Exploring the Cary Sheet

Interesting discussion.

THE STAR - does anyone else see a fishtail or lobster (ie mis-drawn crab from the Moon) tail sticking out of the water? ....

THE POPE/POPESS - I feel that it is likely a male, because of the position of the belt on the outfit. While I'll concede that a popess might have worn masculine clothing, I tend to think that an artist of this time would, for clarity, have dressed a popess in a woman's high-waisted garment.

kwaw said:

Could the feminine features of the Bishop/Pope indicate a 'boy bishop'? [Associated with Saint Nicholas Day, Massacre of the Innocents and Feast of Fools]. The investure of a boy bishop is first recorded in Switzerland in the 10th century but spread through many parts of Europe, it was especially popular in England [after Norman invasion] and Germany but also took place in France and North Italy and other European regions. Also involved in these December/January festivities was the mock whipping of children to remind them of the massacre of the innocents [related perhaps to the devil of this cut sheet with its children in a basket - or perhaps again relating to the companions of St. Nicholas, such as Krampus, who punish the naughty children before Christmas, as opposed to the 'good' children who will recieve presents].

Click to expand...

And just as the companion of St. Nicholas Krampus has the kids in a basket on his back, so St. Nicholas is associated with three kids in a tub:

http://www.tarotforum.net/attachment.php?attachmentid=15987

Image posted by 'room' in the following thread:
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?p=973316#post973316

Kwaw

I was looking at the Cary Sheet again today.

What caught my eye was the partial character next to Bateleur, who I have always assumed to be The Hermit.

And I started thinking of the right to left pattern that seems to me to run through these cards.

And then I thought.. maybe it's The Fool?

So with fresh eyes I wondered what would that mean? Immediately, I noticed the falling legging... or at least that's how it appears to me. And then maybe what might be the leg of the animal at the bottom right. Now, I know it's hard to make out for sure.. but the more I thought of it, the more it seemed at least as likely to me that I was looking at the Fool, not the hermit.

So that put a whole new light on the right to left sequence.

Maybe, maybe the cards on the Cary Sheet aren't as out of sequence, at least to themselves, as we might think they are?

The first row is a bit odd.. right to left (and I'm guessing on the partials) we would have;
Justice, Lovers, Chariot, Wheel, Hanged Man.

Okay, that's a bit odd.

Next line:
Pope/Popess, Empress, Emperor, Pope/Popess, Strength.

The Pope/Popess issue is a bit to sort out in general, and Strength is a bit unusual.

Next line:
Fool, Bateleur, Star, Moon, Sun

Sure, there should be a big break between the Bateleur and the Star.. but I'm willing to go with it.

Then the bottom of the sheet:
8 Batons, 7 Batons, Temperance, Devil, Tower

Temperance Devil and Tower are fine.. but how odd that the Batons are there, and the sequence for them is backwards.

So anyway, I started fidgeting with this, and wondering where the four missing cards might go in the order.. they would be Hermit, Death, Angel, and World.

So I saw that my good friend JMD was on line, so we chatted a bit about some possibilities, and we discussed the "border" lines as well. Then he rudely left to go enjoy his life while I sat there staring at the cards a bit longer.

And the Batons kept bothering me. Not just because they were "out of order", but because they were there at all. And graphically, something seems wrong.

Looking a bit more closely, I noticed that the "border" that separates the cards (which is kind of an odd thing anyway isn't it? Why would that be there? Cutting lines? Or maybe JMD has another idea?) was really odd when I look at the Batons. It looks like it has been PIECED into the rest of the sheet. The borders look cut. There is discoloration at the bottom right of Temperance, that suddenly disappears on the batons, as does the border. The border between the Fool and the 8 of Batons looks like it is split down the middle.. again, to my eye looking like a patch job has occurred here. This is the section that I am referring to:



Does anyone know?

So, play the game with me, won't you? I know this is just a string of IFs and MAYBEs, but let's keep playing.

