German Tarok , sometimes known as Sansprendre or simply Tarok , is an historical ace–ten card game for three players that emerged in the 18th century and is the progenitor of a family of games still played today in Europe and North America. It became very popular in Bavaria and Swabia during the 19th century before being largely superseded by Schafkopf , but has survived in the local forms of Bavarian Tarock and Tapp . During the mid-19th century, it became the most popular card game among Munich 's middle classes and was also played in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by notable Bavarian author Ludwig Thoma , frequently appearing in his novels and journal articles. It was superseded after the First World War by other forms such as Bavarian Tarock .
113-519: German Tarok originated in an attempt to play the Tarot game of Grosstarock with a standard 36-card German-suited pack instead of Tarot cards , but later evolved into a much more interesting game featuring bidding and a suit of preference . The family of games descended from German Tarok includes Austrian Bauerntarock , Mexican rana and the American games of frog and six-bid solo . The name of
226-553: A Herzsolo . In each case, the card points in the scat belong to the declarer. A Frage may only be played in Hearts; to bid this a player may either say " Frage " or "I'll play" ( ich spiele ). A second bidder may overcall this with "I'll play better" ( ich spiele besser ), "I'll play too" ( ich spiele auch ) or "I'll play more" ( ich spiele mehr ). A third bidder may announce "I'll play even better" ( ich spiele noch besser ) or "I'll play (the) best." ( ich spiele am Besten ). A player who
339-480: A packet of 4 cards each, beginning with forehand to the left, followed by two more packets of 3 and 4 cards each, so that every player has 11 cards. There is a single round of bidding with immediate hold . Players may bid for any of 4 contracts which are shown in ascending order below: Beginning with forehand, players may announce "pass" or make a bid. Once a bid has been announced, subsequent players must accept it by saying "good" or overcall it. If overcalled,
452-432: A Heart Solo was named, in which case it is obvious. Players may agree that a Tout (i.e. slam ) may be announced after the auction has been decided. Play is clockwise and forehand leads. Players must follow suit if able, trump if unable to follow, otherwise they may play any card. The trick is won by the highest trump, unless none are played, in which case the highest card of the led suit wins. The trick winner leads to
565-470: A King or the Pagat . The usual tarot rules or play and card point values applied. The winner was the one with the most points in tricks and was paid an amount by the losers based on the difference in scores. Tarot card games are played with decks having four ordinary suits, and one additional, longer suit of tarots, which are always trumps . They are characterised by the rule that a player who cannot follow to
678-454: A Queen and two low cards scores 4. A triplet of three low cards scores exactly 1 point. In some games, players may end up with one or two cards over. Two remaining low cards are rounded up to score 1 point; a single low card is rounded down to zero. This is the simplest method but it doesn't work if a player does not have enough low cards for every counter. The second method, popular in Vienna,
791-573: A Queen, Cavalier and Ten are worth 3 + 1 ⁄ 3 + 2 + 1 ⁄ 3 + 1 ⁄ 3 = 6 points, producing the same result as the second method. A variant of this method is used for Tarot Nouveau or French tarot, where low cards are each worth half a point, and are combined with a counting card. The fractional values of each of the cards are as follows: Oudlers and Kings - 4 + 1 ⁄ 2 , Queens - 3 + 1 ⁄ 2 , Cavaliers - 2 + 1 ⁄ 2 , Jacks - 1 + 1 ⁄ 2 and low cards - 1 ⁄ 2 each. The same method
904-491: A Rascal , 1904), and Tante Frieda ( Aunt Frieda , 1906), are characterized by authenticity of regional language and life. Thoma's dramas, including Die Medaille ( The Medal , 1901), Das Säuglingsheim ( The Orphanage , 1913), and especially Moral (1908), reflect elements of folk theatre. In 1907 he married 25-year-old Marietta di Rigardo, who was born in the Philippines. The marriage, however, did not last; Marietta
1017-843: A coffin anymore." According to Luis Markowsky from the Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism , Thoma "made the crude socially acceptable through a skilful writing style that connected to Nazi propaganda ". On 6 August, Thoma underwent a stomach operation in Munich. He died of stomach cancer on 26 August 1921 at his home in Tegernsee. He bequeathed most of his considerable fortune as well as his fees and royalties to Maidi von Liebermann. His divorced wife Marion, his sisters Katharina Hübner and Bertha Zurwesten and his brother Peter Thoma each received
1130-705: A contribution by Tucholsky (alias Ignaz Wrobel ) in Die Weltbühne ). In an article on 16 March 1921, Thoma wrote in the Miesbacher Anzeiger under the title "Broadcast to all Berlin government and Jewish Pigs" with reference to the law passed in the Reichstag for the dissolution of self-defence organizations that had formed after the First World War: "It only needs a Galician Jew to want to disarm us - we'll beat him so that he doesn't fit in
1243-459: A few points" from its successor, Sansprendre, it was "quite different from it in execution." It was played with 36 German-suited cards, each player receiving 11, the remaining 3 belonging to the dealer. It is likely that Hearts was a permanent trump suit, replacing the role of the tarocks in Grosstarock. It was an ace–ten game in which the player with the most points won. The first rules for
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#17327760478491356-561: A general term for trick-taking games, Triomphe in French, Trumpfen in German and Trump in English, and persisted as the name for the trumps in tarot packs even when they had been renamed Tarocchi . Other different games claimed the name without any use of Tarocchi cards. The first basic rules for the game of Tarocco appear in the manuscript of Martiano da Tortona, the next are known from
1469-401: A more interesting game played with German-suited cards. This new variant had superseded its original form by the 1830s, taking on its name by the 1850s. Thereafter it was usually called German Tarok or simply Tarok, although the name Sansprendre continued to be used in some regions, especially Franconia . By the mid-19th century German Tarok was the card game of choice for the middle classes in
1582-549: A new environment where people knew nothing about his embarrassing behaviour. In his Erinnerungen , Thoma describes his times as a schoolboy in Munich and Prien verbosely, but he treats his degree studies very briefly: I spent two terms at the Forestry Academy in Aschaffenburg, then I switched to law, studied in Munich and Erlangen, where I passed the exam after the prescribed time had expired. My experiences at
1695-453: A new form of German Tarok, initially called Sansprendre, were published in the same treatise, SSR , together with extensive tactical guidance. The author opens by comparing Sansprendre to the original German Tarok saying "It is not easy to find a game played with German-suited cards which gives as much interest as Sansprendre; a variant of German Tarok, although quite different from it in execution" and that "anyone who has played [Sansprendre]...
