Tarot de Marseille - Marteau Grimaud, informations for collectors

letranger

Marteau book reply

Thank you for that detailed reply. I can safely guess that this is indeed the 1949 version but I'll let you know when I receive it. It would have been nice to have gotten the Camoin Conver or 1930 version but maybe I'll find copies during my next trip to France. As it is, I'm thrilled to have this one.

I have a personal preference for the Dusserre edition of Marteau only b/c this was the first deck I bought nearly 20 years ago. Unfortunately I no longer have a copy of my first deck (only the box and Le Monde). That's a long story to explain why. Anyway, I bought that deck w/o knowing anything about the different decks. I could've as easily picked up a Dodal Dusserre instead, but that's life.

I am still looking for the Dodal but refuse to pay the current eBay prices for it. thanks again.
 

Rafaël

Marteau book editions

Hi coredil & letranger,

So this is what we are talking about:

BookMarteausmall.jpg


coredil, those Camoin-bicentenaire cards in a Marteau edition sound pretty strange. That needs some inquiery indeed.
By the way, it would be an hounour to send you some pictures of minors. Send me you mail in pm please.

A nice weekend to all of you,
Rafaël
 

letranger

Marteau book

I received my Marteau book and it is indeed the 1949 edition. The glued on "cards" are gorgeous. I look forward to wadding through the text.
 

Igor

Marteau’s book

Hello to you all,

Paul Marteau’s book is mentioned in some booklets going with old editions of his deck.
I believe that the first editions of his deck came without any booklet, but I have one 80 pages booklet from 1952, written on the last page (80):
"Dépôt légal no 4237, 2e trimestre 1952."
This booklet came with a deck similar to Deck 01, the one with a very unusual cardback. The booklet has a cardboard cover (not counting in the 80 pages) with the title:

Ancien Tarot de Marseille

(logo with the circle and triangle, as on first editions (dark-red and blue ones) or on the green boxes editions)

B.-P. GRIMAUD
54, rue de Lancry, 54
PARIS

It is not mentioned who wrote this booklet, but on the page 5, in the "Avant propos", it is written on the bottom of the page:
"(1) Le TAROT de Marseille par Paul MARTEAU, ouvrage format 19 × 27,5 de 300 pages, contenant la reproduction en couleur des 78 lames. Préface de Jean Paulhan, Introduction d’Eug. Caslant. Arts et Métiers graphiques, 18, rue Séguier. Paris 6e. PARU."

which can be translated:
"(1) The TAROT of Marseilles by Paul MARTEAU, book (19 cm × 27,5 cm) of 300 pages, including a color copy of the 78 cards. Préface by Jean Paulhan, Introduction by Eug. Caslant. Arts et Métiers graphiques, 18, rue Séguier. Paris 6e. EDITED."

The last word, in french "PARU" should mean that the book has already been edited. This word can be translated by "APPEARED" or "EDITED".

So I suppose that the booklet that I have is not its first edition. The first one probably didn’t have the "PARU", then Marteaus book "appeared" and then Marteau added "PARU" to mean that now, the book has appeared.


Maybe Marteau wrote himself this booklet, but it seems that there is no way to be sure. I will read and compare with my 1984 edition of his book to see if the point of view are similar. As they both talk about the same deck and work for the same company/persons, they are probably similar, and it won’t even proof if the writer of this booklet is Marteau or not. So I’ll check it soon and will let you know…
 

Igor

Marteau’s book and booklet

Igor said:
So I suppose that the booklet that I have is not its first edition. The first one probably didn’t have the "PARU", then Marteau’s book "appeared" and then Marteau added "PARU" to mean that now, the book has appeared.

Something else confirms it:

In the "Avant propos", on the same page 5, it start with:
"Avant de publier un important ouvrage sur l’Ancien Tarot de Marseille (1) […], il nous a paru utile d’en rédiger un abrégé."

which can be translated by:

"Before to publish a huge book about the Ancien Tarot of Marseille (1) […], we thought that it could be useful to write a short one".

