Exploring the Cary Sheet

Ross G Caldwell

Hi Jean-Michel,

jmd said:
With regards to the Devil, though there may be little evidence of devils consuming human beings on cards, there are many cathedrals that have stone carvings on the western side (usually above the central entry on the external panel) that depict clearly a post-death weighing of souls, with those doomed entering the mouth of a leviathan-type devil.

It is not a far-fetched possibility that devil-images included such variety.

I only meant that I know of none such in French cards. An anthropophagous (ahem) Devil does exist in the Agnolo Hebreo card, and in the Beaux-Arts sheet. Both of these are presumed to be Bolognese.

I believe that sometime in the 16th century, the Bolognese cardmakers toned down the horror of their Devil.
 

le pendu

jmd said:
The clothing mentioned by le pendu was previously discussed in a variety of threads, called 'Gates of Hell' surcoats by some.

I don't think we are talking abou the same thing. From what I can see the Gates of Hell Surcoats are basically like a dress/covering that has huge openings on the side that allow one to see what the lady is wearing underneath.

I'm focused on the sleeves, not the sides. The sleeves have huge holes in them and then dangle down. On the Empress and Temperance they seem to close in a loop at the bottom.

So far, I've found this which is getting close. It's "The Marriage of Giovanni Arnolfini and Giovanna Cenami; 1434, by Jan van Eyck, a Flemish painter:

Arnolfini_Marriage.jpg

This seems to be getting pretty close to what the Empress and Temperance are wearing.

The Webmuseum says: "This title has traditionally been given to this painting because it was thought to be a form of ``wedding certificate'' for Giovanni Arnolfini and Giovanna Cenami, who married in Bruges in 1434. He was an Italian merchant, she the daughter of an Italian merchant. Their grave, youthful faces both have a lovely responsability that is typical of van Eyck." They are Italians... so Ross is probably correct in identifying the clothing as Italian. I'm still looking to see if I can find the closed sleeve at the bottom.. that might give us more information.

best,
robert
 

Ross G Caldwell

le pendu said:
I don't think we are talking abou the same thing. From what I can see the Gates of Hell Surcoats are basically like a dress/covering that has huge openings on the side that allow one to see what the lady is wearing underneath.

I'm focused on the sleeves, not the sides. The sleeves have huge holes in them and then dangle down. On the Empress and Temperance they seem to close in a loop at the bottom.

So far, I've found this which is getting close. It's "The Marriage of Giovanni Arnolfini and Giovanna Cenami; 1434, by Jan van Eyck, a Flemish painter:


This seems to be getting pretty close to what the Empress and Temperance are wearing.

The Webmuseum says: "This title has traditionally been given to this painting because it was thought to be a form of ``wedding certificate'' for Giovanni Arnolfini and Giovanna Cenami, who married in Bruges in 1434. He was an Italian merchant, she the daughter of an Italian merchant. Their grave, youthful faces both have a lovely responsability that is typical of van Eyck." They are Italians... so Ross is probably correct in identifying the clothing as Italian. I'm still looking to see if I can find the closed sleeve at the bottom.. that might give us more information.

best,
robert

Notice Arnolfi's shoes too - they are the same as the Magician's in the Cary sheet... and I already knew other pictures of the time with exactly the same shoes... But I am *not* going to date the Cary sheet to the 1430s!

That would be crazy! ;-) We need a much more nuanced picture of clothing styles through the century, before jumping to conclusions.
 

firemaiden

Fascinating thread! Perhaps the hair styles warrant a bit of attention as well?

Temperance and the Empress look quite like the same woman. Same hair, same high waisted dress, same odd sleeves.

I love the cow in the Tower card. But I guess she has much been discussed elswhere.
 

Ross G Caldwell

firemaiden said:
Fascinating thread! Perhaps the hair styles warrant a bit of attention as well?

Temperance and the Empress look quite like the same woman. Same hair, same high waisted dress, same odd sleeves.

I'm looking through all my art books to find examples. Based on clothing, shoes and hair styles, it looks really old. No later than 1450. More like 1435-1445.

But that would make it by far the earliest printed tarot, and one of the earliest surviving printings at all!

