How young is the TdM?

I believe the general opinion is that the TdM pattern probably started sometime around 1500.

Some of us may believe it is older, or even the oldest pattern.

I rarely see us ask how young it is.

Is there really persuasive proof that it dates to the 1500's; or are we just taking assumptions and guesses and considering them probable; or certain?

We know the youngest the pattern could be is 1650, with Jean Noblet. How far back can we go from there with evidence? How far with conjecture?

...hmmm... it's perennial

In terms of its historical manifestation, however, I am personally quite satisfied with taking the models from the 17th century as the date of settling into the Marseille 'pattern', with previous ones (including the Cary Sheet and the like) as precursors yet to be standardised.

In that sense, to use the numbering division amongst the Marseille types, we have the TdM-I emerging in the 1650s, TdM-II some decades later, with the Cary-Sheet and others forming a TdM-null - ie, not quite TdM yet.

In this, I am simply outlining in a rather over-succinct manner my current thoughts, happily corrected with further evidence, persuation, or reflection!

le pendu said:

We know the youngest the pattern could be is 1650, with Jean Noblet. How far back can we go from there with evidence? How far with conjecture?

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That's a good way of phrasing the question.

Noblet's tarot is an example of Dummett's "C" order, of which there are around 6 different types, and the C order is attested first in 1543 - Andrea Alciato, "Parergon Juris".

(see the chart at Michael Hurst's page
http://www.geocities.com/cartedatrionfi/Fragments/1540-1739.html
scroll to 1543)

The earliest example of the precise TdM order, but not the pattern, is 1550, Catelin Geoffroy, in Lyons.

So documentarily, the TdM order appears about 100 years before the full TdM pattern.

There are also tarot trumps (World and Sun) found in a well in the Sforza Castle early in the last century which match the TdM pattern. The dating is imprecise (17th century), so they do not really help establish an earlier model than Noblet.

Finally the Cary Sheet, which is certainly older than Noblet and the Sforza Castle cards, but cannot be dated very precisely and whose provenance is unknown.

So much for the facts. Now for more or less reasonable speculations.

Dummett identified the C order with Milan, and speculated that this order went to France after 1499. However, Lyonnais and Avignonnais were making large amounts of tarots by 1505, and exporting them. Dummett didn't know this when he formulated his theory. It seems therefore just as likely (I would say more likely) that the C order came to Milan from France after the French conquest of 1499.

We also know absolutely nothing about how the game was played nor how the cards were ordered in Milan in the 1400s. The game in Milan could have been confined to the upper classes, as apparently in Ferrara. A new popularly priced game would have opened up the game to a new broader market after 1499, and would not have entailed changing old habits, since the game wasn't widely played in Milan.

The dating and provenance of the Cary Sheet is an exercise in speculation based on various assumptions. There is no direct evidence besides the sheet itself, in other words.

There are no numbers on the cards, which means they are old. The designs look old. The order on the uncut sheet suggests the C order. Many of the designs are strikingly like the TdM. Therefore, the Cary Sheet seems rightly regarded as being related to the TdM, and a Jean-Michel points out, it is probably a precursor to the TdM. In my opinion, one of the strongest indications that has so far been overlooked in publications is the form of the Devil, that Robert and others have pointed out is a form of Krampus. It is a worthy effort to try to find exact analogues of this devil, and their geographic extent.

So, Robert, I think you have already known all there is to know about it.

My own belief is that the TdM order was invented in France. Probably in the late 15th century (Thierry speculates, I think, that the name was changed to "taraux" in France because "triomphe" was already the name of another card game by 1480). It was massively exported into the Duchy of Milan during the 25 years (more or less) of French rule there. I think the designs evolved over time, and that the Cary Sheet is clearly an early example of a C order and proto-TdM designs, but beyond that I can't say much. Krampus has me confused - there has to be Austrian or Swiss influence on it.

If I had to bet (as if someone had the real answer) I would say that the TdM pattern of Noblet is a 17th century invention, and that in the 16th century it still did not exist as such yet.

Thanks Ross! Great summary.

The cards you mention at the Sforza Castle bother me. Particularly the World card. In other threads I've explained why I'm pretty convinced titles and numbers were added to a pre-existing pattern, and I think the World card in Sforza Castle is an example of this earlier pattern.
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=44477

So we have these cards in Italy with the right pattern, but no titles and numbers.

