How did playing cards originate?

Playing cards are called "game cards" in English, and the games played with them are called "poker", so people in China call playing cards by transliteration and free translation, just like the translation of motorcycles. It is impossible to find out when and by whom playing cards were first invented. But most researchers are convinced that playing cards originated in the East.

According to textual research, its prototype was first popular in India, China and Egypt, and was later introduced to Europe by businessmen, soldiers and gypsies. Early European playing cards were made by hand, and only princes and nobles could play them. /kloc-After the 5th century, with the development of printing, playing cards became more and more popular, and card games spread among the public. There were three popular playing cards at that time: 78 cards, 50 cards and 40 cards. After a long evolution, today's 52 Zhang Wang (commander and deputy commander) is 54 Zhang Yi, which is said to have been invented by the French. Why are there 52 playing cards now? Astronomers believe that this is exactly the number of 52 weeks in a year; A year is divided into four seasons: spring, summer, autumn and winter, and playing cards are just divided into four colors; If the four seasons of the year are separated, each season has 13 weeks, and each set of playing cards is 13; If you calculate the total number of playing cards, take "J" as 1 1 point, "Q" as 12 point, "K" as 13 point, and the king and the king each have half a point, which is exactly 365 points, which is the same as the total number of days in a year. In leap years, kings and kings should be regarded as 1 o'clock. J, Q, K * * * This 12 card means that there are 12 months in a year, and it also means that the sun passes through 12 constellations in a year. As for red and black, they mean day and night respectively. From the numerical point of view, there is a certain regularity. Therefore, its games have rules to follow and can be ever-changing, thus being popular and enduring. There are four different flowers in each deck of playing cards, representing the four major industries of society at that time. Spears (now spades) symbolize soldiers, clover flowers (now plum blossoms, grass flowers and grass heads) symbolize agriculture, squares represent diamond bricks used by craftsmen, and red hearts symbolize priests. There is also a saying that four kinds of fancy patterns come from ancient European divination tools: the black pattern of spade represents olive leaves and symbolizes peace; "Red heart" is a red heart, symbolizing wisdom and love; The black clover of "Plum Blossom" used to be a European clover, which means good luck. "Square" presents the shape of a diamond and symbolizes wealth. This statement reflects the development of history: at first, playing cards were only used for divination, and later they gradually became toys. J, Q and K in playing cards are the abbreviations of squire, Queen and King respectively. In the early days, there were 16 flower cards (with human figures), depicting all kinds of characters, which were extremely uncoordinated. According to people who study the history of cards, they respectively represent a figure in history. The king in the card of hearts represents Charlie. He is the only king with no beard in this deck. He used to have an axe in his hand, and I don't know when he changed it to a sword. The king of the square card is Caesar, and the picture is a side view. There is no doubt that the king is David in the Bible. The four kings in playing cards represent the monarchs of four kingdoms in the Middle Ages. Hebrew world (another name for Jews), Holy Roman Empire, Rome, Greece. They symbolize the foundation of western civilization. The earliest poker was in Italy and Spain. Under the king, there were nobles, knights, attendants or worthless people. Later, in Italian poker, the queen replaced the nobility. In the English poker produced by 1780, the four kings were the monarchs of England, France, Spain and Prussia. 18 13 years, the bourbon dynasty was restored, and the characters on playing cards developed into the two heads they are today. At present, many people in the world are studying playing cards. 1984, the United States established the Card Museum, which collected 1 10,000 complete cards and 70,000 incomplete cards. It is said that this is the largest card collection in the world.