UnitedCardists.com - The forum for Cardistry, Magic, Custom Decks and All Things Playing Cards.

Posted: **Wed May 11, 2022 6:41 pm**

Some stuff from my collection. Mostly examples of chromolithography in Europe from about 1860-1933.

Dondorf, Whist-Karten No230. Double figures in medieval costumes, chromolithography, printed 1865-1895. There are two versions of this deck. This is the "sober" version (Braun Variant 1). The other version, sometimes called the "Schnapsnasen" deck, the figures are drawn with a rougher, looser appearance, several of the courts given rosy colored noses. It is not known if one version is older than the other. The aces have portraits of Goethe and Schiller, Raffael and Rubens, Alexander von Humboldt and Kant, Mozart and Beethoven. You can see the Schnapsnasen deck on Joop Muller's website DXPO.

Posted: **Wed May 11, 2022 7:12 pm**

Are those your scans?

Thanks for posting, looking forward to seeing this thread grow

Posted: **Wed May 11, 2022 7:56 pm**

Yes - these are scans I made of cards in my collection. I thought I'd add a thread to this forum after reading Harvonsgard's response to Rod Starling's article.

Posted: **Wed May 11, 2022 10:49 pm**

Saks Fifth Ave Advertising Deck (Saks-Werbespiel), No909. c1930. A maker's name doesn't appear anywhere on the cards, but a reference is made to these cards in a privately held book of Dondorf games tying these to Dondorf as the printer (Braun, V4). Johan Bull, a Norwegian artist who emigrated to the United States in 1925 and worked at The New Yorker, designed the cards and secured a patent for them. This is a "no-revoke" design, with the suits in four different colors.

Posted: **Thu May 12, 2022 9:04 am**

Nice stuff!

Posted: **Fri May 13, 2022 1:48 am**

Dondorf, No 276, printed in chromolithography, c1913-1917. Roughly translated from Braun: "The court cards show people from Mecklenburg history from the 16th to the beginning of the 19th century. The kings are dukes or the first grand dukes of Mecklenburg, the Queens are Mecklenburg princesses and the Jacks are well-known statesmen and officials from the history of Mecklenburg. Two sights from Mecklenburg are shown on each of the Aces. The history of Mecklenburg is explained in a small text booklet, taking into account the people depicted."

Posted: **Fri May 13, 2022 10:56 pm**

In 1862, Adolph Charlemagne, a Russian artist known for painting epic battle scenes, received a commission to produce watercolors in preparation for a series of new playing cards. Some of this work was published and became very popular but the drawings shown below were rejected by authorities and were never printed. The original drawings were saved and are now on display at the Peterhof Museum in Saint Petersburg. In 1995, Alexander Perelman published a small book, "New Playing Card figures by Academic Sharleman" featuring the rejected drawings. The book is at bottom left with my scans from it on the right. In 2010 Peterhof published a faithful reproduction of the original artwork in 500 copies. In 2018 Makwell and the Russian Playing Card Society modernized the drawings and published a new deck. You can see both here WOPC.

Posted: **Sat May 14, 2022 10:42 pm**

GandalfPC wrote: ↑Thu May 12, 2022 9:04 am Nice stuff!

Thank you!

Posted: **Sat May 14, 2022 11:37 pm**

Artwork by Nikolay Karazin. First edition, printed in chromolithography, Imperial Printing Plant, St. Petersburg, Russia, 1897. The second edition, published a year or so later, replaces the JC and JS with two new figures. For an interesting discussion about the historical accuracy of these cards, see Joop Muller's post.

Posted: **Thu May 19, 2022 2:25 am**

Shakespearean Playing Cards, 1902. Designed by Frederick Colin Tilney. Bemrose and Sons, Swan Sonnenschein and Co Ltd Publishers, London. Quoting Simon Wintle of WOPC: "The characters of the court cards are chosen from Shakespeare's plays and are arranged into the four suits as follows: Hearts for the gentler emotions; Diamonds for wealth or greed; Clubs for aggressiveness and strife; Spades for the tragic methods of schemers." An advertising version was issued about 1905-1910, for Munich Lion Brew Company. The box, AoS, and back were redesigned and can be seen on dondorf.co.uk here. This is the 1902 first issue printed in chromolithography.

Posted: **Fri May 20, 2022 10:07 pm**

Dondorf's Birma Karte: Einköpfige Englische Karten, No194, c1867-1920.

Posted: **Fri May 20, 2022 10:28 pm**

Wow, thank you for digitizing these historical beauties of yours for us to enjoy! Great decks

Posted: **Mon May 23, 2022 1:00 am**

Russia. c1880, St. Petersburg. These cards first appeared sometime during the 1860s. The previous owner (a scholarly collector) dated this deck to about 1880. A Potter & Potter listing for a deck with this same back was dated to 1863 (frequently changed back designs help date this deck, wars with Germany destroyed many contemporary records). Printing likely continued into the 1910s.

