[Rusty Neon]

Deck 02

My hunch is that Deck 02 (Grimaud B.P. - no copyright year) pre-dates the decks with 1963 copyrights. Presumably, they would have begun putting on the 1963 copyright starting a some point in time in either 1963 or possibly a subsequent year; so they probably wouldn't have printed cards after that point in time without the copyright indication. (Compare U.S. Games, which didn't start putting on the 1971 copyright indication on the Rider-Waite cards until around 1975.)

Deck 04

An interesting thing about Deck 04 (English-French bilingual titles) is that I've seen at least tarot books published by francophones that use cards from this deck; one book even blanks out the English titles. This may suggest that, for a time, Grimaud didn't put out Marteau decks with French-only card titles.

[Rusty Neon]

Coredil,

Which particular distribution of Deck 02 do you have?

I have this French-titles deck 02, in the green French-only Grimaud box with English-only LWB (presumably U.K. market - identified as B.P. Grimaud on first page, John Waddingdon Ltd. on the back page). I'm sure there's a version with French-only instructions, as the box with LWB still has extra room in it, but such a version must be much more rare.
http://www.tarotforum.net/attachment...achmentid=3865

[tmgrl2]

What a wonderful summary, coredil!!

I didn't even realize there were so many....

I checked mine out...I have deck 4...all cards have 1963 copyright....and both French and English titles ...I no longer have the box, but the LWB is in French and English as well.

I put the deck into a photo album and had a hard time finding it today...I thought it was still in the original packaging, but not so.

Now that I see the others, I do see what is cut off because of the dual-language titling.

terri

[coredil]

@Rusty Neon,

unfortunately deck 02 came without LWB.
The red box says:
ANCIEN TAROT DE MARSEILLE.
Also it says on both sides:
78 cartes avec livret explicatif.

But I just discovered that the picture of the red box (L'AMOUREUX) has another copyright: © B P. GRIMAUD 1963
I didn't notice this before because I was so impressed by the B · P · GRIMAUD · copyright!

But according to what I have seen elsewhere (for example with some RWS copy) cards and box must not always match together.
I also agree with you when you say this deck is possibly pre 1963.
But it is a long time between 1930 and 1963.

Has your deck the cardback with the frames?

@tmgrl2
I am glad this is interesting for you.
About the pictures, I already said this in another thread:
when you consider how precise the interpretation of Paul Marteau is in his book (where he gives to almost every little detail in the picture a meaning) it is quite strange that one could take so much freedom to change the pictures.

Best regards

[Rusty Neon]

Originally Posted by coredil

when you consider how precise the interpretation of Paul Marteau is in his book (where he gives to almost every little detail in the picture a meaning) it is quite strange that one could take so much freedom to change the pictures.

Indeed. As you averted to before, the biggest difference is the 4 of Coins. The 1930 Grimaud deck and the Marteau book both refer to the fleur de lys in the centre of the 4 of Coins card. (The 1760 Conver pattern has the fleur de lys in the 4 of Coins.) But somewhere along the way, in the Grimaud deck, the fleur de lys got changed to a tulip. It makes one wonder whether such a change just for copyrighting purposes; otherwise, it doesn't make much sense to change it.

[Rusty Neon]

Originally Posted by coredil

Has your deck the cardback with the frames?

No, my cardback has no frames. By the way, the cardback is in blue and white colours but is of a different geometric pattern, with ovals as a design element in the repeating pattern.

[Abrac]

Coredil -

This is an awesome resource!

Is this your Deck 01? It shows a box too:

http://www.surnateum.org/french/surn.../marseille.jpg

As you know, I recently received a copy of
Deck 05 (1980, French titles only). At the bottom of the Two of Cups there's only a patch of red/orange color with no writing of any kind. Is this normal for Marteau/Grimaud decks, to just have a blank space with no writing?

-fof

[coredil]

fools-fool,

thanks a lot for this link.
Very interesting (though the site looks strange to me)

I would first say that it really look like my deck 01.
Same pictures with the frame narrowing the pictures.
Same background color.
It is for me also nice to finally see how could a box for this deck look like.
BTW this box with this symbol remind me of the "green box" Rusty Neon mentioned.
But one would have to know if it is maybe a 1930 edition of this deck.

Unfortunately there are not much informations on the site.
The pictures are listed under:
Section Tarots Grimaud (période entre deux guerres)
Tarot de Marseille
It means: Department Tarots Grimaud (Time between the two worldwars)
So it would point to the years between 1918 and 1939

I already have send an e-mail to the site to ask further informations.
(Tulip or Lys on the 4 Deniers, coins or dice on the table of LE BATELEUR, LWB ... and also where do this dating comes from)
I am really intrigued to get an answer.

On all TdM from Marteau I have, the 2 of cups have this quite large red space in the bottom with no writing.

As you probably know, the Marteau deck is a re-drawing of the Conver.
I have attached a scan of the 2 of cups from the 1968 edition of the Conver by Camoin (this edition has been printed from original woodblocks).
On the bottom is a kind of blazon and as you can see it does not really match with the style of the drawings.
It could be the reason why Marteau let this place empty but ... he describes this red place in his book two times as "une base rouge" (a red base)

I am not sure about his text, though I am french, I must confess I have some difficulties to clearly understand Marteaus text.
It seems to me as if he takes this "base rouge" as a symbol for "les désirs matériels" (material desires)
and further also as "base rouge, représentation du monde matériel des instincts et des désirs inférieur dont l'inconsistance se révèle par une teinte plate ..."
(red base, representation of the material world of instincts and lower(inferior) desires whose inconsistency is revealed through a flat color ...)

Sorry for my bad english , Marteaus text is quite heavy in french.
Well, I am interested in Marteau more from the collection point of view and as I said before this red and empty place is to me a graphic solution but this is my very humble and personal point of view

Best regards

[Ross G Caldwell]

Originally Posted by coredil

As you probably know, the Marteau deck is a re-drawing of the Conver.
I have attached a scan of the 2 of cups from the 1968 edition of the Conver by Camoin (this edition has been printed from original woodblocks).
On the bottom is a kind of blazon and as you can see it does not really match with the style of the drawings.

The blazon is the shield of the French monarchy, which would have been appropriate in Conver's day since cardmakers were licensed by the monarchy. Books from 16th-18th century have a similar thing, usually a page at the beginning or end with a formulaic license from the King.

Marteau's first edition has the fleur-de-lys shield on the Four of Deniers, but he has removed the whole heraldry from the Two of Cups. Perhaps he thought it was irrelevant because out of date, and no King had commissioned him.

[coredil]

@ fools_fool

I have received an answer from Surnateum.
The deck seems to be the 1930 edition.
It has 3 fleurs de Lys on the the 4 of cups, no dice on the table of the BATELEUR but 2 red circles.
It also seems as if it would have the same cardback (not sure because a description can be quite subjective)
The copyright is the same as on deck 01 and on the same cards.
The owner believes that the box is original, he has no LWB.

I am glad now to know a little bit more on the 1930 deck.
It would seem as if it is not very different from deck 01 beside of the Tulip instead of Lys and dice instead of red coins.

But still nobody seems to know when this deck appeared.
Maybe with the first printing of Marteaus book (00a).
So it could be 1947 or something between 1930 and 1947.

I have read on Flornoys site that there was a very first printing of Marteaus book in 1929 with cards glued in the book from a 1890 Camoin deck (Conver)
http://letarot.com/dossiers-chauds/h...ver/index.html
(BTW the undertitle of the scan on the right says Paul Marteau 1949, but according to the text it probably must be 1930)

@ Ross G Caldwell
Thank you for your more accurate explanations.

Best regards