Clock (card game)

Clock, also called Sundial, is a patience or solitaire card game played with a single standard fifty-two card deck arranged into thirteen piles that are laid out to resemble the face of a clock, twelve piles positioned in a circle at the hour marks and a thirteenth pile of the four Kings placed in the center. Cards are turned up one at a time from the center Kings pile and slid face down beneath the pile corresponding to their rank, aces at the one o'clock position, jacks at eleven and queens at twelve, with each placement immediately triggering the top card to be turned from that same hour pile in turn. The game is won if every card is eventually turned face up before all four Kings have appeared, and lost if the fourth King turns up while cards remain hidden; because no decisions affect the outcome, the odds of winning are fixed at exactly one in thirteen. Known since at least the nineteenth century under the name The Clock, it descends from an older European patience game called Wandering Card and shares its characteristic mechanic of cards shuttling between the bottom and top of a pile as the deal proceeds.