Playing Card Collector
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| Alta Carta | The Alternative for the Playing Card Collector |
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Collecting playing cards is a rather unusual hobby. In the entire German speaking regions there are perhaps some 200 collectors that are organised in corresponding clubs. I estimate that per member there are three to five addition persons with this hobby. From these relations you must not be surprised that you hardly know anybody with this leisure pursuit.
What is the reason playing cards are attractive, other than there are only few collectors? Everybody sees that the post office regularly release new stamps. But a bridge game is a bridge game that already looked the same 50 years ago. Where is the attraction? A big advantage to stamps is that playing cards are much larger and more stable. You don't need a magnifying glass and a pair of tweezers to enjoy the pictures. You can touch the cards with your hands without risking damaging them. It is true that the changes of standard pattern are quite slow and even more rarely patterns are replaced by a new design. But on the other hand you have a huge variety of non standard cards. For nearly every topic you can find special editions. You find cartoons of politicians, comic heroes, historic representations, events, erotic drawings or whatever. Cards are manufactured for various reasons, be it for fortune telling, for learning or just for playing. Beside the standard patterns for popular games such as Bridge, Poker, Skat, Jass or Scopa there are also other games that have own cards. Just think of happy families. Already the regional cards are quite rich. They vary in patterns; there are different systems of suits and different manufacturers that produce cards. There is also the factor time. Even if the patterns change rather slowly, over time modifications are noticeable. But not only have the pictures changed, also the paper, the technique of printing and other treatments to make the cards more endurable. Beside playing cards there are also trading cards. These are subdivided in sports and non-sports cards. These types of cards are a completely different scope and therefore not part of this book.
Further not covered by this book are oriental and other cards that belong to another culture than our western. I think of East Indian and Chinese cards or Vietnamese chess cards. Such cards are definitely an enrichment for every collection, but rather difficult to obtain.
Even I if exclude several fields there is still enough to give each person something of interest. You will find more in the next chapter.
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