 L'Hombre (1887), a painting by Malthe Odin Engelstedt. The player in the center is Rasmus Malling-Hansen, Danish inventor of an early typewriter. | |
| Origin | Spain |
|---|---|
| Alternative names | Hombre, Lomber |
| Type | Trick-taking |
| Players | 3 (4–5) |
| Skills | Tactics and strategy |
| Cards | 40 cards |
| Deck | Spanish |
| Play | Counter-clockwise |
| Playing time | 20 min. |
| Chance | Difficult |
| Related games | |
| Mensch • Quadrille • Solo • Tresillo • Zanga • Bête | |
Ombre (from Spanish hombre 'man',[1] pronounced "omber") or l'Hombre is a fast-moving seventeenth-century trick-taking card game for three players and "the most successful card game ever invented."[2]
Its history began in Spain around the end of the 16th century as a four-person game.[3] It is one of the earliest card games known in Europe and by far the most classic game of its type, directly ancestral to Euchre, Boston and Solo Whist.[4] Despite its difficult rules, complicated point score and strange foreign terms, it swept Europe in the last quarter of the 17th century, becoming Lomber and L'Hombre in Germany, Lumbur in Austria and Ombre (originally pronounced 'umber'[5]) in England, occupying a position of prestige similar to contract bridge today. Ombre eventually developed into a whole family of related games such as the four-hand Quadrille, three-hand Tritrille, five-hand Quintille and six-hand Sextille, as well as German Solo, Austrian Préférence and Swedish Vira, itself "one of the most complex card games ever devised."[6] Other games borrowed features from Ombre such as bidding; for example, the gambling game of Bête, formerly known as Homme, and the tarot game of Taroc l'Hombre.
- ^ The sports and pastimes of the people of England, pg. 262, Joseph Strutt - London 1801
- ^ Dummett (1980), p. 173
- ^ The Merry Gamester by Walter Nelson, Merchants Adventures Press US, 1998, pg. 30
- ^ Oxford Dictionary of game Card Games, David Parlett, pg. 124 ISBN 0-19-869173-4
- ^ The Oxford Guide to Card Games, David Parlett, Oxford University Press, 1990, pg. 197 ISBN 0-19-214165-1
- ^ Parlett (2008), p. 78