I think this probably indicates that the TdM pattern was originally Italian, with no titles and numbers, and then the pattern was imported into France where the titles and numbers were added. Much more likely than an Italian *removing* the titles and numbers, and *adding* the proper iconography that should be there where the titles were missing. Or maybe the pattern was alive and well in France for some time before the titles and numbers were added?

Is there anything particularly French about the TdM? Particulary Italian?

I guess what I'm saying is that I doubt the TdM pattern is originally French.

So if the French were producing Tarot decks by 1505, what were they making? What was the pattern? Was it the TdM pattern without titles and numbers? Was it already turning into what we know today as the TdM? Was it something else now lost to us? Do we have any idea?

I bring all of this up because I've been fairly confused about this. You've mentioned all the cardmaking going on in these towns, and I think it's easy to assume it "must have been the TdM" that they were producing. But we really don't know.. do we?

le pendu said:

I think this probably indicates that the TdM pattern was originally Italian, with no titles and numbers, and then the pattern was imported into France where the titles and numbers were added. Much more likely than an Italian *removing* the titles and numbers, and *adding* the proper iconography that should be there where the titles were missing. Or maybe the pattern was alive and well in France for some time before the titles and numbers were added?

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You could be right Robert. Of course nobody would have removed numbers and titles if they were an integral part of the cards they received.

But I tend to think your latter point is true. The Sforza Castle world card resembles the Vieville, while the rest of the Vieville pack is quite distinct from the TdM, not only in designs but ordering. So we can't be sure that the Sforza Castle card formed part of a TdM strictly speaking. Dummett speculated - and he admits it is a guess - that the Vieville might be a representative of the original Piedmont-Savoy pattern.

Is there anything particularly French about the TdM? Particulary Italian?

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If we think of the TdM pattern as having developed over time, then it could be that much of it was already a part of some Italian tradition (Cary Sheet for instance) - or Piedmont/Savoy. But I believe the full-fledged TdM I is French. I think the TdM Devil is more French than Italian, because he seems to be the Devil of the Witches Sabbat in 16-17th century French books on sorcery, which are not paralleled in anything I have seen from Italy. I don't have any great pictures assembled to show you what this feeling is based on, but I will be on the lookout in the future.

I guess what I'm saying is that I doubt the TdM pattern is originally French.

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So you believe that somebody in Italy was producing something like Noblet by the mid-16th century or earlier... or that it was even made in the 15th century and then forgotten in Italy? (no raised eyebrows here, just trying to get your opinion)

So if the French were producing Tarot decks by 1505, what were they making? What was the pattern? Was it the TdM pattern without titles and numbers? Was it already turning into what we know today as the TdM? Was it something else now lost to us? Do we have any idea?

I bring all of this up because I've been fairly confused about this. You've mentioned all the cardmaking going on in these towns, and I think it's easy to assume it "must have been the TdM" that they were producing. But we really don't know.. do we?

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No, nobody knows for sure. This is a just a field for more research and speculation. I don't believe Lyon and Avignon were making something like Dodal in 1505, however. Although I am sure it would be part of the C family of orderings.

Ross G Caldwell said:

You could be right Robert. Of course nobody would have removed numbers and titles if they were an integral part of the cards they received.
But I tend to think your latter point is true. The Sforza Castle world card resembles the Vieville, while the rest of the Vieville pack is quite distinct from the TdM, not only in designs but ordering. So we can't be sure that the Sforza Castle card formed part of a TdM strictly speaking. Dummett speculated - and he admits it is a guess - that the Vieville might be a representative of the original Piedmont-Savoy pattern.

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I find the Jean Dodal to be the most closely related:


(Sforza Castle, Jacques Vieville, Jean Dodal, Nicholas Conver)

Jean Noblet:


The Vieville has all of the information there, but oddly has switched the bull and the lion but not the angel and the eagle. I like that the Vieville shows a clasp for the cape.

The Dodal is a good match to the Sforza Castle card, the overall "feel" and shape of the card are similar. The feet are in the same position; the basic shape of the wreath is correct; the animals have halos. Where Dodal differs significantly is the areas where the title and the number appear; an example of where a title and number has been added and information has been lost. Note also the way the wings of the top figures are touching, and might actually have crossed if the number area wasn't there. Notice how closely the eye of the bull comes to the border; it's cut off on the Sforza Castle card by having the back wrapped around onto the image. Notice the area above the lion, shown in green; the same area is also on the Sforza Castle. I think there is also something above the bull on both cards.

