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'Trionfi alia franciosa finiti e non finiti’ -
The tarot in France before 1500
Franco Pratesi continues to deliver amazing nuggets taken from the archives of Florence. Id itself or on its web page (http://www.naibi.net), where he distills his notes, friend Franco comes to reveal important information about tarot cards in Florence. The first, found in Note No. 4/24, entitled "1440-1450: Florence - Condanne per giochi di carte nei Libri del Giglio" (10/12/2015) (1). He tells us that two of the most ordinary players were punished "per giuchare alle charter trionfi", for playing tarot, in January 1444. It is the second oldest reference to this game in Florence, and one of the first of all in the long list of instances of the tarot in the fifteenth century. And id, nor princes, nor patricians or condottieri, but two men without relief.
Another interesting and surprising find is that of two inventories after the deaths of Florentine card-makers, very brief, which Franco Pratesi collected with the involvement of Böninger Lorenz, who published recently (2). I will not dwell on the first of these inventories, in November 1499, but rather on that of Giovanbattista di Francesco Monaldi, made in December 1506, I recall here the essentials with translation into modern French:
Besides the mention, so early, of germini (the old name of minchiate), the most extraordinary, of course, is "paio di tr(i)onfi alla franc(i)osa nonfiniti" -- tarot deck in the French manner unfinished. Franco Pratesi on this subject has brought to mind my own hypotheses made in 2004, about the mention of taraux found in36 paia di germini e tr(i)onfi / 36 jeux de minchiate et de tarot (36 packs of minchiate and tarot)
1 paio di tr(i)onfi alia franc(i)osa non finiti / 1 jeu de tarot a la francaise inachevé (one pack of cards in the French manner unfinished)
117 paia di charte / 117 jeux de cartes (117 packs of cards)
2 mazi di fogli bianchi / 2 tas de feilles blanches (2 stacks of white sheets)
40 chanoni dipinti (4)/ 40 canons peints/ 40 painted canons (4)
(...)
26 forme tra grandi e piccole da germini / 26 bois gravés, grands et petits, de minchiate (26 engraved woodblocks, big and small, of minchiate)
più chartoni / cartons en plus (boxes in addition)
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1. http://www.naibi.net/A/424-GIGLI0444-Z.pdf
2. Franco Pratesi, “1499-1506: “Firenze - Nuove informazioni sulle carte fioreantine”, The Playing-Card, vol. 44, n° l, Jul.-Sept. 2015, pp. 61-71.
3. I ignore personal effects.
4. These very likely concern altar cards, cardboard bearing the liturgical texts, often illuminated. To find this is the inventory of a card-maker is not abnormal.
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a 1505 notarial deed of Avignon (5). I deduced that since the word was written in French (not in Latin, like the rest of the act, nor in Provence or Italian), it could only come from the "north", that is to say from Lyon. I concluded that the tarot was known in Lyon around 1500.
Were these cards already so common? And would the tarot have been propagated in France, under the name of “triumph”, before 1500? Two small facts are in the files.
Some gifts for Isabelle of Lorraine
It's a well-known story now, thanks to Franco Pratesi and Ross Caldwell (6). I summarize here.
In 1449, Jacopo Antonio Marcello, a Venetian patrician, Provveditore (controller of armies) and faithful friend of King René (7), has succeeded in obtaining for Isabelle of Lorraine, the first wife of René of Anjou , two decks of cards, one of which appears to have been artistic realization of an idea of Filippo Maria Visconti and Marziano da Tortona, developed by 1420 and realized by Michelino da Besozzo, sort of a "proto-tarot", and the other an "ordinary" tarot. made around 1449. A careful reading of the letter accompanying the careful calligraphy (8) teaches us how Marcello has arranged to convey missive, games and "instructions" in November 1449, from Monselice, his villa in the Veneto, to Saumur, where Isabelle resided, in the confidence of Giovanni Cossa, diplomat and military attache in René of Anjou’s service. These two decks and the booklet associated with them were therefore handed to Isabelle in early 1450. René seems to have inherited the property of Isabella, who died in 1453, and René in turn decided, in 1480, that his collections would mostly go to enriching those of King Louis XI of France, his cousin. The booklet alone has survived today in the collections of the BNF. But it remains true that a deck of "triumphs", now lost, was in the hands of Isabelle of Lorraine. Did she play with these cards?
