In February 1903, a costume ball took place. The main requirement for those invited was to appear in costumes from the 17th century.

The Queen of Clubs and her prototype - Princess Elizabeth Fedorovna.

Check what deck of cards is in your drawer at home. It is quite possible that it is this one! Probably each of us has seen this deck of cards (“Russian style”)- in Soviet times, these cards were among the most common. There is nothing unusual about them at first glance; we are so accustomed to these drawings that we probably didn’t even pay attention to the clothes of the card characters. This is the strange thing: the prototypes for the kings and ladies in this deck were not proletarians and collective farmers, but participants in the last costume ball at the Romanov imperial court in 1903.

The Queen of Hearts and her prototype - Princess Ksenia Alexandrovna.

In February 1903, a costume ball took place. The main requirement for those invited was to appear in costumes from the 17th century. The luxurious celebration in the Winter Palace of St. Petersburg went down in history as the most famous and grandiose ball of the reign of Nicholas II and as the last court ball of Imperial Russia. Photographers captured all the famous participants in this event, which made it possible to recreate these images in playing cards.

All 390 guests of the imperial ball were dressed in the style of courtiers of all stripes, boyars and boyars, archers and townswomen, governors and peasant women of the pre-Petrine era. The sketches of the costumes were developed by the artist Sergei Solomko, and they were sewn by the best tailors of the Russian Empire.

The maps were created based on photographs collected in the “Album of a costume ball in the Winter Palace.” The clothes of the kings, jacks and queens on the playing cards completely repeated the costumes of the participants in the masquerade ball. The aces depict shields surrounded by ancient Russian weapons and armor.

In 1911, German craftsmen from the Dondorf factory developed sketches for the cards, and in 1913 they were printed in St. Petersburg at the Alexander Manufactory. The release of the deck called “Russian Style” was timed to coincide with the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty.

After the revolution, the manufactory was closed; in 1923 it resumed work and again began producing cards based on pre-revolutionary sketches. Later, Soviet illustrator Yuri Ivanov copied the “Russian Style” cards from the original deck for offset printing.

Matreshin Alexander - Panorama of the Kremlin

Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881) - Dawn on the Moscow River from the opera "Khovanshchina"

Matreshin Alexander Valentinovich, born in 1956, is a Soviet and Russian artist.
He graduated from the art department of the All-Union State Institute of Cinematography and worked in the field of book illustration for more than ten years. The artist's works are in many museums and private collections.

“On March 24, 1798, by Imperial decree, the right to brand and sell playing cards throughout the Russian Empire was forever given to the Orphanage, a charitable institution for the care of orphans. The Board of Trustees of the Orphanage began to farm out the right to brand, earning from this considerable funds that went towards "maintenance of orphans." The tax farming system existed for more than 20 years - from April 1, 1799 to January 1, 1820. During the entire period, five card farming took place, each for a period of four years. The tax farming system caused a rapid increase in the number of cards produced. Already in the ninth year. action of farming, in 1807-1808, almost 2,300,000 decks of all types were made. Cards were made as.
in both capitals in large factories, and in remote cities by small card masters who took certificates for their production from farmers.

The factory began production of new premium decks based on sketches by a German artist, an employee of a famous card factory
B. Dondorf in Frankfurt am Main, whose name was kept in the strictest confidence. Four decks were released and remained in production for many decades.
The release of new cards required a significant improvement in the quality of their production. The decks were printed in 16 colors using the chromolithography technique by the best master of the Card Factory, Michael. One of the released decks, called “Russian Style,” allowed us to say that playing cards in a truly national spirit finally appeared in Russia. This deck is notable for the fact that the sketches for it were created under the influence of an album of photographs of the imperial charity ball of 1903, costumed in the style of the 17th century. This version is supported by the extraordinary similarity of the Queen of Clubs to the appearance and costume of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, and the Queen of Hearts to Grand Duchess Ksenia Alexandrovna.
The figures of the kings are represented by the king with an orb in his hand (king of hearts) and the boyars of the time of Alexei Mikhailovich. The ladies are shown in festive clothes: rich townswomen in ferezis and platens, peasant women in embroidered sundresses with soul warmers. Jacks are young falconers and archers with weapons and birds of prey in their hands. The design of the usually modestly decorated aces turned out to be very successful. On each ace, the sign of the card suit is placed on a round shield framed by ancient weapons and hunting attributes. The sign “In favor of the Imperial Orphanage” is also made in the form of an old pendant seal.”

Cards "Russian style"

These cards are probably familiar to almost everyone: they were issued many times during the Soviet years. At home I have two decks of these small format cards with backs of different colors in one box - a gift version from the mid-50s of the last century. And my grandmother had the same pre-revolutionary cards, but of a standard size.

Below are given for comparison, mentioned in the monograph by E.N. Grigorenko, photographs of the Grand Duchesses Ksenia Alexandrovna - the sister of Nicholas II (queen of hearts) and Elizaveta Fedorovna - sister of the wife of Nicholas II, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (queen of clubs).

There really are similarities, first of all, in the costumes: very characteristic kokoshniks on both ladies. You can also catch similarities in faces if you really want to.

