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Kurofuda (Black Cards)

This is a vintage deck made by Nintendo. It is a Mekuri pattern (four-suited deck) which developed in the 1700s. These cards take after the Tensho Karuta, the early Japanese paper cards which were modelled on the standard Portuguese pattern brought into the country in the mid 1500s. They used Portuguese playing cards as a base but obscured the images to avoid retribution from the government for using foreign cards. It was possible to be put to death for this offence.
Mekuri suits are of the Latin family: Koppu (Cups), Ôru (Coins), Isu (Swords) and Hau (Batons). In all mekuri patterns the court figures of Kings, cavaliers and knaves are extremely stylized and barely distinguishable, almost completely covered by heavy strokes of colour. The dragons of the Portuguese aces are so abstarct that they are no longer distinguishable at all (bottom right card of each suit).
This deck includes an Oni-fuda ("ogre card"), also called Kin-fuda ("golden card") which is often written on the small notice above the ogre's head. It is similar to a joker card and does not belong to any of the suits.
Around the mid 1900s mekuri games became practically extinct, and the manufacturing of many patterns was discontinued within a couple of decades. The few decks now produced are considered to be for collectors or game historians.[/color]

Skittles Fanning Deck (Fan Dack)
1972 design by magician Yutaka Kikuchi

This is another deck made by Nintendo, this time for the renowned magician Yutaka Kikuchi. Kikuchi was famous for developing a flame in hand trick, amoung others, and many of his devices are still being sold today.
These playing cards are shaped like bowling pins and have artistically patterned backs for fanning displays. They could probably make spectacular fans in the right hands (not mine ).
The card faces are rather plain with no figures for the courts, only the letters K, Q, J, the suits signs and the usual stripes of bowling pins. The cards are 8" x 2.5", or 20.3 x 6.4 cm if you're metric.
Fan Dack is (mis)printed on the side of the box so that is the name I usually use for them. I got the Skittles title from WWPCM[/color]

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Cool J! I hadn't seen that tripod site before - that's an interesting article.
I'd like to add that the portraits on the grey backgrounds are all actors from traditional Japanese theater. I mention it because women weren't allowed in the profession so the female parts were played by men, which is why they are more homely than you'd expect.

Here's a run of the mill Nintendo deck. About 850 yen.

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Jock1971 wrote:Hi TGinitedcardists , Thanks for posting this deck, I`m curious to know a few things about Nintendo. i hope you can help. Is there any way you can date the decks ? I can`t see any codes etc and from what i`ve seen (not a lot )there are not many variations of the Ace of spades. ALso i see it came in a clear plastic tuck ,My 2 Angel decks came in clear plastic tucks are all the modern Japanese cards packed this way ?
I like the mermaid thingy Joker,
Oh.. 850 Yen is about £5 here and that seems a bit expensive for a standard deck
Thanks agin for showing the deck -jase-

It's a new deck, nothing special. My guess the Nintendo deck is 1-3 years old.

Most people just use a Bicycle or Bee deck to play cards.

Here is the ukiyo-e deck you posted in the shop, about 850 yen too.

I have seen the same basic Nintendo decks with interesting op-art backs.
That price seems pretty reasonable for an all plastic deck. Is Nintendo not making paper cards anymore? I have the Nintendo Club Platinum cards and they are plastic as well.

dazzleguts wrote:Is Nintendo not making paper cards anymore?

I don't know.

Space
2 Vintage Hanafuda
one by Ohishi-Tengudo, one by Matsui Tengudo
exact age undetermined

The double deck box these cards were sold to me in belongs to Ohishi-Tengudo, the oldest existing traditional card maker in Japan. The cards may be original to the box, or they might be replacements for the worn out originals. Both decks that were in the box are quite different from each other. One clearly is a Ohishi deck while the other, the one I am showing, has no make indicated on the Paulownia cards, where a makers mark can usually be found. The cards are a little dark with age and use.

**edit June 1, 2018 - with thanks to UC member mrcrich.
The shown deck is a deck from Matsui Tengudo, a maker that retired in 2011. Matsui Tengudo made high quality hanafuda and was known for hand printed decks. They also made special small sized hanafuda decks for travel that became popular with geisha.

Hanafuda ("Flower Cards") are beautiful playing cards, adorned with plants and animals, that became hugely popular in the Edo (1603-1867) period in Japan.

