Illustrated Playing Cards

Above: Two illustrated cards from c. 1679 depicting episodes from the Spanish Armada of 1588. WCMPC Collection.

Illustrated (or ‘Pictorial’) playing-cards are a highly collectable type but these days fairly rarely seen. They reached the height of popularity from around 1680 until the 1750s or so. Relative to standard cards it seems that they are better survivors – not surprisingly perhaps, since they would rarely have been worn out through play and they may well have been bought as something to keep in the first place.

In ‘illustrated’ or ‘pictorial’ packs, the standard card faces are replaced with drawings and text. A common format is for the cards to be used like a storyboard with illustrations and text telling the reader all about a specific historical event. Well known examples cover topics like The Spanish Armada, The Popish Plot, The South Sea Bubble and similar.

The Worshipful Company of Makers of Playing Cards, in the City of London, UK, has a good many fine examples in its collection and I have used these in all the illustrations here.

For those interested in finance, several early packs tell the story of the famous ‘East India’ trading company, the early days of stock trading in London and the ‘South Sea Bubble’. This was one of the earlier known and most extreme of the many financial ‘bubbles’ – market conditions in which prices rise and rise as the bandwagon gains momentum.

The court cards from the Hodges set are quite something too. In keeping with the maps and the geographical theme, they illustrate people from different nations around the world. Two of the Queens are shown above (and note also the unconventional suit signs (gold diamonds, green clover for clubs).

Above: illustrated card after John Kirk, “Cries and Humours of London”, 1750s.

Many of the sets capture contemporary life and offer us a glimpse of times past.

Some of these cards are particularly appealing, and my own favourite among these is a pack that leaves behind the weighty events of the day and looks at the people on London’s streets – the sellers of bread, fruit, flowers and fish, the polishers of shoes and so on. In the illustration below , the oarsman is offering transport to Vauxhall Gardens, a grand evening venue at the time, and the seller of the Evening Post has a job that we are still familiar with today.