MikeH said:
Okay, Huck, now I have some questions, related entirely to your more recent post on this thread. I think I understand the reasoning behind the "trionfi" 5x16 Cary-Yale theory, and the circumstances in support of it. I've read it on the Trionfi site and in other threads.
Well, it's difficult to understand it and our own website doesn't contain all material. Research is a "floating process".
I'll try to introduce you to same basic conditions - that's all.
But I want to get clearer about your explanation of the design of the original PMB. Just to make sure I have the scenario: you are saying that 3 girls designed the original PMB special cards in Jan. 1441 during Bianca's visit to Ferrara.
Evidence is, that there were three girls (but naturally also other persons) and there is a document with a few words only, which informs, that there was a "gift" to the guest Bianca Maria. The document + context is of the kind, that it is plausible, that it relates to playing cards, but it is not "fact" or 100% secure.
The existence of the document is fact and (probably) the presence of the 3 girls and the result, that Bianca Maria and Beatrice d'Este became "great friends". Also it's fact, that Bianca Maria later was involved in playing card production in Cremona, which was "her city" and that this Beatrice d'Este was probably a beauty, likely also rather clever and creative. Her son (first marriage) became Niccolo da Correggio and became very creative - a poet and an adventurer - from such relations one learns about the mother.
Two of the girls were Bianca Visconti and Beatrice d'Este. They were interested in fun and not virtue, and that's why there's a Fool card in the original PMB but no virtues, unless you count a girl with a knight in shining armor behind her, protecting or courting her.
First: we have no confirming informations about the 14 paintings at 1.1.1441 ... these could have similarities to the 14 cards of Bembo (which we know as factual data), but naturally, these could be also totally different. Trionfi cards know considerable differences: What's common between Sola Busca Tarocchi, Boiardo poem and normal Tarot? They have all 22 special cards. For the cards we've in Sola-Busca at 0-1-20-21, in Boiardo Tarocchi poem at 0-21 and in normal Tarot 0-1-21 "specialities" (iconographically or by idea) and all other content seems exchangeable and is different.
From the Tarot rules we know, that the two lowest cards 0-1 and the two top cards 20-21 are used fo special rules (20 only occasionally). 0 Fool (can't beat and can't be beaten), 1 Bagatello (= lowest trump) and 21 World (highest trump) earn in Tarot the point worth "5" or "4", the same as the 4 kings. Queens have 4 or 3 points, Cavallos 3 or 2 and the Page 2 or 1, additionally there is trick-counting (as in Bridge), which lead to additional points (the counting rules differ).
For the practical game it means, that most points are earned by the courts. But the courts are beaten by trumps - which by their usual value don't give too much points (only by the tricks, that they take). The 3 very special cards have this destiny:
very lucky card: trump 21, the owner has secure 5 points and surely will make one trick additionally.
risky lucky card: trump 1, the owner has the chance to get a trick with it (and with this action 5 additional points), but he might lose it (in such case there are rules, which punish the loser; additional value this card might have, if the bagatto gets the final trick, then he mostly gets a special bonus
no risk lucky card: 0 Fool, secure 5 points, but no chance to get an additional trick - but the possibility to avoid one bad situation in the game
It's easy to decipher, that the special fun in this game is with the actions of Fool and Bagatello, it's not really interesting, that the highest trump beats all other cards, only common condition in games. The Fool can avoid a bad situation ... which such an operation he can save a king or another high card, he can keep the last trump or similar things (and generally the owner is lucky, as he has secure 5 points). The operation of the Fool is difficult to calculate in the game.
Similar the hunt for capturing the Bagatello - or making last trick with the Bagatello - is an interesting feature in practical card games, the highlight of the action.
So, what we can learn from the specific informations about Sola Busca, Boiardo Tarocchi poem and normal Tarot? For Sola Busca and Boiardo Tarocchi we may assume, that the mentioned special rules existed and this caused the special iconographic details.