The Internet is simply flooded with comparisons of representatives of the Russian nobility who attended the famous imperial ball in 1903 with pictures on the “Russian Style” cards. Of all that I happened to see, the most consistent with reality seems to be the fact that the King of Hearts was copied from a portrait of Emperor Alexander III, who could not be at this ball, since he died in 1894.
The costume of the card king differs from the uniform of Emperor Alexander Alexandrovich, but this is not surprising, because all the kings in this deck are dressed in costumes stylized as the clothes of Russian tsars and boyars of the 17th century.

Nikolai Gustavovich Schilder (1828-1898) - Portrait of Alexander III

- “Solemn Coronation March” (1883), written on the occasion of the coronation of Alexander III
USSR Symphony Orchestra
Conductor - Vyacheslav Ovchinnikov

Monomakh's hat

They also compare portraits of the Grand Dukes Mikhail Alexandrovich - brother of Nicholas II and Andrei Vladimirovich - cousin of Nicholas II with jacks of clubs and jacks of diamonds, respectively.
If we talk about the similarity of costumes, then, apart from the fabric and colors, the men's suits and headdresses of the Russian boyars of the 17th century were not much different from each other. Unless Andrei Vladimirovich was considered the prototype of the Jack of Diamonds, since at the ball he was dressed in the costume of the Tsar’s falconer, and the Jack of Diamonds had a mechanical falcon in his hands, indicating that, they say, this fellow is a falconer. And if we talk about the portrait resemblance of the Grand Dukes to the jacks of cards, then, apart from the mustache, for the life of me, I personally don’t find any similarity. This can be clearly seen if you look at photographs of the Grand Dukes in a larger format. But, since two royal relatives became card prototypes, then we can assume that these two royal relatives also became them.

Nikolai Andreevich Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) - Polonaise from the opera "The Night Before Christmas"

Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

As a lyrical digression.
The Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich mentioned here, the grandson of Emperor Alexander II, in the mid-20s of the last century, while in exile, married the well-known ballerina Matilda Feliksovna Kshesinskaya.
Matilda Kshesinskaya is known for the most part not as a ballerina, although she was a Russian prima, but because three Grand Dukes of the House of Romanov hovered around her. First it was the future Emperor Nicholas II - even before his engagement to his future wife. Then Matilda Feliksovna was the de facto wife of Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, the grandson of Emperor Nicholas I. At the same time, she had an affair with another Romanov, Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich.

At all times, exalted fools dreamed of a prince, if not on a white horse, then at least on an ugly black jeep, but not everyone got even the ordinary Ivanushka the Fool, because today princes, alas, are an elusive nature. And Matilda Feliksovna had three princes. And not just any stray Holsteins or Hessians, but the Romanovs themselves!

While this story was hanging around unfinished for almost two months, on July 14, 2016, a new article about card prototypes appeared on the Internet From the king to the ball! , which LiveJournal immediately grabbed for quotes.

What was new, in comparison with previous publications, was, firstly, the comparison of the king of spades from the “Russian Style” deck with the portrait of Tsar Ivan the Terrible from the painting by Alexander Dmitrievich Litovchenko (1835-1890) “Ivan the Terrible Shows Treasures to the English Ambassador Horsey.”

By clicking on the picture of the king of spades, you can independently verify the inconsistency of this statement. As for me, then, rather, the king of clubs plus or minus three camels, as my drawing teacher said, looks like a portrait of Ivan Vasilyevich painted by Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov. It would be a stretch to say that the king of spades is similar to this portrait, but this king has a very vegetarian expression on his face, in contrast to the royal portrait. Yes, in fact, the King of Clubs is also not distinguished by its menacing appearance. A beard and a cap - that's all the similarities.

So the author of the article, a Doctor of Philosophy, a certain Semyon Ekshtut, is either new to materiel, or has weak eyesight, which is confirmed by the following analogies he proposed: headquarters captain, squadron commander of the Cavalry Guard Regiment, adjutant of Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich Alexander Nikolaevich Bezak - jack of spades and the adjutant of the Grand Duke, Admiral General Alexei Alexandrovich, Lieutenant Nikolai Alexandrovich Volkov - the jack of hearts.

Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich the Terrible (1879)
Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov (1848-1926)

The main factors that unite these cards and their “prototypes” are mustaches and the cut of boyar costumes, which was standard for that time.

From all of the above, we can draw an unambiguous conclusion: the presence of a beard automatically makes him a prototype of card kings, and what about card kings - even a prototype of Tsar Nicholas II himself!

Those who have not yet grown to have a beard, forced to be content with youthful growth in the form of a mustache, automatically become prototypes of card jacks.

I won’t even consider all the other “analogies” of the author of the article, because he does not take into account that the German artist drew his card characters and their outfits based on photographs of the Russian nobility who were present at the famous ball, and did not copy them one by one.

I remembered an incident: in connection with repairs, I bought adhesive paper, the design of which for some reason was called “Karelian birch”. In general, the drawing suited me, but the name confused me. I asked the seller if a Karelian birch tree looks like this in cross-section, to which he answered philosophically: “It’s a German, why is that tree a big one?” (The German did this, did he even see this tree?)

Deripaska's beard Peskov's mustache

So in the case of maps, since they were drawn by a German artist, then what is the demand for him?)))