A deck consists of forty-eight cards divided into twelve suits of four cards each. The cards are small (5.3cm long x 3.3cm, 1 1/4" x 2 1/8"), made from stiff cardboard, and are beautifully illustrated. Each suit represents one of the twelve months of the year and shows individual plants, and some animals, that are associated with each month.

Here is an excellent website showing the different cards with their poetic and cultural associations.
http://namakajiri.net/nikki/the-flowers-of-hanafuda/

The cards shown above are, from top row to bottom:
January – Pine (Matsu)
Pine with Crane * Red-lettered Tanzaku(ribbon of paper or thin wood) * Plain Pine (2 cards)

February – Plum (Ume)
Plum with Nightingale * Red-lettered Tanzaku * Plain Plum (2)

March – Cherry (Sakura)
Cherry with Curtain * Red-lettered Tanzaku * Plain Cherry (2)

April – Wisteria (Fuji)
Wisteria with Cuckoo * Solid Red Tanzaku * Plain Wisteria (2)


Game play:
These small stiff cards make a satisfying sound when thrown down onto a table during play, and use the "wash the deck" shuffle - being spread out face down on a table and mixed.

While the easiest strategy for scoring points is to match cards of the same suit, many Hanafuda games have special card combinations – or "yaku" – that will earn you point bonuses. I play the popular Koi Koi which is almost entirely made up of yaku. A few examples are:

"Viewing the Moon" -- Sake Cup card from the Chrysanthemum suit & Moon card from the Pampas suit

"Viewing the Cherry Blossoms" -- Sake Cup card from the Chrysanthemum suit & Curtain card from the cherry suit

"Viewing the Blossoms under the Moon" -- all 3 of the cards: Sake Cup card, Moon card & Cherry Blossom Curtain card

Apparently viewing things always requires some rice wine to keep it interesting

These cards are:
May – Iris (Ayame)
Iris with Bridge * Solid Red Tanzaku * Plain Iris (2)

June – Peony (Botan)
Peony with Butterfly * Solid Blue Tanzaku * Plain Peony (2)

July – Clover (Hagi)
Clover with Wild Boar * Solid Red Tanzaku * Plain Clover (2)

August – Pampas (Susuki)
Pampas with Full Moon * Pampas with Geese * Plain Pampas (2)


Card structure:
The closest thing to cards in japan, before the Portuguese brought paper ones, were seashells that were painted and used to play matching games. So when paper cards were made in Japan they made them thick and hard like the shells, but rectangular like the Karuta of the Portuguese.

Most traditional Japanese card decks have a black, brown, or red border and back. The small cardboard cards are printed, then a piece of paper is glued to the back and folded over the edges of the card to form the border on the front. This frames the imagery and protects the edges of the cards. (In modern decks the borders and back are now often printed on the card stock with the card imagery)

A reason for the different colours of backs is that most serious players carry two or three decks to keep the game moving quickly. Having decks with different coloured backs and borders allows them to shuffle one deck, while the other is in play, without mixing the decks up or giving players an opportunity to cheat.

These cards are:
September -- Chrysanthemum (Kiku)
Chrysanthemum with Sake Cup * Solid Blue Tanzaku * Plain Chrysanthemum (2)

October – Maple (Momiji)
Maple with Deer * Solid Blue Tanzaku * Plain Maple (2)

November – Willow (Yanagi)
Willow with Poet * Willow with Swallow * Willow with Solid Red Tanzaku * Rain and Lightning
**The poet on the willow card was a famous calligrapher whose name was Tofu.

December – Paulownia (Kiri)
Paulownia with Phoenix * Plain Paulownia (3 cards)


In Japan private gambling was illegal for centuries, but games themselves were not. When authorities would ban a type of card deck that was being used for gambling, someone would always come up with new cards, or a new game for existing cards, to get around the ban. This created a large variety of playing cards. Hanafuda were born during this cat and mouse game. Though not really suitable for gambling they were eventually used for it and banned like the rest.

About 120 years ago the Meiji government realized the futility of banning the cards and lifted the ban. Prime Minister Ito Hirobumi even commanded Ohishi to produce sets of flower cards in order to preserve the early flower karuta for future generations. With the ban lifted an entrepreneur called Yamauchi Fusajiro took the opportuinty to open a Hanafuda shop in Kyoto. His hand painted mulberry bark cards became so popular that the brand name of his cards, Nintendo, became synonymous with Hanafuda (and much later with video games).