If the pack painted by Michelino da Besozzo was provided with a presentation text due to Marziano da Tortona, the other pack that Marcello also offered was not accompanied by any written rules. Would Giovanni Cossa have taught the practice to Isabelle and those with her? In my opinion both decks sent by Marcello must have appeared as artistic curiosities without other use, the "real" tarot deck additionally appearing secondary.
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5. Thierry Depaulis, «Des "cartes communement appelées taraux"». The Playing-Card, vol. 32, n° 5, March-Apr. 2004, p. 199-205 and n° 6, May-June 2004, pp. 244-249.
6. Franco Pratesi, «Italian cards, new discoveries, 10: The earliest tarot pack known».
The Playing-Card, vol. XVIII, n° 1, Aug. 1989, p. 28-32 and n° 2, Nov. 1989, pp. 33-38; Ross Caldwell, «Marziano da Tortona's Tractatus de deificatione XVI heroum», The Playing- Card, vol. 33, n° 1, July-Sept. 2004, p. 50-55, and n° 2, Oct.-Dec. 2004, pp. 111-126.
7. René d Anjou (1409-1480), Duke of Bar and Lorraine, Duke of Anjou, Count of Provence, reigned over Naples from 1435 to 1442. He was expelled by Alfonso of Aragon.
8. BnF, Mss. latin 8745A.
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It is noted however that René II (9), grandson of King René, played "au triomphe” [at triumph] at Vezelise (county capital of Vaudémont) in 1496:
It has been suggested that this triumphe could designate the tarot. It is not possible to be affirmative, since the game of triumph, attested in French sources from 1480, knows a long series of quotes in the 16th and 17th centuries, some quite illuminating: it is a simple game of raises, played mostly in fours with ordinary cards. It would be surprising if the use of 1496 is an exception. But it is true that we are in Lorraine, Duchy of the Empire, not in France, where the other references are located. If Rene II could not know his grandmother Isabelle of Lorraine, deceased in 1453, when he was two years old, we know that he spent his youth at the court of his grandfather René of Anjou between Angers and Provence. The tradition of the tarot could have survive and been transmitted to him. The question remains therefore a little open.Au Roy [René II d'Anjou, lui aussi pretendant au royaume de Naples], le xxixe jour d'avril, pour jouer au triumphe a Vezelise, deux frans. Encor audit seigneur Roy, le premier jour de may pour jouer audit triumphe a Vezelise, deux florins d'or. (10)
(To the King [René II of Anjou, also pretending to have the kingdom of Naples] the 29th day of April, to play at triumphe Vezelise two gold florins. Again to said lord King, the first day of May, to play at said triumph at Vezelise, two gold florins.) (10)
Everything of the Constable of Saint-Pol
Prince Louis of Luxembourg, Count of Saint-Pol (1418-1475), Constable of France, is not one of these "heroes" of whose history France likes to recall the memory. Powerful lord of the north, from a younger branch of the prestigious Luxembourg family that had given kings of Bohemia and German emperors, he built his career between France and Burgundy. But keen on raising the stakes between the two camps, Prince Louis of Luxembourg dealt behind the backs of all. For once in agreement, the King of France and the Duke of Burgundy Charles the Bold, aided by the King of England, decided upon the downfall of one whom, ten years earlier, in 1465, had been appointed Constable of France by Louis XI. The king had even done the kindness, in 1466, to arrange his marriage to his second wife, Marie of Savoy, sister of Queen Charlotte.
Arrested Nov. 19, 1475, in Burgundian territory, at the request of Louis XI, Louis of Luxembourg was soon delivered to the King’s people. Arriving in Paris on the 27th, he was imprisoned in the Bastille, indicted and heard by Parliament in early December. On December 16, 1475, he was sentenced to death and then beheaded three days later at the Place de Greve.
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9. René II (1451-1508), Duke of Lorraine from 1473 to his death. He was the son of Ferry II, Count of Vaudémont, and Yolande of Anjou, daughter of King Rene I.