This is not one of the 12 chairs made by master Gumbs, but - for a moment - the throne of Russian emperors.)))

These richly embroidered dresses are the same uniform for the ladies-in-waiting of the Russian court, as were the court uniforms for the male persons who were at the court of the Russian emperors, who were popularly called courtiers.

In 1834, Emperor Nicholas I issued a decree introducing a new court dress, complemented by a kokoshnik. It consisted of a narrow open bodice with long sleeves “a la boyars” and a long skirt with a train. Kokoshniks, combined with a low-necked court dress, remained in the wardrobe of ladies-in-waiting until the revolution.

Sovereign Nikolai Pavlovich personally approved sketches with drawings of court dresses and strictly ensured that the ladies who were required to wear this outfit according to the state strictly wore them to official receptions. It’s a pity that there were no television programs “Fashionable Verdict” and “Take It Off Immediately!” at that time; Tsar Nicholas I could well have been the presenter in them.

True, these were dresses stylized as Russian sundresses, for which they were called French sundresses. Not only the cut, but also the color of these dresses was regulated. So the ladies of the State and the ladies-in-waiting were supposed to wear a green velvet outer dress with gold embroidery on the bottom and side, the mentors - a blue dress, the ladies-in-waiting of Her Imperial Majesty - crimson, the ladies-in-waiting of the Grand Duchesses were also crimson, but the embroidery had to be silver , ladies-in-waiting of the Grand Duchesses - a blue dress with silver embroidery.

If the photographs of the two ladies-in-waiting shown here were in color, we would see that both beauties are wearing bright red dresses with gold embroidery. By the way, they both attended the famous ball in 1903 - their photographs at this ball can be seen below.

On the left side of the neckline of the dress, maids of honor were supposed to wear the so-called maid of honor cipher - a gold brooch with diamonds in the form of a capital letter of the name (monogram) of the empress, on whose staff this maid of honor was; or from two intertwined initials of the empress and her mother-in-law, the dowager empress (this sign was called double). The maids of honor of the grand duchesses and princesses also had their own monograms. The composition was crowned with a stylized imperial crown.
The code was supposed to be worn on a blue bow - the color of St. Andrew's ribbon.

Princess Zinaida Nikolaevna Yusupova - Princess Elizaveta Nikolaevna Obolenskaya -
maid of honor of Empress Maria Alexandrovna maid of honor of Empress Maria Feodorovna
(wives of Alexander II) (wives of Alexander III)

Maid of honor cipher

Adolf Ignatievich Ladurner (1798-1855) - Armorial Hall of the Winter Palace (1838)

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) - Polonaise from the opera "Ivan Susanin"
State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the USSR
Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

The painting by the artist Ladurner depicts groups of guards and court ladies waiting for the start of some official event. All the ladies are dressed according to their uniform.

Ladies who did not have court positions, but were present at official receptions and other ceremonial meetings, were also given a kokoshnik and a standard cut of the dress, although the color and fabric from which these dresses were made could be any - at the discretion of the owner of the outfit.

The shape of the court kokoshniks was quite far from the peasant prototypes, as was the cut of the court dresses. In the second half of the 19th century, diamond kokoshnik tiaras (Russian style tiaras) appeared, which were popular at court.

Maid of honor cipher

Orlov Pimen Nikitich (1812-1865) - Portrait of the maid of honor Anna Alekseevna Okulova in Russian court attire

Orlov Pimen Nikitich (1812-1865) - Portrait of the maid of honor Sofia Vasilievna Orlova-Denisova (1835) in Russian court attire

(1878-1927) - Portrait of Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna in sapphire parure (wife of Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich - son of Alexander II) (1913)

Note. Parure - (parure - attire, decoration) - a set of jewelry selected by the quality and type of stones, by material or by the unity of artistic design.

A. Malyukov (1836) - Portrait of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (wife of Nicholas I)

Makarov Ivan Kuzmich (1822-1897) - Portrait of Empress Maria Alexandrovna (wife of Alexander II)

Makovsky Konstantin Egorovich (1839-1915) - Portrait of Empress Maria Feodorovna (wife of Alexander III)

(1863-1924) - Portrait of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (wife of Nicholas II)

Tiara in the shape of a Russian kokoshnik

Tuxen Laurits Regner (1853-1927) - Marriage of Nicholas II and Grand Duchess Alexandra Feodorovna

Anatoly Konstantinovich Lyadov (1855-1914) - Polonaise in memory of Pushkin
State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the USSR
Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

Small Imperial Crown

Tiara "Kokoshnik" with pink diamond

The costume ball, dedicated to the 290th anniversary of the House of Romanov, took place in the Winter Palace in February 1903 - the famous masquerade ball, at which all those present were dressed in Russian royal and boyar costumes of the 17th century.
The ball took place at the end of the Nativity Fast and took place in two stages: on February 11 (24), 1903, a gala evening and concert took place, and on February 13 (26) the costume ball itself.

In 1904, by order of the Imperial Court, albums with photographs of the ball participants were published.
The albums were distributed for a high fee for charitable purposes, primarily among the participants of the ball.

