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Basset (card Game)
Basset (French ''bassette'', from the Italian ''bassetta''), also known as barbacole and hocca, is a gambling game using cards, that was considered one of the most polite. It was intended for persons of the highest rank because of the great losses or gains that might be accrued by players. Basset in Italy According to DELI (''Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana''), the word ''Basetta'' is first recorded in the first half of the 15th century. The game Basset is described by a few authors as having been invented in 1593 by a noble Venetian named Pietro Cellini, who was punished with exile in Corsica for his contrivance. It may have been devised out of the game of Hocca, Hoca or even Hoc, considered the precursor and an outlawed form of Italian roulette at which people lost considerable sums of money and also an early iteration of Biribi, which was brought into fashion by Cardinal Mazarin. Basset in France Basset was first introduced into France by Signior Justiniani, amba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Rowlandson
Thomas Rowlandson (; 13 July 1757 – 21 April 1827) was an English artist and caricaturist of the Georgian Era, noted for his political satire and social observation. A prolific artist and printmaker, Rowlandson produced both individual social and political satires, as well as a large number of illustrations for novels, humorous books, and topographical works. Like other caricaturists of his age such as James Gillray, his caricatures are often robust or bawdy. Rowlandson also produced highly explicit erotica for a private clientele; this was never published publicly at the time and is now only found in a small number of collections. His caricatures included those of people in power such as the Duchess of Devonshire, William Pitt the Younger and Napoleon Bonaparte. Biography Rowlandson was born in Old Jewry, in the City of London. He was baptised on 23 July 1757 at St Mary Colechurch, London to William and Mary Rowlandson. The baptismal record for St Mary, now in the L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guinea (British Coin)
The guinea (; commonly abbreviated gn., or gns. in plural) was a coin, minted in Great Britain between 1663 and 1814, that contained approximately one-quarter of an ounce of gold. The name came from the Guinea region in West Africa, from where much of the gold used to make the coins was sourced. It was the first English machine-struck gold coin, originally representing a value of 20 shillings in sterling specie, equal to one pound, but rises in the price of gold relative to silver caused the value of the guinea to increase, at times to as high as thirty shillings. From 1717 to 1816, its value was officially fixed at twenty-one shillings. In the Great Recoinage of 1816, the guinea was demonetised and replaced by the gold sovereign. Following the Great Recoinage, the word "guinea" was retained as a colloquial or specialised term, even though the coins were no longer in use; the term ''guinea'' also survived as a unit of account in some fields. Notable usages included professio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
16th-century Gambling Games
The 16th century began with the Julian calendar, Julian year 1501 (represented by the Roman numerals MDI) and ended with either the Julian or the Gregorian calendar, Gregorian year 1600 (MDC), depending on the reckoning used (the Gregorian calendar introduced a lapse of 10 days in October 1582). The Renaissance in Italy and Europe saw the emergence of important artists, authors and scientists, and led to the foundation of important subjects which include accounting and political science. Copernicus proposed the Copernican heliocentrism, heliocentric universe, which was met with strong resistance, and Tycho Brahe refuted the theory of celestial spheres through observational measurement of the SN 1572, 1572 appearance of a Milky Way supernova. These events directly challenged the long-held notion of an immutable universe supported by Ptolemy and Aristotle, and led to major revolutions in astronomy and science. Galileo Galilei became a champion of the new sciences, invented the first ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Dickson Carr
John Dickson Carr (November 30, 1906 – February 27, 1977) was an American author of detective stories, who also published using the pseudonyms Carter Dickson, Carr Dickson, and Roger Fairbairn. He lived in England for a number of years, and is often grouped among "British-style" mystery writers. Most (though not all) of his novels had English settings, especially country villages and estates, and English characters. His two best-known fictional detectives ( Dr. Gideon Fell and Sir Henry Merrivale) were both English. Carr is generally regarded as one of the greatest writers of so-called "Golden Age" mysteries; complex, plot-driven stories in which the puzzle is paramount. He was influenced in this regard by the works of Gaston Leroux and by the Father Brown stories of G. K. Chesterton. He was a master of the so-called locked room mystery, in which a detective solves apparently impossible crimes. The Dr. Fell mystery '' The Hollow Man'' (1935), usually considered Carr's ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Detective Fiction
Detective fiction is a subgenre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an criminal investigation, investigator or a detective—whether professional, amateur or retired—investigates a crime, often murder. The detective genre began around the same time as speculative fiction and other genre fiction in the mid-nineteenth century and has remained extremely popular, particularly in novels. Some of the most famous heroes of detective fiction include C. Auguste Dupin, Sherlock Holmes, Kogoro Akechi, Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot. Juvenile stories featuring The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, and The Boxcar Children have also remained in print for several decades. History Ancient Some scholars, such as R. H. Pfeiffer, have suggested that certain ancient and religious texts bear similarities to what would later be called detective fiction. In the Old Testament story of Susanna (Book of Daniel: 13), Susanna and the Elders (the Protestant Bible locates this story within the apocrypha), t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Four False Weapons
