Triomphe

Triomphe (French for triumph), once known as French ruff, is a card game dating from the late 15th century. It most likely originated in France or Spain (as triunfo) and later spread to the rest of Europe. When the game arrived in Italy, it shared a similar name with the pre-existing game and deck known as trionfi; probably resulting in the latter becoming renamed as Tarocchi (tarot). While trionfi has a fifth suit that acts as permanent trumps, triomphe randomly selects one of the existing four suits as trumps. Another common feature of this game is the robbing of the stock. Triomphe became so popular that during the 16th century the earlier game of trionfi was gradually renamed tarocchi, tarot, or tarock. This game is the origin of the English word "trump" and is the ancestor of many trick-taking games like Euchre (via Écarté) and Whist (via Ruff and Honours). The earliest known description of Triomphe was of a point-trick game, perhaps one of the earliest of its type; later, the name was applied to a plain-trick game.

==Spanish rules== The earliest surviving description was written by Juan Luis Vives in his Exercitatio linguae latinae around 1538 in Basel. As he left Spain in 1509 never to return, the rules may date to his youth. However the game was already widespread by then. In 1541, Juan Maldonado (d. 1554) expanded on Vives's rules and later revised them in 1549. Both Vives and Maldonado described the rules in the form of dialogues between the players. It is an ancestor of Ombre.