Tarocchino Bolognese

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 20 Jun 2004, and now archived in the Forum Library.

lawguy51	20 Jun 2004
Hi All. Long time, no post. I just got a Tarot deck for Father's Day (well, I got it off Ebay and gave it to my wife who gave it back to me for Father's Day...I love buying my own presents). It's a limited edition (113/150) Tarocchino Bolognese by Di G.M. Mitelli, first printed in 1664. It's a second edition. A very interesting deck. It was a bit of a challenge to arrange the 22 Majors in order as some of the drawings bear little resemblence to the Majors as we know them. But the odd thing about the deck is that there are no pips between 2 and 5. Does anyone know the reason for this? Was that the artist's intention? I can't imagine that the 2s through 5 were lost to antiquity. It's too coincidental. Anyway, it's a stunning deck to look at. It's not in colour but that never bothers me. Two of my favourite decks are the Hermetic and Victoria Regina. Happy Father's Day to all you dads. Lawguy51

tao51	20 Jun 2004
but congratulations on your excellent Fathers' Day gift.--Tao

Cerulean	20 Jun 2004
I believe this variation of the game has been this way since the 1600s. http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.tarocchinobolognese.it/&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dtarocchino%2Bbolognese%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26sa%3DG http://l-pollett.tripod.com/cards38.htm I have the watercolor version of the deck and a great out of print poetry book that has some of the majors, uncolored, as illustrations. Have fun with this...take care! Cerulean Mari

Rusty Neon	20 Jun 2004
Quote: Originally posted by lawguy51 But the odd thing about the deck is that there are no pips between 2 and 5. Does anyone know the reason for this? Was that the artist's intention? I can't imagine that the 2s through 5 were lost to antiquity. It's too coincidental. It's a question of regional differences. Various regions omit different sequences of pips from the deck. The 62-card deck in the way you describe is the Bolognese pattern. http://www.pagat.com/national/italy.html#i40 It appears that this pattern was used in playing various card games including the Bolognese tarot game of Ottocento. http://www.pagat.com/tarot/ottocen.html

lawguy51	22 Jun 2004
Quote: Originally posted by Cerulean I believe this variation of the game has been this way since the 1600s. http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.tarocchinobolognese.it/&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dtarocchino%2Bbolognese%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26sa%3DG That translated page is too funny. How clever of Google! Thanks for your input. All of the reference websites were very helpful. Lawguy51

The Tarocchino Bolognese thread was originally posted on 20 Jun 2004 in the Tarot Decks board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Tarot Decks, or read more archived threads.