10. Accounts of the court of Lorraine in Henri Lepage, «Recherches sur l’industrie en Lorraine [...]: De la fabrication des cartes a jouer», Memoires de la Société des sciences, lettres et arts de Nancy, 1850 [1851], p. 66; Henri-René D'Allemagne, Les cartes de jouer du XlVe au XXe siecle, II, Paris, 1906, p. 212. ("Research on industry in Lorraine [...] Of the manufacture of playing cards”, Memoirs of the Society of sciences, letters and arts in Nancy, 1850 [1851], p. 66; Henry René D'Allemagne, Playing cards from the 14th to the 20th century, II, Paris, 1906, p. 212.)
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Meanwhile, the Duke of Burgundy had ordered the furnishings of the mansion [hôtel] of Saint-Pol at Cambrai to be seized. During the winter of 1475-1476, the "moveable goods" of the Constable - bed-sheets and blankets, tablecloths and napkins in great quantities, bags of all kinds, vestments (four complete sets), weapons of war and tournaments, armor, and caparasons [horse coverings] and parade outfits, pieces of silverware, dresses and furs, coats and tops, books, tapestries and a few «tapis velus», [hairy carpets], etc. - were removed from the mansion of Saint-Pol by agents of the Duke of Burgundy, inventoried under the surveillance of a master of the chamber of accounts of Lille, then placed in boxes, baskets and barrels carefully marked with letters.
It was a reckoning without heirs. It is certain that Marie of Savoy, second wife of the Constable, had died, probably in August 1475 during a fatal childbirth. But there were children, seven of a first marriage - from Jeanne de Bar, who died in 1462 - and two of the second. These heirs had filed various appeals in order to gain recognition for the property seized. Now on January 5, 1477, Charles the Bold dies before Nancy. His widow Margaret of York and his daughter (from a previous marriage) Marie of Burgundy made it known they were prepared to return to the children of the Constable the furnishings of Cambrai. A new inventory was made from 16 to 28 March 1477. If the first (that of 1475) is lost, this second document was preserved. Going a bit unnoticed, it is now in the Departmental archives of Doubs, among the Chalon Papers. It was published in 1885 by Jules Gauthier, Doubs archivist (11).
From the first lines of the inventory, it is striking to read:
The term “jeu de cartes fait en triomphe” ["pack of cards made in triumph"] cries out. It seems so much to echo the Italian expression paro (12) di carte da trionfi, which designates the tarot in the archives of Florence, Ferrara and Milan, then at Bologna, Siena, Mantua, etc., one is tempted to understand it thus. We do not see any other meaning to give to that expression.Une petite layette où il y a ung jeu de cartes fait en triomphe, viii s.
(A little layette where there is a pack of cards made in triumph, 8 s.)
Note that this object is in the company of other trinkets, «en une queue (13) signée par A» [in a queue (13) signed by A] (14). Remember that a layette is a small lightweight wooden box, to keep papers, jewelry, etc., and the currency is that of Artois (14). The list contains twenty articles in question that today would rank as decorative items. For example, there are knives
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11. «Inventaire du mobilier de l'hotel du connétable de Saint-Paul & Cambrai (March 1476 [a.st.])». Bulletin du Comité des travaux historiques et scientifiques. Archeologie, 1885, p. 24-57. Arch. dép. du Doubs, E 1311.
12. Literally «pair», here in the sense of pack, current in the 15th century.
13. Type of barrel.
14. In the 15th century, the sol of Artois was worth close to the French sol [the sol of Tours]. As in France, there are 12 deniers in a sol, and twenty sols make a pound.
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in a sheath, hunting horns in their covers, an impressive «orloge de coeuvre doré» [clock of gilded copper] with a dial of silver «monstrant l'eure» [showing the time] – a «serrure tres soubtille, bien ouvrée, en laquelle [il y] a pluseurs ymages» [very subtle lock, well crafted, in which [there] are many images] (estimated at 36 pounds), «une boitte a porter a cheval, ou il y a aucunes lettres et pappiers» [a box to carry by horse, where are there are letters and papers], etc.
