One such game is a French gambling game called quinze, which means “fifteen.”
This game appeared sometime in the sixteenth century, and was popular in European casinos up until the mid-eighteen hundreds.
Here’s how quinze was played:
As a casino game, quinze was not house-banked, but was banked by the player who dealt the cards. The house merely took a percentage of the dealer’s win. All players bet against the dealer/banker, and bets had to be placed prior to the deal. A standard fifty-two-card deck was used, with each card counting as its face value. Aces counted as one, and all court cards counted as ten. The deck was shuffled, and each player and the dealer were dealt one card face down. Players had to play their hands before the dealer played his. Each player in turn had the option to hit or stand, and any number of hits was permitted. If the player achieved a total of exactly 15, he immediately turned up his cards, and provided the dealer did not also make a total of 15, the player would be paid off at 2 to 1 on his bet. If both the player and the dealer made 15, the hand was a push. The only exception was that a two-card 15, a natural 15, would beat a 15 total comprised of more than two cards.
Gambling scholars have argued for decades about the origins of many modem gambling games. When it comes to the game of blackjack, the most popular housebanked card game in history, many modem texts tell us that the origins of the game are “uncertain.” Hey, just about everything in this universe is uncertain, but the origins of blackjack are not. The game can be traced to a number of popular European card games from as far back as the fifteenth century. That’s right around the time when Gutenberg invented the printing press, and cards themselves became popular (and cheap) enough to play games with. Prior to that, cards were hand-painted by artists and calligraphers for royalty only, and they were primarily used for religious, educational, or ceremonial purposes.
Virtually all card games are based on some specified number of cards being dealt, with a winner determined by some happenstance of rank, suit, match, sequence, or total. In the simple children’s game of war-which in recent years has been modified into a house-banked casino games-the only determining factor of the winner is rank. In more complex card games, like poker, various combinations of rank, suit, match, or sequence may decide the winner. Blackjack is more complex than war, but much simpler than poker. The winner at twenty-one is decided almost entirely on the basis of total, with the cards’ numerical values being added together.
What city is home to more casinos per square mile than anywhere in the world, and also happens to be mecca for the modern-day card counter? If your answer was “Las Vegas,” you’re right. Sin City has turned up the volume yet again. And that was a good business decision for slot promotions, because with the popularity of casino gambling exploding across the United States, some place had to emerge as the creme de la creme of gambling towns. And that somewhere remains, indisputably, Las Vegas, Nevada.
Okay, enough about Vegas and poker casinos.
In the United States, try Atlantic City, Northern Connecticut, Gulfport/Biloxi, Reno/Lake Tahoe, Chicagoland, Minnesota, Michigan, St. Louis, New Orleans, Niagara Falls - the list goes on and on, and includes hundreds of riverboats and Indian casinos where you can play Blackjack tournaments all over the United States. By the way, unless you’re from the Upper Midwest, I’ll bet you didn’t know that the state of Minnesota alone has about nineteen oper-ating casinos.
Typically, there are five to seven locations to place a bet on a standard table, and a game called blackjack may be dealt to anywhere from one to seven players depending on the number of betting locations available. On rare occasion, usually at higher-limit games, table layouts with even fewer betting spots may be offered. Players often benefit on blackjack bonus offers.
On the international front, casinos can be found in many countries all over the world. They’re just a little more low-key than those in America. Don’t expect mega-structures with 6,000-room hotels over-looking a volcano. In fact, in some European countries it’s very possible to pass a casino on the street and not even know of its existence behind the glass doors of what could easily be mistaken as a private club or office. Serious players find out where the games are and what rules apply - without the aid of blinking lights or garish advertisement. In every casino you can find a game called blackjack. It’s a whole different kind of interface - you’ll know what I mean if you ever play in other countries.
Some better-known international destinations offering casino start playing blackjack gambling include the Caribbean, Canada, London, Amsterdam, Monte Carlo, and all over the Pacific Rim, including the major cities in Australia.
The object of the game is to beat the dealer, as opposed to getting as close as possible to 21 - a common misconception. Players compete solely against the dealer, or house, and not against one another as is the case in many other card games.
The deck of cards contains a 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, jack, queen, king, and ace-each in one of four different suits. Suits include spades, hearts, diamonds, and clubs, but are irrelevant. Each card from 2 to 9 has a value equal to its number, or total spots. Tens, jacks, queens, and kings are all worth 10. Aces are unique in that an ace can be counted as 1 or 11, depending on which is more favorable to the player at the time of its usage. For some hands the ace may start out being considered as 11 only to be counted as 1 later in the same hand.