From the facts which have been produced in the preceding chapter, there cannot be a doubt that the principle on which wood engraving is founded,–that of taking impressions on paper or parchment, with ink, from prominent lines,–was known and practised in attesting documents in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Towards the end of the fourteenth, or about the beginning of the fifteenth century, there seems reason to believe that this principle was adopted by the German card-makers for the purpose of marking the outlines of the figures on their cards, which they afterwards coloured by means of a stencil.

The period at which the game of cards was first known in Europe, as well as the people by whom they were invented, has been very learnedly, though not very satisfactorily discussed. Bullet has claimed the invention for the French, and Heineken for the Germans; while other writers have maintained that the game was known in Italy earlier than in any other part of Europe, and that it was introduced from the East.

From a passage discovered by M. Van Praet, in an old manuscript copy of the romance of Renard le Contrefait, it appears that cards were known in France about 1340, although Bullet was of opinion that they were invented in that country about 1376. At whatever period the game was introduced, it appears to have been commonly known in France and Spain towards the latter part of the fourteenth century.