1808-481: A period of alternating between boarding school and holidaying in his family's "idyllic home", as he calls it in Lausbubengeschichten ("Tales of a Rascal"). Misdemeanours and conflicts with teachers there are probably based on real experiences: "There is sufficient evidence that Thoma condensed these altercations for his stories, but by no means invented them." In 1877, he moved to the boarding school of
1921-508: A permanent trump suit alongside the usual four card suits . The games and packs which English-speakers call by the French name tarot are called tarocchi in the original Italian, Tarock in German and similar words in other languages. Tarot cards were invented in northern Italy around 1420 for the purpose of playing cards. With their appearance came the first of the two great innovations in trick-taking games since they arrived in Europe:
2034-535: A permanent editor of Simplicissimus . In the years that followed, Thoma was one of the most important authors for Simplicissimus . He appeared as a satirist under several pseudonyms - he usually wrote his poems as "Peter Schlemihl". At the beginning of 1901 he wrote the one-act play Die Medaille , set in Dachau which was premiered at Munich's Residence Theatre . The play was also staged in Berlin; Thoma accompanied
2147-566: A quintet plays Schaffkopf or Quodlibet . By the 1870s, French-suited cards had penetrated into the southwest German states, notably the Kingdom of Württemberg , the variety of German Tarok played with French cards being renamed Tapp , while the game played with the traditional German cards of that region was called as Württemberg Tarock . Both, however, were much the same as the game played in Bavaria. Another name recorded by Anton (1879)
2260-552: A responsible person on site at the editorial office in Munich. Langen considered hiring Thoma as editor-in-chief, his confidant Korfiz Holm had previously spoken out against Thoma: Moreover, in his literary judgment he adopts the viewpoint of a night watchman, declares [...] that everything a woman has written is crap, etc. I'm afraid he's too blunt and outspoken for Simplicissimus But Langen chose Thoma, whose comedy Die Witwen had failed him as well as Munich director Jocza Savits. In September 1899, Thoma sold his law firm and became
2373-577: A shorter treatise published from 1881 to 1910 in several editions and entitled Tarok (Sans prendre), largely follows AAD but mentions two different variations: The family of games descended from German Tarok includes Bavarian Tarock , Swabian Tapp , Mexican Rana and the American games of Frog and Solo, also called Six-Bid, Slough or Sluff, as well as the Austrian game of Bauerntarock . Tarot game Tarot games are card games played with tarot packs designed for card play and which have
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#17327760478492486-440: A single low card is worthless. The third method is a new development and the most precise, but also the most complicated and least used: counting in fractions. Cards are given fractional values as follows: Trull cards and Kings – 4 + 1 ⁄ 3 , Queens – 3 + 1 ⁄ 3 , Cavaliers – 2 + 1 ⁄ 3 , Jacks – 1 + 1 ⁄ 3 and low cards – 1 ⁄ 3 each. In this way individual cards can be counted. So
2599-549: A social morality organisation", a sentence which he had to serve in Stadelheim Gaol near Munich. In 1907, he married dancer Marietta di Rigardo, known as Marion (1880–1966), who was born in the Philippines and was an emancipated young woman for her time. The marriage didn't last long, the temperaments of the two were too different. Marion became bored and became unfaithful. The marriage ended in divorce in 1911, but
2712-567: A sum of 200,000 marks, the latter also a lifelong pension of 2,000 marks a year. Ludwig Thoma was buried in the parish cemetery of the Church of St. Lawrence, Egern, in Rottach-Egern by Lake Tegernsee. Today his grave lies between that of his longtime friend, the writer Ludwig Ganghofer , and that of his lover, Maidi von Liebermann. In his works, Ludwig Thoma tried to expose the prevailing pseudo-morality. He also uncompromisingly denounced
2825-503: A trick with a card of the suit led must play a trump to the trick if possible. Tarot games have introduced the concept of trumps to card games. More recent tarot games borrowed features from other games like bidding from Ombre and winning the last trick with the lowest trump from Trappola . Tarot decks did not precede decks having four suits of the same length, and they were invented not for occult purposes but purely for gaming. In 1781, Court de Gébelin published an essay associating
2938-477: A very remote and lonely area at the time. His upbringing was essentially in the hands of his nanny Viktoria Pröbstl, with whom Ludwig Thoma had a very close relationship. According to Katharina Thomas Willen, Ludwig was to have pursued a career as a priest. As a result, she attached great importance to a good education for her son; private tutors taught him to read and write even before he started school, and he received private Latin lessons early on. Shortly after
3051-408: A year in Munich and stayed until 1885. The family moved to Traunstein in 1883, where his mother leased the inn Zur Post . The trigger for the change of location seems to have been a "shameful act" on the part of Ludwig, which also made it impossible for his sister Marie to accept a suitor. In 1884, after the death of Karl Decrignis, the forest officer Ludwig von Raesfeldt took on the guardianship of
3164-621: Is as in Sansprendre. As in Sansprendre. Four payment schemes are described: In "gentlemen's circles" the tariff was ½, 1 and 2 pf per point for the Frage, Solo and Herzsolo respectively "if one doesn't want to play for high stakes". AAD tells us, without explanation, that if ladies played, these rates are divided by two or four. A Matsch is worth 100 points if silent and 200 if announced. All these rates need to be agreed before play starts. AAD records two optional variations: TSP ,
3277-470: Is believed to be an intermediary form linking the older tarot games to the Central European ones. The individual Tarock game variants differ too widely from one another to give a general description of play. However, they can be grouped by sub-type: The last group is a family of games that emerged as result of the attempt to play Grosstarock with a normal 36-card German-suited pack. Instead of
