Chinese playing cards

Playing cards (Chinese traditional: 紙牌; simplified: 纸牌; pinyin: zhǐpái) were most likely invented in China during the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279). They were certainly in existence by the Mongol Yuan dynasty (1271-1368). Chinese use the word pái (牌), meaning "plaque", to refer to both playing cards and tiles. Many early sources are ambiguous if they don't specifically refer to paper pái (cards) or bone pái (tiles). In terms of game play, there is no difference; both serve to hide one face from the other players with identical backs. Card games are examples of imperfect information games as opposed to Chess or Go.

Michael Dummett attributed to the Chinese the invention of gambling with cards, suits, and trick-taking games. Trick-taking games eventually became multi-trick games. These then evolved into the earliest type of rummy games during the early Qing dynasty (1644-1912). By the end of the monarchy, the vast majority of traditional Chinese card games were of the draw-and-discard or fishing variety. Chinese playing cards have proliferated into Southeast Asia by Chinese immigrants. They were also formerly known in Mongolia and Japan. The direction of deals and play is counter-clockwise.

Writers from the Ming (1368–1644) and Qing dynasties believed the played from the Tang (618–907) to the Northern Song dynasty (960–1127) was a card game however this could not be correct as it is described as complicated dice games in which players consulted the leaves (pages) of a book to understand the rolls. There is also no continuity with the Ming-Qing card games as Ouyang Xiu (1007-1072) and Li Qingzhao (1084 – c. 1155) recorded that the game's rules were lost by their time. The writer (974-1020) and his friends are the last known players of that dice game.

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