Today special edition Hanafuda decks are often inhabited with pop culture characters or scenes. Cards can be found featuring anything from famous attractions of the city Kyoto to characters from Disney, with video game and anime editions being especially popular.


some sources I used:[/color]
http://www.studiokotokoto.com/2014/03/1 ... -of-cards/
http://www.sloperama.com/hanafuda/koikoi.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanafuda

Any of you guys have Obake Karuta ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karuta" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; )? They're kinda like the predecessors of Pokemon cards . They feature Japanese supernatural/mythological creatures.

Some further information...


As with other playing card decks, not all Hanafuda decks are created equal. Often different grades of decks are indicated by their box art or wrappers, like the Napolean box of the Nintendo Kurofuda deck I posted earlier. Napolean was used to indicate Nintendo's top quality cards. Nintendo's medium quality decks feature Tengu (a demon with a long nose), and their cheaper novelty decks come in a wrapper with a simple nature scene.

This box has a gold label indicating it contained gold quality hanafuda cards made by Ohishi-Tengudo. They also made silver quality cards. Here are two vintage Hanafuda decks, with the same numbers of cards, but one deck is 4 cards thicker than the other. These 2 decks were found together in the Ohishi-Tengudo box shown above. The thicker deck may be original to the box and has Ohishi-Tengudo text, but the thinner one, which I used as the hanafuda example deck, is very different and has been identified as a Matsui Tengudo deck. As in pasteboard cards, the quality is not necessarily in the thicker paper. The older (more used) thin deck seems higher quality than it's companion deck. The paper backing and border has been more thoroughly glued in place, and the cards remain flat while the thicker newer deck has bowed a little.


Here are sample cards from three different hanafuda decks:

The top one is a modern plastic Korean Hwa-tu Hanafuda deck that has 6 extra cards for Korean games. They are made by "Diamond Playing Cards" and the extra cards are basically ad cards for Diamond. I have 4 plastic Korean Hanafuda decks in total, all by different makers.
The second deck is a vintage deck with Nichiyu on the box. The only Nichiyu I have been able find in Japan is a forklift company, so either this was a kind of advertising deck, or the Nichiyu playing card company is no longer around. This red backed deck may be contemporary to the black one I featured in the Hanafuda posting, but I am still trying to determine ages. The booklet that came with it has no English and is missing it's cover. The third and last vintage deck in the picture above is the thicker one of the 2 decks that came in the Ohishi-Tengudo box and is an Ohishi made deck.
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The Tengudo deck looks really nicely packaged. The long-nosed mask is actually a depiction of a Tengu - a bird spirit/creature

Sorry BlueToy, I was posting the additional information when you asked about the Obake Karuta.
Yes, I have seen them before, but I don't actually have any. I love those cards and have also seen many of the same fantastical creatures in prints reproduced in books. Do you know if the cards have ever been reproduced? I at the idea of finding a deck f those.

You seem familiar with the Tengu mythology, do you also play hanafuda?

dazzleguts wrote:Sorry BlueToy, I was posting the additional information when you asked about the Obake Karuta.
Yes, I have seen them before, but I don't actually have any. I love those cards and have also seen many of the same fantastical creatures in prints reproduced in books. Do you know if the cards have ever been reproduced? I at the idea of finding a deck f those.

You seem familiar with the Tengu mythology, do you also play hanafuda?

I'm just slightly familiar with Japanese lower mythology and crafts because I've read books about them in the past. Plus I watched anime when I was a kid. Haha

As for the Obake cards (karuta is literally "cards" in Japanese), they seem to be called Yokai Cards nowadays (yokai and obake having similar meanings) and seem to still be in print. There is info in the last comment here:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/146144 ... ake-karuta" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Is anyone here based in Japan? Maybe s/he can give us more info on it.

