List of Playing-card Nicknames - Notes

Notes

^ The ace card has been called As-Nas, the name of a Persian card game believed to be an ancient ancestor of modern poker

^ The nine of diamonds playing card is often referred to as the Curse of Scotland or the Scourge of Scotland, there are a number of reasons given for this connection:

  1. It was the playing card used by Sir John Dalrymple, the Earl of Stair, to cryptically authorise the Glencoe Massacre. Certainly there is a resemblance between the nine of diamonds and his coat of arms.
  2. The Duke of Cumberland is supposed to have scribbled the order for "no quarter" to be given after the Battle of Culloden on a nine of diamonds playing card.
  3. It has also been suggested that it is a misreading of the "Corse of Scotland" i.e. the "Cross of Scotland" or St Andrew's Saltire. There is a resemblance between the pattern of the nine of diamonds and the Saltire.
  4. Nine diamonds were at one time stolen from the crown of Scotland and a tax was levied on the Scottish people to pay for them – the tax got the nickname "The Curse of Scotland".
  5. The game of Comète being introduced by Mary of Lorraine (alternatively by James, Duke of York) into the court at Holyrood, the Nine of Diamonds, being the winning card, got this name in consequence of the number of courtiers ruined by it.
  6. In the game of Pope Joan, the Nine of Diamonds is the Pope – a personage whom the Scotch Presbyterians consider as a curse.
  7. Diamonds imply royalty and every ninth king of Scotland was a curse to his country.

^ The Six of Hearts is known as loyalty at the risk of death or Grace's Card. This is because in 1688 an Irish Jacobite soldier, Colonel Richard Grace of Moynelly House, Athlone, used this card to write a refusal to surrender and sent it to William of Orange. Colonel Grace was loyal to King James II of England, and risked being shot or hanged for his refusal to give up. The words Colonel Grace wrote were, "Tell your master I despise his offer, and that honor and conscience are dearer to a gentleman than all the wealth and titles a prince can bestow"

^ The origin of The Bicycle, Little Wheel, Spoke, Steel Wheel, Steel Wheeled Bike or simply The Wheel is unknown, but it is believed to have something to do with the popular bicycle-patterned playing cards issued by the United States Playing Card Company.

^ The Princess Leia is the hand AA23 (more common in Omaha since this version of poker used 4 hole cards). This is likely because Leia was held prisoner in detention block AA23 before she was rescued by Han, Chewbacca and Luke in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

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