EPoker Network

There are many theories and legends about the roots of poker, but what we can derive from many sources, is that playing a betting game with “tiles” dates back to ancient China around 900 AD.  Most likely early travelers brought these games which were adapted versions from their homelands.  Card fragments dating back from the 12th or 13th century were found in Egypt…and in the 17th century, a game in Persia evolved called 'as-nas'…which is a five-player game only using a 25-card deck with five suits.  The French game of 'poque' is believed to be the most directly related, and a much more easily traceable historical link to New Orleans in 1480. 

In 1834 a book was written by Jonathan H. Green about “the Cheating Game”.  Green became a gambler and traveler on the riverboats, later exposing a lot of what was really going on regarding poker…specifically cheating…and became a “reformed gambler” according to some reports.  Draw poker quickly replaced these other easily “rigged”  card games, because draw elicited more options for the players…and thus was deemed a more honorable or trustworthy form of playing.

Poque (pronounced just like poker without the “r”) as we know it developed in New Orleans, and evolved to what we now know as Draw Poker.  The game's influence traveled by steamboat up the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, then spread via wagon and train into the Western frontier.  Variations such as stud poker and straight poker, otherwise known as 5-card and 7-card poker, became popular during the Civil War.  There are strong influences of the French game in the rules that evolved for the game in the early 1800’s,   and the use of 5 cards is most certainly derived from the Persian As-Nas. In fact, it is believed the word “Ace” is simply a direct link to As-Nas.  The terms blind, straddles, raise, table stakes, and freeze-out find their root from French Poque.

In 1825, an early American edition of Hoyle included “Twenty-Card” poker, and also “Poker or Bluff.”  Twenty years later, American Hoyle added the game called simply “Bluff.”  However, Poker rules began to evolve in 1840, when a fifty-two card deck replaced the original twenty cards.  Each player was dealt five cards face down, and only one round of betting was allowed, without an additional draw of the cards.  During the 1860s, the draw and an extra betting round were introduced.  By 1875, straights and flushes were part of the game.

Back in the wild west pioneer period of United States history, a saloon with a poker table could be found in just about every dusty town from the east coast to the west coast.  Draw poker was THE most popular poker game in the United States for over 100 years, eventually being replaced by Texas Hold’em as the most popular poker game in North America and across Europe.