The Conver is the most distantly related. The figure has lost the cape; is clearly female, and has raised one foot. Like the Dodal, the bottom of the figures has been lost. The bull has also lost his halo.

The Noblet also has all of the important information; but because the shape of his card is different, everything seems a bit "wide". The figure on the Noblet is clearly a woman, something not certain on the Sforza Castle card, the Vieville or the Jean Dodal.

My thoughts and guesses:

Noblet probably knew of a deck like the Sforza Castle, and redrew the entire deck into a new, wider shaped format. Noblet never struggles with the titles and numbers. For instance, he titles "La Mort" on XIII. Because other TdM decks don't have the title, the assumption has been that traditionally it was not done. Rather, I assume that Noblet solved the issue with the titles and numbers by building his cards from scratch, with room for the titles and borders already reserved. He put "La Mort" in because he had reserved room to do so, it never occured to him there was a tradition not to do so... because there wasn't one. If anything, the tradition was to not have titles on any of the cards. The Noblet valets have their titles at the bottom of the card, not running up the sides or missing.

The positive aspect of this is that he copied information and rebuilt it into his new format. The negative is that he might not have copied everything, and might have added or lost details during the translation.

Same for Vieville. He knew of a deck with TdM aspects similar to the Sforza Castle. The Vieville doesn't have titles, and the numbers look added, so he is basing it on something that didn't have titles on the images and he is putting numbers wherever it doesn't change the graphic. The Vieville also has retained some details on the pip cards that were completely lost in every existing TdM deck, but shows up on the cards in Sforza Castle and Cary Sheet. For example, the designs on the side of the 8 of Batons, where roman numerals are used instead on the TdM.

(Sforza Castle, Jacques Vieville, Jean Noblet, Nicholas Conver)

Dodal seems to be either an original attempt, (or more likely in my opinion... a copy of an attempt), to add titles and numbers to the cards. I've mentioned before, I find the deck very sloppy. Hands go missing, details are lost or poorly drawn Often he seems to be struggling with titles and numbers. Sometimes the title area is defined, sometimes it's "soft", like on the World card; sometimes it is partial, like on the Empress. He runs titles up the side when he doesn't want to cut off feet on the Valets. He leaves XIII untitled because it would cut off the scynth and other information.

The Conver, or should I say TdMII... well, I can't place it in time. Generally it seems to have inherited some of the problems of decks like the Dodal, but also seems to have been at least aware of decks like the Noblet, and maybe even like the Sforza Castle. I'm not sure. I am pretty convinced though that it is late. When comparing the iconography of the Dodal/Noblet and the Conver to the Cary Sheet, the similarities are to the Dodal/Noblet, not the Conver.

I'm left with the impression that originally the TdM pattern had no titles and numbers, and the Sforza Castle card is an example of what it looked like at some point in its development, before titles and numbers were added. How far back in the TdM evolution to place the Sforza Castle card is hard to guess. It bothers me that the figure on the Vieville has a halo. Is that original and lost on the Sforza Castle and TdM? Or did Vieville add it? If we're talking about what was happening between 1600-1650, we're still missing about 150 years of changes and developments. The Cary Sheet is a relative, (if not an ancestor). How much time was needed for the variations to occur?

Ross G Caldwell said:

If we think of the TdM pattern as having developed over time, then it could be that much of it was already a part of some Italian tradition (Cary Sheet for instance) - or Piedmont/Savoy. But I believe the full-fledged TdM I is French. I think the TdM Devil is more French than Italian, because he seems to be the Devil of the Witches Sabbat in 16-17th century French books on sorcery, which are not paralleled in anything I have seen from Italy. I don't have any great pictures assembled to show you what this feeling is based on, but I will be on the lookout in the future.

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I think this is interesting, and gets to the heart of the matter. I'm inclined to say that the pattern is probably Italian. It makes sense to me that the French would have added the titles and numbers because they were unfamiliar with it, or customizing it for themselves.

The majority of Tarot development happened in Italy. The TdM pattern shows up in an early form with the Sforza Castle card in Italy. We've also got some details surviving longer in Italy, which I'll discuss in a bit.