Posted: **Mon May 23, 2022 5:41 am**

Beautiful cards and scans. Thanks for posting them and the additional infos as well. Such a treasure. Is there a book for European cards like the Hochman's Encyclopedia?

Posted: **Mon May 23, 2022 5:21 pm**

"Is there a book for European cards like the Hochman's Encyclopedia?"

Hi Harvonsgard."A History of Playing Cards and a Bibliography of Cards and Gaming" by Catherine Hargrave is probably one that gets mentioned a lot, but I didn't find it that helpful. The International Playing Card Society has probably reviewed every book about playing cards in existence. I reference a lot of blogs by other collectors of antique cards - Joop Muller, Peter Endebrock, WOPC, World Web Playing Card Museum, and Mark Irwin. Franz Braun has(d) a collection of 11,000 decks and wrote extensively about them. He wrote one about Dondorf. Two other valuable books on Dondorf - Schultz/Stolzenburg, and Hoffman/Dietrich (also both in German) where I get most of my information about Dondorf.

Posted: **Mon May 23, 2022 10:58 pm**

I forgot one: the Fournier catalogs are also useful. Fournier Museum of Playing Cards.

Posted: **Wed May 25, 2022 10:15 pm**

acetofive wrote: ↑Wed May 11, 2022 10:49 pm Saks Fifth Ave Advertising Deck (Saks-Werbespiel), No909. c1930. A maker's name doesn't appear anywhere on the cards, but a reference is made to these cards in a privately held book of Dondorf games tying these to Dondorf as the printer (I think that's the story, in what little literature I can get my hands on, and in German no less), as well as "Made in Germany" appearing on the double box. (I welcome corrections.) Johan Bull, a Norwegian artist who emigrated to the United States in 1925 and worked at The New Yorker, designed the cards and secured a patent for them. World of Playing Cards adds: "The cards are designed in Art Deco style and represent an original artistic exercise in commercial playing card design." This is a "no-revoke" design, with the suits in four different colors, presumably to make it more difficult for a player to claim they made a mistake during bidding. I'm missing the blank card and the joker - if you know anyone with a spare joker, hit me up.

These are tremendous. Thanks for sharing!

Posted: **Fri May 27, 2022 12:44 pm**

Artwork and plates by Dondorf, sent to St. Petersburg Russia for printing, c1911, in chromolithography. The courts are based on a book of souvenir photos taken of guests wearing 17th century costumes at the 1903 Winter Palace Costume Ball, St. Petersburg.
https://web.archive.org/web/20150328215 ... eball.html
https://tsarnicholas.org/2021/02/21/nic ... er-palace/
https://www.thevintagenews.com/2019/07/ ... ball-1903/

Posted: **Fri May 27, 2022 2:43 pm**

G O R G E O U S

Posted: **Tue May 31, 2022 1:04 am**

Historische Kostüme, Dondorf No232, in Chromolithography, printed 1906-1933. These cards are 60x92mm. There is also a patience version (No235).

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 2:26 am**

Dondorf No272, Members of the Medici family, with palaces depicted on the Aces. This deck was printed 1913-1933. The AH on my deck is stamped "Sept. 1931," marketed in Italy.

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 2:36 pm**

Roi, Dame and? Do you know what the F stands for?
And a continous thank you for making us being able to see those gems.

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 5:57 pm**

Harvonsgard, I am guessing it is Furst, or Prince.

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 6:59 pm**

'R' (for 'Re'), 'D' (for 'Donna') and 'F' (for 'Fante') - source Peter Endebrock. Wikipedia "All Italian suited decks have three face cards per suit: the fante (Knave), cavallo (Knight), and re (King), unless it is a tarocchi deck in which case a donna or regina (Queen) is inserted between the cavallo and re."

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 7:20 pm**

When I started collecting I made two promises: 1) everything had to fit inside one drawer, and 2) the most I could spend on a deck of cards was x-dollars. Well, my collection is in two drawers now and I've spent yz-dollars more times than I care to remember. The point being that I can't buy everything I'd like, so, the cards I have are all cards in a small specialty and cards I really really really want to see for myself. I enjoy the rest of what I can't collect by being a part of groups like this - when you share your cards and enthusiasm, it means something to collectors like me.

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 11:04 pm**

acetofive wrote: ↑Sun Jun 05, 2022 7:20 pmeverything had to fit inside one drawer

Easy peasy

Posted: **Sun Jun 05, 2022 11:10 pm**

acetofive wrote: ↑Sun Jun 05, 2022 7:20 pm 1) everything had to fit inside one drawer

I said the same thing about my display case, which is now very overcrowded

Posted: **Thu Jun 09, 2022 8:37 am**

hsbc - your display case is one of my favorites.

Posted: **Sun Jun 12, 2022 10:53 pm**

Shakespeare Spielkarten, Dondorf, No192. This variation sold in England, c1895-1914.

Posted: **Sun Jun 12, 2022 11:31 pm**

Can someone show this thread to Lotrék so that he stops using Anglo-American courts for his reference?

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