So the book seems to have been written after the booklet which was probably been done by Marteau himself as it happens sometimes: someone write a brief text and then realize that he wants to say more about it and then, writes a book.

By the way, does anyone here have an older booklet ?
 

yaraluna

I have looked through the whole thread and haven't found this info:
Which Grimaud is the one that comes in a large off-white box, with the deck in two parts inside, English titles?
Also, what year is the one with German and English titles?

thank you.
yara
 

coredil

yaraluna said:
I have looked through the whole thread and haven't found this info:
Which Grimaud is the one that comes in a large off-white box, with the deck in two parts inside, English titles?
Also, what year is the one with German and English titles?

thank you.
yara
Decks 8, 13 and 14 from this thread come with the huge two parts white box with english titles.

Indeed there is a lack of informations about the boxes in this thread.
Also about the LWB!
Maybe one day I will find time to change this.

Best regards
 

Freddie

Thank you coredil!!!

Freddie
 

Igor

Stamp or no Stamp ? That is the question…

Hello Marteau’s lovers…

There is something that I am not sure to understand about the deck 21 posted here :
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=57491&page=10&pp=10

thinbuddha said:
Deck 21 […]
No stamps on cards.
(So if understand well, there is no stamp on the ace of coins.)

And later :

thinbuddha said:
Deck 21 […]
"Made in France" stamp on front of box.
(I suppose that it is the straight text-line that we can see on the photo you have posted. Could you please post a scan of this stamp ?)



Here is now my conclusions :

These informations feel strange to me, because the "made in France" stamp is not a tax stamp, and tax stamps were in use on ace of coins until 1945. So without any tax stamp, this deck should be post 1945. But it seems impossible to me, due to its very old look.

I have a theory about it :

this deck was made (from 1930 to 1945) to be sold outside France, so the tax stamp had not to be printed. Instead of it Grimaud used to print a "Made in france" stamp on the box. According to this theory, the deck 21 could be a very early one, maybe a 2nd or 3rd edition…

What do you think about it…

It could help, if someone here knew if french card games had to be tax-stamped even when they were produced for other countries ?

Thinbuddah, could you also tell us in which country did you find this deck ?

Have a nice day ;)
 

coredil

Igor said:
the deck 21 could be a very early one, maybe a 2nd or 3rd edition…

What do you think about it…
This decks seems to be exactly the same as deck 20, except that on my decks there is a tax stamp on the ace of coins.
To my understanding tax stamps have a very relative signification for dating the printing of a deck.
Any stamps can have been stamped on any deck many years after its printing, it just depends on the actual laws and of course if the decks are still in stock.

In this case I would say the back of the deck is significant.
I have the feeling (without any prove for this) that the whirled cardback pattern is older than the curly cardback pattern.
See some thoughts on this in this thread:
http://www.tarotforum.net/showpost.php?p=2111043&postcount=22

But we can be quite sure that the Grimaud-Marteau decks with either the whirled cardback or the curly cardback belong to the oldest one with or without tax stamp.

Of course the "legend" says it exists a Grimaud-Marteau edition of the deck with the Lys on the 4 of coins and the coins on the Bateleur table instead of the dice.
But until today I have never seen a copy of this deck, except the Dussere reproduction.
See deck 18:
http://www.tarotforum.net/showpost.php?p=1075024&postcount=92

I saw in the museum of Issy les Moulineaux a copy of the deck with the lys on the 4 of coins but there were dice on the Bateleur ;)

BTW as you can see, the Dusserre edition has also the whirled cardback.

Igor said:
It could help, if someone here knew if french card games had to be tax-stamped even when they were produced for other countries ?
to my knowledge, Peter Endebrok's site is the most valuable site about Tax Stamps on cards.
You can have a look there:
http://www.endebrock.de/pers-home-de.html

Best regards