I came across a couple of early court cards (JH, QS) in my collection of singles and noticed that they had the initials "RS" on them for Robert Sauzade (U32). I decided to compare them to some other early initialed court cards and was interested in their similarities up to and including the placement, which was the same, of each maker's initials. The first card in each photo is from a Caleb Bartlett deck (U9), the second card is from a Geo. Cook late with Abbot & Ely deck (U12a) and the third card is from a Robert Sauzade deck (U32). It was interesting to note that each early maker placed his own initials on these "Bartlett" court cards for identification, apparently in the same place on each card. Given that both Caleb Bartlett and Robert Sauzade decks are listed in the encyclopedia as c.1830, can we say for certain which maker used his initials first and set their placement on each court card? The two single courts are all I have by way of examples of Robert Sauzade's work and he used his name on some of the other court cards instead of his initials, therefore, they are not all the same as those found in Caleb Bartlett's decks. As an aside, an interesting oddity about the Bartlett decks is that the QC is the only court card that has two sets of "CB" initials.
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