From this back to 1441 ... one interesting point is the question, if the 14 cards from the girl's court already knew the Fool. The PMB had one.
For this it might be interesting to go back to the Michelino deck, ca. 1425.
There we have 16 gods ... one can observe, that an old antique order, the "12 Olympians" is inside. This group is positioned in the deck from 16 (top) to position 5, in a closed row ... from this condition one may assume, that the author knew about the "12 Olympians" and used the concept in his deck. The 12 Olympians are just a closed group, and it's not necessary to exspect special details ... the interesting part is in the lower trumps.
Here we find at position 4 Herakles, who was in Olympic history the 13th of the 12 Olympians ... and in the deck he is the 13th trump (counted from top) ... then we have Aiolus, the god of the winds, which was said to have been connected to Fama (fame) by Chaucer, then we find Daphne connected to Chastity, and then Amor connected to Love. With Fama, Chastity and Love we have 3 of the 6 Trionfi chapters in Petrarca's poem, if we count Hercules in his astronomical function as a possible "Father Time", so he might be the fourth Petrarca figure and the whole a somewhat modified Trionfi-poem interpretation.
Eternity = 12 gods
Time = Herakles
Fame = Aiolus
Death = missing, perhaps left out as too nasty for a card deck
Chastity = Daphne
Love = Amor
From the 16 figures especially Daphne and Aiolus were confusing at first view ... both are in myth too unimportant to be exspected in this collection. The explanation for Daphne was found in Petrarca's special dedication to his peudo-lover Laura (means Daphne, which means laurel) and Petrarca's earlier importance for the Visconti court.
Aiolus was confusing, till Chaucer's work about Fame and her connection to Aiolus was found - then it made sense as part of "Trionfi-poem-imitation" as guiding idea.
Now to the key question: Was the Fool-function already there? Did already some Bagatello-fúnction exist?
Well, the answer is yes, as far we can know it. In the Daphne myth, which we can see as the central theme of the deck, the god Amor fools the god Apollo by making him fall in love with Daphne, and, for the same moment, he filled Daphne with total antipathy against Apollo. The result was, that Daphne fled the love of Apollo and prefered to become a tree.
In the general Tarot game the love of the players is it to capture the Pagat (or Bagatello) to get many points. Naturally the current owner of the Pagat didn't like that. In the Michelino deck the fighting call of the players wouldn't have been "capture the Pagat", but "capture the virgin (Daphne)"
In common card games (Germany) the expression "Jungfrau (means virgin)" is used in a positive sense, when a player doesn't get any trick (and with this wins the game, usually, when it is announced before, that you'll get no trick). If you get "no trick" and you haven't announced it in a common game, the expression "Schneider Schwarz" (cutter Black) is used, which is an association of death (as seen in the common Tarot card).
So we have in the association Daphne = virgin also the idea "Death" implied, which had been missing in the above row of Petrarca chapters. So we have to change the row by this addittion:
Eternity = 12 gods
Time = Herakles
Fame = Aiolus
(Death = implied by alternative to Chastity)
Chastity = Daphne
Love = Amor
This game of Chastity (Jungfrau-announcement) usually changes the complete run of the game - it's just inside the normal game and it becomes an option,if a player has really bad cards) ... as German games with this rules are very special and too complicated for foreigners ( ... .-) ) you may try "Spades", which is offered by the usual Windows function to play it in internet.
Usually the Jungfrau declaration in game is embedded in a necessary bidding process. The Jungfrau declaration usually surpasses other game allternatives (for instants solo or announcement of winning in specific way, with many points for instance).
So far the Pagat rule for Daphne, which has in the Michelino the position 2 - which would be in a usual Tarot game position 1 after zero, so at the Pagat-place.
Amor has the Fool position in the Michelino deck. Amor appears in the myth of the Daphne-myth and tricks there Apoll and also Daphne in a cruel game. It's not really known, that Eros could be captured (although Petrarca knows the captured Amor).
