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Welcome to Poker Robo .com |
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The Origins and History of Poker
Where did the poker come from and how did it get its name? These questions
are very topical as more and more people are playing this popular game.
Unfortunately, there isn't any cut and dried answer to either question, but
there is plenty of speculation about both. Since people who invent games
don't often record the process, we must entertain many possibilities.
Many have speculated that poker is related to a 16th century Persian card
game called As Nas. With rules similar to today's five card stud, As Nas was
played with a 20 card deck containing five suits. It had similar poker hand
rankings, such as three-of-a-kind. A few are of the opinion poker was
invented by the Chinese in 900 A.D. Scarne, in his Encyclopedia of Card
Games, gives credit to French and German players who modified As Nas and
called it poque or Pochen.
According to Scarne, there was a strong French influence in the first poker
rules published in the United States:
The 32-card piquet pack was dealt from the bottom of the deck, and certain
combinations of cards bore French names. The draw feature of Poker is found
in Ambigu, and the blind, straddles, raise, table stakes, and freeze-out in
the pre-Revolutionary Bouillotte. Bluffing and the use of wild cards were
important features in the English game of Brag. In all these European games,
however, a hand consisted only of three cards. The credit for the use of a
five-card hand and also the bluff must go to the Persian As Nas, from which
our word Ace may also have come.
In 1845 an early American edition of Hoyle included Twenty-Card poker and
also “Poker or Bluff.” Twenty years later the American Hoyle added the game,
calling simply “Bluff.” Perhaps a few players may have confused it with the
English Brag also called that, but most players have always called it Poker.
Game-book editors who do their research in previous game books sometimes
still call it “Poker or Bluff,” although no player has used the latter term
for nearly a century
Poker rules began to evolve in 1840 when a fifty-two card deck replaced the
original twenty cards. Each player was dealt five cards face down. Only one
round of betting was allowed. There was no additional draw of the cards.
During the 1860s the draw and an extra betting round were introduced. By
1875 straights and flushes were part of the game.
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