3390-416: Is often accompanied by the following 'standard' card values: The system by which players work out their scores in almost all Tarot games may appear "eccentric and puzzling", but the rationale to it is that, originally, the cards were each valued at one less point than that shown above (e.g. Kings were worth 4 points and low cards had no point value), but every trick taken scored one point. Dummett argues that
3503-542: Is one of only two major innovations to trick-taking games since they were invented, the other being the idea of bidding . Trump cards, initially called trionfi , first appeared with the advent of tarot cards , in which there is a separate, permanent trump suit comprising a number of picture cards. The first known example of such cards was ordered by the Duke of Milan around 1420 and included 16 trumps with images of Greek and Roman gods. A basic description first appeared in
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3616-405: Is overcalled and wants to hold the higher bid announces "I'll play [it] myself" ( ich spiele selbst ). An announcement to take all tricks is a Matsch ("mudslide"). Players bidding a Solo in a suit other than Hearts must not name trumps until the auction is over. A Frage player who is done with the scat announces "I'm ready" ( es liegt ). Aces may now be laid away in the scat. Otherwise bidding
3729-526: Is played with a pack of 36 German-suited cards . In that part of Swabia outside of Bavaria, these were of the Württemberg pattern . In Bavaria itself, cards of the Bavarian or Franconian pattern would have been used. These are still widely available and marketed as "Schafkopf Tarock" packs (see illustration). These standard German packs have cards ranking from Ace (Bavarian: Sau or "Sow".) to 6. Thus
3842-415: Is that you publicly profess moral principles. That has a favourable effect on the family, on the state." In the same piece, the chairman of this moral society makes the statement: "Mr. Assessor, when a couple in a marriage stop lying, then they separate." Until then, Thomas' attitude had been left-liberal . So he had not held back from often biting criticism of society, church and state. This changed with
3955-499: Is the second most popular card game after Belote . In Austria , Tarock games, especially Königrufen , have become widespread and there are several major national and international tournaments each year. Italy, the home of tarot, remains a stronghold. Games of the tarot family are also played in Hungary, Slovenia, Liechtenstein, Czechia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Denmark, south Germany and south Poland. Tarot games have yet to be common in
4068-398: Is to make as many points as possible from the cards taken in tricks , the cards having different point values. Those cards which have little or no point value are called various names – Skartins , Ladons or cartes basses depending on the region – but may be referred to as low cards . Cards which have a higher point value may be called counting cards or counters. They usually include
4181-460: Is unlikely to return to Tarok; because, in comparison, it appears to him very simple and without interest." The aim is to score 61 or more points per game as the declarer. The defenders aim to prevent this. The game is for three or four players. If four play, there are only three active players; the dealer is called the 'king' and does not participate. To decide seating, cards of differing suits are placed by each seat and players draw from cards with
4294-517: Is used as above but counting only two cards. For example, a Queen (worth 3 1/2 points) and a low card (1/2 point) would be counted together to make 4. For the purpose of the rules, the numbering of the trumps is all that matters. The symbolic tarot images have no effect in the game itself other than influencing the naming of a few of the cards (Fool, Mond, Pagat, Little Man). The design traditions of these decks evolved independently, and they often bear only numbers and whimsical scenes arbitrarily chosen by
4407-578: The Black Forest or the Vosges , and the countries within the boundaries of the former Austro-Hungarian Monarchy , for which even the name 'Tarockania' ( Tarockanien ) has been coined. The Austrian variation of the game and the variations thereof is still widely popular among all classes and generations in Slovenia and Croatia . In Hungary different rules are applied. The Swiss game of Troggu
4520-595: The British Isles or the Iberian Peninsula . The cards of the special suit in these games are variously called Tarocks, tarocs, taroks, tarocchi or tarots . In French Tarot , they are just called the atouts . Dummett classified tarot games into three distinct types: Tarocchi (Italian, singular Tarocco ), and similar names in other languages, is a specific form of playing card deck used for different trick-taking games . An earlier name of
4633-630: The Corps Suevia Munich . In Munich he did compete in two compulsory duels, but stayed on the defensive each time. So he received the (at his time) desirable schmiss ("duelling scar"), but was also released from the Corps Suevia without a ribbon. On the advice of a fellow student, he switched to the University of Erlangen for the summer term; he studied here without getting involved in any clubs, and on 1 August 1890 he received
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4746-679: The Ludwig-Thoma-Bier from the Hofbrauhaus Berchtesgaden bear his name. The municipal Ludwig Thoma Middle School ( Realschule ) in Munich has borne his name since it was built in 1973. In Dachau there is a Ludwig Thoma School (primary school). In Prien am Chiemsee there is the Ludwig Thoma Grammar School ( Gymnasium ) in Prien in the restaurant where Thoma and his mother lived from 1876. There
4859-476: The atouts , 21 are numbered from 1 to 21, and a non-numbered card called " Fou " ("Fool", also called " Mat " or " L'Excuse " in play) which "excuses" the player from following suit. Of the atouts , only the Fool and trumps 1 and 21 are considered to be "counting" cards because they are worth more than 1 point. Winning the last trick awards bonuses only if it is won with the lowest trump. Tarot games from Piedmont ,
4972-417: The 18 tricks making a total of 70 points in total; thus, in most cases, a declarer needs 36 points to win. Mayr and Sedlaczek described 3 common systems: The first, easiest and oldest method is counting in threes with low cards. A player gathers the cards won in tricks and groups them into triplets each comprising one counting card and two low cards. Each triplet scores the value of the counter only e.g.