Appraised at 8 sols of Artois, this pack of cards does not represent a huge value: that is the price of a «boitelette d'yvoire a mettre poudre pour le pappier quant on escript» [small box of ivory for putting powder for paper for writing]. To give an idea of the modesty of 8 sols, we will observe that there are few items worth less in he inventory and that for that amount it, there are only que «trois doubliers (grandes nappes doubles), fort usés, liée ensemble» ["three doubliers [large double tablecloths], very worn, linked together"] (No. 97) or «une nappe de liée d'ouvrage de Damas, fort usee»" (a tablecloth with links of damask work) (No. 380). For one sol more, one has hardly more, «un vieux banquier [housse de banc] de soie vermeille» (an old banker [bench cover] of scarlet silk" (No. 61) or «un vieux convertoir (couverture) de serge vermeille, armoyée des armes de monseigneur le comte de Liney [Ligny], lequel est de petite valeur ["an old convertoir [cover] of scarlet serge, decorated with the arms of Bishop Count Liney [Ligny], which is of little value"] (No. 62). That is what is said. One must exceed 10 sols to find any article that is neither old, nor with holes in it, nor "very worn".
How was a tarot deck able to enter the property of Louis of Luxembourg, Count of Saint-Pol? Since it does not appear that the Constable ever took the road of ltaly or even exceeded the Loire, and as the man did not seem particularly attracted by the art and culture of Italy, we are led to think that it cannot be he who brought this pack, nor his first wife Jeanne of Bar, Countess of Marie and Soissons, married in 1435, died in 1462. Despite an Italian mother (14), Louis de Luxembourg lived and fought only in the north of France, between the Seine and the Scheldt. The inventory of 1477 does not include any object that could come from Italy. So there is only one possible explanation: this deck is due to the second wife of the Constable, Marie, married in 1466.
However, Marie of Savoy (Turin, 20 March 1448 - Bohain Aug. 1475), daughter of Louis Duke of Savoy, despite the place of her birth, is not an "Italian" princess. Raised in Savoy, between Thonon, Geneva and Chambery, Marie is steeped in French culture, still very Gothic. In addition, King Louis XI had brought to his court, in 1463, the sisters of the queen, Agnes (born in 1445), Marie (born in 1448), Bonne (born in 1449) and Marguerite (born in 1439). Raised as French, Marie of Savoy and her sisters had no knowledge of the tarot. One is tempted to turn to Bonne [Bona, in Italian] of Savoy, last daughter of Duke Louis, a year younger than her sister Marie, who married Galeazzo Maria Sforza (1444-1476), Duke of Milan in 1468, not too long after. This is perhaps the track that leads us to the tarot of Louis of Luxembourg. Because Milan is one of the earliest homes of the tarot.
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14. Marguerite des Baux, i.e. Margherita del Balzo (1394-1469), daughter of Francesco del Balzo, duke of Andria (d. l422).
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That Bona, arriving in Milan in July 1468, was soon initiated there in the tarot, one can find proof in the decoration of Pavia Castle that Galeazzo Maria Sforza orders from Bonifacio Bembo, the painter of tarot cards, which he requires to show " ...la illustrissima Madona [this is Bona!], the illustrissima Madona Ysabeta [Elisabetta, sister of Galeazzo Maria] che zoghi [...] ad triumphi ... ", playing tarot (16). It is easy to think that Bona has decided to make known this game to the sister of hers closest in age. The two sisters remained very connected. Diplomatic couriers could convey a tarot deck from Milan to Bohain.
If the path of the "pack of cards made in triumph" can be established in a credible fashion, it remains that the principal of interest, Marie of Savoy, was no longer alive in 1477 to tell appraisers what this so special game was. There was thus someone who knew and was able to name the object accurately. Among those who participated in the inventory, we see one who could have brought the information sought. The «députés et commis d'iceux seigneurs et dame» [deputies and clerks of these lords and lady] are men of the region, just like the experts.
But the final formula, which rules the expenses of the inventory, teaches us that a son of the Constable and a "Madame de Brienne" have come to control the operations. Now "Madame de Brienne" is none other than the wife of Pierre, Count of Brienne, henceforth head of the household, that is, Margaret of Savoy (1439-1483), another sister of Marie (17). Had she received a similar missive from her sister Bona? Or had she simply discovered the tarot with her first husband John IV Palaeologus, Marquis of Monferrat, married in 1458, lost in 1464? She was without doubt the best placed to say what the strange deck of cards was.
If the contrast is great between the tarot offered to Isabelle of Lorraine in 1450, which appears to have been rather precious, and the deck found at Cambrai in 1477, "of little value", that does not allow speaking of a diffusion of the tarot in France before 1500.
