15th Century Italy: How confident are you?

You know... I hate sounding like the historical, "the facts and only the facts" guy. This is not me.

As I reponded earlier to Baba's post... there is certainly the romantic in me that REALLY wants to find an answer beyond 15th Century Italy. I get no pleasure at all from defending this point of view.. but I am at a loss to find verifiable data that points otherwise.

best,
robert

Hi Robert, I don't take you as a dry fish on History. But I think you don't seem to look at earlier connections as a possible answer.
I said that I believe Tarot came back to Rome with the Pope when he returned from Avignon in 1377. Then it that is taken as French when the iconology is obviously Northern Italian. There is no disparity there. Avignon was more Italian than Rome in many ways. The Italians were pretty pissed at the Avignon Papacy throughout the hundred years. Emperor Henry V11 visited and that was a threat to Rome (Emperor+ Pope) the Queen of Naples sold Avignon to the Holy See mid 1300's and the Italians were strongly at Avignon. What makes me so convinced of the connection to Tarot is that Pope Urban V had an Italian legate called Gil Albornoz who was trying to bring Bernado? Visconti and his mercenaries to heel and Urban V interferred. There are many visual connections that point to this time as well. Clement the V1th, protected the Jews after Avignon was decimated by the Black Plague(It was thought the Jews were the cause) and The Death Card seems to be directly related as it was Clement that said the plague could take kings and paupers and Jews alike.The Judgement card seems related to the huge blunder over the Beatific Vision of the bible and the Hermit to the Franciscian problem.It goes on and on- these connections. They are definitly Italian- not French, these connections, but definitely the popular images of the time; but I think earlier than Bianca. A sort of Happy Families card game that I played as a child and so did my parents when they were children. I have the remnants of my parents deck, but not my own(how strange is that)~Rosanne

I still feel the romance when I look at a broad sweep

I haven't significantly modifed my views since the early posts to this thread...but my interests and changes of focus into Latin-suited decks or Bolonese, Etteilla or other patterns have kept the romance alive for me...

I don't think this is too far off-topic...just responding to the questions/subjects in general.

I know we dwell on the trumps, majors, and such and we dig deep until we come to closest strings of the 22 usual suspects...why not just play awhile with looking into the bigger picture of cards in general and enjoy the romance?

Sometimes I find that I like looking into how the minors came to be--that's why Latin suited cards and odd patterns are charming to me.

http://www.wopc.co.uk/history/page_5.html

Or the approach that I've been finding refreshing this past year is looking at illuminated Books of Hours and finding things that 'almost' remind me of tarot trumps...I used to haunt Dantesque references for that...but I found after awhile, the juicy joy of discovery wasn't within me for the earliest topics.

So I looked at other areas that were obscure to me...with about 500 years of card design and history, there's many different card designs and patterns and points to follow up on.


Regards,

Cerulean

"possible Sufi origin of the Tarot"...

Does anyone know of Sir Fairfax Leighton Cartwright's association with the Tarot or Sufism? Ronald Decker: History of the Occult Tarot, 2002 pp.304-5
denies that this is " an authentic Sufi document", but places Cartwright in Teheran, nevertheless. Decker doesn't reveal how he knows this is inauthentic but assures us in dismissing Blakeley's neoplatonisms that: "a Muslim mystic surely would not give such attention to pagan deities." perhaps Decker's overlooking the Sabaeans...

"John D. Blakeley in The Mystical Tower of the Tarot describes his search for the possible Sufi origin of the Tarot. He found a book written in 1899 called The Mystic Rose from the Garden of the King by Sir Fairfax L. Cartwright. ... a wanderer approaches a tower ... There are three chambers on each floor, each containing a living Tarot archetype..."
http://www.lelandra.com/tarotbook/tableaux.htm

Sir Fairfax Leighton Cartwright (Jul 20, 1857 d.1928) was secretary to the legations in Mexico 1899-1902 and Lisbon 1902-1905, councillor to the Madrid Embassy 1905-1906, minister to Munich and Stuttgart 1906-1908 and ambassador to the Austro-Hungarian Empire 1908-1913. He married the daughter of an Italian senator.
http://www.northamptonshire.gov.uk/Community/record/FamcollC.htm

"Writing in January 1913, the British Ambassador in Vienna, Sir Fairfax Cartwright observed that ‘Serbia will some day set Europe by the ears and bring about a universal war on the continent.’
The Russians, he advised, were encouraging this ‘little country’ to antagonise Austria to the point of exasperation."
http://www.palgrave.com/pdfs/0333786637.pdf

The Mystic Rose from the Garden of the King by Sir Fairfax L. Cartwright.
he mystic rose from the garden of the king : a fragment of the vision of Sheikh Haji Ibrahim of Kerbela / rendered into English by Fairfax L. Cartwright.
Published: [London?] : Privately printed, [1898]
Description: 2 p. l., [v]-xvii, [2] l., 315 p. ; 21 cm.