5085-411: The 1880s. In the most detailed account Ausführliche Anleitung zum Deutschtarokspielen ( AAD , 1881), French terminology has been abandoned and more elaborate payment schemes were described. The following rules are based on AAD and show the main changes from the rules for Sansprendre above. All is as in Sansprendre, except that there is an alternative method for choosing the dealer: to shuffle and fan
5198-416: The 62 card Tarocco Bolognese deck. These games have four face cards in each suit but dropped some of their pip cards early in their history. Both decks include 21 trumps and The Fool , a suitless card that excuses the player from following suit. The French adopted tarot games after their occupation of Milan in the late 15th century. French tarot , known locally as Jeu de Tarot , is one which uses
5311-507: The 78-card Swiss 1JJ Tarot , another derivative of the Tarot de Marseille. Danish Grosstarok , which focuses on winning the final trick, historically used Animal Tarot decks or decks that replaced the animal motifs with ones featuring Danish architecture, until a dying out of local production and a shift towards exclusively producing stripped 54-card decks among foreign producers of Animal Tarot, resulted in players of this game now also adopting
5424-630: The Bavarian capital of Munich , being played almost to exclusion of all others. It 1864 it was the most popular game in Augsburg . Treatises specifically on the game were published in Bayreuth, Munich and Nuremberg from the 1830s to the early 20th century, further testifying to its popularity in Bavaria, but it was also known further afield, for example, in Hesse and Prussia. During this time the rules of
5537-651: The Fatherland Party, as in the summer of 1917 in Munich's Löwenbräukeller . He could not cope with the looming war defeat in November 1918 . He no longer understood the world and bitterly withdrew to his house. In summer of 1918 he met Maidi Liebermann von Wahlendorf (1883–1971), who came from the Jewish sparkling wine dynasty Feist-Belmont and was now married. Thoma fell passionately in love with her and bemoaned his fate for not having taken her as his wife at
5650-451: The Fool ( Excuse or Sküs ), the I ( Pagat Petit , Bagatto or Little Man ) and the XXI ( Mond ) plus all the court cards . In such a case, the low cards are the remaining tarots (II to XX) and all the pip cards . Not all games follow this precisely. In some games, other cards are included among the counters. However, the division of counters and low cards described is the most common and
5763-625: The Hungarian upper class, was Kathinka Ganghofer, the wife of Ludwig Ganghofer . Thoma and Ganghofer did not know each other personally at that time; Thoma ended the affair at the end of 1901; he and Ganghofer only met in 1903. In 1901, Thoma wrote his comedy Die Lokalbahn , which opened on 19 October 1902 (again in the Residence Theatre). Viktoria Pröbstl died in November 1902. In 1903, Thoma met graphic artist Ignatius Taschner , with whom he soon became close friends. Certainly by
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#17327760478495876-940: The Imperial Latin School in Landstuhl (today: Sickingen - Gymnasium Landstuhl), he first studied Forestry in Aschaffenburg , then Law until 1893 in Munich and Erlangen . Subsequently, he settled down as a lawyer, at first in Dachau , later in Munich. After 1899, he worked for the magazine Simplicissimus and published humorous narrations , comedies , novels and stories. Thoma satirized Bavarian rural and small-town life. His serious peasant novels Andreas Vöst (1905), Der Wittiber (1911), and Der Ruepp (1922), as well as his humorous collections Assessor Karlchen (1900), Lausbubengeschichten ( Tales of
5989-511: The Italian region bordering France, are more similar to French tarot than other Italian games. These games use the 78-card Tarocco Piemontese deck which was derived from the Tarot de Marseille. The most common Piedmontese tarot games are Scarto , Mitigati, Chiamare il Re, and Partita which can be found in Pinerolo and Turin. Troccas , a Swiss tarot game, is also related and is played with
6102-817: The Latin suits of Cups, Coins, Clubs, and Swords are common in Italy and Spain, and the French suits of Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs, and Spades are seen in France, Quebec, West Germany and most of the English-speaking world. This trend continues even to non-Tarot decks such as for the German game of Skat, played with a deck of similar-value cards as in the French piquet deck used for Belote . Players in most of western Germany use French suits, while players in Bavaria and eastern Germany use German suits. The 78-card tarot deck contains: The 54-card 'Tarock' deck contains: Due to
6215-616: The Tarocco Bolognese. Jeu de Tarot is now the most popular card game in France after Belote and many tournaments are held by the Fédération Française de Tarot. A Tarot Nouveau deck consists of 56 cards of four suits and 22 emblematic cards called atouts (trumps). Each suit consists of fourteen cards: ten pip cards , and four face cards : the Roi (King), Dame (Queen), Cavalier (Knight), and Valet (Jack). Of
6328-553: The Tarot Nouveau. Tarock games, Dummett's Type III, differ from other forms in the function of the Fool which is now simply the highest trump. Games of this category include Cego , Zwanzigerrufen and Königrufen . These games use the 54 card French suited Cego or Industrie und Glück decks that strip certain pip cards. The games are widely played in the Upper Rhine valley and its surrounding hills such as
6441-675: The Thoma siblings. In 1885, Raesfeldt succeeded in getting Ludwig admitted to the final year of the grammar school in Landshut , after he was threatened with expulsion from his school in Munich. Martin A. Klaus quotes the "special remarks" from Thomas Landshut's high school diploma: He did his earlier studies at the Wilhelmsgymn. in Munich, but behaved there in such a way that he had to be advised seriously to change schools. In Landshut, Thoma passed his Maturität examinations in 1886. At
