African art playing cards
African art and symbolism on playing cards designed by John J. Beckvermit III, USA, 1994.
Published by U.S. Games Systems in 1994, this pack is a well-researched source of information on African art symbolism designed by John J. Beckvermit III. Accompanying the 54 cards is a 32-page booklet which explains the background to the pack’s creation and a detailed description of every card. For example, each of the court cards represent an individual African, or matriarchal figures, priests, African gods or symbols. The jokers represent a sorcerer or medicine man. The pip cards have different background illustrations: masks (hearts) representing the religious side of African life; crocodiles (diamonds) the symbol of the gold used by African merchants; leopard heads (spades) representing the elite African warrior; geometric shapes and triangles (clubs) representing the working class of Black African people. See the box►
Above: African Art playing cards designed by John J. Beckvermit III and published by U.S. Games Systems in 1994.
By Peter Burnett
United Kingdom • Member since July 27, 2022 • Contact
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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