This isn´t a tarot deck (is it?)

[Le Fanu]

Maybe this should go in the Marseilles / historic section, (Moderators please feel free to move it) but I just wanted opinions... Ive come across this deck:

http://taroteca.multiply.com/photos/album/266/Allemand_A_2_Tetes

on the taroteca pages, and think it´s really quite wonderful. But this isnt a tarot deck is it? I don´t understand how those majors can have Major Arcana names and yet I can´t find any proof that they actually depict what they say they are depicting! That death card doesn´t look like death, that hermit doesn´t look like a hermit. Some I can vaguely make connections with. I think there´s a chariot there, but it aint number 7

This is tarrochi surely, different from what we know as tarot? Is it also used for divination (as well as gaming)?

It´s just that Ive been getting back into playing card readings and I thought this deck looked quite lovely and Ive seen an old copy in an antiquarian bookshop near where I live...

 

[karenquilter]

It doesn't look like Tarot to me, either. Perhaps the Major arcana names were assigned to the cards based just on the number on the top of the card.

What's with the designs on the bottom half of the cards? Are they Baroque water monsters?

 

[Gavriela]

http://taroteca.multiply.com/photos/album/266/Allemand_A_2_Tetes#159

It's a fairly common pattern for decks. People still play tarot, too, you know.

 

[karen0205]

It's a tarot playing card deck for the card game tarot that's played in Europe.
I think sometimes they are also called tarrock decks too.

It gets confusing because I've bid on 'tarot' decks on e-bay only to get a
deck thats for the card game 'tarot'. It was a beautiful deck too but not
a tarot deck for divination.

 

[firecatpickles]

Of course it's a tarot deck.

Tarrock has 62 cards, not 78.

 

[femalegamer]

Here's a link to the wikipedia article on the card game: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_tarot

The deck they picture looks similar to the one you linked, though they aren't the same one.

I play Tarot in my medieval group. It's fun, though I prefer Euchre in a non-medieval context.

 

[karen0205]

Of course it's a tarot deck.

Tarrock has 62 cards, not 78.

There are tarock decks that have 54, 56, 78 cards also.

Check out R. Somerville's site, it's full of tarock decks.
He has one for sale right now that's 78 cards.

This is a 78 card tarock deck. Tarock decks are confusing because they seem to
have major arcana type cards and then the minors seem to be regular type
of playing cards and if you could apply the minor arcana to the regular playing
card suits you could use it. It would be kind of like having a tarot deck
where the minors aren't illustrated.

There are some very beautiful decks though. I can see why you like it.

 

[Abrac]

I think Taroteca has stock titles they use on every deck regardless. Sometimes they don't match very well.

 

[firecatpickles]

There are tarock decks that have 54, 56, 78 cards also.

I was wondering when someone was going to call me on that. I looked also and saw that.


There are many varied ways to play tarot and its sibling games:

http://www.pagat.com/tarot/

Little Baron (no longer here, I don't think) used to collect jeu de tarot cards and read with them.

But IMAO, I think that it simply does not matter whether you call it a tarock deck or a tarot deck, as long as there are 78 cards of Majors and minors, it is a tarot deck.

 

[philebus]

I would agree that it doesn't matter which you call them, although I get a little annoyed when all French suited cards get called Tarock as a way to disinguish them from reading cards. Only the French called them tarot after all - the Italian suits and trumps were being called tarocks in countries like Austria long before they adopted French suits.

While I don't read cards (I'm a player only), I have a modest collection of French suited packs and try to add to it here and there. My latest was a promotional pack for Woody Allen's film Scoop (standard trumps I'm afraid - just a box announcing the movie with its release date). The French game is very mainstream and so there are novelty packs with the same kind of range as you would find for regular cards. There are souvenier packs with photos or local scenery, there is a pack for the French Foreign Legion, packs celebrating the French Revolution, Rugby, Tennis, regional dress, belle epoque reproductions such as the Tarot des Fleurs and the Argio Orell, a pack for the perfumier Lanvin, not to mention various comic characters such as Asterix, Droopy, Largo Winch, and XIII. Then there are some great funnies as well.

Sadly, they don't show up on the worldwide ebay listings so much. So, if you want them, you tend to have to go to the French ebay and ask nicely if they will post outside of France. They are usually happy to do so and will let you know the postal charges. In any case, there's no harm in asking - the beautiful French Revolution pack that is available worldwide now was only available in France until I asked! Babel Fish is far from perfect but it is up to the job of getting through this sort of thing - and its better than just assuming that they will speak English (many do but its polite not to assume).