On the other hand, is there is something about the iconography that is particularly French? You mention the Devil, and I'd love to see the samples that you do have. I just don't know of anything about the cards that would strongly lead to a French origin for the pattern. On the other hand, I'm not sure there is any reason why they couldn't be French and simply crossed the border at some point.

I do wonder about the titles though, as I've said... if the pattern was French, why add them? Fashion?

Ross G Caldwell said:

So you believe that somebody in Italy was producing something like Noblet by the mid-16th century or earlier... or that it was even made in the 15th century and then forgotten in Italy? (no raised eyebrows here, just trying to get your opinion)

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Yes, Im inclined to believe someone in Italy was making a TdM pattern deck, without titles and numbers, at least in 1650 and probably much earlier than that. I believe that all of the decks we have can help give us clues about what the pattern might have looked like. Consider what Michael Dummet said, that "a million is probably a highly conservative estimate of the number of Tarot packs produced in France during the seventeenth century". It's astounding to consider what variety might have existed!! We've got a small handful of them remaining.. the "Paris", Noblet and Vieville being the ones that come to my mind, all of them different.

I think we can be incorrectly inclined to suppose that cardmakers "created" their decks. I think it is likely that most cardmakers simply copied another set of plates; some made alterations, many didn't, but truly original designs were rare. However, with that many decks being produced, there probably were many designs and variations that have been lost to us now.

Maybe Noblet originated his design shape, and details like the Fool having a penis, but I doubt it. Maybe he is the one who transferred the design into the new shape, or maybe he just duplicated someone else's work. When I talk of Noblet and Vieville, I suppose I mean the general style of the pattern of their deck rather than the cardmaker himself.

I don't believe that Noblet of Dodal or anyone we know of created the pattern for the TdM, and I doubt they were the first to put titles on their TdM decks. When I look at Dodal, Payen, and Conver, I see, even when making significant changes, the tendency to maintain and copy "oddities" as well. Look at the titles on the Conver Valets compared to the Dodals, and you'll see what I mean. Why would an original artist make some of those choice? It seems more likely they tended to adapt pre-existing designs/plates.

I look at the Dodal, Noblet, and Conver, and it's clear to me that these are all later, poorer copies of an earlier pattern. I look at the floor patterns on the court cards and try to see how clearly they are defined. I check the horses on the Knights to see how detailed they are, and their gear. I look for clarity and consistancy everywhere.

One card that I find incredibly important is the Knight of Batons. I noticed early on that the Conver version was very different than the Dodal. The Conver shows almost a "blanket" around the horse, hiding the details of its legs and chest. The Dodal is confused, and hard to determine. I was surprised to find that when I looked at the Payens, they were "confused" too. When I finally saw Noblet, I was shocked and disapointed; he's confused as well!!! Why? I had expected him to be the most clear.

Yet the Vieville is clear, there's no ambiguity.

There is also a card in the Sforza Castle collection that shows the Knight of Batons (and his horse) clearly. It IS titled, so I assume it can't be too early. Then I discovered the Giuseppe Drago Tarot, published in Italy around 1790, and has only 18 cards remaining. The Knight here is also clearly shown. Why are TdM decks in Italy clear about the horse, but TdM decks in France confused????

Here's Sforza Castle, Giuseppe Drago, Jean Dodal, and Nicholas Conver:


Here's the Vieville and J.B. Benois (Tarot of Besancon), and the Giacomo Zoni from Italy:


Why do all of these non-TdM decks have a clearer representation of this card than ANY TdM?

Then I come across an image like this:


It's from the Cary Collection and is identified as part of a Trapolla deck. Yet, I can't help but wonder why it is so much clearer and cleaner? I look at the Vieville and see the feathers on the horse, and knight's head, and the spurs on the knight's feet and think "YES!" I look at how the hoofs are drawn and compare them to the Dodal. I look at the clarity of the ground design. I note the absence of a title. I can't help but think that at some point, the TdM pattern had the same type of clarity, but was distorted over time by careless copying into what we have now.

So I guess I have to ask myself, how long would it take to go from a clean pattern like we see in the Trapolla card, to the state of the pattern in a card like the Sforza Castle world, to the state we have in the Noblet, Dodal, and other TdM decks?

