The dealer deals three cards face-up to each player, one at a time, covering the face-down cards.The dealer deals a row of three face-down cards to each player, one at a time.The deal rotates clockwise after each hand. The dealer is randomly selected for the first hand. The cards rank highest to lowest 2, A, K, Q, J, 10. The game requires one regular 52-card deck. The loser typically suffers some forfeit such as having to make the tea, or at least has the job of shuffling and dealing the next hand.įrom two to five may play. Shithead is a beating game in which the players try to avoid being the last to get rid of all their cards. It is now known in many parts of the world, having been spread during the last decades of the 20th century by young travellers (backpackers) of all nationalities. The game is probably of Scandinavian or Nordic origin: it may be descended from the very similar Swedish game Vändtia ( 'turn ten') and it is quite closely related to the Finnish game Paskahousu ( 'shit pants').
The first version of the page was based on a contribution from Michael Labranche, and Jim Curtis, Ciaran Gultnieks, Sean Daly, William Putt, Jane Guarducci and Cristian Seres have added variations.
This game is also sometimes known by other names, such as Palace, Karma, China Hand and Ten-Two Slide.
