Winning screen from Windows XP's solitare.

Solitaire or patience is any of a family of single-player card games of a generally similar character, but varying greatly in detail. The games are generally referred to as "patience" in British English and "solitaire" in American. Klondike is a solitaire card game often known purely by the name of Solitaire. ... This article or section is not written in the formal tone expected of an encyclopedia article. ... Look up solitaire, Solitaire in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 578 pixelsFull resolution (1024 × 740 pixel, file size: 83 KB, MIME type: image/png) famous winning screen for Microsofts solitare This is a screenshot of a copyrighted video or computer game, and the copyright for it is most likely... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 578 pixelsFull resolution (1024 × 740 pixel, file size: 83 KB, MIME type: image/png) famous winning screen for Microsofts solitare This is a screenshot of a copyrighted video or computer game, and the copyright for it is most likely... Windows XP is a line of operating systems developed by Microsoft for use on general-purpose computer systems, including home and business desktops, notebook computers, and media centers. ... // For the game on The Price Is Right, see Card Game (pricing game). ... British English (BrE, BE, en-GB) is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the United Kingdom from forms used elsewhere in the Anglophone world. ...

These games typically involve dealing cards from a shuffled deck into a prescribed arrangement on a tabletop, from which the player attempts to reorder the deck by suit and rank through a series of moves transferring cards from one place to another under prescribed restrictions. Some games allow for the reshuffling of the deck(s), and/or the placement of cards into new or 'empty' locations.

Solitaire has its own terminology; see solitaire terminology. There are a number of common features in many solitaire (patience) games, such as building down and the foundations and tableau, used to simplify the description of new games. ...

There are many different solitaire games, but the term "solitaire" is often used to refer specifically to the most well-known form, called "Klondike". Klondike and some other solitaire games have been adapted into two-player competitive games. Klondike is a solitaire card game often known purely by the name of Solitaire. It is probably the most well known solo card game. ...

There are a vast array of variations on the solitaire/patience theme, using either one or more decks of cards, with rules of varying complexity and skill levels. Many of these have been converted to electronic form and are available as computer games. Basic forms of Klondike solitaire and FreeCell come with every current installation of Microsoft Windows, for example, and Windows Me, Windows XP and Windows Vista also include a version of Spider. Many software solitaire collections can be downloaded from the internet at no charge. This article needs a complete rewrite for the reasons listed on the talk page. ... Klondike is a solitaire card game often known purely by the name of Solitaire. It is probably the most well known solo card game. ... Part way through game of FreeCell on KDE. FreeCell is a solitaire card game superficially similar to Klondike. ... Windows redirects here. ... Windows Millennium Edition, or Windows Me (IPA pronunciation: [miː], [ɛm iː]), is a hybrid 16-bit/32-bit graphical operating system released on September 14, 2000 by Microsoft. ... Windows XP is a line of operating systems developed by Microsoft for use on general-purpose computer systems, including home and business desktops, notebook computers, and media centers. ... Windows Vista is a line of graphical operating systems used on personal computers, including home and business desktops, notebook computers, Tablet PCs, and media centers. ... This article or section is not written in the formal tone expected of an encyclopedia article. ...

The term 'solitaire' is also used for single-player games of concentration and skill using a set layout of tiles, pegs or stones rather than cards. These games include: Mission, or barrel, roof tiles A tile is a small, manufactured piece of hard-wearing material such as clay or stone used for covering roofs, floors, and walls, or other objects such as tabletops. ...

• Peg solitaire
• Shanghai solitaire

English peg solitaire board European peg solitaire board Peg Solitaire is a board game for one player involving movement of pegs on a board with holes. ... Mahjong solitaire, also known as Shanghai solitaire, electronic or computerized mahjong, MahJong solitaire, solitaire Mahjong and, erroneously, as mahjong, is a solitaire matching game that uses a set of Mahjong tiles rather than cards. ...

History

Like the origin of playing cards, the origin of solitaire is largely unknown as there are no historical records to support it. Some scholars think these kinds of games are largely French in origin as early English language books about patience games refer to French literature. This can be evidenced by the names of some games written in those English books such as La Belle Lucie, Le Cadran, Le Loi Salique, La Nivernaise and others. For the Russian group of artists, see Jack of Diamonds (artists). ... A game of La Belle Lucie in progress. ... Forty Thieves is a solitaire card game. ... Salic Law is a solitaire card game using two decks of 52 playing cards each. ... Tournament is a solitaire card game which uses two decks of playing cards shuffled together. ...

Napoleon was also said to have "played patience" during his exile. Some solitaire games were named after him, such as Napoleon at St. Helena, Napoleon's Square, etc. But whether he played those games or actually invented them is not known. For other uses, see Napoleon (disambiguation). ... Forty Thieves is a solitaire card game. ... Napoleons Square is a solitaire card game which uses two decks of playing cards. ...

The first collection of solitaire card games in the English language is attributed to Lady Adelaide Cadogan through her Illustrated Games of Patience, published in about in 1870 and reprinted several times. Before this, there was no literature about solitaire, not even in such books as Charles Cotton's The Compleat Gamester (1674), Abbé Bellecour's Academie des Jeux (1674), and Bohn's Handbook of Games (1850), all of which are used as reference on card games. Charles Cotton (April 28, 1630 - February, 1687) was an English poet, best-known for translating the work of Michel de Montaigne from the French. ...

