Thursday, July 18, 2019

Jokers with Swords

My jokers with swords section starts with  two jokers where the four suits are designed into the picture. The shield of this ferocious green fighter shows that he fights for the hearts, spades, clubs, and diamonds, regardless of their color.  Note his manly mustache and yellow curls!




On this joker, the suits have been collected onto his sword.



Here's a video that I just made that walks you through my 85 jokers with swords. Oh, this group has been expanded to become jokers who fight so while many have swords, others are wrestlers, some have other medieval weapons, and some have old or modern firearms.



 

The long weapon in this Jolly Joker's hand is a medieval pole axe used to stab, slash, and pull horseman down from their horses.  Thanks to Ronald Kruijmel of the "Joker Collectors Group" on Facebook for pointing me towards the term halbards

This fighter to my eye looks to be outfitted more for a parade than battle, is holding a halbard in one hand and has a sheathed sword attached to his belt. 

Halbard-Holding Jolly Joker
Halbard-Holding Jolly Joker

A halbard is also called a halberd, halbert or Swiss voulge). It's a two-handed pole weapon popular in the 14th and 15th centuries. The halberd consists of an axe blade topped with a spike mounted on a long shaft. It always has a hook or thorn on the back side of the axe blade for grappling mounted combatants.  And here is another!


World Joker Soldier with a halbard






I recently added a Diana with a bow and arrow to the fighter section. She is from a set of Congress decks that I bought in 2023 which includes an 1899 Congress Diana deck of cards.


Now for the ensemble shots of these fighting jokers. Tough-looking, eh?



Here's a section with more modern fighters.

Bicycle Monster Playing Card Jokers
Bicycle Monster Playing Card Jokers
Bicycle Monster Playing Card Jokers

These next two jokers are in this fighter's section although they've clearly brought guns to a knife fight.   Anyone know anything about them?


Here's the back.
Now for more swordsmen...




The joker in the middle of this next page is inspired by the bronze sculpture of Arlequin (Harlequin) by Charles Rene de Saint-Marceaux (French, 1845 - 1915).  Here's the statue, thanks Jane Lane of the FB Joker Collectors Club, for this info and photo.

May be an image of sculpture and monument



This last page has 9 more variations (there's two in previous pages) of this soldier with has banner and sheathed sword.


What jokers to look at next?
Maybe jokers with swords is a type of sports joker?
Or related to standing jokers?
Or jokers of history? (OOPS, just realized that I'm years later posting about how I've split the Real People jokers inter entertainment, statues, history, and others. Stay tuned for this too!!!)


1 comment:

Thanks for your input and for reading and thinking about jokers.