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Suzy Q
Lv 7
Suzy Q asked in Education & ReferenceTrivia · 7 years ago

What was this card game called 'lottery tickets' in Jane Austen's time?

I'm re-reading Pride and Prejudice, and several times a card game called 'lottery tickets' is mentioned. People who play it can apparently win or lose 'fishes'.

Who knows how this card game was played?

3 Answers

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  • ?
    Lv 4
    4 years ago

    Lottery Card Game

  • Anonymous
    7 years ago

    "...the game Lydia Bennet was playing at Mrs Phillips’s house in Chapter 16 of Pride and Prejudice.

    She was playing a simple card game called Lottery. The rule of this game are included in my copy of Hoyles Games of 1817.

    As you can see it is merely a game of chance, no skill required:

    The cards being shuffled and cut by the left hand person, one dealer gives every person a card, face down, for the prize, on which is to be placed different values of counters from the pool,at the option of the person to whom each card has been given.

    The second dealer then delivers to each player from the other pack, a card for the ticket. Next the cards are turned, by order of the manager, and whoever happens to have a corresponding card takes the prize upon the card dealt to him and those remaining undrawn, are returned to the hand…..

    Just the sort of game to engross Lydia, a girl not known for her towering intellect.

    For gaming counters at Mrs Phillips’s Meryton home ,we understand that the company used “fish”:

    Elizabeth went away with her head full of him. She could think of nothing but of Mr. Wickham, and of what he had told her, all the way home; but there was not time for her even to mention his name as they went, for neither Lydia nor Mr. Collins were once silent. Lydia talked incessantly of lottery tickets..."

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  • 7 years ago

    I found 3 websites about it doing a google search for 'lottery tickets card game'.

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