Lady Cadogan's book spawned other collections such as Patience by E. D. Cheney, Amusements for Invalids by Annie B. Henshaw (1870), and later Dick's Games of Patience, published by Dick and Fitzgerald. Other books about solitaire written towards the end of the 19th century were by H. E. Jones (a.k.a. Cavendish), Angelo Lewis (a.k.a. Professor Hoffman), Basil Dalton, and Ernest Bergholt. There are very few or no other articles that link to this one. ...

There are also literary references to solitaire games. Some of these are:

• Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace mentions a scene that took place in 1808 where the characters were playing patience.
• In John Steinbeck's novella Of Mice and Men, protagonist George Milton often plays Solitaire on the road and on the farm.
• Somerset Maugham's The Gentleman in the Parlour mentions Spider and quotes playing solitaire as "a flippant disposition."
• In Evelyn Waugh's A Handful of Dust, a character plays patience while waiting for news of a death to reach London.
• In Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov, the character Grushenka played a solitaire game known as Fools to get through times of crisis.
• In Peter Duck, one of the books in Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series, Captain Flint keeps himself occupied by playing Miss Milligan.

It is also noted that according to Redbook magazine, President Franklin D. Roosevelt was a fan of the solitaire game Spider. Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy(Lyof, Lyoff) (September 9 [O.S. August 28] 1828 – November 20 [O.S. November 7] 1910) (Russian: , IPA:  ), commonly referred to in English as Leo Tolstoy, was a Russian writer – novelist, essayist, dramatist and philosopher – as well as pacifist Christian anarchist and educational reformer. ... War and Peace (Russian: Voyna i mir; in original orthography: Война и миръ) is a novel by Leo Tolstoy, first published from 1865 to 1869 in Russki Vestnik, which tells the story of Russian society during the Napoleonic Era. ... John Ernst Steinbeck (February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968) was one of the best-known and most widely read American writers of the 20th century. ... Of Mice and Men is a novella by John Steinbeck, first published in 1937, which tells the tragic story of George Milton and Lennie Small, two displaced Anglo migrant ranch workers in California during the Great Depression (1929-1941). ... W. Somerset Maugham as photographed in 1934 by Carl Van Vechten. ... This article or section is not written in the formal tone expected of an encyclopedia article. ... It has been suggested that Cultural depictions of Fyodor Dostoevsky be merged into this article or section. ... The Brothers Karamazov (Братья Карамазовы in Russian, ) is the last novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky, generally considered the culmination of his lifes work. ... Peter Duck is a metafictional book in the Swallows and Amazons series by Arthur Ransome. ... Cover of Arthur Ransomes autobiography Arthur Mitchell Ransome (January 18, 1884 – June 3, 1967), was a British author and journalist, best known for writing the Swallows and Amazons series of childrens books, which tell of school-holiday adventures of children, mostly in the Lake District and the Norfolk... Swallows and Amazons is the first book in the Swallows and Amazons series by Arthur Ransome and was published in 1930. ... Miss Milligan is a solitaire card game which is played using two decks of playing cards. ... For other uses, see Red Book. ... FDR redirects here. ... This article or section is not written in the formal tone expected of an encyclopedia article. ...

In the 1962 movie The Manchurian Candidate, Raymond Shaw is compelled to perform specific actions through a brainwashing trigger, which often includes a game of traditional solitaire and finding the queen of diamonds. The Manchurian Candidate is a film adapted from the 1959 thriller novel written by Richard Condon. ...

In the Finnish TV-series Hovimäki Aunt Victoria is very fond of playing solitaire.

Examples of solitaire card games

See: List of solitaire card games

This is a list of solitaire or patience card games. ...

Reference Materials

• Lee, Sloane & Packard, Gabriel. 100 Best Solitaire Games: 100 Ways to Entertain Yourself with a Deck of Cards. ; New York, N. Y.: Cardoza Publishing, 2004. (ISBN 1-58042-115-6)
• Arnold, Peter. Card Games for One. London: Hamlyn, 2002 (ISBN 0-600-60727-5)
• Moorehead, Albert H. & Mott-Smith, Geoffrey. The Complete Book of Solitaire and Patience Games. New York: Bantam Books, 1977 (ISBN 0-553-26240-8)
• Crépeau, Pierre. The Complete Book of Solitaire (a translation of Le Grand Livre des Patiences). Willowdale, Ontario: Firefly Books, 2001. (ISBN 1-55209-597-5)
• Marks, Arnold & Harrod, Jacqueline. Card Games Made Easy. Surrey, England: Clarion, 1997 (ISBN 1-899606-17-3)

See also

• Solitaire terminology
• Mahjong solitaire
• Patience sorting
• Video poker
• PySol
• World of Solitaire

There are a number of common features in many solitaire (patience) games, such as building down and the foundations and tableau, used to simplify the description of new games. ... A Shanghai solitaire in Dragon formation. The same solitaire, with free tiles highlighted. ... Patience sorting is a sorting algorithm, based on a solitaire card game, that has the property of being able to efficiently compute the length of the longest increasing subsequence in a given array. ... Video poker is a casino game based on five-card draw poker. ... PySol is an open source, platform independent computer game that incorporates around 200 solitaire card games. ... World of Solitaire is a free platform independent web based computer game that incorporates 11 solitaire card games. ...

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Solitaire

• Open Directory Project: solitaire
• Cheat Solitaire How to cheat Solitaire (Windows XP)