6554-696: The Waldbauer bookstore in Passau . Paul switched in 1897 to the satirical weekly Simplicissimus founded the year before by Albert Langen , whose employees Thoma also met in Café Heck on Odeonsplatz . In 1898, he sent the first manuscripts to Simplicissimus , which were well received by publisher and public. When the edition of 31 October 1899 was confiscated for lèse-majesté , author Frank Wedekind , draftsman Thomas Theodor Heine and publisher Langen fled abroad to avoid prosecution. Simplicissimus needed
6667-407: The antiquity of tarot games, the cards are ordered in an archaic ranking. In the plain suits, Kings are always high. With the exception of modern French tarot and Sicilian tarocchi, the ranking in the Latin round suits (cups and coins) or the French red suits (diamonds and hearts) goes from King (high), Queen, Cavalier, Jack, 1, 2, 3 ... 10 (low). The aim in almost all card games of the Tarot family
6780-539: The ascendancy. After the First World War, scoring with overshoot points and complex payment schemes were dropped in what became known as Bavarian Tarock . During this time a large number of local and regional variants appeared, some of which survive. However, the dominant version today is the point-bidding version of Bavarian Tarock or Haferltarock that emerged after the Second World War . The game
6893-612: The beginning of the First World War . Simplicissimus became increasingly less strident, and Thoma could not and did not want to withdraw from the general enthusiasm for the war, especially among intellectuals. He volunteered as a medic and moved in 1915 with a Bavarian Division to the Eastern Front in Galicia . There he became seriously ill with dysentery and became unfit for military service. Many works appeared in
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#17327760478497006-569: The cards with ancient wisdom, the earliest record of this idea, subsequently debunked by Dummett . As a result of the unsupported theories of de Gébelin and other occultists, tarot cards have since been used for cartomancy and divination as well as gaming, although now fortune-tellers tend to use specially-developed tarot decks rather than those used for games. Tarot games are increasingly popular in Europe, especially in France where French tarot
7119-456: The certificate for entry into legal clerkship. For Martin Klaus, failure and the subsequent change of educational establishment is symptomatic of Thoma's character: The move to Erlangen following the "Suevia" embarrassment is an important indication of how little Thoma could cope with a tarnished public image of himself. In order to keep up appearances in such situations, he preferred to switch to
7232-594: The concept of trumps. At around the same time or slightly earlier, a similar concept arose in the game of Karnöffel . In this south German game played with an ordinary pack, some cards of the given suit had full trump powers, others were partial trumps and the 7s had a special role. These features are retained in games of the Karnöffel family to the present, but are never seen in tarot games. Suits with these variable powers are called chosen or selected suits to distinguish them from trump suits. The introduction of trumps
7345-429: The dedicated trump suit, Hearts is chosen as the trump suit or at least as a preference suit . This family includes German Tarok , Württemberg Tarock or Tapp , Bavarian Tarock , Bauerntarock , Frog and Dobbm . They are ace–ten games that incorporate features of Tapp Tarock, but are not true Tarock games. The following true Tarock games are known: A complete Tarot deck such as one for French Tarot contains
7458-488: The earlier bidder must accept it or hold it. If a Frage or Sansprendre has been bid, a later player may ask "is it in Couleur ?" i.e. in Hearts, but if the reply is "no", the later player must then play in Hearts. The highest bidder wins the auction and becomes the declarer . In a Frage , the declarer exchanges 3 cards with the scat; these may not be Aces unless the entire suit is held. The declarer names trumps unless
7571-402: The early 19th century, standard German-suited packs were simply labelled "German Taroc" ( Deutsch-Taroc ). No detailed rules for the original form have survived, but it is briefly described in the forward of an 1839 treatise, the author calling it "very simple and without interest" compared with the subject of the booklet, Sansprendre, a variant he considered so good that it would be hard to find
7684-410: The engraver. There are still traditional sequences of images in which the common lineage is visible. E.g. the moon that is commonly visible at the bottom left corner of the trump card 21 stems from confusion of the German word Mond , meaning "moon", with Italian mondo and French monde , meaning "world", the usual symbol associated with the trump card 21 on Italian suited tarots. In the denouement of
7797-412: The fact that, in a Sansprendre contract, the declarer could not make use of the scat (skat) – the 3 cards left over after the deal. However, with the demise of the original game, the name German Tarok or Tarok passed to the new one, although the name Sansprendre persisted in some circles. For example, in 1878 a Nuremberg choir song features a pub in which four play Sans Prendre into the night while
7910-556: The family moved to Forstenried near Munich in 1874, when Ludwig was only seven years old, his father died and the family were surprised to find themselves destitute: Viktoria Pröbstl had to sell furniture from the forester's lodge to pay for the burial. Thoma's mother had to raise seven children alone. The children initially had one of their father's colleagues, Karl Decrignis, as a guardian. Ludwig and his sister Luise were taken in by their uncle Albert Paulus in Landstuhl . There Ludwig attended one year of primary school, and then went into
8023-494: The first time by bicycle with colleagues from Simplicissimus through Italy to Rome . He wrote the mocking story Der heilige Hies and began to write his first novel Andreas Vöst . In 1906, Thoma and Hermann Hesse became editors of the magazine März . Also in 1906 he was imprisoned because of the satirical poem "On the morality of Preachers in Köln am Rheine" being sentenced to six weeks imprisonment for "insulting members of
