More observations about the Ukiyoe.
La-Luna you are quite right - it is comfortingly close to the Marseille, but the art and the feel of the deck is entirely different. I am amused, for instance, by the Magician holding his little coin, like the Marseille Bateleur, who looks nonetheless completely Japanese. There is also the use of woodblock as a connection: in the 17th Century the Japanese started to use woodblocks, and these were of major importance in the dissemination of Ukiyoe art in Japan. But i have to say, it looks much finer than most of the Marseille-patterned cards that have come down to us!
Colours: these are glowing and subtle in tone and variation. The palette is huge and brilliant, but not loud.
Facial and bodily expression: while these are fairly stylized, the artist managed to convey different expressions, not only with the faces but the whole body. A little like No Theatre, where every posture and facial expression is archetypal.
If I study the High Priestess, for instance, I see a woman behind a half-open sliding door that reveals a garden landscape, who turns her body away from the edge of the door. She holds a scroll in her left hand to her right breast, as though to keep it lightly from curious eyes. Her head is turning towards the world: she is not the Hermit - she has one ear and one eye in the world, and the other on her knowing mystery. She looks also as though she is waiting, which fits the idea of gestation associated with the High Priestess. She is dressed in a brilliant red undergown over which cascades a floral gown of green and pink. A yellow garment hugs her shoulders. Red is a happy colour in Japan, yellow symbolises both courage and moderation, green is eternal life and pink shows feminity, and particularly purity in a woman. It is obvious this is a beautiful, perfumed woman of some learning, but an enigma as well. What I find most interesting of all is the way the artist has conveyed the archetype of the High Priestess mainly in body language, rather than more elaborate symbolism (assuming most Westerners know next to nothing about Japanese colour symbolism - in fact, I had to do a search for those colours I mentioned
)
I see this economy of symbolic objects and glyphs throughout the Majors and Courts, replaced by the symbolism of body language and expression, and relationship to the world (or in the cards where there are several people, with each other). Another example I enjoy is the Page of Wands, whose body language conveys cockiness, challenge and deference together, yet all in a highly stylised manner. In this spare and careful use of symbolism, the Ukiyoe pays a clear homage to the Marseille, which uses few object-symbolism, but it does so by using the Japanese heritage - which is an amazing feat, if you thing about it. It also makes the archetypes and the symbols associated to them all the more authoritative.
There are some amusing touches: like on the Hierophant card, where on of the disciples before the Buddhist Master, who is teaching, turns towards his companion - I imagine him whispering something like: "do you understand what he just said? I don't!" or on a grumpy morning - "when do you think the old fart will let us get off and have our breakfasts"?