Costumes for the ball were created according to special sketches by the artist Sergei Sergeevich Solomko (1867-1928) with the assistance of historical costume consultants.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) - Polonaise from the ballet "The Sleeping Beauty"
State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the USSR
Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

Diamond hat

Fairytale Rus' by Sergei Solomko

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) - First Song of Bayan
from the opera "Ruslan and Lyudmila"
Bayan - Yuri Marusin
Mariinsky Theater - St. Petersburg

Sergei Sergeevich Solomko, born in 1867 in St. Petersburg, is a Russian artist, watercolorist, and graphic artist. Member of the St. Petersburg Association of Artists.

1883-1887 - studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.
1887-1888 - volunteer at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg.
Late 1880s - began collaborating with art magazines: “North”, “Niva”, “World of Art”, “Jester” and others as an illustrator.
For the publishing house of Alexei Sergeevich Suvorin (1834-1912) he illustrated the works of Pushkin and Chekhov. For the publishing house of Adolf Fedorovich Marx (1838-1904) he illustrated the works of Lermontov and Gogol.

Sergei Solomko was engaged not only in painting, but also in jewelry and costume design: the artist created models for the Imperial Porcelain Factory and collaborated with the Faberge jewelry company.

1903 - the artist executed sketches of ancient Russian costumes for a costume ball in the Winter Palace.
Since 1910, Sergei Solomko lived permanently in Paris.

1916 - worked on orders from the Commission involved in the creation of a museum of the First World War, at whose request he painted portraits of holders of the Order of the Russian Expeditionary Force in France.

In France, Solomko created theatrical costumes: in particular for ballerinas Anna Pavlova and Matilda Kshesinskaya.

1925 - took part in the creation of the Russian Art and Industry Institute in Paris.

Sergei Sergeevich died in 1928 in the “Russian House” in Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois. He was buried in the local cemetery.

Note. "Russian House" is a nursing home, originally intended for first-wave emigrants from Russia.

The Last Ball - documentary (2011)
Director - Boris Liznev

All the kings of the House of Romanov

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) - “Glory” - finale from the opera “Ivan Susanin” (Life for the Tsar)
Orchestra and Choir of the Mikhailovsky Theater (6 March 2013, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg)
Conductor - Alexey Karabanov

Great Imperial Crown

"RUSSIAN PLAYING CARDS (The Story of a Factory)"

"Russian playing cards"("The History of One Factory") - an illustrated catalog-album dedicated to the activities of the St. Petersburg Card Factory (later, the Color Printing Plant) in the period from 1817 to 2001. Almost all series (images) of playing cards issued during this period of time are collected Petersburg and outlines the history of the formation and development of the factory. The book-album “Russian Playing Cards” was published in a limited edition - the first study in our country dedicated to the history of one of the most interesting types of applied graphics. It is especially pleasant to note that a famous collector took part in the creation of the book. playing cards Evgeny Grigorenko. In addition to aesthetic value, the album “Russian Playing Cards” is, as stated earlier, “of great interest not only for specialists, but also for a wide range of readers. For example, from the book you can learn that during the Great Patriotic War.” During the Patriotic War, the Soviet command used playing cards in propaganda. To produce a special “anti-fascist” deck in besieged Leningrad in the winter of 1942, a handful of specialists who had previously worked at a card factory were assembled. In difficult conditions, without sleep or rest, they manually printed anti-fascist cards. Soon, they were loaded onto planes whose route lay behind the front line and scattered in areas where enemy troops were concentrated. To this day, only two decks of “anti-fascist cards” have survived. The figures on them are caricatures of Nazi figures: Kings - Hitler, Mussolini, Horthy, Mannerheim; Jacks - Goebbels, Himler, Ribbentrop, Goering...

During the reign of Catherine the Second and finally under Alexander the First, it was introduced state monopoly for the production of playing cards. Income from the production of cards went to the maintenance of the Department of Empress Maria, caring for orphans. The production of cards was launched at the state-owned Alexander Manufactory, where the Imperial Card Factory began operating in 1819. A distinctive feature of Russian playing cards was their original design, which compared favorably with the decks of European card factories. The themes of the drawings of kings, queens and jacks often reflected the events of modern cultural life of the Russian Empire. For example, the famous “Russian Style” deck, which many Russians still play today, was created in 1911 based on the national costumes of the 17th century, shown during the famous “Historical Ball” in the Kremlin. The prototype of the King of Hearts was the Russian Emperor Nicholas II himself, and the ladies were Empress Maria Feodorovna. This tradition continued during Soviet times. On the 1925 deck, the figured cards are dressed in the costumes of the peoples of the first Soviet republics: Belarus, Ukraine, Russia and Transcaucasia.

In the early years of Soviet power, the popularity of playing cards was also widely used in political propaganda. In 1934, the production of “anti-religious” playing cards began, on which clergy of various faiths were printed in a satirical form. An export version of the “anti-religious” deck was also produced, which was supplied abroad, which caused numerous protests from the Vatican and religious leaders. Among other things, playing cards were used for educational purposes: in 1927, a deck was published - instructions “Rifle”, intended for illiterate soldiers of the Red Army.

