The Bride of Christ
The papesse belongs to a group of cards, fool to pope, comparable with other hierarchal allegories of the ‘ranks of man’. Maybe relating the card within this context can give us some clue as to its historical signification. As a 'baseline' with which to compare the ranks of man group within
the tarot sequence I would suggest the medieval three estates of man -
peasants, nobility and clergy; and the three estates of woman -
virgin, wife and widow. In using this as a ‘baseline’ understand that I am not saying this is the source of the tarot sequence. Merely that it is an example of the ‘ranks of man’ concept which is fairly well known and understood, and which through a process of comparison of similarities and differences may shred some light on the ‘ranks of man’ sequence of the tarot.
Our card sequence in comparison we may relate to our comparative model
with the poor man as peasant, emperor as nobility, pope as clergy;
but differs from the model with the bagatto, one to many, an addition
to our baseline model. This leaves us with the two female cards in
our 'ranks of man' grouping, the popesse and the empress; which I
think we may compare to our baseline model with the virgin and wife,
differing in that it lacks the widow. These differences I think are enough to show that the traditional three estates of medieval society are not the basis or source of our tarot sequence. Excepting for the purpose of our speculative 'free association' the comparisons, how do we explain or what can we understand by the differences?
The inclusion of a fourth estate of man, the mercantile class [which
in its early stages included artisans], suggests a late medieval
period. Certainly post late 14th century when we see the beginning of
the breakdown of the feudal 'three estates of man' of the medieval
period [by which I mean the three classes 'peasants', 'nobility'
and 'clergy']. This breakdown into further class divisions begins
[but is not limited to] with the recognition/rise of the mercantile
class, giving us our fourth 'estate of man' [bagatto, with poor man
as peasant, emperor as nobility, pope as clergy]. A problem with this
is that the breakdown of the medieval feudal three estates into
further classes is not limited to the mercantile class, but also sees
the rise of others such as intellectual 'middle' class such as
clerics who perhaps we can dismiss as still being subsumed under the
classification of 'clergy', teachers, physicians, lawyers. Why then
is the tarot sequence limited to four estates? One possibility is
timescale, the rise of mercantile/artisan class was the first to be
recognized as a separate 'estate of man' in its own right and
therefore the inclusion of this estate but not others is an
indication of an early date of design within the late medieval
period. Another possible explanation is one of design, in a scheme
which wished to limit the estates of man for example to one which
would correspond perhaps with an already existing scheme of four
suits of cards.
What then of the three estates of woman? Excepting for purpose of our
speculative free association that popesse may be equated to 'virgin'
and empress to 'wife' how do explain the difference to our baseline
model with the loss of the third estate 'widow'. One explanation is
that the 'widow' has been subsumed in one of the other two; in
defense of this supposition we may draw a parallel with chauser, who
subsumes the two estates of wife and widow in the one character of
the 'wife of bath'. In terms of our tarot sequence however, presuming
a 15th century N.Italian origin, it is just as likely the figure of
widow is subsumed under the figure of the 'popesse', given the fact
that many widows of the period and place joined nunneries [a practice
that for various reasons appears to have ceased in the 16th century].
The problem this fails to answer is why the conflation of two estates
in our tarot sequence? One possibility is that our tarot scheme reflects a change in the perceived 'estates of woman' in 15th century N.Italy from the three estates to basically two, those two being as a 'bride of man' or
a 'bride of Christ'.
The calling of the figure of the bride of Christ 'popesse' and her
positioning below the empress subverts this two-fold division of the
estates of woman however; suggesting to me an element of satire or
propagandist polemic.
The image bears close comparison with images of ecclesia, the church. It is based upon the concept of the church as 'the bride of Christ', and as it is not called 'ecclesia' or 'papacy' but 'papesse' and in the context of a group related probably to the ranks of man I think it quite possible it relates to the concept of 'the bride of Christ' as one of the two estates of woman commonly referred to in 15th century N.Italy; the other estate being 'bride of man'.
This would give us the four estates of man, peasant, merchant, noble
and clergy; and two estates of woman, bride of Christ and bride of
man. A scheme that is consistent with place and period. If the
papesse and empress did refer to these two estates of woman then
their order is significant. The conventional and orthodox order, in
tune with an underlying concept of 'contempt for the world', is for
the bride of Christ to be valued 'higher' than the bride of man. To
place the bride of man above the bride of Christ places it in the
tradition of the reformists whose voice is most commonly reflected in
the form of satirical allegories of the time, and via which may also relate the figure to that of Pope Joan, a character of many a satirical allegory of the period. Whatever the intent behind the image, Pope Joan was well known through satirical literature, and in the 14th and 15th century at least was considered a historical figure; I find it difficult to believe that anyone of the period would not have made an association between the image and Pope Joan. The title popesse/pope in terms of ranks of man is also perhaps suggestive of a 'marriage' between the ranks of the brides of christ and clergy, hinting at accusations of sexual relationships that were common in satirical allegories, often pornagraphically so in their sallacious description and innuendo. While such accusations in such satirical allegories are undoubtedly exagerated by the polemics of reformist agenda and sallaciousness of meeting the expectation of an often pornographic genre, they did have an element of truth; particularly in context of the 15th century, the 'golden age' of conventual sexuality.
The concept of the bride of christ is so multivalent I prefer to view in context of all its associations - the 'bride of christ' could refer to the church, or to an 'estate of woman', to some a virgin, to others a whore; pances [womb] could refer to Mary, Augustine called Mary the Bride and her womb the 'bridal chamber' of the bridegroom Christ; according to some gnostic sources much quoted today, although I am unsure of how well known such a concept was then, Mary Magdalene was the 'bride of Christ'.
Another explanation is that the sequence parallels just
the three estates, being represented by three pairs fool/bagatto as
peasant, popesse/pope as clergy, empress/emperor as nobility. While
woman are part of the 'three estates of man' they are usually 'taken'
to be so included and not separately represented; but perhaps our
designer decided they should be [but why the male to male pairing of
fool/bagatto?]. Another problem is that it provides no explanation
for the odd naming and position of the 'popesse'. If we do take popesse/pope as representing the estate of 'those who pray', then the popesse could still be taken as the female members of that estate, and so as nuns still a 'bride of christ'.
Kwaw
