Faro (card game)

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Faro

Playing Faro in an Arizona Saloon in
1895.

Origin

Italian

Type

Gambling

Players

Np.

Skills required

Counting

Cards

52

Deck

Anglo-American

Play

Clockwise

Playing time

10-15 min.

Random chance

Medium

Related games

Baccarat

Faro, Pharaoh, or Farobank, is a late 17th century
French gambling card game descendant of basset, and belongs
to the lansquenet and Monte Bank family of games,
in that it is played between a banker and several players winning or losing
according to the cards turned up matching those already exposed or not.

Although not a direct relative of poker, faro was played by the masses
alongside its other popular counterpart, due to its fast action, easy-to-learn
rules, and better odds than most games of chance. The game of faro is played
with only one deck of cards and allows for any number of players, usually
referred to as "punters."

Contents

1 History

1.1 France

1.2 England

1.3 United
States

2 Etymology

3 Rules

3.1 Description

3.2 Procedure

4 French terms used in
Faro

5 In culture

6 See also

7 References

8 Additional
reading

9 External
links

[edit]
History

[edit]
France

The earliest references to a card game named pharaon are found in
Southwestern France in the late 17th century (1688) during the reign of Louis
XIV.

[edit]
England

Pharaoh and basset, the most popular card games of 18th and 19th century
Europe, were forbidden in France during the reign of Louis XIV on severe
penalties, but these games continued to be widely played in England during the
18th century. Pharo, the English alternate spelling of Pharaoh,[1]
was easy to learn, quick and, when played honestly, the odds for a player were
the best of all gambling games, as records Gilly Williams in a letter to George
Selwyn in 1752.[2]

[edit]
United States

With its name shortened to faro, it soon spread to the United States in the 19th
century to become the most widespread and popularly favored gambling game. Also
called "Bucking the Tiger", which comes from early card backs that featured a
drawing of a Bengal Tiger, it was played in almost every gambling hall in the Old West from 1825 to
1915.[3]

Faro's detractors regarded it as a dangerous scam that destroyed families and
reduced men to poverty, because of rampant rigging of the dealing box. Crooked
faro equipment was so popular that many sporting-house companies began to supply
gaffed dealing boxes specially designed so that the bankers could cheat their
players. Cheating was prevalent enough that editions of Hoyle’s Rules of
Games began their faro section warning readers that not a single honest faro
bank could be found in the United States. While the game became scarce after World War II, it continued
to be played at a few Las Vegas and Reno
casinos through 1985.

[edit]
Etymology

Historians have suggested that the name Pharaon comes from Louis XIV's
royal gamblers who called the game pharaon because of the motif that
commonly adorned one of the French-made court cards.[1]
Another idea traces the name to the Irish word
fairadh, pronounced "fearoo", meaning "to turn". It could have been
brought to England and France through the mass emigration from Ireland,
in particular in the aftermath of the Flight of the Wild
Geese. Also the Irish Brigade
served in France and may have brought the term with them.

[edit]
Rules

The layout of a faro
board.

[edit]
Description

A game of faro was often called a "faro bank". It was played with an entire
deck of playing cards. One person was designated a "banker" and an indeterminate
number of players could be admitted. Chips (called "checks") were purchased by
the punter from the banker (or house) from which the game originated. Bet values
and limits were set by the house. Usual check values were 50 cents to $10
each.

The faro table was oval,[4]
covered with green baize, and
had a cutout for the banker. A board with a standardized betting layout
consisting of one card of each denomination pasted to it, called the "layout",
was placed on top of the table. Traditionally, the suit of spades was used for the
layout. Each player laid his stake on one of the 13 cards on the layout. Players
could place multiple bets and could bet on multiple cards simultaneously by
placing their bet between cards or on specific card edges. Players also had the
choice of betting on the high card located at the top of the layout.

[edit]
Procedure

A deck of cards was placed face-up inside a "dealing box", a mechanical
shoe used to prevent manipulations of the draw by the banker, and intended to
ensure players of a fair game.

The first card in the dealing box is called the "soda" and is "burned"
off, leaving 51 cards in play. As the soda is pulled out of the dealing box,
it exposes the first card in play, called the "banker's card". This is placed
on the right side of the dealing box. The next card exposed after the banker's
card is called the carte Anglaise (English card) or simply the
"player's card", and it is placed on the left.