Noteworthy: The "cruel beauty" (La Belle Dame sans mercy - actual the lady which doesn't fulfill the will of her lover, so as Daphne did in the work of Ovid and later Petrarca) became a major topic around 1424 in French literature by a poem of Alain Chartier. Chartier worked as diplomat for the French king, in 1424/25 he was at a visit in Italy (no confirmation, if he visited also Visconti ... but it would be logical). The last letter from Chartier (he "disappeared" with no information about his death event) in 1429 was addressed to Filippo Maria Visconti and reported about the appearance of Jeanne d'Arc. It's no joke, but this was about the best possible "virgin" of 15th century.
"Chartier" writes relative similar as "Cartier", which is a "card producer". One of the topics of Chartier were "4 Dames", "le Livre des quatre dames" (French decks are said to have invented the 4 dames, but confirmation for this is missing), and also there is "le Quadrilogue invectif", another title with a fixation on the number 4 (as it appears in the card game). In the Germany Empire one had about the same time the same tendency (orders were parted in 4 major categories). The poet Chartier was surely not a cardmaker, but perhaps his family had a relation to playing cards.
Leaving this, as it mybe, we return now back to 1.1.1441 ...
ca. 1425: We have a deck with 16 trumps, the Magician is suspected to be a hunted virgin and the Fool a fooling Amor.
1.1. 1441: We have a deck-preparation with 14 trumps (at least the assumption of it) - we don't know, how it was composed, but the suspicion is there, that it had a Fool
October 1441: The Cary Yale, the real marriage, has partly survived and there are chances, that the reconstruction has met the reality. So there is exspected a 16 trumps version with gender-harmonized court cards. It's doubted in the reconstruction, that it had a Fool
February 1442: Leonello pays for 4 decks, which likely are commissioned to celebrate, that he became Signore of Ferrara in January 1442 .. the first time, that we know of the use of the Trionfi name. As we have later in 1457 in Ferrara the note about "70 cards" and before the note of 14 paintings, there is the suspicion, that this was a deck with 5x14-structure. But again ... we don't know, how it was filled, but it might have had similar motifs as the 14 experimental paintings.
Summer 1442: The two boys (9 and 11 years old) get a deck, considerable cheaper as the price paid in January (1/8 of it), but still rather expensive, a 1/2 lira marchesana. A noble man might have earned 20 lira marchesana a month, and had to pay usually 2 servants, a horse and other things from this money. A very high state official might have gotten 80 Lira marchesana a month - but in this category were only very few persons. A servant might have gotten 1/2-2 Lira Marchesana. So for the real low budget person this was a not possible price. Even for a noble man it might have been troublesome, considering, that he had a complex household, which possibly allowed per month 3-5 Lira Marchesana as free money for culture.
In comparition to book printing editions we have the circumstance, that books were produced in editions of 200 - 300 ... if we assume mass-production for playing cards we possibly had similar or smaller numbers, at least if it was an expensive market.
This game was bought from a merchant of Bologna, from whom we know, that he traded with Sagramoro (the Tarocchi painter in Ferrara).
There are two different interpretations:
1. Ross assumes, that the merchant sold Bolognese decks, which possibly were mass production products.
2. An alternative explanation is, that Sagramoro made 4 elitary decks for the court, and then made the same models for a small number of clients in cheaper edition (visitors of the festivities), just for guests which were interested to buy some. As he didn't got all decks sold, he gave the rest to the merchant from Bologna to trade them.
In this interpretation the deck was an "event deck", which lost part of its worth, when the event became history. Nobody tells us, if this early attempt to produce Trionfi decks became a financial success or had been bad business. We only see, that we have between 1442 and 1449 no Trionfi notes and this seems to say, that playing card business had become bad during this period. Although this seems to have had various reasons, especially the final success of Pope Eugen (started as a very weak pope) , who had a strong connection to the Franciscans and the Franciscans were against playing cards.
So ... there is much more to tell and to reply, ... but I need a pause