However, for playing cards, the Chinese use the word 牌 = Pái.
The Chinese word for Card, as in Cardboard is 卡 - Kǎ. Our next source is from the writings of the Ming dynasty scholar Lu Rong (1436-1494), who notes that he was sneered at for not knowing how to play cards when he was a government student at Kunshan in modern Jiangsu Province. The law case notes that nine paper cards and thirty six taels of zhong tong period (1260-1264) paper currency were seized, along with wood blocks for printing cards. Another report dates from 1294, when Yen Sengzhu and Zheng Pig-Dog were apparently caught gambling in Enzhou (in modern Shandong Province). At some point playing cards were also printed from woodblocks. Printing had also been developed in China as early as the eighth century for printing Buddhist texts, and later, banknotes or money printed on paper. This evidence suggests that card playing began in China at an early date. �Leaves (cards) are descended from those of the tala tree used for Buddhist sutras of old� Introduction 介绍Īn 11th century source reports that the game of cards appeared in the middle of the T'ang dynasty (613-906) and �that a certain Yang Tan-ien greatly esteemed the playing of cards�, and that these cards had markings taken from dice.
