Spooneye! The Card Game

Introduction

History of the Game

SPOONEYE! First documented as "Thirty-Fours" in a 1571 British list of injunctions, the modern form of the game developed aboard pirate ships sailing in the Caribbean in the late 17th century. The game's most notorious enthusiast was none other than the ruthless pirate Spooneye, who had a spoon in the place of a lost hand due to a fondness for soups, and who, owing to extreme myopia in one eye (the right, it is believed), would often cover the bad eye with his spoon-hand in order to focus. During the infamous double mutiny fad of the 1690s, (itself immortalized in the game as well as numerous ballads,) Spooneye learned of Thirty-Fours from the crew formerly belonging to his mortal enemy, the nefarious Danish privateer Weirdbeard. Legend has it that the most powerful card in the game, the Nine, or 'Spooneye', originated when Spooneye was engaged in a game with his ship's cook (name unknown). Frustrated at his own poor performance, Spooneye played a Nine-his favorite card, due to the resemblance-and then grabbed one of the cook's cards. Justifiably angry, the cook argued that this was not part of the rules: in the original Thirty-Fours, Nines have no special effect. Spooneye, enraged, leapt out of his chair and gouged out the unfortunate cook's eye with his mighty spoon-hand. Most accounts suggest that the cook was keelhauled after the game; others suggest that it was this cook who later became the despised buccaneer Disheye. In either event, we can assume that Spooneye won the game, which has borne his name, and his new rule, ever since. The game subsequently spread to the mainland, and maintained a modest following until the middle of the 18th century, when Whist's sudden rise in popularity and social cache caused Spooneye to fall out of favor with all but the most provincial stratas of society. A brief revival of interest, mainly among women of ill repute, is documented as occurring in the 1840s, when the game was imported to America via profiteers importing illegal merchandise into New Orleans. The revival had completely waned by the 1860s, however, and in this day and age, with such technological marvels as the moving picture show, the broadcast television variety program, and the long-playing phonograph record capturing the public's fancy, interest is almost entirely confined to inmates, invalids, and the otherwise socially incapable.

From "Pirates: An Unruly History," by Herbert Zim. Farrar and Strauss, New York, NY, 1953.

Previous Page:
Introduction

Table of Contents

Next Page:
Editor's Note