Space
Ainu
Published by Nintendo 1978/79
Designed by Tsumura Juntendo


There are 2 of these decks, each with different courts - one deck having the single figure courts shown here, the other having more traditional double ended courts and Ace of Spades. I like the grace of the single court drawings, but would like to find the double-ended ones as well. I found my deck at a thrift store, in a Nintendo black plastic case with a clear lid.
The Ainu appearance and culture is very different from Japanese culture. In fact their language is unrelated to Japanese, or to any other language, and is considered a "language isolate". (Only 100 people are presently known to speak the language fluently.)
Traditional dress, worn by all Ainu, was/is a robe spun from the inner bark of the elm tree, called attusi or attush. Both men and women wore ninkari - earrings. Women also wore matanpushi - embroidered headbands, various necklaces, and tattoos around their mouths and on their forearms.
"Ainu" means "human" (also Aynu, and in Russian Ajny). The Ainu people regard things that are useful to them, or beyond their control, as containing "kamuy"(gods). One of the most important was Kim-un Kamuy, god of bears and mountains, and live bears were often kept in villages, which is why you see them here in the cards. Men wore a crown called "sapanpe" for important ceremonies. Sapanpe was made from wood fiber with bundles of partially shaved wood. This crown had wooden figures of animal gods, and other ornamentation, on its center.
After a certain age boys would stop shaving and most men developed full beards and moustaches (though many modern Ainu are clean shaven to help them blend in better with the Japanese population). Men carried an emush (sword) secured by an "emush at" strap at the shoulders.
The Ainu originally lived in Russia mostly on Sakhalin Island and on the Kuril Islands, as well as on what became Hokkaido Island of Japan. With WW ll the Ainu and Japanese populations of Sakhalin and the North and South Kuril Islands were "repatriated" to Japan, though genetic testing has shown a relationship between the Ainu and the indigenous populations of Siberia and Mongolia, rather than with the Japanese.

They have only recently been officially recognized as indiginous people by the Japanese government (2008). The rather contented atmosphere of the cards belies the usual sad story of aboriginal people who were decimated by new diseases, violent conflict over land, and a continuing discrimination.
The largest population of Ainu was, and still is, on the island of Hokkaido. Hokkaido was known to the Ainu as Ainu Moshir, and was formally annexed by the Japanese in 1868, partly as a means of preventing the intrusion of the Russians, and partly for imperialist reasons.
[/color]

Information for this posting came from:
http://www.wopc.co.uk/japan/ainu-culture
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ainu_people
http://www.ainu-museum.or.jp/en/study/eng01.html

Space
Tactics Supranational
By Nintendo c. 1980-82


This is the second of 2 decks, the first being called simply "Tactics". This deck has been referred to as "men's grooming playing cards" on the WOPC site, but I cannot find any source for that. Since they are made by Nintendo and have "Good luck, our members" and "TACTICS members" printed on the box I was inclined to think they had something to do with a Nintendo games club. But, looking at the first deck it has an alternate back and an ace of spades both printed with "Tactics Design". It remains a mystery. Sorry for the variance in colour from my poor old scanner. The first scan is too pink.
The Tactics Supranational court cards have a suicide King and one-eyed Jack, but are otherwise a simplified modern design that reminds me of underground comics. I get a claustrophobic feeling from the way the heads of the courts are enclosed, and the lack of hands. They are probably designed by the same M. Nakajo who designed the other known Tactics Nintendo deck. The drawing style in the courts is very similar.
There are actually 2 different jokers and my deck did not have any when I bought it. The one joker I have was acquired separately and it shows the alternate pale green colour this deck came in. [/color]
Information for this posting came from:
http://a.trionfi.eu/WWPCM/decks08/d06281/d06281.htm
http://www.wopc.co.uk/japan/index

Nintendo Playing Cards No. 87 ("Trump"/Hanafuda Combination Deck) from 1952/53


Left: Outer and inner box
Centre: Inner box with a 50 yen tax revenue stamp (in use between 1951 and 1957)
Right: Date stamp on the outer box ("1953.1.4"). Not sure if this is an official stamp from the manufacturer or from one of the previous owners.


Cards spread out. The most interesting ones at the bottom.

The queens/paulownia cards are marked with "S.P.C." and "The Standard Playing Cards Co.", a name apparently sometimes used by Nintendo.

A regular hanafuda deck only has 48 cards (12 suits/months of 4 cards each), so the kings have other motifs - the king of spades is a medal with the text "吟見勲賞" (ginmi(?) kunsho), the king of diamonds is a bamboo rice strainer (I think? ) with the text "手役の章" (teyaku no shou), the king of cloves is a samurai (?) with the text "不見出" (mizude), and the king of hearts is a gunbai war fan with the text "跡絶の章" (todayu(?) no shou).

The single joker features the Nintendo trademark "Napoleon."



