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Jass

Trick-Taking Card Games

Jass is a family of trick-taking, ace-ten card games centered on Switzerland, where the most common variant, Schieber, is played by two partnered pairs and is regarded as the country's national card game. Players compete using a 36-card deck with a distinctive jack-high trump ranking, and the family extends into the wider Alemannic German-speaking world, including Liechtenstein, Alsace, Vorarlberg, southwestern Germany and South Tyrol. First documented in Switzerland in 1796, Jass traces its name to games that spread from the Netherlands during the Late Middle Ages. An estimated three million Swiss players still play regularly today, and more than seventy distinct variants of the game are documented, ranging from simple household versions to competitive tournament formats.

Facts
Sport
Game Type (category)
Trick-Taking Game 1
Classification
Player Count
Team-Based (Two Teams) 1
Origin Year
1796 1
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Sources
1. Jass (Wikipedia)
  • Introduction
    Jass (German pronunciation: [ˈjas] ) is a family of trick taking, ace-ten card games and, in its key forms, a distinctive branch of the marriage family. It is popular in its native Switzerland as well as the rest of the Alemannic German-speaking area of Europe, Italian South Tyrol and in a few places in Wisconsin, Ohio, California, Oregon and Washington USA.
  • Introduction
    The most common variant of Jass is Schieber (in Vorarlberg also known as Krüzjass), which is played by two teams of two players each.
  • Infobox, first documented mention
    First documented mention 1796 in Switzerland.
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