Tarot de Marseille - Marteau Grimaud, informations for collectors

Abrac

As of today, I am the proud owner of my very own "Deck 03." :)

I didn't really want a Marseille with English titles, but I like this one, it's a beautiful deck. The only thing that's a little weird is La Maison Dieu has become The Tower of Destruction in this version.

The card stock is super thick. This deck is almost twice the thickness of a regular deck. You wouldn't want to drop this one on your toe. The cards do have a good protective coating, but it's not excessive, and the feel is more like paper than plastic, albeit very stiff paper.

coredil says the background color is white, but it's more of an off-white, compared with Deck 05 which is a true white. It's not beige, so compared with Deck 01, it looks white. The rest of the colors are very different (mainly hue and saturation) from Deck 05. Set against the off-white background, they simply look magnificent.

I would recommend this deck to anyone who is looking for a Marseille and is lucky enough to run across one.

-fof

Edit To Add: My deck came with two advertisment cards, but there is no blue US Games stamp on either of them. There is no mention of US Games in the LWB. Some of the flaps are missing from the box, so it is conceivable it was on one of those. I'm assuming this deck was distributed in the US and Canada by US Games; however, I don't know for sure.
 

Rusty Neon

Unless I've missed it, I notice that the now-out-of-print circa 1990 Dusserre photoreproduction of a 1930 Marteau Grimaud Tarot de Marseille (Bibliothèque nationale de France specimen) hasn't been mentioned yet on this thread. It's worth checking out too.
 

Abrac

Rusty - there are several posts about the Dusserre reproduction. I searched the thread and found seven.

Out of curiosity, do you know where there are some scans of the Dusserre? If so, would you mind posting a link, or point me in the right direction?

Thanks

-fof
 

Rusty Neon

fof ... The Dusserre wasn't one of the numbered items; I guess that's why I missed it. Still, it's good to mention it, so that those new to Marteau decks know what it's about.
 

coredil

Rusty Neon said:
fof ... The Dusserre wasn't one of the numbered items; I guess that's why I missed it. Still, it's good to mention it, so that those new to Marteau decks know what it's about.

Hello Rusty Neon,

as you realise this thread was first based only on my own collection.
I do not have a Dusserre reproduction (I would rather like to find an original 1930 deck :))
To my knowledge there are many more Grimaud TdM versions.
Some days ago I even saw in a big Book Store in Germany, a version that was completely new to me in a glossy yellow box.
Maybe I should buy one to see how does the copyright looks like :)

BTW Rusty-Neon (sorry for the cross-posting) I would really like to know what your impressions now are on the similitude Arnoult-Grimaud and Marteau.
It really took me some times trying to convince you ;)

@ fools-fool
I am glad for you!
And now that you mention it, I can see the color difference on the background, it is really a "mellower" white.
On deck 03 the US-Games stamp is on one advertising card, not on the red box.
 

Fulgour

tmgrl2 said:
What a wonderful summary, coredil!!
I agree :) completely! Thank you, coredil.
 

Abrac

Hmmm...this deck of mine doesn't have the blue US Games stamp on it. I wonder what that means. Another tarot mystery.
 

Lee

I just realized that my deck 4 (English-French titles) has the back which coredil shows for decks 3 and 5 (the blue-and-white pattern) rather than the sunburst-and-flowers which coredil shows for deck 4. Otherwise, my deck matches coredil's description for deck 4.

I bought the deck new at Samuel Weiser's bookstore in New York in the early '80s.

-- Lee