Suit of Spades-Écarté ranking-52-card pack

Belle, Flux et Trente-et-Un, is an historical,

gambling Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three el ...

card game A card game is any game using playing cards as the primary device with which the game is played, be they traditional or game-specific. Countless card games exist, including families of related games (such as poker). A small number of card ...

that was widespread in France and Germany during the 17th and 18th centuries. As a relative of Brag and

Poch Poch, Pochen or Pochspiel (french: Poque) is a very old card game that is considered one of the forerunners of poker, a game that developed in America in the 19th century. An etymological relationship between the game names is also assumed. Ga ...

, from which the game of

Poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game w ...

developed, it is of cultural-historical interest. The game is also called Les Trois Jeux ("The Three Games") or, in German, Dreisatz ("Triple Stake") or Belle, Fluss und Einunddreißig ("Belle, Flush and Thirty One"). Meanwhile Parlett records it as Best, Flush and Thirty-One.

Rules

The game is played with a pack of 52

French playing cards French-suited playing cards or French-suited cards are playing cards, cards that use the French Suit (cards), suits of (clovers or clubs ), (tiles or diamonds ), (hearts ), and (pikes or spades ). Each suit contains three o ...

; in addition three coin dishes are needed for the stakes. Before the start of the game, each player puts an agreed amount of money into each of the three dishes. Like Poch, Belle, Flux et Trente-et-Un is a compound game of 3 parts, hence the names ''Dreisatz'' ("Triple Stake") and ''Les Trois Jeux'' ("The Three Games").

Belle

Once the stakes have been placed, each player is dealt 2 cards, face down, and 1 card, face up. The player who has the highest upcard, the so-called ''Belle'', wins the first deal and the contents of the first dish. The ranking of the cards is as in

Écarté Écarté is an old French casino game for two players that is still played today. It is a trick-taking game, similar to whist, but with a special and eponymous discarding phase; the word ''écarté'' meaning "discarded". Écarté was popular in the ...

with the

Ace An ace is a playing card, Dice, die or domino with a single Pip (counting), pip. In the standard French deck, an ace has a single suit (cards), suit symbol (a heart, diamond, spade, or club) located in the middle of the card, sometimes large a ...

between the

Jack Jack may refer to: Places * Jack, Alabama, US, an unincorporated community * Jack, Missouri, US, an unincorporated community * Jack County, Texas, a county in Texas, USA People and fictional characters * Jack (given name), a male given name, ...

and Ten: :King – Queen – Jack – Ace – Ten – Nine – ... – Two If there is no clear winner, then

Forehand The forehand in tennis and other racket sports such as table tennis, squash and badminton is a shot made by swinging the racket across one's body with the hand moving palm-first. In tennis, except in the context of the phrase ''forehand volley ...

, the player who is next to deal, wins.

Flux

In the second deal, ''Flux'', the winner is the player who has the highest-value flush. A flush is a hand of three cards of the same

suit A suit, lounge suit, or business suit is a set of clothes comprising a suit jacket and trousers of identical textiles worn with a collared dress shirt, necktie, and dress shoes. A skirt suit is similar, but with a matching skirt instead of tr ...

. If no player has a flush, the stakes remain in the dish for the next game. If two or more players have a flush, the card points are added and the highest-value flush wins. For this, the Aces counts as 11 points, the

court card A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance w ...

s) 10 each, and the

pip card Pip, PIP, Pips, PIPS, and ''similar'', may refer to: Common meanings * Pip, colloquial name for the star(s) worn on military uniform as part of rank badge, as in the British Army officer rank insignia or with many Commonwealth police agencies * T ...

s score from 2 to 9 depending on their natural value. If there is a tie, the same rule applies as in Belle: forehand wins. Unlike the game of Poch, there is no betting on the highest combination, as subsequently became typical for Poker. There is also no option to

bluff Bluff or The Bluff may refer to: Places Australia * Bluff, Queensland, Australia, a town * The Bluff, Queensland (Ipswich), a rural locality in the city of Ipswich * The Bluff, Queensland (Toowoomba Region), a rural locality * Bluff River (New So ...

Trente-et-Un

Finally, in the third deal each player attempts, by exchanging cards, to score 31 points, or to get as close to 31 points as possible (c.f.

Vingt-et-Un Twenty-one, formerly known as vingt-un in Britain, France and America, is the name given to a family of popular card games of the gambling family, the progenitor of which is recorded in Spain in the early 17th century. The family includes the casi ...

, and the third round of Brag). The player who comes closest to 31, wins the contents of the third dish. If there is a tie, forehand wins. The modern casino game of

Black Jack Blackjack is a popular casino-gambling card game. Black Jack or Blackjack may also refer to: Places Australia * Black Jack, Queensland, a locality in Queensland * Black Jack, a civil parish of Pottinger County, New South Wales * Black Jack H ...

was developed from this contract via '' Trente-et-Un'' and ''

''.

Notes

References

Literature

*''Meyers Konversationslexikon'' of 1888 *''Brockhaus Konversationslexikon'' 1894/96 *Friedrich Anton: ''Encyklopädie der Spiele'', Leipzig, 1889 *Jacques Lacombe: ''Encyclopédie méthodiques. Dictionnaire des jeux'', p. 7 , 1800 *

Parlett, David David Parlett (born 18 May 1939 in London) is a games scholar, historian, and translator from South London, who has studied both card games and board games. He is the president of the British Skat Association. His published works include many pop ...

(1990). ''The Oxford Guide to Card Games'', Oxford University Press, Oxford/New York * Ludovici, Carl Günther (1735). ''Grosses vollständiges Universal-Lexicon aller Wissenschafften und Künste.'' Vol. 9 (F). Halle and Leipzig: Johann Heinrich Sedler. * {{Historical card games 17th-century card games Gambling games French card games German card games French deck card games Vying games