Progression from Visconti-style decks to the modern 'Jeu de Tarot'

[Kiama]

Hi all,

I don't usually post much in this part of the forum, since everybody else says everything so wonderuflly and there's nothing for me to add! (I do read this forum though when I have time!) Anyway, this morning I received two decks in the post: 22 Arcani i Gatti, and Jeu de Tarot. The Jeu de Tarot is a modern French Tarot deck (French Tarot being the name of a version of the game of Tarocchi, played with the 78 card deck). We know that around the time of the Visconti-style decks in Italy and some other parts of Europe (France, Austria, etc) the Tarot deck was used for gaming. We look at the Visconti, Marseilles, etc decks, and see very similar images for the Major Arcana.

Yet I look at the Jeu de Tarot, and the images on there seem to just be there to give the deck some colour: They do not have titles, just numbers, and the pictures on the Majors aren't relevant to what the card would be if it was given a title. My boyfriend asked why this was, and even though I knew that this was the case with that deck, I hadn't though to ask that question... until now!

What caused the makers of the later French Tarot decks to take out the traditional images? My boyfriend theorised that it was because the traditional images were seen as 'heretical' (What with the Papess, etc, and the Pope and Judgement day being used in a pack of what was essentially gambling cards) And when did this change occur?

I'm trying to gear my deck collection to the point where I can track the progression from the earliest decks we know of to the modern decks, and this seems to be an interesting piece in the puzzle.

Any ideas?

Kiama

 

[jmd]

I don't have exact dates for anything I'm going to say, and will probably want to add some more words a little later.. but for now, here goes:

I do think there are two 'traditions' which need to be looked at in Tarot's development: the first is the one which interests us, ie, its more esoteric iconography and its uses amongst those with interests other than just gaming; the other is precisely this 'gaming' aspect.

Of the latter type are a number of events which occurred over time:

• the first, and most well known, is the replacement of the Tarot suits (also at times called the 'Italian' suits) of Swords, Cups, Coins and Battons with the French suits (which have the advantage of being able to be stencilled) of Spades, Hearts, Diamonds and Clubs;
  
• another is the need to easily see the card without the need to 'upright' it if it is dealt reversed (one would otherwise show one had a court or trump, as most pips are already reversible). So some decks, using traditional images, 'cut' them in half and place the same half both up & down;
  
• a third element is that if used for gaming, the images can easily be changed, for the number of the trump is more significant. Thus, hunting scenes, court scenes, revolutionary scenes, etc, all develop as socially acceptable/politically correct and visually pleasant forms upon the now reversible deck.

As to when some of this occurs, there was already such development in the 18th century. Having no esoteric need to maintain 'meaningful' images, these altered with tastes.

This is precisely why some of us consider that the Marseille sequence does have more than mere 'game' status. One needs to only look at the sequence and the iconography to reflect that here more than mere game may have been involved in image selection - as too for the beautifully designed Mantegna (which is not a Tarot).

Looking forward to other responses here...

 

[Rusty Neon]

To bring this development full circle, there is even a book by Monique Pavan _Les sécrets du tarot à jouer_ which looks at trying to derive esoteric/divinatory meanings for the trumps of one of the common French tarot gaming decks.

 

[Diana]

This is precisely why some of us consider that the Marseille sequence does have more than mere 'game' status. One needs to only look at the sequence and the iconography to reflect that here more than mere game may have been involved in image selection - as too for the beautifully designed Mantegna (which is not a Tarot).

jmd: Wonderful post. Your three points sum it up. What else is there to say.

Except I am tired of being politically-historically-documented correct.

The Marseille Tarot was never designed as a "game". This is obvious to anyone who has studied it and has an inkling of French history. But because there is no written documents, they are shouted down by those who need written proof.

There can be no written proof for it was destroyed a long time ago.

The Marseille so-called Major Arcana were never any game........

The very idea is quite ridiculous.

And just about any French tarologue will tell you the same. Which is why for many of them, the 56 minor cards are quite secondary and they stick to the 22 Majors.

 

[Rusty Neon]

Diana ... Your explanation for why the minor arcana isn't used for divination is interesting. I had always presumed that many present day French tarotists don't use the minor arcana for divination because they simply don't know what to do with the unillustrated pip cards. I do know that some take the happy medium and read with the major arcana and the court cards. That they don't use the pip cards for divination has been puzzling for me in light of the fact that Grand Etteilla cartomancy as well as cartomancy using playing cards (often a piquet deck and sometimes a 52 card deck) seem to be alive and well in present day France.

 

[ihcoyc]

This is precisely why some of us consider that the Marseille sequence does have more than mere 'game' status. One needs to only look at the sequence and the iconography to reflect that here more than mere game may have been involved in image selection - as too for the beautifully designed Mantegna (which is not a Tarot).

Just so: since the numerical order is the only thing that counts for anything in the tarot game, the real question is not when the images on the trumps were replaced by fanciful ones; it's why the traditional images were retained for so long.

