What's the 5x14-theory

[Huck]

Huck, thanks again for your posts and the links they provide.
I think both "Interpretation of the 14 trumps of Bembo" and "Genesis of Standard Tarot" on trionfi.com are very interesting. In particular, the idea of the Visconti snake being the origin of the devil is completely new to me! I definitely have to study more of the material you suggest

Ciao
Marco

This idea belongs to "our ideas", in this case from autorbis.

The crucial point is, that the surviving trumps of the Visconti-Sforza type know 20 trumps, but not "Devil" and not "Tower", but 2 Visconti-snakes. From other early Tarot- or Trionfi-devils we know, that they usually have a man in their mouth - like the Visconti-snake.

That 2 trumps are missing seems to be statistical "normal", as there are not too much trumps surviving. However - one deck (PMB) is nearly complete and just the missing cards of this deck do not show in other fragments .... so things are a little "strange".
The next point is, that it just are 2 "dark cards", which are missing.
This did lead to the suggestion, that somebody consciously sorted them out. But this seems unlikely, cause the fragments come from different sources and nobody could control that.
And we have the Visconti snake twice .... and the Goldschmidt-cards - which is not a Tarot of the common sort - include a comparable heraldic card (crowned fish).

We have the condition, that the Sforza-Visconti belong to the circle of persons, which might the inventors of the game .... deciding things in the development of Tarot could only happen, when mass production started. But ... as far we see it: mass production didn't exist in the early time, not for Tarot cards. So a development in the early attempts could exist, which had no influence on the later decks, in the case that mass production decided to change the concept.
We have great improvements in printing techniques generally, we've a printing revolution, probably the greatest, that mankind had seen. This covers in Italy the time after 1470. First signs of small mass productions of Tarot cards exist end of the 70ies. Anything else, what we know from before, can't be seen as mass production. The cheapest deck, from which we know, has the worth of a week's earning of a humble worker, the usual price which we know are 8 times more, so about 2 monthes.

 

[Huck]

The most rudimentary way to play Tarot

Lothar (autorbis) posted the following email at LTarot, which reflected a debate in TarotL (LTarot and TarotL is not the same). The content reflects important elements of the 5x14-theory.
It's a little complicated, cause Lothar reflected a specific term of Ross (also active here at aeclectic), "thin air" used in question about origin of the Tarot cards, so Ross' statement is integrated in his letter.

*********************

Lothar wrote:


The following post was composed by me for a debate in TarotL, which centered on Michael's recent publication and a note of Ross, that Tarot might have been invented out of "thin air". Ross defined his term "thin air" with

###
"I meant that there was a time when nothing like the tarot deck
existed, and then there was a time when it did. And the difference
between the two times was only the time it took someone to conceive
and produce a deck or a template for a deck - perhaps a few weeks,
perhaps a few days (maybe longer, of course). This is what I meant
by "out of thin air" - that is, it came out of someone's - or a
team's - head. Before - nothing; after - something. I wasn't
commenting on the structure or meaning of the deck, nor the content
of the images, all of which things obviously reflect and draw upon
previously existing stuff.

I was directly responding to the notion that tarot is a "concept"
that exists outside of an actual deck of cards, and therefore is
something as ancient as time, which could be found in various places
in countless incarnations, etc. not necessarily as a deck of cards
appearing in the first half of the 15th century in Italy."

####

... but if you wish to know more of the debate, you've to visit TarotL yourself.

Here follows my text:

Hi,
the question about "invented in thin air" leads to a specific other
question: What is the most rudimentary way to play Tarot?
Given is a common 4x13-deck. Or, if you want to use the Italian style, which has evidence to exist in 1423 by the preaching of San Bernardino.
Now you want to play Tarot - not in the final form, with 4x14 + 22 trumps, but just with the most common rules of it, that is trumping and a trump-row (the number of the trumps in the trump row is free) and some special rules to Fool, Pagat and highest trump. We assume, that you already have the rules in mind and doesn't need time to invent them.
How long do you need to realize your aim? Do you need to produce cards?
No.
Step 1: You just define one row of the 4 suits as trumps. Let's say, you chose batons.
Step 2: You define the Pagat. The most near card to number 1, Pagat, is the Ace of Batons, aslso Nr. 1 in its suit.
Step 3: You define the Fool. The most funniest card (this is the normal condition in older German decks) is the Unter, which has as equivalent in Italian suits the page.
Step 4: You define the highest trump. The highest card in the batons-row is the batons-King.
You're ready to start, but you probably has to explain your playing partners, how the game works.