I'm not sure how I come across in this post... and I'm sorry my thoughts are all over the place and not properly formed and presented. If it sounds like I am absolutely certain of anything then I am not clearly communicating! I'm just throwing a lot of thoughts out and joining them together with very thin arguements.

Ross G Caldwell said:

No, nobody knows for sure. This is a just a field for more research and speculation. I don't believe Lyon and Avignon were making something like Dodal in 1505, however. Although I am sure it would be part of the C family of orderings.

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I'm glad to hear this. I mistakenly thought that people assumed the TdM as we know it was being produced then.

I suppose I can easily imagine an early version of it being made then, with no titles and numbers, with clarity in the design... and that unfortunately all we have left are poor, distant descendants of it.

Maybe the basic content of the designs have remained the same? Maybe they have changed dramatically and been lost to us? Did the early TdM look closer to the Noblet or the Cary Sheet?

And I agree with you about the Cary Sheet itself. Why does it have this odd version of the Devil? Does it in any way suggest that the TdM pattern was not originally either French or Italian at all? Or was it just an adaptation for a foriegn market?

So many questions, so few answers!

Wonderful posts to read through - as usual!

It is this combination of the Sforza Castle [SC] card and the discovery of the usage of the word 'taraux' from 1505, as well as what le pendu has clearly articulated in there needing (my word) to be an anterior model to the relatively 'poor' models in the TdM versions that suggests something earlier than 1650s for the sequence and model.

The clarity of the horse on the Cavalier (or the clarity of any other card) may be more a social artistic reflection - both of (perhaps) artistic realism but also of local acceptability. Perhaps this need for realism in France was not as precise as in either Italy, Switzerland or Germany. In other words, the clarity, outside of any other evidence, could move from more rudimentary imprecision to greater clarity, even if I have previously argued for the other direction based on what one would expect from logical progression in loss of detail with copies made over time.

Does, then, the SC World card indicate a pattern that is in all other respects similar to the Dodal? from its detail, it may resonably be thought that this is so. As, for that matter, that it antidates the addition of titles, and hence that it antidates the known French high-production models (rather than the hand-painted cards that that, in any case, been claimed of Italian origin).

The other factor, the usage of the term 'taraux', does to my mind suggest that whatever it referred to is connected to a deck that later becomes the TdM. How close in detail this invisible 'taraux' is to the known later ones would, I would suggest, be such that the later decks reflect a causal connection to the earlier referred to deck. But its details may nonetheless be sufficiently different as to be more reminiscent of the Cary Sheet than to the TdM.

As to whether or not 'The figure on the Noblet is clearly a woman', I have to disagree. Even the depiction of breasts does not, in the context of religious iconography and literary documents of Christ, need to depict a woman, especially given the suggested sequence and context of the card (though of course it may nonetheless indeed be a woman that is intended - I simply want to pose a question mark as to the 'clearly a woman' for a minute).

For example, ... and here I shall quote from a modern book that harkens to two much earlier sources:[from Rachael Kohn's The New Believers: re-Imagining God, 2003, p51]

Of course, more than this needs to be pointed to for this sense of Christ as androgenous representation, but at the very least, it opens the possibility, even when the image has aspects that, with time, have certainly attained a near universally accepted feminine representation (and appropriately so, as far as I'm concerned, but that is another topic entirely).

So... DO we have earlier than 17th century TdM evidence? yes and no. Linguistically and in terms of partial decks, yes. In terms of standardised models, not really, though undoubtedly its causal antecedents and cognates are there.

le pendu said:

I find the Jean Dodal to be the most closely related

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Yes, you're right Robert, Dodal and C. Sforzesca are clearly genetically related.

(I'm not concentrating enough these days... cold has me in a fog. Slaps self - wake up!)

The Dodal is a good match to the Sforza Castle card, the overall "feel" and shape of the card are similar. The feet are in the same position; the basic shape of the wreath is correct; the animals have halos. Where Dodal differs significantly is the areas where the title and the number appear; an example of where a title and number has been added and information has been lost. Note also the way the wings of the top figures are touching, and might actually have crossed if the number area wasn't there. Notice how closely the eye of the bull comes to the border; it's cut off on the Sforza Castle card by having the back wrapped around onto the image. Notice the area above the lion, shown in green; the same area is also on the Sforza Castle. I think there is also something above the bull on both cards.

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I think it's wings on all the animals (if we're noticing the same details).

