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Glite Dictionary
all fours

all fours

1 9.2
A card game in which players win points by taking certain cards
  • noun
  • UK
translation icon : cuatro cartas

Synonyms

high-low-jack
vsall fours
  • Jargon
9.9

Card game where players score points by taking the highest card, the lowest card, the jack, or most cards

uses the traditional label for total card score rather than saying most cards

Surface Forms

all fours singular
all fours plural

Morphology

all + four

The sense 'a traditional card game' is a conventionalized name and cannot be compositionally derived from 'all' (whole) + 'four(s)' (the number/card). A B1 learner who knows the constituent words would be unlikely to infer that this specifically names a card game rather than a literal or numeric meaning, so the phrase is lexicalized and language-specific.

Etymology

All fours probably gets its name from the four ways to score in the old card game: 'high', 'low', 'jack', and 'game'. Winning those four points was called taking 'all fours', so the name reminds you of the four prizes in the game.