Wallachen

Wallachen is a plain-trick card game for three players that originated in the Old Bavaria region, with roots tracing to the Bohemian area, and belongs to the wider Preference family of card games. It is played with a 32-card German-suited deck from which the Sixes have been removed, and its history reaches back at least to 1784, when it appears in the literature under the names Wallacho or Walacho on a list of gambling games banned across the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Despite that early official disapproval, the game has endured as a fixture of everyday card play in its home region. Described as a relatively simple three-hander that is easy to learn, Wallachen carries a relaxed character that sets it apart from more demanding Bavarian games, lacking both the mental strain of Schafkopf and the psychological pressure that characterizes Watten. In the basic form of the game, players aim to win six or more of the ten tricks dealt in a hand to succeed. Wallachen remains, by its own regional reputation, probably still the most widely played card game in Old Bavaria after Schafkopf and Watten, especially in East Bavaria around Regensburg, where it continues to be described as an indispensable part of Bavarian pub culture.