Some great poker trivia,
poker stories, poker myths and poker
quotes.
The History
of Poker!
Actually no one is
absolutely positve how modern day poker
originated. There is no recorded game
that from which poker is clearly
derived. Modern Poker is most likely a
blend of different games sem dating back
centuries.
The earliest written
record comes from Jonathan H.
Green, circa 1834. He had encountered the
game on Mississippi riverboats, and
he recorded rules of what he referred to
as the "cheating game". Unable to find
any other references to the game, even in the
current Hoyle editions, Green named the
game Poker. The original game as he
described it was played with
20 cards, using only the aces, kings, queens,
jacks and tens. Two to four people could play, and
each was dealt five cards.
By
the time Green wrote about it, poker had become
the number one cheating game on the Mississippi
riverboats, receiving even more action than
Three-Card Monte. Poker had been invented,
most likely by card cheats looking to expand from
Three-Card Monte.
Where did Green get the
workd poker?
The dictionary says it is derived
from an eighteenth-century French game,
poque. There are also references to
pochspiel, an old German
game. Pochspiel was also a game with
bluffing, where players could pass or
open by rapping on the table and saying, "Ich
Poche!"
But Green may have found the word from another
source! It is belived that the card cheats used
the term "poker" when playing the game, a
reference from pickpockets to a "marks" bankroll,
the "poke" If they got the money from the mark
using the card game, they may have called it a
"poker". While observing the game on the
riverboats, Green may have overheard this
term from the card
cheats.
The game of Poker later
evolved to include 32 cards, and eventually the
modern day deck of 52, and has gone from illegal
backrooms and basments to famous casinos and even
some of the best hotels in New York! Today
poker is played legally in many states, and on the
internet there is always a game just a click
away!