"In Arabic, the word for "rose" (ward) is just a vowel away and related by root to the word for "invocation of sacred Names" (wird). Thus the rose symbolism in the Sufi way (connoting remembrance), and the name of this device in Christianity: "Rosary.""
http://peacedances.50megs.com/glossary/glossary.html

"When the Mystic Dervish had ceased to relate what he had seen, the Young King spoke to him thus: 'Oh! Sage, where is the Strange Land to be found where the Temple of Knowledge lieth?'

The Dervish replied: 'Oh! King, wouldst thou know where lies the Strange Land where dwell the Disciples of the Path - the Seekers after Truth? Turn to thy Heart; hidden therein lieth the magnificent Temple of Human Knowledge, but the Key to the Gate thereof God alone can give'. "
http://www.greylodge.org/occultreview/glor_002/mysticrose.htm

In the Mamluk period Sufi masters and novices became a widespread
phenomenon.
http://www.carm.es/educacion/sufismo/sinopsis.doc.

"Shahab al-Din al-Suhrawardi also elaborated the idea of an independent
intermediary world, the imaginal world ('alam al-mithal). His views have
exerted a powerful influence down to this day, particularly through Mulla
Sadra's [(1571/2-1640)] adoption of his concept of intensity and gradation to existence, wherein he (i.e. Mulla Sadra) combined peripatetic and illuminationist descriptions of reality."
http://www.mereislam.info/

-John

I was under the impression that the story had since been assumed to be in the same league as P. Christian's Egyptian 'find'.

Re: Fairfax L.Cartwright-
http://www.hermes-press.com/witintro.htm

"On March 31, 1909, she [Serbia] made at Vienna the formal declaration which had been agreed upon by Aehrenthal and Sir Fairfax Cartwright, the English Ambassador at Vienna, in the following terms:

Serbia recognizes that she has not been affected in her rights by the fait accompli created in Bosnia, and that consequently she will conform to the decisions that the Powers may take in regard to Article 25 of the Treaty of Berlin. In deference to the advice of the Great Powers, Serbia undertakes to renounce the attitude of protest and opposition which she has adopted since last autumn with regard to the Annexation. She undertakes, moreover, to modify the direction of her present policy toward Austria-Hungary, and to live in future on good neighborly terms with the latter.

In conformity with these declarations and with confidence in the peaceful intentions of Austria-Hungary, Serbia will replace her army, as far as concerns its organization and the location and number of the troops, to the state in which it was in the spring of 1908. She will disarm and disband the volunteers and irregular forces and prevent the formation of new irregular corps on her territory.(69)

Within the next few weeks the Serbian and Austrian armies were demobilized and the Annexation Crisis was relieved. But, as will be seen later, the Serbians, encouraged by Russia, did not live up to the promises which they had been forced to give, and Conrad repeatedly complained later that Germany had prevented Austria in 1909 from settling the Serbian danger in the only permanently satisfactory way, viz., by the use of force.
http://yamaguchy.netfirms.com/fay/origin_105a.html

"The close relationship of the Mamluk number cards with the Italian tarot cards forces one to assume that the latter and all the other Western cards are ultimately dependant on the former. The conclusion is all the more mandatory as the 'cultural current' in Egypt and medieval Middle East was from East to Europe...Since the number cards show such a filiation , the question naturally arises about the possible source of inspiration for the figural court-cards."
-Ettinghausen, Richard. "Further Comments on Mamluk Playing Cards" in Gatherings in Honor of Dorothy E. Miner. McCracken, Ursula E. et al. (edited by).
Baltimore: The Walters Art Gallery, [1974]. 51-78.

Two illustrations are presented as earlier Egyptian court card fragments depicting respectively a King estimated as being from the 12th-13th C.[Cairo, Museum of Islamic Art No. 15610/4-1] and a Governor (Na'ib al-Malik) 12th-14th C. from the collection of Edmund de Unger, a Hungarian barrister who arrived in Britain in 1949. Both of these are figured individuals rather than simple inscriptions depicting their hierarchical rank. Both of the cards as well as two 16th c. Italian cards (8 bastoni & 6 swords) discovered by Ettinghausen in rubbish heaps of Fostat (first capital city of Egypt under Arab rule) were purposefully destroyed, perhaps due to religious restrictions.

