The relation which the marks of the suits bear to each other in the three varieties of cards most generally known in Europe, will perhaps be best understood from the following summary, which shows, at one view, the names given to the suits of each variety in the country where such cards were chiefly used.
HERZEN, oder ROTH. GRÃN. EICHELN. SCHELLEN. (HEARTS, or RED. GREEN (LEAVES). ACORNS. BELLS.)
COPPE. SPADE. BASTONI. DANARI. (CUPS. SWORDS. CLUBS, or BATONS. MONEY.)
CÅUR. PIQUE. TRÃFLE. CARREAU. (HEARTS. SPADES. CLUBS. DIAMONDS.)
In the oldest cards of the German and Spanish type there appears to have been no Queen. In the German pack, the second coat card was a kind of superior officer, distinguished as OBER,--Upper, Superior; while the third, corresponding with our Knave, was named UNTER,--Inferior.[265] The Spaniards called the second coat card CABALLO,--the Horseman or Knight;--and the Knave they called SOTA, a word which, in the Dictionary of the Spanish Academy, is said to be derived from the Italian _soto_, signifying 'under.'[266] The Italians called their second coat card CAVALLO, and the third FANTE; in each of the four suits the principal coat card was the King. It would, however, appear that at an early period, the Italians occasionally substituted a Queen for the Cavallo; and if the cards formerly belonging to the Marquis Girolamo be really of so early a date as is assigned to them by Millin,[267] it would seem that the French have no just title to the "honour" of being the first to introduce a Queen as the second coat card, and that in having made "Place aux Dames," in the pack, they had only followed the example set them by the Italians.
Millin's notice of those cards is to the following effect: "In the collection of the Marquis Girolamo, at Venice, there are some cards of very early date,--about the beginning of the fifteenth century. They are larger than the ordinary cards of the present day; they are also very thick; and the material of which they are formed resembles the cotton paper of ancient manuscripts. The figures, which are impressed--'imprimées'--on a gold ground, consist of three Kings, two Queens, and two Valets, one of the last being on horseback. Each figure has a Baton, a Sword, or a piece of Money [as the mark of the suit]. The design is very like that of Jacobello del Fiore; but the work has the appearance of impression, and the colours seem to have been applied by means of a stencil. They are the most ancient specimens of their kind."[268]