And if that dating is plausible, then the origin of the "TdM" style is surely to be found wherever this sheet comes from.

I love the cow in the Tower card. But I guess she has much been discussed elswhere.

I don't know - I remember someone mentioning it on some other thread a while back, but no lengthy discussion.
 

firemaiden

The Moon

Dogs being absent from the moon card make me think - they had simply not been though of yet.

What about the twin towers in the Moon? Are they not much shorter, smaller than you would expect, given how closely this card ressembles a Marseille Moon? Do they not seem more gate like and less tower like? - or even - more like memorials in a cemetary?
 

Ross G Caldwell

firemaiden said:
Dogs being absent from the moon card make me think - they had simply not been though of yet.

Yes, it's delightfully puzzling. It seems doubtful that anyone would have *removed* the dogs from a design, so I concur with Dummett that the Cary sheet must be earlier than any known tarot "de Marseille".

Sometimes I though of the two dogs as a French insult to Jews or Arabs - in the southern style cards there are usually *two* astronomers, dressed in exotic garb (middle eastern Jews or Arabs) pointing at and studying the Moon (a nice example is the Charles VI Moon). Thus - according to my tenuous theory of transmission across the Savoy Alps of the Bolognese style - the French cardmakers at some point changed the two astronomers to two dogs.

But the Cary sheet should have actually made me think twice about that. It should be earlier than any TdM; and if it is an Italian copy of a French pack, it should have two dogs or two astronomers, which if it is from 1500 the French packs (if TdM were invented yet) might still have had. I don't know why they would remove these figures, if they were there.

I suppose the dogs could have been added later, as an extra artistic bit to illustrate the Moon (but why two?).

But in any case, it seems the Cary sheet is just beginning to show its importance - a good deal of which it already has.

What about the twin towers in the Moon? Are they not much shorter, smaller than you would expect, given how closely this card ressembles a Marseille Moon? Do they not seem more gate like and less tower like? - or even - more like memorials in a cemetary?

Yes, they are a little less prominent than in the TdM. Could be gate-posts.

The heraldry of the city of Genoa has two towers like this, IIRC.

But where do we get a stream or river going between two towers?
 

Ross G Caldwell

Discovery

It looks like the girl on the far right of the "Charles VI" Love card has the same kind of sleeves and hair-style we are looking for.

(no link as yet)

So... the dating on this deck is, as usual, not settled. For a long time it was held to be late - 1470-1480. But lately the consensus seems to be turning in favor of an earlier date, around 1450.
 

le pendu

I spent a lot of time yesterday looking for clues about the "hanging-sleeves". From what I can gather the style seems to have been popular throughout the 15th century, and in several places. I found French, Italian and Flemish images that show it..

Here is a French one from 1430, the second character on the left:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/65/02n_1403.jpg

On this page ( http://www.florentine-persona.com/menflorence.html ) scroll down to "Benozzo Gozzoli, The School of Tagaste, 1464, detail. From a fresco in San Gimignano." You can see that the child on the left and the one on the right are both wearing them.

Here the figure on the right, St. Catherine, has very long hanging-sleeves which she has wrapped around her arm:
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/w/weyden/rogier/13variou/1diptych.html

At this point, I would not feel at all secure dating the Cary Sheet from the sleeves, they seem to have been popular for a long time and over a large area. I read somewhere... and can't find it now, that they were popular in the *late* 15th Century. Also.. it seems to have remained popular much later on children.

If I could find a closer match to the cards then maybe that will help.

best,
robert
 

le pendu

Ross G Caldwell said:
It looks like the girl on the far right of the "Charles VI" Love card has the same kind of sleeves and hair-style we are looking for.

(no link as yet)

So... the dating on this deck is, as usual, not settled. For a long time it was held to be late - 1470-1480. But lately the consensus seems to be turning in favor of an earlier date, around 1450.

Good find Ross. This is a much closer match than anything I could find so far. The high dress, "pregnant" look, and hanging sleeves. So now we just have to date the Charles VI! No problem! hee hee

Isn't the headress on the central figure pretty specific in time?

best,
robert