Left: bridge-sized playing card
Centre: Nintendo Playing Cards No. 87
Right: Nintendo's regular hanafuda (Miyako no hana/hachihachibana)



Card backs

Bought these online. Cards from three or possibly four incomplete sets, probably from early or mid-period Meiji, i.e. 19th century.

mrcrich wrote:Cards from three or possibly four incomplete sets, probably from early or mid-period Meiji, i.e. 19th century.

Do you have any guidance on how to date hanafuda decks? And how did you sort the cards into one or the other set? I see that the cards in the third set have a red back, and the cards in the first are generally grimier than those in the second set, but the red ribbon on bush clover looks more or less the same in both sets (right down to the handwriting of the "7" the owner used to indicate the month).

Merlebird wrote:Do you have any guidance on how to date hanafuda decks?

Well... it's complicated! The book "Hanafuda" by Takashi Ebashi (2014) is very helpful for dating the very oldest decks. There's a lot of detail when various makers were active, how some of the motives changed in Edo and in the provinces (i.e. chihoufuda), what printing methods were used and when, and so on. There's scans of various decks as well which are helpful for comparison. This Japanese site is also incredibly helpful for comparing decks from late Edo and onwards.

It's easier when you have boxed decks of course, largely because the tax stamps help quite a lot - the tax changed several times so there's several stamps. For pre-tax decks (1902) like I suspect these are, that's less helpful though.

In the end there's always some detective work involved and what that work includes totally depends on the deck and what info you have about it. If you don't read Japanese, you won't get far of course. And even if you do read Japanese there's not really a lot of information available online and when you do come across something, it's usually on a "geocities" looking website from who know's how many years ago and it's very hard to tell how reliable they are or where they got their information from.

If you have a deck you want dated I'm always happy to give it my best guess based on what I can find in Ebashi, etc..

Merlebird wrote:And how did you sort the cards into one or the other set? I see that the cards in the third set have a red back, and the cards in the first are generally grimier than those in the second set, but the red ribbon on bush clover looks more or less the same in both sets (right down to the handwriting of the "7" the owner used to indicate the month).

I got three piles wrapped in tissue paper from the vendor. I sorted the cards after the months for each pile, but I didn't try and correct the probably miss-matched cards, so the picture depicts them as they were when I bought them.

Very cool posting of the antique hanafuda decks you scored. Love seeing the older styles. Looks like they had heavy use, perhaps even in a gambling house.
How do you know the period? I'm guessing you used the Takashi Ebashi book? I will have to look for an english translation, if one exists.

https://kotaku.com/nintendo-japan-hanaf ... 1848724872

I provided the photos for the cards used of a hand-printed Nintendo deck in this kotaku article!

BlueToy wrote: ↑Sat Oct 03, 2015 10:06 pm Any of you guys have Obake Karuta ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karuta" )? They're kinda like the predecessors of Pokemon cards . They feature Japanese supernatural/mythological creatures.

Thanks for bringing these to my attention, though my accountant will surely disagree one day soon - just dipped a toe in with a set that can be readily found on ebay…

They are from 2016, Only $30 or there abouts.


Going to have to seek out some more of these, the older the better (the ones that come up with a search for yokai on ebay are generally the new ones, not much (perhaps better stated not any?) around at the moment for the older variety

Figured this was the best place for the pics, rather than giving them a thread of their own…

Specter Obake Karuta unboxing:

The picture cards have black backs with white text, white cards are blank on the other side - from my limited understanding the picture cards go on the table, white cards are selected and read (each containing a poem), players then attempt to pick up the matching picture card

A Japanese oracle deck by Tankobon, Yokai Oracle or Tankobon Yokai will have to do for a name for the moment unless someone reads Japanese - red letters on front of box translate to “Monsters” for me…

The included instruction book is in Japanese, so it will take a bit of hunting or translating to use this deck, reviews in Japan were very good for it (oracle wise) and I am looking forward to getting to the bottom of it.

GandalfPC wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 12:13 pm A Japanese oracle deck by Tankobon, Yokai Oracle or Tankobon Yokai will have to do for a name for the moment unless someone reads Japanese - red letters on front of box translate to “Monsters” for me…

Do you mean 妖怪? That's yokai, the "easy" translation is just "ghost" but of course it's more complex than that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yokai

And here's the product page if you weren't aware

http://visionary-c.com/goods/1594