The game of poker is shrouded in the mists of time, but there are a few things that we can say with some certainty.

The Pre-European Story of Cards

Before poker could evolve there had to be playing cards for the game to be played with. Playing cards must have come originally from China, where paper was first invented, they featured two suits. From there cards spread to the Islamic world, where they gained two more suits. Modern cards almost certainly originate in the Marmeluke Sultanate that ruled Egypt in the late middle ages. At the time, the Islamic empire stretched all the way into Spain.

Early European Playing Cards

It was in Spain that cards resembling our modern variety first appeared in Europe. By the 1430's, playing cards were being printed in Germany. The current suits of Diamonds, Hearts, Clubs and Spades were first recorded in France in the 1480's; it was these cards that were adopted in England and eventually became the most popular version of playing card in use today.

In the eighteenth century came the introduction of the reversible picture cards and then aces high, which allowed players to use the ace as either the lowest or highest card. Finally in 1865 the Joker joined the pack from the United States.

Pre Poker

The origins of poker are difficult to trace, but seem to be descended from a Persian game called as Nas. In the sixteenth century the Spanish played a game called 'primero' which involving competing with combinations of ranked cards and the use of bluffing. By the eighteenth century this had evolved into the French 'poque' and German 'pochen' (meaning knocking the table).

The Birth of Poker

It is probably from the French game that poker evolved in Louisiana, which until 1803 was a French colony. In 1829 Joseph Crowell reports playing a game in New Orleans involving four players who bet on the strength of their respective hands.

It was in 1834 that Jonathan H. Green writes of the 'cheating game' which was played on Mississippi River Boats. This new game started to replace the previously most popular game, 3-card Monte, which was often fixed.

Poker Spreads

New Orleans was an ideal position for poker to spread, the Mississippi river boats took the game into the heartlands of the United States. Great convergences of people during the civil war from 1861 to 1865 meant the game spread further. By the following decades poker was the key card game played in the 'wild west'.

During this time the game continued to evolve, with wild cards being used during the 1870's, lowball games at around the turn of the century and poker games with community cards being introduced around 1925.

The popularity of poker continued to grow, and soon terms taken from the game entered the English language. Phrases such as ace up one's sleeve, call one's bluff, cash in, high roller, pass the buck, poker face, up the ante, when the chips are down, and wild card are so common that most people barely associate them with the game from which they came.

The First and Second World Wars took American troops and their favourite card game around the world, where it soon became equally popular. But it was probably in the late 1960's that poker's profile began to rise more exponentially.

The World Series of Poker

It was the World Series of Poker or WSOP that took the game from the backroom, den and parlour into the casino and towards world domination.

The inspiration for the WSOP is credited as a five month long series of heads up (two-man) poker games held in 1951 between Nicholas 'Nick the Greek' Dandolos and Johnny Moss in which the two played numerous different versions of the game. This event was organised by Benny Binion, who in 1969 played in Tom Moore's 'The Texas Gamblers Reunion' in the Holiday Hotel in Reno playing alongside Johnny Moss and several other top poker players.

It was the 1969 event which directly led to the creation of the first World Series of Poker the following year, when many of the same players met up once more at Benny Binion's Horseshoe casino to play their favourite game. In 1971, a 30,000 cash prize was introduced which grew into $385,000 in 1980, $895,000 in 1990, $1,500,000 in 2000 while 2006 saw players fighting for a first prize of $12 million. Helped by television coverage, the number of players had increased from seven in the original game to a whopping 8,773.

Internet Poker

The nineties brought a second massive change to poker - the rise of online poker. Many date the origin of Internet poker to 1994, when the government of Antigua and Barbuda passed the Free Trade and Processing Zone Act which allowed online casinos to operate from their shores.

Two of the first people to take advantage of the new legislation in the Caribbean were Andrew and Mark Rivkin who formed Cryptologic, and started to write software that provided encryption to ensure safe financial transactions. Soon, new startups such as Microgaming and Starnet Communications followed suit.

In 1996, things really started to hot up in the world of online gaming. The Mohawk nation of Kahnawake established their gaming commission to regulate and control gaming conducted from territory, which included online gambling sites. Cryptologic launched their first e-cash and gaming platform, and in 1996 InterCasino was one of the very first online casino to launch.

It was in the following year, in 1997 things began to change once more. A tender green shoot poked its head into the daylight, this was a shoot that would grow into a mighty tree. PlanetLuck and Starluck Casino's were launched in the Dominican Republic by the company that would launch PartyPoker in 2001.

By 2000 there were 700 online casinos in operation. After launching and raising the stakes in terms of usability and safety in 2001, the following year PartyPoker would set the standard for promoting their site when they started the PartyPoker Million. This was a large poker tournament that took place on Caribbean cruise ship and gave the poker world its first woman to win a $1,000,000.

In 2003 PokerStars scored a hit when Chris Moneymaker won the WSOP main event, having qualified through a $39 satellite tournament. Moneymaker by name and deed, his $2.5 million first prize meant that that two powerful new faces had arrived on the poker scene: his own and that of online poker.

In the summer of 2005, history was made once more when PartyGaming, the owners of PartyPoker 'the world's largest poker room' floated on the London Stock Exchange for £4.64 billion ($8.46 billion).

On September 29, 2006 Senator Bill Frist attached his Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act to the unrelated, but politically charged Safe Port Act. This act prohibits the transfer of funds from a financial institution to an Internet gambling site. Shortly afterwards several of the major players in the internet gaming business pulled out of the US market.

The riveting story of poker, and now online poker, continues apace; it is a story that is not only gripping but also reverberates across our culture. What will the future bring? When the chips are down it's impossible to say, but it's certain that it'll be exciting.

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