The earliest tarots that survive have un-numbered trumps, and some written sources that list them, do so in different orders. It seems fairly clear that the sequence was added to a deck of playing cards, and contains some internal logic of its own.

 

[Kiama]

The earliest tarots that survive have un-numbered trumps, and some written sources that list them, do so in different orders. It seems fairly clear that the sequence was added to a deck of playing cards, and contains some internal logic of its own.

So I'm assuming these decks with un-numbered trumps involved games where the order of the cards was memorised?

Are there any game rules still in existence from the time when the earliest decks came into being? I'd be interested in seeing them if they still (Or ever did) exist.

Because game rules from that time would prove to me at least that these decks were originally used as a game, but would still leave me with lots of questions to ponder... If it was just a game, why have the original Major Arcana images in the first place?

JMD: Why isn't the Mantegna a Tarot deck? And does this mean that the Minchiate decks aren't either? Do they derive in any way from the Tarot deck...? I'm assuming they do because of the similarity in that the Mantegna, Minchiate, and trad. Tarot decks all have these 'Major Arcana' type images... They depict major parts of life, death, and beleifs about the Universe. What I'm basically asking is how the Minchiate and Mantegna decks play out in this evolution of the Tarot from the earliest decks we know to the modern day...

Diana: You will have to bear with us rational disbelievers! Sometimes we just need that last possible shred of evidence before we can believe in something, especially when it is history we are questioning. People like me (A philosopher - Figures!) are really bad at taking leaps of faith when it comes to historical things, simply because in everyday life, if we take leaps of faith, we are ridiculed... Or worse!!! (Our arguments could be argued down ) It's force of habit really! Of course, you are welcome to try and talk me round in possibly taking a leap of faith with the Marseilles deck...

Kiama

 

[ihcoyc]

So I'm assuming these decks with un-numbered trumps involved games where the order of the cards was memorised?

Are there any game rules still in existence from the time when the earliest decks came into being? I'd be interested in seeing them if they still (Or ever did) exist.

Because game rules from that time would prove to me at least that these decks were originally used as a game, but would still leave me with lots of questions to ponder.

One of the Gareth Knight books I have at home has somewhat more elaborate info about the actual sources, and speculates as to the meaning of the several orders.

The Hermitage has a table of data about the variant orders found in early sources. They all seem to agree on Magician - Papess - Empress - Emperor - Pope (but see the text below), but after those they all go off on tangents.

I have enough of a hard time remembering whether four of a kind beats a full house, and it's hard for me to imagine that game players had the numbers of trumps memorized and always agreed. On the other hand, some of the literary sources are suspect. One is from a sermon condemning the game; you wonder how thorough that guy's reasearch was. Others were from poetic sources that may have moved things around for effect.

 

[jmd]

A few other comments on the game of Tarot, before commenting on the Mantegna.

Two reflections come to mind:

• firstly, in many cases, the order of the Trumps may not be too important, as it may be that trumps, if used, have very strict rules for their application (only if one has no other cards of the suit), and that, simply, the last person to trump wins the hand;
  
• on the other hand (no pun intended), we live in a fast and 'overly' literate society, in which images are often difficult to interpret, and in which we want to learn a game quickly and play it. With no television, numerous books, cars, ... nor, heaven forbid, internet access, the learning of the sequence of trumps would not have been considered too difficult. Even now, for many of us, cut out the numbers and names of (at least) our main deck, and we would easily be able to place them in the right sequence... even though when we 'play' these are mixed! Here the number is virtually not relevant to its learned position.

This does not, of course, mean that the early decks were designed for gaming - and neither has the historian ever shown this. At most, what has been discovered is that gaming using the cards (but not, incidentally, the Mantegna) was the case some time after the cards were already around.

Kiama, if you want to apply deductive logic, then you'll recognise that concluding from this evidence that the deck was either designed or first used for gaming is an invalid argument (I am using the term 'invalid' in its formal way). Inductively, the significance of the images in the context of the society of the time, as well as later (historical) documents which affirms their usage as a game, indicates various possibilities, depending on which premises one gives more important weight to...
__________

Now, with regards to the Mantegna, it is not a deck with 78 cards, of which 22 are Major Arcana, and the remaining 56 are four suits with peculiar characeristics such as having, amongst other factors, 16 courts.

Just because a sequence of cards is printed with images does not make them Tarot, no matter how wonderful these are. Using this term outside a reasonably clear designation which has particular characteristics confuses, rather than illuminates, what Tarot is or isn't (though there may be commercial reasons to use the appelation of 'Tarot' to a product).

But I'd better end here... for now!

 

[Rusty Neon]

Minchiate deck

jmd ... I agree that the Mantegna is not a tarot deck. However, is the Minchiate deck a tarot deck? I'm undecided as to yes or no. If you remove the 'extra' trumps, the Minchiate deck has 22 major arcana, 16 court cards and 40 minor cards (10 cards per suit).