can be very attractive and, usually, all the packs of cards made both Indian and others are supplied in a beautifully decorated wooden box.

Above: Indo-French Ganjifa playing cards from India, combining Indian imagery with French suits.

This group of hand-painted cards shows the Indo-French character of the pack: French-style suits and indices appear alongside Indian imagery and court figures. The pack also includes jokers and floral card backs.

REFERENCES

1) Leyden, Rudolf van: Ganjifa, the playing cards of India, exhibition catalogue, V&A Museum, London, 1982. Van Leyden believes that Chinese money cards were in India before 1300. Fragments found in Egypt were dated at around 1300. It is known that there were Chinese living in Iran and printing paper money for them.

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By Rex Pitts (1940-2021)

United Kingdom • Member since January 30, 2009

Rex's main interest was in card games, because, he said, they were cheap and easy to get hold of in his early days of collecting. He is well known for his extensive knowledge of Pepys games and his book is on the bookshelves of many. His other interest was non-standard playing cards. He also had collections of sheet music, music CDs, models of London buses, London Transport timetables and maps and other objects that intrigued him.

Rex had a chequered career at school. He was expelled twice, on one occasion for smoking! Despite this he trained as a radio engineer and worked for the BBC in the World Service. Later he moved into sales and worked for a firm that made all kinds of packaging, a job he enjoyed until his retirement. He became an expert on boxes and would always investigate those that held his cards. He could always recognize a box made for Pepys, which were the same as those of Alf Cooke’s Universal Playing Card Company, who printed the card games. This interest changed into an ability to make and mend boxes, which he did with great dexterity. He loved this kind of handicraft work.

His dexterity of hand and eye soon led to his making card games of his own design. He spent hours and hours carefully cutting them out and colouring them by hand.