I am a joker collector yet I have at least two dozen tarot decks in my collection. Here's a few of them.
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| Tarot decks (some) in my collection. And Oracle decks. |
Rather than speculate on why these decks have compelled me to buy them, I will focus on a joker collector's perspective of tarot decks. And my thoughts on how the joker came to be.
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| More of my Tarot and Divination Decks |
As an American, I think of tarot decks primarily for divination and fortune telling. If I lived in Europe, I would know that the tarot deck is for a popular game called tarot. In France for instance, tarot is the second most popular card game (per wikipedia). Games with tarot decks are popular through-out Europe except for the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula (again, per wikipedia).
I recently started improving my understanding of the tarot deck aided by Taschen's 500 page tome.
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| Tarot by Taschen |
When did tarot cards become associated with divination? In 1781, a Count de Gébelin published an essay associating tarot cards with ancient wisdom. As it turns out, this was totally invented (ie not historically true!) but these theories took on a life of their own and since then, particularly in the United States, tarot cards have been used for divination.
An ongoing question about tarot decks is about the relationship between the Tarot Fool card and the joker card in normal decks.
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| The Fool Card from some of my tarot decks |
On the web and in conversation, one often hears that the joker evolved from the fool in tarot decks. This is not true. But it is often repeated and believed. After all, look at the tarot Fool card below, doesn't it look like a jester that we might see on jokers? It seems easy to believe that the Fool card, which existed for 500 years prior to the invention of the joker, directly led to the addition of the joker to the 52 card deck. But again, it is not true. Or at least, it is a lot more complicated than that.
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| The Fool from The Gilded Tarot by Ciro Marchetti |
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| The Dog House Imperial Bower - 1863 |
There were a number of Best Bower cards published in the same period. Here's mine:
The first card published labelled as a joker is probably this one, published in 1871.
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| NY16 'The Joker' 1871 (not 1860 as listed in Hochman) |
The Heathen Chinese Card. NY16 1871. It appears that the NY16 deck could be the first time a card was labelled The Joker. The card featured an illustration of a card game amongst a number of cheats, one of whom was Chinese. It was story told in a poem published in 1870 by Bret Harte. There's more background about this poem and image in this article. While Hochman says the card is copyright 1860 by the New York Consolidated Card Company (NY16 JNO J Levy), everyone now seems to agree that this date is wrong and the most likely date for this card is 1871, the year after the poem was published. This later date still leaves this card as the first one to use the word joker.
More Background on the first use of the word Joker for playing cards...
Phil Neil's Article. (published Feb 2019, updated in 2022) is a well-researched article which both debunks the euchre-to-juker-to-joker story and provides additional information on the use of the word joker around playing cards in that era. Phil emphasizes that there is no evidence supporting the concept of the joker having an intermediate period Best Bower phase when it was known as the juker card.
Phil Neil insists that it became clear that the blank card being used as a wild card or best bower could be best integrated in the deck as a court member - the court jester or joker - who belongs in the court with the kings, queens, and jacks. He also argues that the concept of the Fool card as a wild trump card in the tarot decks and games was known in the US at that time because the game of tarot was being played. This was when tarot was known as a game and a deck with 54 cards, not as a fortune telling deck with 78. Also, "Another source on cards was the book Facts and Speculation on the Origin of Playing Cards(17), 1848, by William Andrew Chatto".
Phil says that an early form of poker - Brag - was popular in the mid 1800s and used the J♣ (jack of clubs) as the wild card. Euchre also used the jacks as bower card and so it was natural to see both of them as similar wild cards. Phil also documents that the Yankee Notion publishing house introduced cards in the 1850s which were popular for several decades. These cards were not the common deck and were introduced since regular decks were often associated with gambling and were often not considered appropriate for wholesome family entertainment. In the games and cards that the Notion introduced, there were cards called the jokers.
In 1852, Thomas W. Strong published a popular humor magazine entitled “Yankee Notions.” Then in 1856, he designed new playing cards totally different from the classic cards for a series of 16 new games which he named Yankee Notions. His purpose of designing these new games was to give card players some alternatives instead of using traditional cards which were associated with gambling vices. Strong’s Yankee Notions were first published in Hoyle’s Games(12), in 1857, edited by Thomas Frere, and were also in several other later editions as well. When his new games were published, the newspaper, New York Commercial Advertiser, stated, “We are glad to see something in the way of domestic games, and social amusement, that we can recommend, not only for scientific and instructive character, but for its good moral influence(11).” These games were popular for at least thirty years (1857 - 1887) for those not wanting to use classic cards and games.
Strong devised three elements different from classic cards: reduced the deck to 50 cards, initiated five suits, and added all new names. One of the Yankee Notions games of major importance as related to the development of the joker was called “Black Joke.” In this game, all ten face cards were called Jokers and were printed with various humorous characters.
Source: https://hobbylark.com/card-games/The-History-of-the-Joker-Card
So this nuanced view, somewhat confusing, is that the Best Bower for Euchre established a role for a wild card to be added to the 52 card deck and that the use of the term joker or jester, which was known within the card publishing industry was coopted so the bower phase was replaced by having a jester who seemed to fit so well with the royal court of jack, queen, and king.
The first publication of the word “Joker” in a book associated with the game of euchre appears in The Modern Pocket Hoyle 4th ed. in 1868, by “Trumps”(16). The Modern Pocket Hoyle lists a variant game called Railroad Euchre. Quoting from this Hoyle, “A Euchre pack is usually accompanied by a specimen blank card which has given rise to this amusing variety of the game of Euchre. It is called “the Joker,” highest trump card, and ranks above the right bower.”
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