The banker's card is the "losing card". All bets placed on that card are
lost by the players and won by the bank. The player's card is the "winning
card". All bets placed on that card are returned to the players with a 1 to 1
(even money) payout by the bank (e.g. a dollar bet wins a dollar). The banker
collects on all the money staked on the card laid on the right, and he pays
double the sums staked on those on the card remaining on the left (in the
dealing box). The dealer settled all bets after each two cards drawn. This
allowed players to bet before drawing the next two cards.

A player could "copper" his bet by placing a hexagonal
(6-sided) token called a "copper" on it. Some histories said a penny was
sometimes used in place of a copper. This reversed the meaning of the win/loss
piles for that particular bet. An abacus-like device, called a
"case keep", is employed to assist the players and prevent dealer cheating by
counting cards. The operator of the case keep is called the "case
keeper".

Certain advantages were reserved to the banker: if he drew a doublet, that
is, two equal cards, he won half of the stakes upon the card which equaled the
doublet. In a fair game, this provided the only "house edge". If the banker drew
the last card of the pack, he was exempt from doubling the stakes deposited on
that card. In most cases, when three cards remained, the dealer would offer a
specialized bet called "calling the turn", with the house paying to the players
who can identify the exact order of the last three cards a 4-to-1 (since the
real odds of naming the order is 5 to 1) payout and a 1-1 payout if there is a
pair, called a "cat-hop". [5]

[edit]
French terms used in
Faro

By 1870, the words used in the game were a mixture of French and
English words and spellings.

Banker - The person who keeps the table.

Taillèur (Dealer) - Generally the banker.

Couche or Enjeu - The stake.

Coup (a Stroke or Pull) - Any two cards dealt alternately to the
right and left.

Croupier (Croup) - An assistant to the dealer

Doublet - When the punter's card is turned up twice in the same
coup, then the bank wins half the stake. A single paroli must be taken down,
but if there are several, only one retires.

Fasse - The first card turned up by the Banker, by which he gained
half the value of the money laid upon every card of that sort by the punters
or players.

Hocly - The last card but one, the chance of which the banker
claims, and may refuse to let any punter withdraw a card when eight or less
remain to be dealt.

Livret - A suit of 13 cards, with 4 others called Figures. One
named the little figure, has a blue cross on each side and represents ace,
deuce, tray; another yellow on both sides, styled the yellow figure,
signifies, 4, 5, 6; a third with a black lozenge in the centre, named the
black figure, stands for 7, 8, 9. 10; and a red card, called the great or red
figure, for Jack, Queen, King: those figures are useful for those who punt on
several cards at once.

L'une pour l'autre (One for the other) - Means a drawn game, and is
said when two of the punter's cards are dealt in the same coup.

Masque - Means turning a card, or placing another face downwards,
during any number of coups, on that whereon the punter has staked, and which
he may afterward play at pleasure.

Oppose - Reversing the game, and having the cards on the right for
the punter, and those on the left for the dealer.

Pli (Bending) - Used when a punter, having lost half his stake by a
doublet, bends a card in the middle, and setting it up with the points and
foot towards the dealer, signifies thereby a desire either of recovering the
moiety, or of losing all.

Ponte or Punt (Point) - The punter or player.

Pont (Bridge) - The same as paix.

Paix (Peace) - Equivalent to double or quits; that is, when the
punter having won, does not choose to paroli and risk his stake, but bends or
makes a bridge of his card, signifying that he ventures his gains only. A
double paix is, when the punter having won twice, bends two cards one over the
other. Treble paix, thrice, etc. A paix may follow a seven, fifteen, or
thirty, etc.

Paroli or Parolet-Double - Sometimes called cocking, is when
a punter, being fortunate, chooses to venture both his stake and wins, which
he intimates by bending a corner of his card upwards.

Cocking - See Paroli.

Paix-Paroli - When a punter has won a paroli, wishes then to play
double or quits, and save his original stake, which he shows by doubling a
card after making his first paroli; double-paix-paroli succeeds to winning a
paix-paroli; treble-paix-paroli follows double, etc.

