Curse of Scotland excluded, making the 7, later called the "beer card", a "stop") but there is no direct relation with the 9. Gomme's book goes on to claim "At the game of Pope Joan, the nine of diamonds is Pope; therefore the nine of diamonds is the curse of Scotland". "The Spectator" review considered the claim "more cogent in form than in matter". A letter written in response to "The Spectator's" book review pointed out that the saying was established well before Culloden, and preferred the Pope Joan theory to other explanations. Other explanations given in the letter were: An 1864 book
Deuce (playing card) between the Deuce and the Sow is evinced by Johann Leonhard Frisch in his 1741 German-Latin dictionary: ""Sow in card game, from the figure of a sow, which is painted on the Deuce of Acorns, whence the other deuces are also called Sows."" How the boar ended up on the playing card is unknown. Hellmut Rosenfeld suspects that it was derived from the prize sow that played a role in local shooting festivals ("Schützenfesten") and which was linked with the last sheaf of the harvest. The description "Sau" may have been a corruption of the word "Daus", and the depiction