Sport and Games Atlas

How The Game Is Played
Sign In
Text size
100%
Theme
Game

Klondike (Solitaire)

Matching and Shedding Card Games

Klondike is a single-player card game, and by far the most commonly played form of the broader family of card games known as solitaire or patience. A standard deck is dealt into a tableau of seven overlapping piles of increasing size, and the player builds descending sequences of alternating colors within the tableau while trying to move all cards up onto four ordered foundation piles by suit. Its name is generally associated with the Klondike Gold Rush era, though the exact history of the game's development is not precisely documented, and it became one of the most widely played card games after being bundled with early personal computer operating systems.

Facts
Partially Attested
Origin Year
1907 1
this is the year of the earliest known printed rules under the Klondike name, not a confirmed invention date, the name's own origin is unverified and the Klondike Gold Rush link is unsubstantiated speculation per the same source
Classification
Player Count
Single-Player 1
Game Type
Solitaire card game for one player 1
Sport
Game Type (category)
Card Game 1
Sources
1. Klondike (solitaire), Wikipedia
  • Lead section
    Klondike is a card game for one player and the best known and most popular version of the solitaire family.
  • History section
    The earliest rules for the game known as Klondike today appear in the 1907 edition of Hoyle's Games under the name 'Seven-Card Klondike'.
  • entity record, description lead (player-count)
    Klondike is a single-player card game, and by far the most commonly played form of the broader family of card games known as solitaire or patience. A standard deck is dealt into a tableau of seven overlapping piles of increasing size, and the player builds descending sequences of alternating colors within the tableau while trying to move all cards up onto four ordered foundation piles by
View the Source

Take a Related Quiz

Comments (0)
No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.
Reader Challenges (0)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.

View At A Past Year

Choose a year to see this entry's facts and connections as the atlas records them at that moment: what it held then, what it held instead, and what it had not yet adopted. Choose Present for the current record.