Sept et le Va (Seven and it goes) - Succeed the winning of a
paroli, by which the punter being entitled to triple his stake, risks the
whole again, and, bending his card a second time, tries to win
seven-fold.

Quinze et le Va (Fifteen and it goes) - When the punter having won
a sept, &c., bends the third corner of the card, and ventures for 15 times
his stake.

Trente et le Va (Thirty and it goes) - Follows a fifteen, etc.,
when the punter again tries his luck, and makes a fourth paroli.

Soitraitte et le Va (Sixty and it goes) - When the player having
obtained a thirty, ventures all once more, which is signified by making a
fifth paroli, either on another card, if he has parolied on one only before,
or by breaking the side of that one which contains four, to pursue his luck in
the next deal.

[edit]
In culture

Friedrich
Freiherr von der Trenck makes mention of playing faro in his memoirs
(February 1726– 25 July 1794) he was a Prussian officer, adventurer, and
author. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2668/2668-h/2668-h.htm

Faro is central to the plot of Alexander Pushkin's
story "The Queen of
Spades" and Tchaikovsky's opera The Queen of
Spades.

Numerous references to faro are made in the HBO television series
Deadwood.

Casanova was known to be a
great player of faro.

The 18th century Whig radical Charles James Fox
preferred faro to any other game, as did 19th-century American con man Soapy Smith. It was said
that every faro table in Soapy's Tivoli Club in Denver, Colorado, in
1889 was gaffed (made to cheat).

The famed scam artist Canada Bill Jones
loved the game so much that, when he was asked why he played at one game that
was known to be rigged, he replied, "It's the only game in town."

In Misfortune by Wesley Stace, Pharaoh is named after his father's
profession, a faro dealer.

Wyatt Earp dealt
faro for a short time after arriving in Tombstone Arizona having acquired
controlling interest in a game out of the Oriental saloon.[6]

John "Doc" Holliday dealt
faro in the Bird Cage Theater as an additional source of income while living
in Tombstone,
Arizona.[7]

Numerous references to faro are made in the Western radio drama Gunsmoke, staring William Conrad.[citation
needed]

The town of Faro,
Yukon was named after the game.

[edit]
See also

Commerce

Phat

Cassino

[edit]
References

^ a
b
Scarne, John Scarne on Card Games: How to Play and Win at Poker, Pinochle,
Blackjack, Gin and Other Popular Card Games pg. 163 Dover Publications
(2004) ISBN
0486436039

^ Blackwood's Edinburgh magazine vol. 15 pg. 176 London
1844
Our life here would not displease you, for we eat and drink
well,
and the Earl of Coventry holds a Pharaoh-bank every night to
us,
which we have plundered considerably.

^
Oxford Dictionary of Card Games, p. 16, David Parlett - Oxford University
Press 1996 ISBN
0-19-869173-4

^ The
hand-book of games, p. 336, H.G. Bohn - Bell & Daldy, London 1867

^ The
book of card games, p. 121, Peter Arnold - Barnes & Noble 1995 ISBN
1566199506

^
William M. Breakenridge,Richard Maxwell Brown Helldorado: bringing the law to the mesquite pg. 171
University of Nebraska Press (1992) ISBN
0803261004

^
Wesley Treat, Mark Moran, Mark Sceurman Weird Arizona: Your Travel Guide to Arizona's Local Legends and
Best Kept Secrets pg. 190 Sterling (2007) ISBN
1402739389

[edit]
Additional reading

Tom and Judy Dawson, The Hochman Encyclopedia of American Playing
Cards, Stamford, CT: US Games Systems Inc., 2000. ISBN
1-57281-297-4 (Gives historical account of Faro cards in the US,
extensively illustrated.)

John Nevil Maskelyne, Sharps and Flats, (London: 1894;
reprint, Las Vegas: GBC. ISBN 0-8950-912-5

J. R. Sanders, "Faro: Favorite Gambling Game of the
Frontier", Wild West Magazine, October 1996

[edit]
External links

Newspaper articles: 1880s games of chance Faro, Poker, Keno,
Spanish Monte, Stud, Nutshell, Deadwood Poker blog

"Former dealer hopes for return of faro", Las Vegas
Review-Journal

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faro_(card_game)"

Categories: Lottery card
games | Gambling
games | French card
games

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