Reykjavik Athletic Club playing cards
made in Iceland
There are not many older packs of cards known from Iceland, but this one of them dating from 1940. It was made for an Athletic Club in Reykjavik which is indicated by the initials "IR"in the logo on the aces and the reverse. It was printed by the Isafold Printinghouse with black & white aces depicting athletes at work, and court cards which were copied from cards used by Emil Jensen / Warburg of Denmark who had them printed by Goodall in the UK. The joker is a copy of the one used by Goodall for many years.
My pack has 52 cards and a joker with a brown coloured back, but is also known with a blue back.
Below: The reverse of the cards and the joker.
References:
- Saga Spilanna, Gudbrandur Magnusson 1978. Page 129 & 167
- Playing Cards from the Nordic Countries, Ali Jerremalm 2011. Page 25
All cards shown are from the collection of Paul Symons ©
By Paul Symons
Member since February 01, 2016
I'm British but I have now lived in the Netherlands for more than 50 years and am still enjoying every minute of it. I started collecting playing cards in the early 1980’s after speaking with my neighbour who was at that time a croupier in a casino. I started with just collecting jokers, but that soon led me to complete packs of cards and eventually to specialising in old and antique playing cards, particularly those of C.L. Wüst of Frankfurt, Germany. I am presently the Dutch representative of the I.P.C.S. and the auctioneer at the IPCS conventions.
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