I agree with all your comments above - although it's hard to say if the bull was cut off by the fold over (rabat) or ended at a line.

The Noblet also has all of the important information; but because the shape of his card is different, everything seems a bit "wide". The figure on the Noblet is clearly a woman, something not certain on the Sforza Castle card, the Vieville or the Jean Dodal.

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Noblet is "wide", and it is also very small.

My thoughts and guesses:

Noblet probably knew of a deck like the Sforza Castle, and redrew the entire deck into a new, wider shaped format. Noblet never struggles with the titles and numbers. For instance, he titles "La Mort" on XIII. Because other TdM decks don't have the title, the assumption has been that traditionally it was not done. Rather, I assume that Noblet solved the issue with the titles and numbers by building his cards from scratch, with room for the titles and borders already reserved. He put "La Mort" in because he had reserved room to do so, it never occured to him there was a tradition not to do so... because there wasn't one. If anything, the tradition was to not have titles on any of the cards.

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That's good reasoning...

I'm left with the impression that originally the TdM pattern had no titles and numbers, and the Sforza Castle card is an example of what it looked like at some point in its development, before titles and numbers were added. How far back in the TdM evolution to place the Sforza Castle card is hard to guess.

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The backs seem to be late 16th century at the earliest. This was Novati's original guess (Novati first published them in 1908).

It bothers me that the figure on the Vieville has a halo. Is that original and lost on the Sforza Castle and TdM? Or did Vieville add it? If we're talking about what was happening between 1600-1650, we're still missing about 150 years of changes and developments. The Cary Sheet is a relative, (if not an ancestor). How much time was needed for the variations to occur?

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That question could probably be answered if we knew how many prints were taken from a given woodblock, and how long they lasted. My guess is that no woodblocks were used for more than a century, and probably much less - say every twenty years or so they had to be re-carved at the height of tarot's popularity.

There are instances where blocks were inherited or brought when a cardmaker moved from one place to another. This is logical, of course, but it's nice to have evidence (this came up in our discussion of Savoy cardmakers a while back - I can't recall the details at the moment).

The progressive degradation of the images that you notice seems paralleled in normal playing cards, where (for example) in the earliest French patterns the details of the court figures are clear, through evolution they have morphed into the nearly abstract images of modern English packs (even before they became double-headed).

I think this is interesting, and gets to the heart of the matter. I'm inclined to say that the pattern is probably Italian. It makes sense to me that the French would have added the titles and numbers because they were unfamiliar with it, or customizing it for themselves.

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The French name for tarot cards was often "Italian cards", because they had already switched over for the most part to French suit-signs by 1500, and the only kind of Latin-suited cards north of Provence were tarot cards.

That doesn't tell us how or if the French altered the designs of the trumps, but why would they? Except by sloppiness in copying, as you point out...

On the other hand, is there is something about the iconography that is particularly French? You mention the Devil, and I'd love to see the samples that you do have. I just don't know of anything about the cards that would strongly lead to a French origin for the pattern. On the other hand, I'm not sure there is any reason why they couldn't be French and simply crossed the border at some point.

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I think it's a chronological thing, as well as maybe the fact that the differences between the TdM and the "uncontaminated" native Italian tarots, like the Bolognese, Ferrarese and Florentine Minchiate, are so huge. And that the V-S types don't seem to have any echo of the TdM, any more than other Italian tarots that is. So if it's Italian, where did it come from? Where was it used? If it's Milanese, when did it get invented there (since it doesn't have any presence before a two of Coins in 1499, and that is not securely a tarot, although there is no reason it couldn't be...

And that gets to the chronology - 1499 is when the French took over in Milan. We used to think this is when tarot came to France, but with the new discoveries of 1505, the chronology becomes too tight to imagine tarot being made in France for export to Piedmont, and presumably Milan, already. Thus, tarot had to be there already for a while. So, Thierry suggests Florentine immigrants to Lyon (attracted by the incentives offered by Louis XI in particular) brought tarot with them in the 1450s or 1460s, and some development occured during the latter half of the 15th century. No one has studied the Lyon records closely, however, and this remains conjecture - like every other theory.

One objection to this idea I can think of is why isn't the Florentine pattern in France then? Why did they change it so fully? Maybe this is where Vieville's models or the origins of them came from. But the order is still strange then.

