Tresillo is a trick-taking card game for three players which originated in Spain at the beginning of the seventeenth century, when it was also known as El Hombre (The Man). This name was lost in Spain, where the game is nowadays known only as Tresillo, the name referring to the number of active players in the game. In the rest of Europe the game was generally known as Hombre, while in South America it is called Rocambor, and in Portugal Voltarete. Tresillo/Hombre spread rapidly across Europe during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, enjoying a position of prestige similar to Bridge today, and at the time Planas produced his erotic drawings was played by almost everyone in Spain.

Tresillo has its own vocabulary, which like many gaming terms can readily be adapted to have sexual connotations. Planas used these to the full, producing a series of captioned drawings which were collected like cigarette cards, which means that today they are most often found singly in a rather dog-eared condition. So here we have El Noble Juego del Tresillo – the noble game of Tresillo.