Used time: no time, you just must have had the idea to it. Well, let's call this short time "thin air".
What you probably are missing, are all the funny pictures. Alright -this needs time to develop some culture to your idea.
Let's assume you decide to develop a 5th Trump suit. You've to decide, how many trumps you wish to have in this suit.
Perhaps some impatient persons might try to request with enthusiasm: "Yes! 22! 22!" - but this wouldn't be the first natural idea of somebody, who lived in 1423 and not near the Newage-shop nearby in 2005, where you can buy wonderful Tarots with wonderful motifs and colours in various styles, which all show 22 trumps in it - or better, 21 trumps + Fool.
You live in 1423, and you don't know the newage-shop. As you - if you played the game already with a 4x13 or 4x14-deck, are already used to a trump-suit with 13 or 14 cards, you naturally would develop a 5th suit, which contains 13 or 14 cards and it would be naturally for you to connect each card in the trump suit by a number or just an idea to the cards already present in the other suits.
Trump-1 to the aces
Trump-2 to the 2's
etc.

From the document of Johannes of Rheinfelden in 1377
http://trionfi.com/0/c/01/
we know, that he in a 60 cards game, which existed in his time and which had 5 court cards King - Queen - Ober - Unter - Maid, counted the court cards 11-12-13-14-15 (15 = King), which means in sequence together with the number cards (1-10). Considering this, it seems likely, that in decks with 4x13 or 4x14-structure the courts were counted 11-12-13 or 11-12-13-14.
Now we've observed, that - considerung the rules of Tarot about Pagat, Fool and highest trump - it seems likely, that the trump-row-Unter or Trump-row-Page was changed to the Fool and the King to the highest trump (in the most rudimentary form of Tarot).
According to the rules of Johannes
1. Trump-Unter = Fool would have the worth 11
2. Trump-King (in the Italian 4x14-version and the developing 5x14-version) would have the worth 14.

#####
Some of you might know it, but we're in the world of the 5x14-theory ...
those, who don't know it, may read something about it:
http://trionfi.com/0/f

The basis of the 5x14-theory is the socalled Pierpont-Morgan-Tarocchi, a playing card deck fragment of mid 15th century from the Visconti court. The fragment consists of 74 of assumed 78 cards, missing are the trumps devil+tower and two pip-cards.
This deck has the strange quality, that 14 trumps and the remaining 54 pip cards are all painted by the same painter (it is assumed, it was Bonifacio Bembo), but 6 trumps by another unknown artist.
This feature is explained by some as "6 replacement cards", which replaced lost cards. We (trionfi.com) heavily contradicted this opinion, claiming that there were no cards, which were replaced, and that the otiginal Pierpont-Morgan-deck only had 14 trumps and the whole composition had have a 5x14-structure. The other 6 cards were added at a later time - in our opinion.
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Now you may observe the numbers in the 14 cards of Bembo, as they're known from later versions versions of Tarot (Bembo cards had no numbers).
The numbers are
0 (= Fool, changed Unter = 11)
1 Magician, Pagat
2 Popess
3 Empress
4 Emperor
5 Pope
6 Love
7 Chariot
8 Justice
9 Hermit
10 Wheel of Fortune
(11) (missing, Unter was changed to Fool)
12 Hanging Man
13 Death
(14) (missing, highest trump got a special ranking)
...
20 Judgment (highest Trump, originally Nr. 14)
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From this you can see, that the real, by evidence given conditions of the 14 Bembo cards, fit perfectly with the assumed conditions of "the most rudimentary way to play Tarot".

Thanks