What if, there were two different cards there originally, and the Batons were patched in at some point. What would go before Temperance? What's missing? Death. Leaving the last space to the Hermit most likely.

So now let's take more jumps, and allow that for some reason, the sequence breaks between the Bateleur and the Star, but generally.. we should try to piece the "strips" together.. we might get something like:

0. Fool
1. Bateleur

2. Pope/Popess
3. Empress
4. Emperor
5. Pope/Popess
6. Strength

7. Justice
8. Lovers
9. Chariot
10. Wheel
11. Hanged Man

12. Hermit
13. Death
14. Temperance
15. Devil
16. Tower

17. Star
18. Moon
19. Sun

Thoughts?

Anyone find anything interesting about this sequence?

Sure, it's just play.. but sometimes play can lead to wonderful things, (and sometimes it can be just play).

Cary Sheet Sequence

Hello all the crew,

Le Pendu I have to congratulate you for your sharp eyes !... God damned it it is truth for sure. In french : " Bon Dieu mais c'est bien sur !!"
I am sure that it is The Fool. And he seems to have his hat on his back and a big hair on his head.
I am short-sighted and consequently very good for details.
Plus an ascendant Scorpio who rectify my natural vision ha! ha!
Incidently, I noticed that on Tower card, it could be an Ox on bottom right in place of the usual human that everybody is used to find.
Or it is messy in my brain may be after all.
Thoughts Made in France/Marseilles €urope
Yves Le Marseillais

Ah! I see that le pendu has posted!

Fantastic. To my eyes as well, the card to the right is pretty 'clearly' the Fou, and the one above it is nearly equally clearly Justice.

Personally, and as I had mentioned to le pendu, I do not think that the Cary Sheet, unlike relatively more recent decks (as in the ensuing 200+ years) was constructed from a single large woodcut, but rather from individual woodcuts.

Ie, it is possible that, unlike as an example the large Conver woodcut (referred to at various times via the Camoin site), the Cary Sheet has each card as its own woodcut, thereby making a total of 78 card-sized blocks.

Each of these would then (all this is hypothetical) be pressed upon the sheet, so the 'order' from one sheet to the next may not even be similar, but we COULD and should expect some sequences to emerge if the storing of the blocks was consistent. What the Sheet order shows is that this is a possibility.

But the detail of the lack of line puzzles me. If I was correct, then I would personally expect the 'guides' to be made either before or at the same time as the image imprints, yet the Bastons details shown above suggests that the 'guide' line (between the cards) is here missing... what can explain that?

It is as if the white of the image stands above the intended line and thereby 'covers' it. In electronic manipulation of images, this would make sense. It would even make sense if the Cary Sheet was not one sheet, but rather a couple of sheets for which we only have a single photographic mirage... but we are told it is a single sheet, so why was the 'guide' line not able to be drawn in that section?

These black outlines are not stencils, as they would otherwise 'fall' apart, so they must remain as either woodcut or other engraving (copperplate was invented in the Florentine area in the 15th century, I think, by Finiguera). So it could be an early copperplate for which the burin was still used, and hence its relative lack of fine-ness.

If that is the case, and also if each 'card' was its own copperplate (a little like the 'movable type' of the Gutenberg press of the contemporaneous period), these could have been placed adjacent each other atop a softer material, allowing these to act as some kind of line guide, but also giving the impression of the cards being over the 'line' when the plates were too close or touched each other.

If this highly hypothetical scenario is the case, then what we may have is an early instance of having a series of 78 (let's presume 78 for now) copperplates acting as movable type, and placed adjacent each other for the printing roller/press, giving the result above shown by le pendu.

I am not, however, that familiar with printing techniques, and Alex's and Karen's (baba studio) experiences in this may clarify or correct my flights of fancy.

I'm inclined to go with whatever Robert says about the Cary Sheet.