However, the most widespread and popular cards for more than 150 years remain the well-known cards “ Satin"- says Evgeniy Grigorenko. - But few people know that the drawings of these maps were created in 1862 by academician of painting Adolphe Charlemagne. Moreover, it must be said that other famous Russian artists did not shy away from drawing playing cards. It is enough to name such names as the most popular graphic artist of the early twentieth century, Ivan Bilibin, and the creator of the “Millennium of Russia” monument, Vladimir Mikeshin. Unfortunately, the card factory “Color Printing Plant” in St. Petersburg, unable to stand the test of time, ceased its almost two-century existence in 2004. However, the traditions of Russian card artists and graphic artists in modern Russia are continued by small printing enterprises in different regions of the country.

This deck of cards can rightfully be called a classic, not only because almost every Russian person has seen and held it in their hands.

Playing cards or even solitaire cards with figures are much closer to the Russian people than you might think. A Swiss, French or German deck, for example, is quite different in appearance, and now you are more likely to see ordinary hand-drawn cards. But this deck was in almost every home.

The familiar kings, queens and jacks are people who actually existed! Not only that, they really were kings and queens.

In fact, the cards depict members of the royal family who once gathered for a costumed masquerade ball. This was one of the last luxurious balls - the empire soon fell under the onslaught of revolution, but the memory of the celebration was preserved in such a miraculous way!

The Imperial Ball took place in 1903 in St. Petersburg, and the dress code was the 17th century era. Noble people dressed up in luxurious, stylized costumes, and photographers captured it all. Card images accurately replicate the images of the guests.

It should be noted that there were 390 guests and they were all dressed up in the style of courtiers of all stripes, boyars and boyars, archers and townswomen, governors and peasant women of pre-Petrine Rus'. The sketches of the costumes were developed by the artist Sergei Solomko, and they were sewn by the best tailors of the Russian Empire.

The most interesting thing is that the “Russian Style” deck of cards was printed and released for the 300th anniversary of the House of Romanov at the Alexander Manufactory. After the revolution it was closed, and a little later the factory resumed work and continued producing cards based on pre-revolutionary sketches. Later, the deck was adapted for offset printing by the Soviet artist Yuri Ivanov.

It is surprising that this particular deck became the most popular in the former USSR - no others could compete with it, although there were anti-religious, anti-fascist and many others. Among other things, it turns out that we all know what “Russian style” is.

Card suits. Versions of origin

As such, there is no “official” version of the origin of card suits. There are several hypotheses.

According to one of them, cards were invented by the Chinese. According to another, Egyptian priests drew 78 tablets - Tarot cards. Modern cards were drawn on 56 tablets (the so-called “Minor Arcana”) and another 22 tablets (“Major Arcana”) made up Tarot cards. The hypothesis was voiced in 1785 by the French occultist Etteila, and it was continued to be promoted by the Anglicans Crowley and Mathers, the French Levi and the doctor of magic Papus.

According to another, Charles the 6th (suffering from schizophrenia) had a jester, Jacques Gringoner, who in 1392 entertained the king with a deck of 32 cards: no queens.

Another hypothesis says that in Indian maps there is a multi-armed Shiva, in his hands he held a rod, a cup, a coin and a sword. Suits were drawn in the same way in Italian card decks.

The Germans still call the suits spears, flowers, squares and hearts. There are also leaves, acorns, bells and hearts.

Heart, diamond, cross and spade. In English, worms are hearts. Tambourines diamonds, diamonds. Clubs (crosses) - clubs, tubers. The peaks will be so - spades.

Card suits and crosses on temples

Let us pay attention to the crosses of Orthodox churches:

On old crosses, not new ones, made before the 1917 revolution, card suits are present and clearly distinguished in the design of the ornament.

One of the options for semantic reading is according to the principle of nesting. The “end” of the beam on the cross is made in the style of a heart or spades suit. On each ray of one cross, there may be a smaller “cross” from one of these two suits. And this small “cross” merges into the suit of tambourines (see picture).

From a distance, the entire cross pattern merges into the cross suit itself.

Based on this arrangement of the elements of the cross, we can conclude that the black (spade) and/or red (cherva) elements are components of a larger red element (tambourine), which, in turn, is a component of a larger black ensemble - clubs, the actual cross.

Some researchers, for example, argue that, in fact, the suits symbolize the worlds in the ancient Vedic beliefs that existed in Rus' and have survived in this form to our times. These are the worlds of Reveal, Navi, Glory and Rule. According to the researcher, reality is a peak, glory is a tambourine, nav is clubs, and rule is worms. The world of reality is our obvious world. The worlds of Navi and Slavi are dark and light otherworldly worlds. And finally, the world rules - the highest divine world.

Matreshin Alexander - Panorama of the Kremlin

Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881) - Dawn on the Moscow River from the opera "Khovanshchina"

Matreshin Alexander Valentinovich, born in 1956, is a Soviet and Russian artist.
He graduated from the art department of the All-Union State Institute of Cinematography and worked in the field of book illustration for more than ten years. The artist's works are in many museums and private collections.

