Pope Julius (card game)

Template:Short description Pope Julius, or Pope July, is a gambling card game of the 16th century for four or more players.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> Players included King Henry VIII and it appears to have been one of his and Anne Boleyn's favourite pastimes.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Grueninger, Natalie (2022). The Final Year of Anne Boleyn. Barnsley: Pen & Sword.</ref>

Very little is known about the game, and its existence is known to be attested only by three written sources, those being:

• c. 1521 - John Skelton, Speke, parrot

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• 1532 - anon, Privy Purse Expences of King Henry VIII (30 November 1532)

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• c. 1596 - Sir John Harington, A Treatise on Playe, in Nugae antiquae (1769)

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Some sources speculate that it was the precursor to the game of Pope Joan.<ref>Lives of the Queens of England by Agnes Strickland. Retrieved 24 December 2020.</ref>