Forty Thieves

Full rules

1. Overview
2. Terms
3. Setup
4. Playing
5. Winning
6. Tips for beginners
7. Variants

Overview

Forty Thieves is a big patience (a card game for one player, also called solitaire) played with two decks. Your goal is to sort all 104 cards into eight piles, two for each suit, each running from Ace up to King. All forty cards of the layout are face up, but you may only move one card at a time and go through the stock only once – so it is hard to win. It is also known as Napoleon at St Helena.

• Players: 1
• You need: two standard 52-card decks without jokers (104 cards), shuffled together, and a large table.
• Time: about 20 minutes per game.

Terms

• Rank: the value of a card. From low to high: A, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, J, Q, K. The Ace is low.
• Column: a pile of cards spread downwards, each card slightly overlapping the one before it, so that you can see every card.
• Tableau: all ten columns together.
• Last card: the card at the end of a column – the one nearest to you, not covered by any other card. Only last cards can be moved.
• Foundations: eight spaces above the tableau, empty at the start. Each is started with an Ace and built up in suit: the 2 of the same suit, then the 3, and so on up to the King.
• Build down in suit: in the tableau, put a card onto a card of the same suit that is exactly one rank higher, e.g. 7♥ onto 8♥.
• Stock: the face-down pile of cards left after dealing.
• Waste: the face-up pile onto which you turn cards from the stock.

Setup

1. Shuffle both decks together.
2. Deal four rows of ten cards, all face up, each row overlapping the one before. This gives ten columns of four cards – the tableau.
3. Put the remaining 64 cards face down as the stock. Leave room above the tableau for eight foundations and next to the stock for the waste.

Playing

There are no turns – you make one move after another in any order you like.

1. To a foundation: move any Ace that is a last card (or the top card of the waste) to an empty foundation. Then build the foundations up in suit, from any last card or the top card of the waste. Cards on a foundation stay there.
2. Within the tableau: move a last card onto the last card of another column if it is of the same suit and one rank lower. You may move only one card at a time – never a group.
3. Empty columns: when a column is empty, you may put any last card from the tableau or the top card of the waste there.
4. Using the stock: turn over the top card of the stock onto the waste, one at a time. The top card of the waste may be played to a foundation or onto the tableau; the card below it becomes available once it has gone.
5. No redeal: you go through the stock only once. When it is empty and no move is left, the game is over.

Example: Column 4 ends in 9♣ and column 7 in 10♣. You move the 9♣ onto the 10♣, which frees the card above it in column 4: the A♦ – it goes straight to a foundation. Column 4 still has two cards; if you can clear them too, the empty column is a handy parking space.

Winning

You win when all 104 cards lie on the eight foundations. According to Morehead and Mott-Smith, about one game in ten comes out.

Tips for beginners

• Aim for an empty column as early as possible. Choose one column that is easiest to clear and avoid blocking the cards it needs.
• An empty column lets you move a short run: to move 8♥ 7♥ onto 9♥, park the 7♥ in the empty column, move the 8♥, then put the 7♥ back on it.
• Don't fill an empty column with a card you could just as well play later; keep it for a move that frees something important.
• Play Aces and 2s to the foundations at once.

Variants

All optional – agree before you start. Most make the game easier.

• Peeking: before deciding a move, you may look at the next stock card.
• Lucas: take the eight Aces out first as foundations, then deal three rows of 13 (13 columns). Wins about one game in three.
• Limited: deal three rows of 12 (12 columns). About one game in five.
• Maria: deal four rows of 9 (9 columns) and build down in alternating colours instead of in suit (red 7 on black 8).
• Josephine: a correctly built group of the same suit may be moved together as one unit.
• Computer rule: many programs move a group at once if you have enough empty columns to do it card by card – the result is the same.