Tressette

Tressette or Tresette is a 40-card, trick-taking card game. It is one of Italy's major national card games, together with Scopa and Briscola. It is also popular in the regions that were once controlled by the Italian predecessor states, such as Albania, Montenegro, coastal Slovenia (Slovene Littoral) and coastal Croatia (Istria and Dalmatia). It is also played in the Canton of Ticino with a French-suited deck. The Austrian game Trischettn as historically played in South Tyrol is also a derivative, albeit played with a 32-card German-suited deck. It is recorded only from the early 18th century, though greater antiquity is suggested by its lack of trump. The name of the game, literally "three seven," may refer to seven sets of three or four point possibilities when a minimum of three each (three, two, ace or all of those together in a matching suit) are dealt, or to the fact that it is played up to twenty-one. According to Cäsar (1800), the name is derived from "Tre Sett" (three sevens) because, at that time, a player holding three sevens could declare them immediately and win the game (Partie). There are many variants depending on the region of Italy where the game is played.