''The Four False Weapons'', first published in 1937, is a detective story by John Dickson Carr featuring his series detective Henri Bencolin. This novel contains a Locked-room mystery, locked-room situation. Plot summary Richard Curtis is a junior British barrister entrusted with disentangling a client of the firm, Ralph Douglas, from his involvement with ''poule de luxe'' Rose Klonec. The infamous Rose has had more lovers than she can count—she removes all their cash and jewelry in the process, then discards them. Rose's dead body has been found in Douglas's country villa and in the room are a pistol, a razor, a box of poison pills and a stiletto. Henri Bencolin, of the Paris police, proves that none of these four weapons were used to kill Rose, and that she has been the victim of an unusual fifth. The comings and goings at the villa that night are the subject of much investigation. It is not until Bencolin is invited to take a hand at the Corpses' Club to play a 17th-ce ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cassino (card Game)
Cassino, sometimes spelt Casino, is an English card game for two to four players using a standard, 52-card, French-suited pack.Parlett (2008), p. 401. It is the only fishing game to have penetrated the English-speaking world. It is similar to the later Italian game of Scopa and is often said, without substantiation, to be of Italian origin. Cassino is still played today in Madeira, probably due to English influence.''Câmara de Lobos cumpre tradição do Torneio de Cassino do 1º de Maio'' at funchalnoticias.net. Retrieved 22 May 2023. History Although Cassino is often claimed to be of Italian origin, detailed research by |
Faro (card Game)
Faro ( ), pharaoh, pharao, or farobank is a late 17th-century French gambling game using cards. It is descended from basset, and belongs to the lansquenet and monte bank family of games due to the use of a banker and several players. Winning or losing occurs when cards turned up by the banker match those already exposed. It is not a direct relative of poker, but faro was often just as popular due to its fast action, easy-to-learn rules, and better odds than most games of chance. The game of faro is played with only one deck of cards and admits any number of players. Popular in North America during the 19th century, Faro was eventually overtaken by poker as the preferred card game of gamblers in the early 20th century. Variants include German faro, Jewish faro, and ladies' faro. History The earliest references to a card game named (French for 'pharaoh') are found in Southwestern France during the reign of Louis XIV. Basset was outlawed in 1691, and pharaoh emerged sev ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abraham De Moivre
Abraham de Moivre FRS (; 26 May 166727 November 1754) was a French mathematician known for de Moivre's formula, a formula that links complex numbers and trigonometry, and for his work on the normal distribution and probability theory. He moved to England at a young age due to the religious persecution of Huguenots in France which reached a climax in 1685 with the Edict of Fontainebleau. He was a friend of Isaac Newton, Edmond Halley, and James Stirling (mathematician), James Stirling. Among his fellow Huguenot exiles in England, he was a colleague of the editor and translator Pierre des Maizeaux. De Moivre wrote a book on probability theory, ''The Doctrine of Chances'', said to have been prized by gamblers. De Moivre first discovered Binet's formula, the closed-form expression for Fibonacci numbers linking the ''n''th power of the golden ratio ''φ'' to the ''n''th Fibonacci number. He also was the first to postulate the central limit theorem, a cornerstone of probability theo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parlay
A parlay, accumulator (or acca), combo bet, or multi is a single bet that links together two or more individual wagers, usually seen in sports betting. Winning the parlay is dependent on all of those wagers winning together. If any of the bets in the parlay lose, the entire parlay loses. If any of the plays in the parlay ties, or "pushes", the parlay reverts to a lower number of wagers with the payout odds reducing accordingly. Parlay bets are high-risk, high-reward; linking the possibilities drastically reduces the chance of the bet paying off overall. The benefit of the parlay is that there are much higher pay-offs, although as usual, casinos and bookkeepers offering parlays often exploit the poor calculation of gamblers by not increasing the pay-out as much as the odds truly demand, with the effect of the house edge increasing in parlays. Although a variety of bets can be used to build a parlay bet, correlated parlays are usually not allowed by traditional bookmakers. Co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Compleat Gamester
''The Compleat Gamester'', first published in 1674, is one of the earliest known English-language games compendia. It was published anonymously, but later attributed to Charles Cotton (1630–1687). Further editions appeared in the period up to 1754 before it was eclipsed by ''Mr. Hoyle's Games'' by Edmond Hoyle (1672–1769). History In the mid-17th century, game literature in England took off. Initially these were translations of French books, for example on piquet, but later more original publications appeared. The most successful of these was ''The Compleat Gamester'', which was first published anonymously in 1674, but was attributed during the 18th century to Charles Cotton. Contents The 1674 edition included instructions on how to play "all manner of usual and most gentile games either on cards or dice," as well as "the arts and mysteries" of riding, racing, archery Archery is the sport, practice, or skill of using a Bow and arrow, bow to shooting, shoot arr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
