España Imperial
España imperial / Imperial Spain playing cards with artwork by Serny, published by Heraclio Fournier, Spain, 1983.
Published by Heraclio Fournier in 1983, these playing cards are dedicated to the first century of Imperial Spain which began with the marriage in 1469 of Queen Isabella of Castile and King Ferdinand of Aragon. This “Union of the Crowns” was the birth of Imperial Spain. The court cards show drawings by Serny (Ricardo Summers, 1908-1995) of the monarchs and other principal figures of four dynasties:
Spades
Hearts
Clubs
Diamonds
By Peter Burnett
Member since July 27, 2022
I graduated in Russian and East European Studies from Birmingham University in 1969. It was as an undergraduate in Moscow in 1968 that I stumbled upon my first 3 packs of “unusual” playing cards which fired my curiosity and thence my life-long interest. I began researching and collecting cards in the early 1970s, since when I’ve acquired over 3,330 packs of non-standard cards, mainly from North America, UK and Western Europe, and of course from Russia and the former communist countries.
Following my retirement from the Bodleian Library in Dec. 2007 I took up a new role as Head of Library Development at the International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications (INASP) to support library development in low-income countries. This work necessitated regular training visits to many sub-Saharan African countries and also further afield, to Vietnam, Nepal and Bangladesh – all of which provided rich opportunities to further expand my playing card collection.
Since 2019 I’ve been working part-time in the Bodleian Library where I’ve been cataloguing the bequest of the late Donald Welsh, founder of the English Playing Card Society.
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