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First published 1952 (SND Vol. III).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.
CURSE OF SCOTLAND, n.phr. The nine of diamonds (Sc. 1710 British Apollo III. No. 71). Hist.Sc. 1715–47 J. Houstoun Memoirs 92:
[Lord Justice-Clerk Ormistone] became universally hated in Scotland, where they called him the Curse of Scotland; and when the Ladies were at Cards playing the Nine of Diamonds, (commonly called the Curse of Scotland) they called it, the Justice Clerk.
[The origin of this name is obscure. The following explanations are suggested: 1. the news of a severe defeat to the Scots was written on the back of this card (some say that Cumberland gave the orders for no quarter at the battle of Culloden on the back of a nine of diamonds); 2. diamonds represent royalty, and every ninth king of Scotland was a tyrant and a curse to the country; 3. the nine of diamonds resembles the arms of the Earl of Stair (or, on a saltire azure, nine lozenges of the first), who was hated for the part he played in bringing about the Massacre of Glencoe and the Union of 1707; 4. in the game of Pope Joan, the nine of diamonds is called the Pope, who stood as Antichrist to the Scottish Reformers; 5. the nine of diamonds was the winning card in the game of comette, introduced to Scotland by Mary, Queen of Scots, and the cause of the ruin of many families; 6. the word curse is a corruption of the word cross, the nine of diamonds resembling the cross of St Andrew. This latter argument, however, would apply equally to the nine of hearts. Our quot. shows the name to have been in common use early in the 18th cent., and therefore discounts the Culloden explanation. No. 3 seems to be the most likely.]
