Playing Cards — Grammatical Cards
London: John Lenthall, (circa 1717)
Estimate
10,000 - 15,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Playing Cards — Grammatical Cards
52 cards, comprising 51 (of 52) suit cards and one imprint card. Engravings on paper, text in Latin, with red ink tax stamp on the king of spades, plain versos; lacking the ten of spades. 13 of the cards are mounted in a frame, the rest are housed in a folder attached to the back of the frame.
3¾ by 2¼ in. (card); 26 by 20 inches. (frame)
9.5 by 6 cm; 66 by 51 cm
Jaime Ortiz-Patiño (Sotheby's, London, 10 December 2013, English literature, history, children's books and illustrations, lot 231)
Acquired at the above sale by the present collector
Jaime Ortiz-Patiño Collection of Early Playing Cards, #27
Mann, Sylvia. All Cards on the Table: Standard Playing Cards of the World and Their History, #260
An educational deck of playing cards, used to teach Latin grammar.
This deck is based on an earlier version first published by John Seller and J. Hill in 1677. However, Lenthall's set is fully engraved instead of typeset with woodcuts. Both decks were based on William Lily's A short introduction to grammar, an influential schoolbook that was widely used in England between 1515 and 1758. In the deck, each suit represents a section of Latin grammar: clubs are Etymologia, spades Orthographia, diamonds Prosodia, and hearts Syntaxis.
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