8136-611: The first volume of Dorothy Dunnett 's Lymond Chronicles , The Game of Kings, the protagonist's life depends on his friend winning a prolonged game of tarocco. Ludwig Thoma Ludwig Thoma ( German: [ˈluːt.vɪç ˈtoː.ma] ; 21 January 1867 in Oberammergau – 26 August 1921 in Tegernsee ) was a German author, publisher and editor, who gained popularity through his partially exaggerated description of everyday Bavarian life. After graduation from
8249-546: The first year. During his time in Aschaffenburg he joined the oldest forestry corps ( Forstcorps ), the Corps Hubertia of Munich. Because he did not attend a Mensur , he was dishonourably dismissed ("without a ribbon"). In the winter term of 1887/1888 he moved to the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and enrolled for a degree in law . Like his father before him, he became a member of
8362-723: The forest service; his great-grandfather Joseph von Thoma [ de ] (1767–1849) had headed the Bavarian Forestry Commission and had been elevated to the nobility as a life peer for his services. His mother's family initially ran an inn in Oberau , later in Oberammergau. He spent the first years of his life in the forester's lodge of Vorderriß on the River Isar near the Tyrolean border,
8475-688: The full 78-card Tarot deck. Originally played with the Italian-suited Tarot de Marseille , the game is now played with the French-suited Tarot Nouveau . The Tarot Nouveau, of Frankfurt origin, has trumps which depict scenes of traditional social activities. This differs from the Renaissance allegorical motifs found in Italian-suited tarot decks such as the Tarot de Marseille, Tarocco Piemontese and
8588-463: The full 78-card complement. It can be used to play any game in the family, with the exception of Minchiate , an extinct game that used 97 cards. Austrian-Hungarian Tarock and Italian Tarocco decks are a smaller subset, of 63, 54, 40, or even 36 cards, suitable only for games of a particular region. Regional tarot decks commonly feature culture-specific suits . The German suits of Hearts, Bells, Acorns and Leaves are used through most of Germanic Europe,
8701-684: The game Trionfi is first recorded in the diary of Giusto Giusti in September 1440 In other early documents it was called ludus triumphorum or similar. In June 1505, the name Tarochi was first used in Ferrara . In December 1505, the name Taraux appeared in Avignon . The names tarocco, tarocchi and tarot developed in later times beside different writing forms. The poet Francesco Berni mocked this word in his Capitolo del Gioco della Primiera written in 1526. The name Trionfi developed later as
8814-419: The game remained remarkably stable, the main changes being elaborations to its systems of payment. German Tarok was a penny ante game , usually played for low stakes. An 1876 table of "card game tariffs" gives 3 levels of payment for games played with a Laus-Tiegel (common pot) as well as additional payments if blocks or a pool ( Poule ) was used. In the cheapest, winning a Frage with up to 20 overshoot points
8927-425: The game was variously spelt in German as Deutsch-Tarock , Deutsch-Tarok , Deutsch Tarrok , Deutschtarok , Deutscher Tarok , Deutscher Taroc , or simply Tarok . In English it is rendered German Tarok or German Tarock . When the new variant appeared in the 1830s, it was initially called Sansprendre , based on the name of its Solo contract; sans prendre being French for "without picking up" and referring to
9040-515: The government in Berlin and social democracy . But he also wrote about the Jewish bourgeoisie, for example: "Teiteles Cohn and Isidor Veigelduft, they are still allowed to put their ornate knuckles in their leather cases in summer, with Rebekka on her arm in a dirndl dress, smelling of violets and garlic." He described the Reich capital of Berlin as a "duck dump" and a "combination of a Galician Jewish nest and New York criminal district", described in
9153-579: The household. With a student friend he started a legal practice, to which he devoted less and less time in the years that followed. Adolf Hölzel , who worked in the Dachau Artists' Colony , and Bruno Paul , who celebrated his first successes in the Jugend , illustrated his collection of stories Agricola: Bauerngeschichten ("Stories of the Peasantry") in 1897. This, Thoma's first book, appeared in
9266-666: The language of the Völkisch movement of an "idiosyncracy deeply rooted in race ..." and insulted the Weimar Republic as "characterless idiocy". He called its representative "this sad herd of pigs from Tarnopol and Jaroslau " and emphasized that "besides the Hymie from Promenadenstrasse , we also have shot down several from the tribe of Levi ..." (the Bavarian Prime Minister Kurt Eisner
9379-551: The last years of his life in the Miesbacher Anzeiger " as dark episodes in Ludwig Thoma's life. He also points out that Thoma never submitted his doctoral thesis, but still called himself "Doctor Ludwig Thoma" and let himself be called a doctor, which has to be mentioned for an author who is so critical of his fellow human beings. Thoma still enjoys great popularity in Upper Bavaria today. For example, products such as
9492-821: The manuscript of Martiano da Tortona, written before 1425. The games are known in many variations, mostly cultural and regional. Tarot games originated in Italy, and spread to most parts of Europe, notable exceptions being the British Isles, the Iberian peninsula, and the Balkans. The earliest detailed description of rules for a tarot game in any language were published by the Abbé de Marolles in Nevers in 1637. The abbot learnt this variant from Princess Louise-Marie of Gonzague-Nevers , who introduced some rule variations from
9605-473: The next. The declarer requires 61 to win and is paid for each card point in excess of 60. If he loses, he pays for each point below 60. There is normally no payment for a draw (60–60). A tariff per point is agreed beforehand at, say, 1 point = 1 pfennig. This tariff is then multiplied as per the table above. In addition, Sansprendre may be played: By 1851, the game has adopted the name of its predecessor, German Tarok. Further, mainly cosmetic, changes appear in
