Klaverjassen and Hartenjagen: Histories Of Two Card Games

Hartenjagen is best known for its American variant entitled Hearts. The game as we know it today has its origins hundreds of years ago, back to 1750. At that time in Spain a family of related card games called Reversis were extremely popular. The rules of Reversis included penalty points for won tricks plus extra points for the player who seized the Queen or Jack of Hearts. Similar to Reversis was a game called Four Jacks in which players had to avoid tricks containing the Jacks, which were worth penalty points.     

Reversis' popularity allowed it to develop in the next hundred years until around 1850 a basic version of today's Hearts emerged. Some time after that a variant known as Black Maria appeared, which introduced the Queen of Spades, and not long after, the concept of “shooting the moon” was integrated into the game.    

The ten positive points variation, known as Jack of Diamonds, appeared in the 1920s; and in a few decades penalty points were reversed to positive. 

Modern additions to hartenjagen include breaking Hearts and passing cards.

Nowadays hartenjagen is most popular among students, especially in the United States; though people of all ages sometimes play it when they meet socially. The game's popularity has received a significant boost in recent years because of its packaging with the Windows OS. This led numerous gaming sites to include it in their list of featured games. Some Internet users play it constantly. 

Klaverjassen, which is also known as klaverjas, is also hundreds of years old, though it’s exact date of origin is not accurately pinpointed. However, it is believed that the game's name dates back to around the mid 1890s, from the Dutch word klaverjas which combines klaver (the suit of clubs) and jas (Jasper, a man's name).

The country of origin for klaverjassen is also uncertain. The popular belief is that the game has its roots in the Netherlands. This belief is mostly due to the fact that the game was one of the preferred amusements of the Dutch people, who played it regularly over the years in public places such as cafes. Nonetheless, klaverjassen's origin has been contested by Hungary, France, and Switzerland.