“On March 24, 1798, by Imperial decree, the right to brand and sell playing cards throughout the Russian Empire was forever given to the Orphanage, a charitable institution for the care of orphans. The Board of Trustees of the Orphanage began to farm out the right to brand, earning from this considerable funds that went towards "maintenance of orphans." The tax farming system existed for more than 20 years - from April 1, 1799 to January 1, 1820. During the entire period, five card farming took place, each for a period of four years. The tax farming system caused a rapid increase in the number of cards produced. Already in the ninth year. action of farming, in 1807-1808, almost 2,300,000 decks of all types were made. Cards were made as.
in both capitals in large factories, and in remote cities by small card masters who took certificates for their production from farmers.

The factory began production of new premium decks based on sketches by a German artist, an employee of a famous card factory
B. Dondorf in Frankfurt am Main, whose name was kept in the strictest confidence. Four decks were released and remained in production for many decades.
The release of new cards required a significant improvement in the quality of their production. Decks were printed in
16 colors in the chromolithography technique by the best master of the Card Factory, Michael. One of the released decks, called “Russian Style,” allowed us to say that playing cards in a truly national spirit finally appeared in Russia. This deck is notable for the fact that the sketches for it were created under the influence of an album of photographs of the imperial charity ball of 1903, costumed in the style of the 17th century. This version is supported by the extraordinary similarity of the Queen of Clubs to the appearance and costume of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, and the Queen of Hearts to Grand Duchess Ksenia Alexandrovna.
The figures of the kings are represented by the king with an orb in his hand (king of hearts) and the boyars of the time of Alexei Mikhailovich. The ladies are shown in festive clothes: rich townswomen in ferezis and platens, peasant women in embroidered sundresses with soul warmers. Jacks are young falconers and archers with weapons and birds of prey in their hands. The design of the usually modestly decorated aces turned out to be very successful. On each ace, the sign of the card suit is placed on a round shield framed by ancient weapons and hunting attributes. The sign “In favor of the Imperial Orphanage” is also made in the form of an old pendant seal.”

Cards "Russian style"

These cards are probably familiar to almost everyone: they were issued many times during the Soviet years. At home I have two decks of these small format cards with backs of different colors and one box is a gift version from the mid-50s of the last century. And my grandmother had the same pre-revolutionary cards, but of a standard size.

Below are given for comparison, mentioned in the monograph by E.N. Grigorenko, photographs of the Grand Duchesses Ksenia Alexandrovna - the sister of Nicholas II (queen of hearts) and Elizaveta Fedorovna - sister of the wife of Nicholas II, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (queen of clubs).

There really are similarities, first of all, in the costumes: very characteristic kokoshniks on both ladies. You can also catch similarities in faces if you really want to.

The Internet is simply flooded with comparisons of representatives of the Russian nobility who attended the famous imperial ball in 1903 with pictures on the “Russian Style” cards. Of all that I happened to see, the most consistent with reality seems to be the fact that the King of Hearts was copied from a portrait of Emperor Alexander III, who could not be at this ball, since he died in 1894.
The costume of the card king differs from the uniform of Emperor Alexander Alexandrovich, but this is not surprising, because all the kings in this deck are dressed in costumes stylized as the clothes of Russian tsars and boyars of the 17th century.

Nikolai Gustavovich Schilder (1828-1898) - Portrait of Alexander III

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) - “Solemn Coronation March” (1883), written on the occasion of the coronation of Alexander III
USSR Symphony Orchestra
Conductor - Vyacheslav Ovchinnikov

Monomakh's hat

They also compare portraits of the Grand Dukes Mikhail Alexandrovich - brother of Nicholas II and Andrei Vladimirovich - cousin of Nicholas II with jacks of clubs and jacks of diamonds, respectively.
If we talk about the similarity of costumes, then, apart from the fabric and colors, the men's suits and headdresses of the Russian boyars of the 17th century were not much different from each other. Unless Andrei Vladimirovich was considered the prototype of the Jack of Diamonds, since at the ball he was dressed in the costume of the Tsar’s falconer, and the Jack of Diamonds had a mechanical falcon in his hands, indicating that, they say, this fellow is a falconer. And if we talk about the portrait resemblance of the Grand Dukes to the jacks of cards, then, apart from the mustache, for the life of me, I personally don’t find any similarity. This can be clearly seen if you look at photographs of the Grand Dukes in a larger format. But, since two royal relatives became card prototypes, then we can assume that these two royal relatives also became them.

Nikolai Andreevich Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) - Polonaise from the opera "The Night Before Christmas"

Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

As a lyrical digression.
The Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich mentioned here, the grandson of Emperor Alexander II, in the mid-20s of the last century, while in exile, married the well-known ballerina Matilda Feliksovna Kshesinskaya.
Matilda Kshesinskaya is known for the most part not as a ballerina, although she was a Russian prima, but because three Grand Dukes of the House of Romanov hovered around her. First it was the future Emperor Nicholas II - even before his engagement to his future wife. Then Matilda Feliksovna was the de facto wife of Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, the grandson of Emperor Nicholas I. At the same time, she had an affair with another Romanov, Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich.

At all times, exalted fools dreamed of a prince, if not on a white horse, then at least on an ugly black jeep, but not everyone got even the ordinary Ivanushka the Fool, because today princes, alas, are an elusive nature. And Matilda Feliksovna had three princes. And not just any stray Holsteins or Hessians, but the Romanovs themselves!

