Documentation shows that the history of the playing cards dates back to the Chinese in the 10 century.  They used paper dominoes in which they would shuffle into different playing games.  The Muslims introduced the four suited court decks which were imported by the Europeans in 1370.  During this time these cards were hand painted and could only be afforded by the very wealthy.

It was the French that gave us the four suits of diamonds, clubs, hearts and spades which we used today.  The French used great rulers for the kings to represent each of the suits.  The clubs - Alexander the Great, spades - King David from the Bible, diamonds - Julius Caesar and hearts was represented by Charlemagne ( King of Franks  (France) in 792)

The Americans introduced their version of playing cards in the 1800's.  Doubled-headed to avoid constant flipping, varnish surfaces for smoother shuffle, cornered edges to avoid "flicking" which would mark the card and indexes. The Americans also introduced the "joker" to the decks.  Since the game was sometimes referred to as "juker" which soon turned into joker and depicted the jouster, clown, etc image. Cycling was so popular at this time that the vehicle, bicycling was introduced with the joker.  With this idea more ideas opened involving social satire and commercial advertisement such as products, services, events and even landmarks.

So, the nest time you pick up that deck of cards know some interesting history brought us the pleasure of card playing.