In 1985, when the exhibition "Tarot game and magic" was in full swing, two forgotten tarot cards were exhumed by Gisele Lambert, then curator at the Bibliotheque Nationale, responsible for the inventory of the "first Italian engravers." A Hermit and a Queen of Cups, engraved on wood and colored with the help of stencils, acquired at the beginning of the 20th century, waiting their turn at the bottom of a
......
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16. Evelyn S. Welch, «Galeazzo Maria Sforza and the Gastello di Pavia, 1469», Art Bulletin, 71, n° 3,1989, annexe 1.3, p. 373; Sandrina Bandera, Brera: I tarocchi, il caso e la fortuna, Milan, 1999, p. 17.
17. In marrying the daughter of the Count of Saint-Pol, Marguerite of Savoy thus becomes ... the sister-in-law of her sister and the sister-in-law of her brother-in-law!
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Box (18). The surprise was total. I soon published these cards, dating them from the end of the 15th century. They are significantly smaller than the painted tarots and measure only 99 x 58 mm. The backs are white.
Attributed, for lack of anything better, to Milan when they were discovered, these two cards might well be, upon reflection, ... French. One thinks of Lyon because of the Queen of Cups, which presents some similarities in the shape of the arm and hand, the treatment of the face, and the veil under the crown, with the queens of Lyon cards. In addition, these cards have blunt borders, no trace of the flap onto the back so typical of Italian cards. With the Donson cards (Ferrara?), they are the only printed tarot cards "complete" and in color for this period.
Are these the trionfi Franciosa discussed in the Florentine inventory?
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18. They are now listed BnF, Estampes, RESERVE BOITE FOL-KH-34-(l,,3), and are visible on the server Gallica at the address gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b10510958d.r.
19. Thierry Depaulis, «Tarot: nouvelles découvertes a la Bibliotheque Nationale», Nouvelles de I'estampe, n° 80, May 1985, p. 4-5.
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French cards in Florence?
It should not be surprising to meet French cards in Florence. Laurenzo De’ Medici was in himself the champion! In a letter of 12 July 1472,he claims:
Aretino, in his dialogue on games (known under the name of “Le carte parlante’ [‘The speaking cards’] has his card-maker, Padovano, say [the translation, except for "tra si fatte nazione", is from http://www.letarot.it/page.aspx?id=180&lng=eng, which has more, on the other suits]:Dite alia Chiarina che mi mandi due paia di charte alla franzese et datele
all'aportatore. (20)
(Tell Chiarina I am sending two packs of French-style cards and give them to the messenger.)
Alfonso Pazzi (1509-1555), in an unedited, undated poem published by Franco Pratesi, invites this same Padovano to use the French designs:Da che in Italia si giuoca con le carte francesi, chiaretimi (io ve ne supplico)
cio che dinotano, tra si fatte nazioni, i cappari.
(Since in Italy people are playing with French cards, please tell me (I implore you) what, as done between nations, the pikes are.)
In Rome, the papal state was importing 'carte da giocare franciose' already in 1480. And in the middle of the 16th century, the inventory of Domenico di Biagio Bacchi, done in 1559, includes 36 dozen packs of "Carte romane fatte a Lion di Francia di Moret " [Roman cards made in Lyon, France by Moret] (21) and five dozen packs of "Carte romanesche larghe fatte a Lion ferute e ligate in carta bianca" [Large Roman-style cards made at Lyon cut and bound (?) in white paper] (25).lo credo, che tu pensi, Padovano,
D'aver a far sempre picche o mattoni,
In sulle carte, e che noi siam babbioni
Come te, sebben fussi Veneziano;
Noi ti faren veder, ch'ogni Toscano
Ha le sue bizzarie ed invenzioni:
Or lassa dunque andar coppe e bastoni,
E prendi il nuovo tema, che ti diano.
(I believe that you think, Padovano,
Of having to make always spades or tiles [French word for diamonds].
In the cards, and that we are baboons
Like you, even though you were Venetian;
We make you see that every Tuscan
Has his oddities and inventions:
Now let go then of cups and sticks,
And take the new theme, which I give you.)
Tarot “a la francaise" [in the French manner] in Florence seems therefore not so strange.
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