While this story was hanging around unfinished for almost two months, on July 14, 2016, a new article about card prototypes appeared on the Internet From the king to the ball! , which LiveJournal immediately grabbed for quotes.

What was new, in comparison with previous publications, was, firstly, the comparison of the king of spades from the “Russian Style” deck with the portrait of Tsar Ivan the Terrible from the painting by Alexander Dmitrievich Litovchenko (1835-1890) “Ivan the Terrible Shows Treasures to the English Ambassador Horsey.”

By clicking on the picture of the king of spades, you can independently verify the inconsistency of this statement. As for me, then, rather, the king of clubs plus or minus three camels, as my drawing teacher said, looks like a portrait of Ivan Vasilyevich painted by Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov. It would be a stretch to say that the king of spades is similar to this portrait, but this king has a very vegetarian expression on his face, in contrast to the royal portrait. Yes, in fact, the King of Clubs is also not distinguished by its menacing appearance. A beard and a cap - that's all the similarities.

So the author of the article, Doctor of Philosophy, a certain Semyon Ekshtut, is either new to materiel, or has weak eyesight, which is confirmed by the following analogies he proposed: headquarters captain, squadron commander of the Cavalry Guard Regiment, adjutant of Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich Alexander Nikolaevich Bezak - jack of spades and adjutant of the Grand Duke Admiral General Alexei Alexandrovich, Lieutenant Nikolai Alexandrovich Volkov - jack of hearts.

Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich the Terrible (1879)
Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov (1848-1926)

The main factors that unite these cards and their “prototypes” are mustaches and the cut of boyar costumes, which was standard for that time.

From all of the above, we can draw an unambiguous conclusion: the presence of a beard automatically makes him a prototype of card kings, and what about card kings - even a prototype of Tsar Nicholas II himself!

Those who have not yet grown to have a beard, forced to be content with youthful growth in the form of a mustache, automatically become prototypes of card jacks.

I won’t even consider all the other “analogies” of the author of the article, because he does not take into account that the German artist drew his card characters and their outfits based on photographs of the Russian nobility who were present at the famous ball, and did not copy them one by one.

I remembered an incident: in connection with repairs, I bought adhesive paper, the design of which for some reason was called “Karelian birch”. In general, the drawing suited me, but the name confused me. I asked the seller if a Karelian birch tree looks like this in cross-section, to which he answered philosophically: “It’s a German, why is that tree a big one?” (The German did this, did he even see this tree?)

Deripaska's beard Peskov's mustache

So in the case of maps, since they were drawn by a German artist, then what is the demand for him?)))

This is not one of the 12 chairs made by master Gumbs, but - for a moment - the throne of Russian emperors.)))

These richly embroidered dresses are the same uniform for the ladies-in-waiting of the Russian court, as were the court uniforms for the male persons who were at the court of the Russian emperors, who were popularly called courtiers.

In 1834, Emperor Nicholas I issued a decree introducing a new court dress, complemented by a kokoshnik. It consisted of a narrow open bodice with long sleeves “a la boyars” and a long skirt with a train. Kokoshniks, combined with a low-necked court dress, remained in the wardrobe of ladies-in-waiting until the revolution.

Sovereign Nikolai Pavlovich personally approved sketches with drawings of court dresses and strictly ensured that the ladies who were required to wear this outfit according to the state strictly wore them to official receptions. It’s a pity that there were no television programs “Fashionable Verdict” and “Take It Off Immediately!” at that time; Tsar Nicholas I could well have been the presenter in them.

True, these were dresses stylized as Russian sundresses, for which they were called French sundresses. Not only the cut, but also the color of these dresses was regulated. So the ladies of the State and the ladies-in-waiting were supposed to wear a green velvet outer dress with gold embroidery on the bottom and side, the mentors - a blue dress, the ladies-in-waiting of Her Imperial Majesty - crimson, the ladies-in-waiting of the Grand Duchesses were also crimson, but the embroidery had to be silver , ladies-in-waiting of the Grand Duchesses - a blue dress with silver embroidery.

If the photographs of the two ladies-in-waiting shown here were in color, we would see that both beauties are wearing bright red dresses with gold embroidery. By the way, they both attended the famous ball in 1903 - their photographs at this ball can be seen below.

On the left side of the neckline of the dress, maids of honor were supposed to wear the so-called maid of honor cipher - a gold brooch with diamonds in the form of a capital letter of the name (monogram) of the empress, on whose staff this maid of honor was; or from two intertwined initials of the empress and her mother-in-law, the dowager empress (this sign was called double). The maids of honor of the grand duchesses and princesses also had their own monograms. The composition was crowned with a stylized imperial crown.
The code was supposed to be worn on a blue bow - the color of St. Andrew's ribbon.

Princess Zinaida Nikolaevna Yusupova - Princess Elizaveta Nikolaevna Obolenskaya -
maid of honor of Empress Maria Alexandrovna maid of honor of Empress Maria Feodorovna
(wives of Alexander II) (wives of Alexander III)

Maid of honor cipher

Adolf Ignatievich Ladurner (1798-1855) - Armorial Hall of the Winter Palace (1838)

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) - Polonaise from the opera "Ivan Susanin"
State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the USSR
Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

The painting by the artist Ladurner depicts groups of guards and court ladies waiting for the start of some official event. All the ladies are dressed according to their uniform.

