firemaiden
Oh my goodness, am I the last one to learn this? I just found online a website reproducing, in its original un-doctored 18th century French, Monsieur Antoine Court de Gébelin's Du Jeu des Tarots, 1781.
I'm reading it, and am fascinated by his introduction to tarot - how he happened to be invited over to meet some friends, and found a lady very engaged playing cards - and what were they playing?
I quote and translate
So he right away recognised the World card as an "Egyptian" allegory. Why is that? Is there an Egyptian allegory? Was he comparing it specifically to something Egyptian being discovered at that time?
And then -- any idea exactly which deck it is he would have run into? His description of the fool shows him with a tiger. (!)
* from the Wikipedia: "a "marotte" is a prop stick or scepter with a carved head on it. Typically carried by a jester or harlequin, the miniature head will often reflect the costume of the jester who carries it. Modern marottes typically have music boxes or other machinery built into the head. Older marottes may utilize swivel heads with bells."
I'd love to study this text with some folks...
I'm reading it, and am fascinated by his introduction to tarot - how he happened to be invited over to meet some friends, and found a lady very engaged playing cards - and what were they playing?
I quote and translate
Invited a few years ago to a lady friends house, to meet a lady, Madame la C. d'H, who had just come from Germany or Switzerland, we found her busy playing this game with some other people. We play a game which you surely dont know... or perhaps you do; what game is it? The game of tarot. I had once the opportunity to see this game when I was very young, but I didn't know anything about it... it is a rhapsody of the most bizarre and extravagant figures: here is one, for example, I took care to chose the most amazing of these figures, and one which has no relationship to its title - it is the World. I glance at the card, and immediately I recognise the Allegory: everyone leaves his game immediately to come and see this marvelous card where I perceived something they had never seen before, and then each one showed me another, and in a quarter of an hour, I had seen the whole game, explained and declared it was Egyptian...
So he right away recognised the World card as an "Egyptian" allegory. Why is that? Is there an Egyptian allegory? Was he comparing it specifically to something Egyptian being discovered at that time?
And then -- any idea exactly which deck it is he would have run into? His description of the fool shows him with a tiger. (!)
One could not mistake the Fool in this Card, by his Fool's stick [marotte*] and his peasant blouse [hoqueton] decorated with shells and whistles: he walks very fast, like the madman [fou] that he is, carrying behind him his little package, and imagining that he is escaping this way from a tiger who is biting his backside [croupe]: whereas in fact, [quant au fac] it is the emblem of all his faults that he doesn't want to see, and this Tiger is all of his regrets which follow him gallopping and jumping onto his backside behind him.
* from the Wikipedia: "a "marotte" is a prop stick or scepter with a carved head on it. Typically carried by a jester or harlequin, the miniature head will often reflect the costume of the jester who carries it. Modern marottes typically have music boxes or other machinery built into the head. Older marottes may utilize swivel heads with bells."
I'd love to study this text with some folks...