Yes, the 7 and 8 of Batons look pasted in to me. I'll believe it until I read otherwise from someone who's looked at the sheet, or seen it myself. Neither Dummett nor Depaulis comments on this detail, so it must not be evident.

Robert, you have to make a trip to New Haven to study this sheet for yourself. I doubt I'll ever get the chance. You probably don't need recommendation, just an appointment (maybe not even that - any professional credentials and any excuse will work).

As for what it means? My first instinct is "Ah, it's a forgery, just like I thought!"

But then, I get ahold of myself, and cannot attribute such dishonesty to Cary, his seller (for what purpose - nobody knew anything then about the coming controversies), Dummett or anyone connected to the museum. And if it is really is a paste up, surely Dummett would have pointed it out?

And really, the only reason I want it to go away is because it's so difficult - I'm tempted to date it to 1450, by the clothing and style. It's a woodcut, by the way, not a metal engraving. (Nothing to do with France, directly, neither by the Krampus-devil nor any theory of French origin for the trump-game. There is no theory of French origin (i.e. asserting that tarot was invented in France is not a theory in itself).

The order Robert gives is interesting - putting the Hermit at 12! - even Strength at 6 is bizarre. But I think that by comparison with other sheets, like the Rosenwald, we can see that all the cards were not necessarily in order all the time in printed sheets.

All of these sheets are rejects (probably) - for some reason. On the Rosenwald, it is surely because the numbering is wrong. Did the carver have to go back to the block and make a whole new carving? Or are the numbers inked in, and the apprentice screwed up? Probably the latter. They were no good for cards anymore.

Maybe, an apprentice had to take an old sheet and add numbers, and then recarve the cards with the numbers - this means that the surviving sheets are at the moment that cards went from unnumbered to numbered. But why the Cary Sheet - where's the error?

Maybe the error was in the pasted in section, and somebody fixed it and used it as stiffening for a book binding - which is where most of these sheets were found (maybe not Cary, about which nothing is known).

Personally, I really think the best way to study this sheet is to look at styles of woodcuts around Europe, and to look at the figure of the Devil, which is the most unique of the images. Devil with a basket is unique in tarot (IIRC), and is immediately recognizable as Krampus. Devil with a basket may not always be Krampus, and the Cary Devil may not be Krampus, but it's a good place to look.

Ross

Ross G Caldwell said:

Personally, I really think the best way to study this sheet is to look at styles of woodcuts around Europe, and to look at the figure of the Devil, which is the most unique of the images. Devil with a basket is unique in tarot (IIRC), and is immediately recognizable as Krampus. Devil with a basket may not always be Krampus, and the Cary Devil may not be Krampus, but it's a good place to look.

Ross

Click to expand...

Ross, did you see this?
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=40900

It's not much, but at least it's the first old image that I've found related to the Devil. And French too!

Le Marseillais said:

Hello all the crew,

Le Pendu I have to congratulate you for your sharp eyes !... God damned it it is truth for sure. In french : " Bon Dieu mais c'est bien sur !!"
I am sure that it is The Fool. And he seems to have his hat on his back and a big hair on his head.
I am short-sighted and consequently very good for details.
Plus an ascendant Scorpio who rectify my natural vision ha! ha!
Incidently, I noticed that on Tower card, it could be an Ox on bottom right in place of the usual human that everybody is used to find.
Or it is messy in my brain may be after all.
Thoughts Made in France/Marseilles €urope
Yves Le Marseillais

Click to expand...

Hey Yves!

I think that's a cow or ox on the tower as well! It's so frustrating that we only have partial images for some of these cards, it would be fascinating to see what the entire image revealed. At least we can see the tower clearly, and the circles surrounding the tower.

Did you see what looks like Le Pendu? Here the "hands"/"wings" look to me like broken money bags, at least that's what I'm guessing right now. Maybe, as JMD has suggested, it's torn clothing or mabye something else? It looks less like hands than on the TdM I decks.

Wouldn't it be nice to see the whole Sun card? Are there two figures on it or just the one?

