William Tell Playing Cards

German-suited cards in Austria are usually of the William Tell pattern, in which the picture cards show characters from the William Tell legend and the aces depict the four seasons of the year. These are sold as "Doppeldeutsche Karten" - "double" because like most modern cards they are double headed - the pattern is the same at each end.

Several cards from a Piatnik -- Nr. 1883 Doppeldeutsche - William Tell deck

William Tell Playing Cards

Ace (deuce) in Acorns The King in Leaves The Over in Bells The Under in Hearts Weli

The pattern on a Doppeldeutsche deck is in contrast to "Einfachdeutsche Karten", in which a single one-way image occupies the full length of the card. These are also (confusingly) known as the Salzburg pattern, though they are used mainly in the mountainous Western provinces of Vorarlberg and Tirol, and as Jass cards, because in Vorarlberg they are used to play Jass, though they look quite different from the cards used to play the same games in Switzerland.

The characters depicted on the Kings, Overs and Unders are from the 15th century legend of Wilhelm Tell, who is supposed to have led the Swiss resistance against Austrian domination. According to the legend, he was compelled to shoot an arrow through an apple placed on his son's head. Specifically, the characters are from the play about Wilhelm Tell written by Friedrich Schiller in 1804.

The playing cards with these characters became popular around the time of the revolutions of 1848, probably because of the parallels with the uprisings against the Habsburg Empire. Interestingly these playing cards are used mainly in Austria, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia and Romania, but are unknown in Switzerland, even though the characters on them are Swiss.

It was long believed that these cards were invented in Vienna at the Card Painting Workshop of Ferdinand Piatnik. However in 1974 the very first deck was found in an English Private Collection, and it has shown the name of the inventor and creator as Schneider József, a Master Card Painter at Pest, and the date of its creation as 1837. He has chosen the characters of a Swiss drama as his characters for his Over and Under cards. Had he chosen Hungarian heroes or freedom fighters, instead, his deck of cards never would have made it into distribution, due to the heavy censorship of the government at the time.

A William Tell deck usually consists of 32 or 36 cards. The numbering includes VII, VIII, IX, X, Under, Over, King and Ace (wich is actually a deuce). Some variations with 36 cards have also on additional card with the number VI, in the suit of Bells. This additional card functions like a joker, in some games, and is named Welli or Weli.

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