- Spades (suit)
Spades is one of the four suits found in
playing cards .In bridge, it ranks highest out of the four suits. In
cartomancy , it is typically associated withdeath .whatFact|date=August 2008The symbol was first used on French
playing cards , made inRouen andLyon in the15th Century , around the time that playing cards were first mass-produced by the use ofwoodcut s. The suits were based on the four major economic classes of the lateMiddle Ages : spades represented themilitary , hearts represented the clergy, clubs representedagriculture and diamonds represented trade merchants.In the Germanic countries the spade was the symbol associated with the blade of a
spade - and in all Germanic languages the name of the tool and the suit are identical. In German and Dutch the suit is also, alternately, named "Schüppen" and "schoppen" (shovel ).It is often stated that the suit is named after Spanish "espada" (
sword ), but this is not likely. In Germany and Scandinavia, Spanish playing cards were not in use, and Spanish loanwords in these languages were rare. It should also be noted that the Spanish name for the French suit is "picas" - not "espadas".In some parts of Britain, namely the West Midlands, the suit can be known as "cabbages", or "cabbage-leaf", which is a direct correlation with the German suit of "leaves".Fact|date=March 2008
Analogues in other suits
* German suits: leaves ( _de. Laub, Blatt, Gras, Grün)
* Swiss German suits:shield s ( _de. Schilten)
* Italo-Spanish suits:sword s ( _it. Spade / _es. Espadas)
*Tarot suits:suit of swords Meanings in other languages
* - pikes,
lance s
* - pikes,lance s
* (Bastounia) - canes
* - pikes, lances
* ("List") -leaf (always singular)
* - swords
* ("Piki") (transcription from French)
* - pikes, lances
* - pikes,lance sСodes of symbol
Unicode — U+2660 and U+2664:: ♠ ♤HTML — "♠" ("♠") and "♤"::Example cards
The Beatles TV show
On the Beatles TV show,
Ringo Starr is the spades suit.ee also
*
Ace of Spades
*Spades (card game)
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