According to the above Ettinghausen article, the Topkapi Sarayi Museum, Istanbul cards- King of Polo-sticks and the King of Cups are both prefixed with: 'Ahad al-arkan'; the provided translation there being: 'pillar of the game'
Arkan being = 'pillar', however according to Wikipedia:
ahad= "only." Islamically, ahad means One Alone, unique, none like God.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Islamic_terms_in_Arabic

"...variants on the well-known Súfí hierarchy which includes, according to one version, a single "pole" (qutb), four "pillars" (arkán), forty "replacements" (abdal), seventy "nobles" (nuwubá), and three hundred and sixty "righteous" (salihún)[112]"
http://bahai-library.org/articles/hierarchy.babi.html

-John

Re: Sir Fairfax L. Cartwright

Not a great deal appears online about this man, considering his importance in securing the peace negotiated prior to the outbreak of WWI. The extended overt 1898 Tarot allegory that occurs in The Mystic Rose from the Garden of the King : a fragment of the vision of Sheikh Haji Ibrahim of Kerbala,
[see:]
http://www.greylodge.org/occultrevi.../mysticrose.htm
-is actually a very small part of work as a whole which, in its original edition ran 315 pp. It apparently was Cartwright's last work and certainly his most well known, existing in at least 5 editions and perhaps his only work on mysticism as far as I can determine. There does exist a work [I haven't seen] about Cartwright: by Haan, Christian Reinhold.
Sir Fairfax Cartwright, britischer Gesandter und Botschafter 1906-1913, und sein Verhaltnis zu Deutschland. Ein Beitrag zur Kriegsschuldfrage. Inaugural-Dissertation, etc.
Publisher/year pp. vi. 73. Dusseldorf, 1938.

About Sheikh Haji Ibrahim of Kerbala I have found nothing definite yet.

I found a used paperback copy of Cartwright's work itself that I ordered so... I'll report back eventually.

Thanks for the wavelength
Happy Solstice & Peace all
-John

The symbolism of the Visconti and Tarot de Marseille is so completely different, I wonder a bit whether the Marseille tarot was derived from the Visconti, or rather from a common source, or the reverse. Also, the earliest extant Marseille tarot is from the 16th century, yet the costumage looks perhaps from an earlier century. (This I'm not sure about. Any experts on medieval/renaissance attire?) So I think it's possible that there were earlier tarot decks than the Visconti (perhaps as early as 1375), probably originating in France, held in secrecy and destroyed/thrown away like most paper products.

However, evidence like the Jacopo Antonio Marcello statement in 1449 that triumph cards were "a new Italian invention" (I hadn't heard that one before until this thread) points to the 15th century Italy origin.

So how confident am I of 15th century Italy? I'll say 80%.

northsea said:

However, evidence like the Jacopo Antonio Marcello statement in 1449 that triumph cards were "a new Italian invention" (I hadn't heard that one before until this thread) points to the 15th century Italy origin.

Click to expand...

This was important for me too.

It comes from the letter J-A Marcello sent to Isabelle of Lorraine in 1449, along with two decks - a "normal" tarot deck, and the deck Marziano da Tortona designed, and Michelino da Besozzo painted, for Filippo Maria Visconti.

"And as often as you will restore the mind wearied by the highest labours by means of this game, and to revive the spirit by this new Italian invention"

(& quotiens hoc ludo mentem summis laboribus arrisque lassam reficietis, et hoc novo Italico invento animum recreabitis)
http://trionfi.com/0/b/03/

I think this statement is an important witness, because of the people involved.

Isabelle
Scipio Carafa
Marcello
Cossa

Isabelle (Duchess) of Lorraine, and Queen of Sicily, had spent the years 1435-1440 in Naples, with excursions into Tuscany. In 1449, at the age of 39, she had retired to her estates in Angers (her husband was René d'Anjou).

Marcello was the Venetian army "proveditore" - the liason between the Senate and the army, whose principal job was to pay the soldiers. Marcello also supported Anjou's claim on Naples (the Kingdom of Sicily) over Alfonso of Aragon's. In early 1449, Marcello had been given a gift of a pack of triumph cards, something he seems never to have seen before, and when Scipio Carafa saw them, he exclaimed how much Queen Isabelle would love them.