9718-454: The normal game. It was played by three players with a 66-card pack, obtained by removing the 3 lowest cards of each suit from a standard 78-card, Italian-suited tarot pack. Two players received 21 cards each. The dealer received 25, from which four were discarded. There were payments for declaring certain card combinations at the start, for playing the Ace of Coins and for taking the last trick with
9831-433: The pack has a total of 36 cards in 4 suits each of 9 cards. In Bavarian Tarock, a card's trick-taking value generally increases with its face value. The Ace ( Aß ) or Sow ( Sau ), symbol A, is the highest card and it is followed by the: Ten ( Zehner ) (10) > King (K) > Ober (O) > Unter (U) > Nine ( Neuner ) (9) > Eight ( Achter ) (8) > Seven ( Siebener ) (7) > Six ( Sechser ) (6) The cards have
9944-454: The pack, face down. Players draw a card, and the one with the lowest deals first. French packs are said to be used in "several places." Once again, there is a single round of bidding with immediate hold , but this time only three contracts; the ordinary suit Frage has been dropped. Frage in Couleur is renamed Frage , a Sansprendre is now a Solo , and a Sansprendre in Couleur is now
10057-563: The particularly productive year of 1916. In 1917, Thoma advertised in the Miesbacher Anzeiger for subscription to war bonds. "Our fatherland must carry on the war to the victorious end", it said in October 1917 under the headline "Why does the farmer have to subscribe to the war bond?" In July 1917 he enrolled as a member of the German Fatherland Party , which advocated an uncompromising victory . He spoke several times for
10170-697: The party conference of the Bavarian SPD and their agricultural policy for the Augsburger Abendzeitung in October. In it, he opposed the reform efforts of the Social Democrats and described Clara Zetkin as a "Russian virago". His early successes and better financial circumstances made him consider marriage. As early as 1892 he had met Johanna Sachs from Nuremberg, daughter of a grain dealer, whom he cautiously began to woo. But when her father gave him no further hopes, he gave up
10283-429: The plan. In late 1896, Thoma made another attempt to find a wife. On the basis of a marriage advertisement, he began to exchange letters with several candidates, which, however, did not result in anything. He mocked women a little later in his first comedy Witwen ("Widows"). In spring 1897, Thoma moved to Munich, where he shared a bachelor's apartment with his school friend, Richard Rothmaier, while Viktoria Pröbstl ran
10396-541: The production at Überbrettl there in November 1901. In 1898, Thoma met a woman whom he never mentioned by name in his diary entries and private letters, but instead described her as "G." or Hohenzollernstraße . (The two met for their assignations in Hohenzollernstraße in Schwabing .) Martin Klaus suspects that his lover, who was married, older than Thoma and (according to his roommate Rothmair) came from
10509-579: The same point values as in Schafkopf . The 10, with ten card points, is just below the Ace (11 points), but above the King (4), Ober (3) and Unter (2). The value of the Spatzen ("sparrows" – 9 to 6) lies only in their ability to take tricks , draw trumps or other cards during play, but they have no intrinsic point value. In the original game, Hearts may always have been trumps. In the later variant, Hearts
10622-419: The same suits, sitting at the place where the suit of the card is corresponding to that of the one they drew. Usually two 36-card German-suited 'Tarok' packs are used, the second being pre-shuffled ready for the next dealer. The first dealer is the player who drew Hearts. He shuffles , offers the pack to the right for cutting and places the top 3 cards as a scat , face down on the table. The dealer then deals
10735-557: The second year of the Latin school. The death of his father and separation from his family affected his school work; as a result he was a difficult student who received few favourable reports: There's something sly about his character. When censured and punished, he shows an unusual coldness and stubborn, defiant insensitivity for his years. In 1876, his mother rented the pub Zur Kampenwand in Prien am Chiemsee , which she managed together with Viktoria Pröbstl and her daughters. Ludwig began
10848-615: The study seminar in Neuburg an der Donau . He had to repeat a year at the study centre in Burghausen . Here Georg Pauliebl was one of his friends; his life story was described by Thoma in the story Der heilige Hies ("Saint Hies"). In 1879, Thoma moved from Burghausen to the Wilhelmsgymnasium . During his school days he lived as a lodger, and he described this time in his Erinnerungen ("Memoires"). He also had to repeat
10961-426: The suggestion of his classmates, he went up to give the graduation speech: "But the young man failed. Thoma stood silently in front of the auditorium, unable to choke out a word, until the headmaster rushed to the podium, improvised a speech and saved the situation." Like his father, Thoma wanted to be a forester and began studying forest science in Aschaffenburg in the winter term of 1886/87, but dropped out after
11074-476: The tedious work of counting tricks and card points separately led players to fuse the two processes into a single operation. There are several practical methods, but all are designed to achieve the same aim: a quick and relatively simple way of calculating the score. A very common system used in many 54-card Tarock games is counting in packets of three. Under the original scoring scheme, the pack would have been worth 52 points and there would have been 18 points for
11187-521: The time of his success with the novel Lokalbahn , Thoma had become an important source of income for the publisher. Thoma was rid of his financial worries and indulged in an upper-class lifestyle: together with Albert Langen, he leased a hunting ground in Unterweikertshofen near Dachau, which he had visited repeatedly since 1895. Although Langen paid half the lease, the hunt was primarily used by Thoma. In March and April 1903, he travelled for
11300-419: The time. Until his death he was to court her vigorously. Although she remained close to him, she could not bring herself to move in with him completely, since her husband refused to divorce. In the last 14 months of his life Thoma wrote for the Miesbacher Anzeiger - often through an editorial on the first page - 175 mostly (except for five cases) anonymous and mostly anti-Semitic articles, especially against
