Karniffel was a descendant of the original Karnöffel, which itself originated in Bavaria in the first quarter of the 15th century and is thus the oldest identifiable European card game in the history of playing cards with a continuous tradition of play down to the present day.

Although games variously known as Karniffel, Karniffeln, Karnöffel or Karnöffeln, were played in much of German-speaking central Europe from around 1425, the earliest detailed description of a set of rules comes from an article in the periodical, Teutsche Merkur, dated 1783.

[4] Relatives of Karniffel that are still played today include Swedish Bräus, German Knüffeln and Faroese Stýrivolt.

Karniffel was played with the 36 cards of a standard German-suited pack i.e. King, Ober, Unter, Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six and Deuce in the suits of Acorns, Leaves, Hearts and Bells.

[3] The trick is won, in order, by:[2] Wiegand does not make clear what rule applies if two cards of equal value (both trumps or both non-trumps) are played.

In other variants of Karnöffel, the trick is won either by the first of the two cards played (e.g. Watten) or suit priority applies in the order: Acorns, Leaves, Hearts and Bells or their French-suited equivalent (e.g. most of the Bruus family) The team that wins three or more tricks wins the stake for the game.