I think we have to admit that, somewhere along the line, tarot got reinvented a few times (not a big surprise there, when you consider things like Boiardo and Sola Busca, not to mention Minchiate). All Italian, I know.

It is hard to believe that something as different as the TdM could have been fully conceived in France, when nothing else so drastic happens there... but then, except for those fragments that could have gone either way, there is no particular presence of TdM in Italy either. Although, on balance, your arguments based on printed names and numbers are strong, and if the Cary Sheet and Castello Sforzesco cards are both Italian, they tend to weigh on the Italian invention side.

Yes, Im inclined to believe someone in Italy was making a TdM pattern deck, without titles and numbers, at least in 1650 and probably much earlier than that. I believe that all of the decks we have can help give us clues about what the pattern might have looked like. Consider what Michael Dummet said, that "a million is probably a highly conservative estimate of the number of Tarot packs produced in France during the seventeenth century". It's astounding to consider what variety might have existed!! We've got a small handful of them remaining.. the "Paris", Noblet and Vieville being the ones that come to my mind, all of them different.

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Yes, it's astounding what we could discover with a time machine. That ignorance is why it's no use losing sleep in heated arguments about who's right in this debate. All that can be done with the fragmentary evidence is weigh it against our ignorance and plausible scenarios to explain it all.

I think we can be incorrectly inclined to suppose that cardmakers "created" their decks. I think it is likely that most cardmakers simply copied another set of plates; some made alterations, many didn't, but truly original designs were rare. However, with that many decks being produced, there probably were many designs and variations that have been lost to us now.

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I think you're right. The ones we have, like Catelin Geoffroy, are the rarities. There are no other 16th century French tarots, and nobody thinks they all looked like that. 17th century, a little better, and maybe two representative types - Vieville and Noblet. Paris is surely another rarity. How many "types" have we lost?

In 1622, an author named Garasse mentioned that Tarot was more popular than Chess in France. This was the crest of the wave, and probably the crest in "vanity" decks as well. French decks were cheap, there is no doubt about it, which is why there are so few of them despite their large numbers then.

There is also the fact that card packs tend to get thrown away when even one card is lost. Someone who was lecturing on a 19th-early 20th century card collection recently remarked that it is a very recent phenomenon for collectors to look for whole decks. Until maybe 40 years ago, collectors with huge collections were satisfied to have a selection of court cards and the Aces or other cards with information on them (two of cups in tarot packs notably).

I look at the Dodal, Noblet, and Conver, and it's clear to me that these are all later, poorer copies of an earlier pattern. I look at the floor patterns on the court cards and try to see how clearly they are defined. I check the horses on the Knights to see how detailed they are, and their gear. I look for clarity and consistancy everywhere.

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Good rule.

Thanks for the post and the thoughts Robert. I think you're on the right track and thinking clearly about the issues. With the evidence we have, all we can do is argue the pros and cons of various positions.

There is a lot to be gained just by studying the images and putting them in some kind of order based on the principles you are using above - e.g. ambiguity indicates carelessness or ignorance of an original. Some people are already using these methods with good results in the study of German patterns of playing cards, but no one has done it so clearly for tarots yet. Although of course these methods are implicit in every plausible historical argument.

Let's compare the court cards of the TdM and Vieville with the court cards in the other traditions (regular and tarot) and see what we come up with. This might give a lead even in the absence of trumps.

Ross

How young, how old... I would like to add, reasonably, the oldest tarot deck made with woodblock printing, (as opposed to oil painting or hand painting) cannot be older than the earliest woodblock printing in Europe, which sets (if I trust the info in this article) the earliest possible date as 1417.

The woodcut is the oldest of the graphic techniques. No history of it is properly introduced without a mention of the print called 'St. Christopher Bearing the Infant Jesus' which was found in a monastery at Buxheim. It is famous because for a long time it was called the oldest dated woodcut in existence - the date being 1423. Some authorities still think it is; others point to the 'Virgin with the Holy Child' with the date 1417 that may have been added to the print instead of cut on the block.

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firemaiden said:

How young, how old... I would like to add, reasonably, the oldest tarot deck made with woodblock printing, (as opposed to oil painting or hand painting) cannot be older than the earliest woodblock printing in Europe, which sets (if I trust the info in this article) the earliest possible date as 1417.

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Yay what a sensible attitude! Of course! Thanks Firemaiden. ~Rosanne