Ah, holiday customs. At my
house, we’ve developed a new one over the last year or two: after exchanging
presents and eating Christmas dinner and pulling crackers (we
lurrrrve Christmas crackers!) and
nibbling at dessert, we usually play a rollicking game of Cards Against
Humanity (my 81-year-old mom is a huge fan!)
Although I would dearly love to write a Regency version of CAH some day
(imagine the scurrilous things one could come up with to say about Prinny’s
personal life!), Regency family games were themselves somewhat less, er,
naughty...and also a lot prettier.
Those of you who obsess over
details in books (umm, like me) might remember certain references in
Pride and Prejudice to family games:
“...Lydia
talked incessantly of lottery tickets, of the fish she had lost and the fish
she had won....” and in
Georgette Heyer’s
The Grand Sophy: “...Gertrude...and
Amabel...cast themselves upon their brother, with loud professions of delight
at seeing him, and rather louder reminders to him of a promise he had made them
to play at lottery-tickets the very next time he should spend an evening at
home....The card-table had been set up, and Amabel was already counting out the
mother-of-pearl fishes on its green-baize cloth.”
(Pause to re-read the hilarious
ending of The Grand Sophy. Ahem.)
No, Lydia was not crowing over
winning anchovies. Nor was Amabel handing out minnows, but these handsome little guys. The game was called “lottery
tickets,” and was a game of pure chance; utilizing two decks of cards, it was played in rounds, and fish-shaped
markers were used for placing bets (sort of), with the winner of each round getting the fish.
Aren’t they lovely? These are
of mother-of-pearl (which is darned difficult to photograph well, I’ll have you
know!), likely made in China, but they were also made of bone and ivory. Nor
were they restricted to just fish shapes (I haven’t been able to discover ‘why
fish?’)
Here are several circular ones
from my collection—again, Chinese mother-of-pearl, some very elegantly
engraved. The wealthy would have theirs custom-carved with their coats of arms
or other heraldic devices.
And more, not round. Squares,
rectangles, and other shapes are also seen:
I wonder if there's any way to incorporate my fishy collection into our upcoming Cards Against Humanity game on Christmas? Hmm...
While I ponder that question, I hope all NineteenTeen readers will enjoy a splendid upcoming holiday week full of your own happy family traditions, whether they involve fish or not.
No, Lydia was not crowing over
winning anchovies. Nor was Amabel handing out minnows, but these handsome little guys. The game was called “lottery
tickets,” and was a game of pure chance; utilizing two decks of cards, it was played in rounds, and fish-shaped
markers were used for placing bets (sort of), with the winner of each round getting the fish.
Aren’t they lovely? These are
of mother-of-pearl (which is darned difficult to photograph well, I’ll have you
know!), likely made in China, but they were also made of bone and ivory. Nor
were they restricted to just fish shapes (I haven’t been able to discover ‘why
fish?’) Here are several circular ones
from my collection—again, Chinese mother-of-pearl, some very elegantly
engraved. The wealthy would have theirs custom-carved with their coats of arms
or other heraldic devices.