11413-458: The two remained friends. In 1908, he moved into his house "Auf der Tuften" in Tegernsee . His comedy Moral premiered that year, and the work became one of his greatest successes. In the play he had a representative of a morality association ( Sittlichkeitsverein ), who had committed a grave offence against the principles of such an association, say: "Being moral, I can manage that alone in my room, but that has no educational value. The main thing
11526-444: The university were the usual ones, so much so that I don't need to describe them. From 1890, he worked as a legal intern at Traunstein . At the same time he wrote a dissertation on the topic The Theory of Self-Defence with criminal law professor Karl Lueder. On 6 December 1890, he passed the oral exam with the (lowest possible) grade of Rite ("satisfactory"). A handwritten copy of his doctoral thesis with its final correction edits
11639-605: The weakness and stupidity of the bourgeois milieu and chauvinistic Prussianism with its ' Pickelhaube ' militarism . He also resented the provincialism and the clerical politics of his time in the Kingdom of Bavaria , which is reflected in Jozef Filser's Briefwexel . His stories spiced with humour and satire or his one-act plays of the rural and small-town environment in Upper Bavaria are regarded as brilliant. His unsentimental descriptions of agrarian life in his novels are therefore particularly true to life, because Thoma
11752-498: The year 1637. Excluding Piedmontese tarocchi, which is more closely related to French tarot , Italian tarocchi are all of Type I, i.e. they have trumps other than the I and XXI that are worth more than one card point. Winning the final trick ( ultimo ) awards a set number of points. Sicilian tarocchi is played in only four towns with 63 cards from the Tarocco Siciliano deck. Tarocchini is confined to Bologna and uses
11865-742: Was Solo , the German name of the Sansprendre contract. The earliest reference to German Tarok dates to 1795 in Illerfeld in Upper Swabia in what was then the Electorate of Bavaria . However, it is likely that the game emerged in the south German states in the mid-18th century as an attempt to play the German Tarot game of Grosstarock with standard German-suited cards . The original game became sufficiently popular that by around
11978-759: Was able to gain a wealth of practical insights into living conditions in the country from his work as a lawyer. The Bavarian dialect is rendered as concisely as that in Georg Queri's works. Based on his articles in the Miesbacher Anzeiger (1920–1921), a 1989 article in Der Spiegel accused Ludwig Thoma of becoming an angry anti-Semite and to have developed into a pioneer of Hitler . Lawyer Otto Gritschneder highlights his six-week imprisonment in Munich-Stadelheim (1906) and "the extremely anti-Semitic and vulgar anti-democratic essays by Thoma's from
12091-480: Was adapted into an animated short film released in 1962, the Lausbubengeschichten ( Tales of a Rascal ) and Jozef Filsers Briefwexel ( Jozef Filser's Letters ). Lausbubengeschichten was made into a movie in 1964, also released in English under the title Tales of a Young Scamp [ de ] . Ludwig Thoma was born as the fifth child of forester Max Thoma and his wife Katharina Thoma, née Pfeiffer, in Oberammergau . His paternal ancestors were active in
12204-417: Was developed later: counting in threes with a 2-point deduction. Cards are grouped in threes again, but the composition is irrelevant. Within each triplet the card values are added and then 2 points are deducted from the total. So, for example, a Queen, Cavalier and Ten are worth 4 + 3 + 1 – 2 = 6 points. Players try to ensure that any odd cards left over are low cards. Again, two low cards are worth 1 point and
12317-454: Was found in Thoma's estate; However, Thoma never had them printed and therefore did not receive a doctorate certificate. Strictly speaking, he was therefore wrong to claim a doctorate. In April 1895, Ritter published Thoma's short story "Der Truderer" in the literary supplement Sammler , in which cheerful events of rural life were recorded for the first time in prose form. Ludwig Thoma also commented on political issues, writing an article about
12430-673: Was normally the permanent trump suit in the lowest contract , known as a Frage , in which the scat could be picked up and exchanged with. However, it was only a suit of preference in Solo contracts, i.e. a Heart Solo outranked a Solo in another suit . The only account of the original game is a few sketchy remarks in the forward of the 1839 treatise, Das Sansprendre-Spiel in Regeln zur richtigen Auffassung und Ausführung desselben nach seinen verschiedenen Nuancen dargestellt ( SSR ). Although this original form of German Tarok differed "in only
12543-492: Was shot dead in Promenadenstrasse ). He called Eisner himself a "Jewish pig", whose murder he described as an "execution". And Thoma insulted Jewish publisher Rudolf Mosse with the words "Rascal with your curly hair and your progressive motion scissors"; Kurt Tucholsky he denigrated as a "little Galician cripple". (c.f. also the reaction Thomas wrote anonymously in the Miesbacher Anzeiger on 2 February 1921 to
12656-470: Was soon bored and by 1911 Thoma and Marietta were divorced. In the later years of his life, he wrote nationalistic propaganda agitating against left-wing politicians (e.g. for the newspaper Miesbacher Anzeiger ). During World War I he served as a medical orderly . In July 1917 he joined the German Fatherland Party . His best-known works are Der Münchner im Himmel ( The Munich Man in Heaven ), which
12769-517: Was worth 5 pfennigs , winning with 21 to 40 was worth 10 pfennigs and over that was worth 15 pfennigs. German Tarok in its later form lasted into the early years of the 20th century, when it was a favourite of the wealthy Bavarian author Ludwig Thoma , who played it before and during the First World War . He is known to have played both at 'Sharp Tarock' and Tarock with Talerblocks i.e. blocks or counters valued at 3 Marks or 1 Thaler . However, it fell into steady decline as Schafkopf gained
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