Primo Visto - Historical Claims

Historical Claims

Based upon references in period literature it appears to be closely related to the game of Primero, with some later authorities claiming that the two games were in fact the very same. Opposing claims to this theory include the fact that the earliest known reference to the name Primo visto appears in Greene's "Notable Discovery of Coosnage" published in 1591, more than half a century after the name Primero was in common use. John Minsheu, an English linguist and lexicographer, claims that Primero and Prima vista (hence Primo visto) were two distinct card games - "That is, first and first seen, because he that can shew such an order of cardes first winnes the game", although he gives but one set of names and just one reason for their names Robert Nares in his book "A Glossary" states that the circumstance of the cards being counted in the same way, with the "Six" reckoned for eighteen and the "Seven" for twenty-one, seems to determine that Primo visto was the same as Primero, or even possibly a later variation of the latter.

Slightly stronger evidence exists in the form of a wonderful list of popular board and card games and diversions of the time of the English Renaissance in John Taylor's 1621 book "Taylor's Motto", listing both Primero and Primefisto, and the same occurs in a list of card games in Richard Brome's "The New Academy".