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Maw (card game)
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Maw (card game)
Maw, formerly also mawe, was a Scottish card game for two players, popularised by James I, which is ancestral to the Irish national game of Twenty-five as well as the Canadian game of Forty-fives. Maw appears to be the same as five cards, a game described by Charles Cotton in the 17th century. The game disappeared from the literature after the period of the English Commonwealth, only to emerge in Ireland in the 19th century in new forms for two or more players and known as five and ten, spoil five and forty-five. These new variants are still played today, the latter has evolved into the Canadian game of forty-fives.
The earliest records of the Scottish game of maw date to around 1550. James VI and I played maw, and it is frequently mentioned up to about 1650. Maw was played at Hengrave Hall at Christmas 1572. In 1580 it was described as "a playe at cardes grown out of the country, from the meanest, into credit at court with the greatest." On 14 December 1594 a lost play called The Set at Maw premiered at The Rose.
The game is mentioned in a 1608 play by Thomas Middleton in which a character replies: "Then I hope, you will be as good to us as the five-finger at maw," and in another in 1611 written by George Chapman and called May Day in which Lodovico rues his loss in a game of Maw against Lucretia: "You will the more muse at my fortune, or my oversights. For the game [at maw] stood, methought, upon my last two tricks, when I made sure of the set, and yet lost it, having the varlet [Jack] and the five finger to make two tricks." Thomas Cockson's 1609 engraving The Revells of Christendome includes a description of maw being played:
Hopes to winn something too, Maw is the game
at which hee playes, & Challengeth at the same
A Monk, who stakes a Challice : France setts gould,
& shuffles: the Monk cutts: but France (being bould)
Deales freely: Rubs : and the first card hee showes,
is the Five Finger, which being tourn’d up, goes
Cold to the Moncks hart : the next card, France sees
in his owne hand, is the Ace of hartes, "I Leeze"
Cryes out the Monck; sayes France, "Show what you have,"
the Monck could show France nothing but the Knave.
The former peasant's game became fashionable in court circles by the reign of James I and the king himself was a card player, a 1622 pamphlet alluded to this:
Ever in the very gaming Ordinaries, where men have scarce leisure to say grace, yet they take a tyme to censure your Majesties actions and that in their oulde school Termes. They say you have lost the fairest game at Maw that ever King had, for want of making the best advantage of the five finger, and playing the other helpes in time. That your owne Carde-holders play bootye, and give the signe out of your owne hande. That he you played withall hath ever been knowne for the greatest cheater in Christendome.
"Five finger" was the name of the trump 5 in the game. The Duke of Buckingham mentioned playing six sets of maw with Sir John Ayres in a letter to King James.
Along with many other old card games, maw died out in England during the time of the English Commonwealth (1649–1660). These games were succeeded by new ones primarily from Europe.
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Maw (card game)
Maw, formerly also mawe, was a Scottish card game for two players, popularised by James I, which is ancestral to the Irish national game of Twenty-five as well as the Canadian game of Forty-fives. Maw appears to be the same as five cards, a game described by Charles Cotton in the 17th century. The game disappeared from the literature after the period of the English Commonwealth, only to emerge in Ireland in the 19th century in new forms for two or more players and known as five and ten, spoil five and forty-five. These new variants are still played today, the latter has evolved into the Canadian game of forty-fives.
The earliest records of the Scottish game of maw date to around 1550. James VI and I played maw, and it is frequently mentioned up to about 1650. Maw was played at Hengrave Hall at Christmas 1572. In 1580 it was described as "a playe at cardes grown out of the country, from the meanest, into credit at court with the greatest." On 14 December 1594 a lost play called The Set at Maw premiered at The Rose.
The game is mentioned in a 1608 play by Thomas Middleton in which a character replies: "Then I hope, you will be as good to us as the five-finger at maw," and in another in 1611 written by George Chapman and called May Day in which Lodovico rues his loss in a game of Maw against Lucretia: "You will the more muse at my fortune, or my oversights. For the game [at maw] stood, methought, upon my last two tricks, when I made sure of the set, and yet lost it, having the varlet [Jack] and the five finger to make two tricks." Thomas Cockson's 1609 engraving The Revells of Christendome includes a description of maw being played:
Hopes to winn something too, Maw is the game
at which hee playes, & Challengeth at the same
A Monk, who stakes a Challice : France setts gould,
& shuffles: the Monk cutts: but France (being bould)
Deales freely: Rubs : and the first card hee showes,
is the Five Finger, which being tourn’d up, goes
Cold to the Moncks hart : the next card, France sees
in his owne hand, is the Ace of hartes, "I Leeze"
Cryes out the Monck; sayes France, "Show what you have,"
the Monck could show France nothing but the Knave.
The former peasant's game became fashionable in court circles by the reign of James I and the king himself was a card player, a 1622 pamphlet alluded to this:
Ever in the very gaming Ordinaries, where men have scarce leisure to say grace, yet they take a tyme to censure your Majesties actions and that in their oulde school Termes. They say you have lost the fairest game at Maw that ever King had, for want of making the best advantage of the five finger, and playing the other helpes in time. That your owne Carde-holders play bootye, and give the signe out of your owne hande. That he you played withall hath ever been knowne for the greatest cheater in Christendome.
"Five finger" was the name of the trump 5 in the game. The Duke of Buckingham mentioned playing six sets of maw with Sir John Ayres in a letter to King James.
Along with many other old card games, maw died out in England during the time of the English Commonwealth (1649–1660). These games were succeeded by new ones primarily from Europe.