It is no exaggeration to say that Sylvia Mann was the most influential person in the development of our knowledge of playing cards in the 20th century.
Yet it is now nearly three decades since her death, and while many people will have personal memories of her, increasingly, playing card collectors will know her only by reputation and by reference to her published work.
We will all have been influenced, and continue to be influenced, by her contribution to our fascinating hobby.
The IPCS is therefore honoured that the Society, by reason of a generous gift from Miss Adrienne Gurr, can award an honorarium to a speaker to present a paper at our annual conventions in her memory.
This serves as a reminder of the debt that both the hobby and the IPCS itself owes to her. Recipients of the honorarium include:
Alberto Milano for Carte de Giocci: Immagini Stampate per Giocare
Robert Kissel for Northern Reflexes on Karnöffel Games
Thierry Depaulis for Cartes et cartiers dans les anciens États de Savoie (1400 – 1800)
Filip Cremers for L’utilité du Whist: différentes opinions sur le jeu de cartes
Klaus Reisinger for Mohren Deutsche
Tom Dawson for Playing Cards in Canada: 1600 to 1949
Juan Agudo Ruiz for Heraclio Fournier: Notas para la fabrication de naipes
Cláudio Décourt for On the origin of styles: the evolution of the English pattern
Professor Sir Michael Dummett for A brief sketch of the history of Tarot cards
Han Janssen for The 14th Century and the Introduction of Playing Cards into Europe
Manfred Hausler for From Schongau to St. Petersburg
Lucia Nadin for Interplay between politics, playing cards and the police through the exploration of trials in the late 1790s
Lex Rijner for Three Centuries of Playing Cards in the Netherlands
Jean-Pierre Garrigue for La Carte à Jouer à Perpignan du XIVe auXIXe siècle
Giuliano Crippa for Illustrated backs of cards made in Milan
Hans Hinrup for The Rise and Demise of the Pierre Steinmann Card-factory in Copenhagen: 1798 – 1824
Filip Cremers for The role of playing cards in WWI
Emilia Maggio for Ludwig Pollak and the Ursino Deck
Jean-Pierre Garrigue for Les origines de la carte à jouer en Catalogne et dans la Couronne d’Aragon aux XIVe et XVe siècles
Thierry Depaulis for Un tarot de Marseille de 1639 et led premiers cartiers marsellias
Nathaniel Shockley for Exploring the Italian Origins of the Trappola Deck