Scipio Carafa was the Venetian ambassador to the French court (Charles VII). Carafa had just come back to Italy after visiting René's court in Provence (Tarascon and Aix).

Marcello decides to send the triumph cards, but also discovers a more famous pack that F-M Visconti had conceived of and owned; he decides to send that one to Isabelle too, along with the book describing it. He sends it with Giovanni Cossa, the primary ambassador between René d'Anjou and the Italian powers.

Some deductions -

Everybody in the story is excited about the cards (the lesser triumph pack started the story; Marziano's comes later).

Marcello and Carafa are Venetians; Marcello knows the north and east of Italy intimately, and Carafa knows northern Italy and France from Provence to Paris (and who knows what else). Both men seem never to have seen triumph cards before Marcello received a pack as a gift near Milan.

Isabelle knew Italy well, and loved and sought out beautiful things; if triumph cards had existed in Naples or Florence at this time, it seems she would already have known them.

Carafa must have observed her either playing cards or at some other kind of game, and when he saw Marcello's cards, he believed she would love them. Thus it seems, neither Carafa nor Isabelle would have seen them before (i.e. if Carafa knew of such cards before, he wouldn't have been surprised to see Marcello's, which Marcello implies are less than worthy of royalty; and if Isabelle had already had a pack, Carafa wouldn't have insisted to Marcello on how much Isabelle would love to have a pack of them).

Therefore, I think that triumph cards didn't exist yet in the late 1430s, or someone of these three card-playing people, in all their travels, would already have a pack of them and none of this story would have happened - AND Marcello wouldn't have called them a "new Italian invention".

Additional observations and deductions -

There is a famous Venetian law in 1441 that forbids imported cards, because it is damaging the local artisans. The law seems especially directed at German cardmakers.

We know that German cardmakers were numerous in Florence and Bologna, at least since the 1420s, and probably earlier.

We know that "Emperors" cards were made at Florence in the 1420s. We don't know what kind of cards these were, but when an Italian heard "Emperor" in the 14th-15th centuries, it would have brought to mind "German" first and "Caesar" (as in ancient Rome) second. Thus, I think that Emperors cards were some kind of German pack of cards. It seems plausible that Emperors cards were the same as the German "Kaiserspiel" - Emperor's Game - which is another name for "Karnöffel". Karnöffel had an allegorical component - normal cards called Emperor, Pope, Devil, the Sow, and the "Karnöffel".

Emperor Sigmund came to Italy in 1431 and stayed 2 years. He was crowned King of Lombardy in Milan, and Emperor in Rome in 1433. This was the first time an Emperor had been crowned in Rome in over 100 years, and Sigmund celebrated with a Roman style triumph in Rome and in Mantua on his return trip. Thus - in 1433, the Italian people were treated to a German Emperor in an ancient Roman style Triumph.

In the late 1430s, finally, Petrarch's allegorical poem "Trionfi" begins to get wider circulation, with the first recorded illustrated version done in 1441.

So the theme of Triumph, in both the allegorical sense and the Roman victory sense, seems to be getting more popular in the 1430s.

When we consider the protectivist spirit that made the Venetians crack down on German cards, the fact that someone interested in cards did not know them as of 1440 while still in Italy (Isabelle), and the rise of Italian self-determination in the end of the Western Schism and that massive international event, the council of Ferrara-Florence (1438-1443), which ended in Rome - i.e. the "triumphal" spirit of the times, especially the second half of the 1430s - I would hazard to guess, if it were possible to know, that Triumph Cards were invented around 1439, by someone who knew the Emperors Game (Emperor = Triumph), but wanted to make a native game that would be the final, greatest game of all - Italy's triumph, taking back the Church, bringing the world together (Council uniting Greeks and Latins (on paper at least) and all the other Churches (Copts, Ethiopians, Syrians, Indians)), crowning the Emperor - the triumph of right order over the misfortunes of the previous century. This is what I think triumph cards signifies and celebrates, and those were the events that occasioned its birth.

I think many of these deductions are sound, some less sound, and the hypothesis is... um... bold; but even if the risk of taking a stab at the precise conditions and dating is a little over the top, the general proposition of a dating in the 1430s, even up to 1441, is something I will defend.

So... my confidence in Italy, 15th century? 99.9 per cent.

Wonderful to read your deductions Ross. I have a question. What did you mean in 1449 a 'Normal' Tarot deck? ~Rosanne