It is uncertain whether the cards are a Chinese invention dating back to the second millennium BC, coming across India by the Arabs who called them "naibbe (na'ib), or whether they are an offshoot of the Indian chess, it seems certain that have not been invented in any country in Europe. According to evocative belief the origin of playing cards would be much older, dating back to the Egyptians, and in particular to the god Thoth who, wishing to teach men the art of writing invented hieroglyphics whose evolution led to the equalization of the same with the numbers and suits of cards .

The playing cards were an invention that pleased and very soon, we played in homes, taverns, on the streets, in the houses of the poor, the rich, the nobles and even in convents because they operated within these structures shoemakers, blacksmiths, masons, carpenters, bakers, tailors, all in the service of the community of monks, from which depended; living together of the religious with the secular meant that the passion cards would spread and would involve one and the other. The urge to gamble became so frantic as to cause the intervention of religious authorities, the reason for the ban was to be found in the function that, at that time, was attributed to religious places and those who had taken the vows and therefore required the utmost propriety in morals, and the violation of the religious centers of social life with exhibitions operated a dangerous obstacle on the way of holiness.

Among the laity were mainly the Spanish monarchs to impose bans on heavier game papers considered a tool of corruption, lawlessness and immorality. The first cards were thin wooden boards and, for the most refined, tablets of ivory, painted, decorated with elegant figurines, in the Middle Ages were made ??freehand or laminae 'gold. The first Italian manufacturer of playing cards arose in Bologna , not surprisingly, because Bologna was the primary center for cultural exchanges and merchant both national and European.