Ladies who did not have court positions, but were present at official receptions and other ceremonial meetings, were also given a kokoshnik and a standard cut of the dress, although the color and fabric from which these dresses were made could be any - at the discretion of the owner of the outfit.

The shape of the court kokoshniks was quite far from the peasant prototypes, as was the cut of the court dresses. In the second half of the 19th century, diamond kokoshnik tiaras (Russian style tiaras) appeared, which were popular at court.

Maid of honor cipher

Orlov Pimen Nikitich (1812-1865) - Portrait of the maid of honor Anna Alekseevna Okulova in Russian court attire

Orlov Pimen Nikitich (1812-1865) - Portrait of the maid of honor Sofia Vasilievna Orlova-Denisova (1835) in Russian court attire

Boris Mikhailovich Kustodiev (1878-1927) - Portrait of Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna in sapphire parure (wife of Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich - son of Alexander II) (1913)

Note. Parure - (parure - attire, decoration) - a set of jewelry selected by the quality and type of stones, by material or by the unity of artistic design.

A. Malyukov (1836) - Portrait of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (wife of Nicholas I)

Makarov Ivan Kuzmich (1822-1897) - Portrait of Empress Maria Alexandrovna (wife of Alexander II)

Makovsky Konstantin Egorovich (1839-1915) - Portrait of Empress Maria Feodorovna (wife of Alexander III)

Elena Petrovna Samokish-Sudkovskaya (1863-1924) - Portrait of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (wife of Nicholas II)

Tiara in the shape of a Russian kokoshnik

Tuxen Laurits Regner (1853-1927) - Marriage of Nicholas II and Grand Duchess Alexandra Feodorovna

Anatoly Konstantinovich Lyadov (1855-1914) - Polonaise in memory of Pushkin
State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the USSR
Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

Small Imperial Crown

Tiara "Kokoshnik" with pink diamond

The costume ball, dedicated to the 290th anniversary of the House of Romanov, took place in the Winter Palace in February 1903 - the famous masquerade ball, at which all those present were dressed in Russian royal and boyar costumes of the 17th century.
The ball took place at the end of the Nativity Fast and took place in two stages: on February 11 (24), 1903, a gala evening and concert took place, and on February 13 (26) the costume ball itself.

After the end of the ball, at the request of the Empress, all participants were captured by the best photographers of St. Petersburg.
In 1904, albums with these photographs were published by order of the Imperial Court.
The albums were distributed for a high fee for charitable purposes, primarily among the participants of the ball.

Costumes for the ball, which cost fortunes, were created according to special sketches by the artist Sergei Sergeevich Solomko (1867-1928) with the assistance of historical costume consultants.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) - Polonaise from the ballet "The Sleeping Beauty"
State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the USSR
Conductor - Evgeny Svetlanov

Diamond hat

Fairytale Rus' by Sergei Solomko

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) - First Song of Bayan
from the opera "Ruslan and Lyudmila"
Bayan - Yuri Marusin
Mariinsky Theater - St. Petersburg

Sergei Sergeevich Solomko, born in 1867 in St. Petersburg, is a Russian artist, watercolorist, and graphic artist. Member of the St. Petersburg Association of Artists.

1883-1887 - studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.
1887-1888 - volunteer at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg.
Late 1880s - began collaborating with art magazines: “North”, “Niva”, “World of Art”, “Jester” and others as an illustrator.
For the publishing house of Alexei Sergeevich Suvorin (1834-1912) he illustrated the works of Pushkin and Chekhov. For the publishing house of Adolf Fedorovich Marx (1838-1904) he illustrated the works of Lermontov and Gogol.

Sergei Solomko was engaged not only in painting, but also in jewelry and costume design: the artist created models for the Imperial Porcelain Factory and collaborated with the Faberge jewelry company.

1903 - the artist executed sketches of ancient Russian costumes for a costume ball in the Winter Palace.
Since 1910, Sergei Solomko lived permanently in Paris.

1916 - worked on orders from the Commission involved in the creation of a museum of the First World War, at whose request he painted portraits of holders of the Order of the Russian Expeditionary Force in France.

In France, Solomko created theatrical costumes: in particular for ballerinas Anna Pavlova and Matilda Kshesinskaya.

1925 - took part in the creation of the Russian Art and Industry Institute in Paris.

Sergei Sergeevich died in 1928 in the “Russian House” in Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois. He was buried in the local cemetery.

Note. "Russian House" is a nursing home, originally intended for first-wave emigrants from Russia.

The Last Ball - documentary (2011)
Director - Boris Liznev

All the kings of the House of Romanov

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) - “Glory” - finale from the opera “Ivan Susanin” (Life for the Tsar)
Orchestra and Choir of the Mikhailovsky Theater (6 March 2013, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg)
Conductor - Alexey Karabanov

Great Imperial Crown

Victor Aleksandrovich Hartman - sketch for the project of the city "Bogatyr Gate" for Kyiv (1869)

Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881) - Pictures from the exhibition - Bogatyr Gate