In Czechia and Slovakia, Prší and Faraón feel like games that have always been there. They are played at cottages, on trains and in pubs, and the rules pass from parents to children. Look a little closer, though, and it turns out to be a fairly young game, part of a big family that has spread around the world under dozens of names.
A family of shedding games
These are games in which the winner is the first to get rid of their cards. You play a card of the same suit or rank, and some cards have special effects: one changes the suit, another forces the next player to draw, a third makes them miss a turn. Card game historians name the group after its best-known American member, Eights.
The site pagat.com, one of the largest collections of card game rules, lists names from many countries: Mau-Mau in Germany, Pesten in the Netherlands, Makao in Poland and Hungary, Switch or Black Jack in England, Tschau Sepp in Switzerland and Prší in the Czech Republic. In Slovakia the game is called Faraón.
Crazy Eights in America
The British games scholar David Parlett writes in his dictionary of card games that the game first appeared in print in the 1930s under the name Eights. The name Crazy Eights dates from the 1940s. One explanation links it to the US military’s Section 8 discharge for soldiers judged mentally unfit.
Crazy Eights uses a standard pack of 52 cards, and the suit is changed by the eight, which can be played on anything. Pagat.com also mentions WHOT!, a commercial game with its own cards that was patented in 1935 and was perhaps the earliest game sold on this principle.
Mau-Mau in Germany
German Mau-Mau, according to Wikipedia, appeared shortly after the Second World War. Its rules were first printed in 1958, and a source from 1961 still described it as a very recent game that had become astonishingly popular within a few years. The Czech Wikipedia says the name comes from the Mau Mau movement that fought for independence in Kenya in the 1950s.
Mau-Mau is played with 32 cards, often German-suited. A seven makes the next player draw two, an eight makes them miss a turn, the Unter changes the suit and an ace means the player has to play another card. Whoever is down to their last card calls out “Mau”, and anyone who forgets draws a penalty card.
Prší and Faraón
The game reached Czechia and Slovakia in a form slightly different from the German one. The Czech Wikipedia says Prší appeared after the Second World War. An ace makes a player miss a turn instead of an eight, the Ober changes the suit, and players usually get four cards. Prší means “it is raining” in Czech. Why the game has that name is not reliably known.
In Slovakia the game is played in much the same way. For Faraón, the English Wikipedia lists differences such as these: five cards are dealt and the loser of a hand gets one fewer in the next, each seven means drawing three cards, and the Unter of Leaves cancels the penalty for sevens. On HoyHop you can choose four or five cards before the game, and a seven means drawing two, with three available as a house rule.
Where the Slovak name comes from, we cannot document. What is certain is that Faraón shares only its name with the old French game pharaon, which became faro in America. Pharaon was a gambling game in which players bet against a banker on which cards would turn up. It was played as early as the reign of Louis XIV, and in the 19th century faro was the most widespread gambling game of the American Wild West. It has nothing to do with matching and shedding cards.
Dozens of house rules
None of these games has an official body that sets the rules. Every region, school and family has adapted them. The Czech Wikipedia lists variants in which a red seven brings back a player who has already played their last card, the King of Leaves means four extra cards, the Unter changes the rank instead of the suit, or a ten reverses the direction of play. So-called pub Prší combines several of them.
That is why, before the first game with new people, it is always worth asking how they play. On HoyHop you can switch on two popular house rules: drawing three for a seven, and the Seven of Hearts bringing a player back.
Uno, a descendant
The best-known descendant of the family is Uno. It was invented in 1971 by Merle Robbins in Reading, Ohio. Instead of ordinary cards it has its own pack with four colours, numbers and action cards such as Draw Two, Skip and Reverse. Robbins sold the rights for 50,000 dollars plus royalties to a group led by Robert Tezak. Since 1992 the game has been published by Mattel. Anyone who has played Uno will understand Prší in a few minutes, and the other way round.
German-suited cards and William Tell
In Czechia and Slovakia the game is almost always played with German-suited cards, known locally as mariášky after the popular game Mariáš. Several patterns are in use, and the most widespread is the William Tell pattern. The first packs in this style were made around 1835 by József Schneider in Pest. The figures on the Obers and Unters come from Friedrich Schiller’s play Wilhelm Tell of 1804, and the Ober of Acorns is Tell himself. The aces show the four seasons and the kings sit on horseback.
According to Wikipedia, the Prague pattern is more common in Bohemia, while Tell cards are preferred in Moravia. In Slovakia people play with a Slovak-Moravian version based on the Austrian design, in which the figures and seasons are not labelled. The Austrian company Piatnik has made Tell cards since 1865.
The cards in HoyHop’s Crazy Eights are drawn from photos and drawings of the William Tell pattern on Wikimedia Commons. To help players used to French-suited cards, they carry the letters J, Q, K and A and Roman numerals in the corner.
Why the game has lasted
Prší needs nothing but a pack of cards, and the rules can be explained in a minute. Seven-year-olds play it with their grandparents, and there is still room for tactics. Crazy Eights tips and strategy shows how to use it. The full rules are in Crazy Eights rules, the Central European way.