What does the other Pope/Popess look like?

Are there 4 people on the Wheel?

Is the character standing/sitting on a platform on the Chariot?

I've so many questions.

Yes, Ross, have a look at the Paris 1407 image of devil with basket le pendu found

Perhaps "French-origin wish" would be a more academically accurate way to put it, but it's out there, LOL, we have one.

Sorry le pendu, I don't understand how you got the order of cards you did from looking at the sheet. But I love your idea that the two batons cards were superposed. I agree the card adjacent to le bateleur must be le mat.

Trying to remember, it's been a long time... but don't we have any other extant cards with a cow or goat on the tower?

jmd said:

Each of these would then (all this is hypothetical) be pressed upon the sheet, so the 'order' from one sheet to the next may not even be similar, but we COULD and should expect some sequences to emerge if the storing of the blocks was consistent.

Click to expand...

I wonder if occasionally sheets were made of just particular cards that needed replacing? Probably not, if it was a commercial enterprise manufacturing whole decks. Hence I am inclined to picture them pretty much stacked haphazardly (though trumps may have been kept clumped together) and simply picked, inked, pressed, and placed in a 'discard' pile to avoid duplication in any given 'run'.

But the detail of the lack of line puzzles me. If I was correct, then I would personally expect the 'guides' to be made either before or at the same time as the image imprints, yet the Bastons details shown above suggests that the 'guide' line (between the cards) is here missing... what can explain that?

Click to expand...

What occurred to me was that perhaps the pips did not have the borders but the trumps did (perhaps court cards also, it thus being based on having a picture as opposed to a mere collection of symbols). (Looking again at the sheet, it appears to me the borders may merely be thicker on the pips, not missing.)

Ross G Caldwell said:

As for what it means? My first instinct is "Ah, it's a forgery, just like I thought!"

Click to expand...

I make it to be a 'forgery' of sorts, but a 15th-century Italian one, namely a distorted version of a Provence (or Lyons) original (the Marseilles), its more conventional devil, for instance, arising from lack of understanding of the essentially Masonic symbolism of the chained pair, these not being present in typical conventional depictions of the devil from those times, although these often occur in the context of the Orpheus myth (big in the Middle Ages) and thus pinned symbolically to a pair (note the devil is as much chained to the pair, in a sense, as they are to him).

And really, the only reason I want it to go away is because it's so difficult - I'm tempted to date it to 1450, by the clothing and style.

Click to expand...

This would, by my reckoning, put it in the running as the original Italian offshoot of what sprang up originally northwest of the Alps.

There is no theory of French origin (i.e. asserting that tarot was invented in France is not a theory in itself).

Click to expand...

Beg to differ: showing that the Marseilles symbolism itself arose from confluence of British bardic and Languedoc Jewish poetico-mystical traditions, and not merely as an imperfect mock-up of an Italian 'tradition' that could not even agree on trump order, constitutes a theory rather than mere assertion does it not? You do not have to 'buy' the theory to admit that such does, at least, exist.

All of these sheets are rejects (probably) - for some reason. On the Rosenwald, it is surely because the numbering is wrong. Did the carver have to go back to the block and make a whole new carving? Or are the numbers inked in, and the apprentice screwed up? Probably the latter. They were no good for cards anymore.

Click to expand...

I think you're right here.

Personally, I really think the best way to study this sheet is to look at styles of woodcuts around Europe, and to look at the figure of the Devil, which is the most unique of the images. Devil with a basket is unique in tarot (IIRC), and is immediately recognizable as Krampus. Devil with a basket may not always be Krampus, and the Cary Devil may not be Krampus, but it's a good place to look.

Click to expand...

And yet, as I mentioned above, this Devil seems more conventional to that era than the Marseilles one, based at least on what I have seen in threads and links here and also in illustrations of the Orpheus tale in a work I own. The consumption of souls is the exoteric side of Satan, so to speak, while the chained pair is his esoteric side, methinks.