Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote: 01 Aug 2020, 10:35 "Black" Venus and shield comparison, same photograph, same scale. The dark blue-black of the shields should be silver. Perhaps the artist painted Venus silver as well, and she has similarly blackened.
I can confirm this is correct per below. The upper right image is the stemma of the county ofPapie/Pavia - but given the large size of the Stemmario Trivulziano they did not use expensive silver leaf (but note the same three eagles on the upper right shield, matching the shield on the upper left of the Semideus):

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On this single leaf (torn out and now in the Wallace Collection) by Cristoforo de Predis, Initial ‘A’ with Galeazzo Maria Sforza in prayer, 1477 (?), note the same Pavia stemma on the shield on the middle far right but also the standard G.M. Sforza stemma in the bottom margin - both oxidized silver:
https://www.wallacecollection.org/blog/war-and-peace/

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But why is Venus is singled out for silver leaf? Boccaccio says she has a "Phlegmatic complexion" (III.22.5, Solomon p. 383) which can be bloodless/white but that hardly seems to warrant silver. I think it has to be because this is her planetary aspect, white and the brightest "star" in the sky: "Hesperus among the Greeks is a name appropriate for the planet, especially when it sets after the sun, and therefore she is also called Vesper, as is clear in Vergil: 'Sooner would Vesper set the day's close on Olympus.'" (Boccaccio III.22.19-20, Solomon 395-397).

Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Phaeded wrote: 01 Aug 2020, 16:58 I can confirm this is correct per below. The upper right image is the stemma of the county ofPapie/Pavia - but given the large size of the Stemmario Trivulziano they did not use expensive silver leaf (but note the same three eagles on the upper right shield, matching the shield on the upper left of the Semideus):
Perfect, brilliant. Just what I was looking for, thanks. I'm actually relieved, Black Venus was getting hard to get my head around in this context. It has nothing to do with Marziano, but it was just so incongruous.
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Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Remember that Marziano explicitly states that he is going to ignore the multiple numbers, and conflate them. Thus he seems to conflate the Jupiters, for instance the "King of Athens" and specific laws in GDG II, 2 (although second Jupiter is also called a king of Athens V, 1) with the third or Cretan Jupiter GDG XI, 1, who is given as husband of Juno, the War with the Giants, etc.

For Venus he seems to conflate even more, the heavenly Venus "Lucifer" with the mother of Cupid, the third Venus. Here is the short passage in Cicero that Boccaccio relies on.

Cicero, De natura deorum, III, xxiii (59); page 342-345 of Harris Rackham edition and translation, Loeb, 1933.
The first Venus is the daughter of the Sky and the Day; I have seen her temple at Elis. The second was engendered from the sea-foam, and as we are told became the mother by Mercury of the second Cupid. The third is the daughter of Jupiter and Dione, who wedded Vulcan, but who is said to have been the mother of Anteros by Mars.... The first Cupid is said to be the son of Mercury and the first Diana, the second of Mercury and the second Venus, and the third, who is the same as Anteros, of Mars and the third Venus.
https://archive.org/details/denaturadeo ... 4/mode/2up

Venus 1, GDG III, 22
Venus 2, GGD III, 23
Venus 3, GDG XI, 4

Cupid 1, GDG II, 13
Cupid 2, GDG III, 24
Cupid 3, GDG IX, 4

Latin, opening paragraph -
CAP. IV
De Venere Iovis XIa filia, que peperit Amorem.

Venus, Omero teste, Iovis fuit filia et Dyonis, et est hec, quam Tullius, ubi De naturis deorum, terciam vocat. Et coniugem dicit fuisse Vulcani. Hanc aiunt Martem amasse, de quorum adulterio et captivitate supra ubi de Marte dictum est. Sic et Enee matrem dicunt, de qua etiam ubi de Enea scriptum est.
The opening paragraph of the Third Venus in the 1498 French translation of GDG -
De Venus vnziesme fille de iupiter laquelle engendra amour. Chapitre iiiie.

Ainsi que homere tesmongne Venus fut fille de iupiter & de dion Et est celle, laquelle tulle en son liure de la nature des Dieux dit estre la tierce & auoir este femme de vulcan. Ils dient quelle ayma mars, de ladultere et captiuite deulx est la hault escrit la ou est parle de mars. Pareillement dient de la mere de eneas, de laquelle est aussi escript la ou est fait mencion de eneas.
https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k ... geneologie

"Venus, eleventh daughter of Jupiter who gave birth to Love.

"As Homer attests, Venus was the daughter of Jupiter and Dion, and it is she whom Cicero in his book On the Nature of the Gods calls the third, and says to have been the wife of Vulcan. They say that she loved Mars, concerning whose adultery and captivity it is written above where it is spoken of Mars. Also they call her the mother of Aeneas, of whom it is also written where Aeneas is mentioned."

Obviously Cicero knew nothing of Venus as mother of Aeneas, but Marziano knows the Venus who is the mother of Cupid by Mars, which is Boccaccio's and Cicero's Third Venus, who is also the mother of Aeneas. It would seem that Castelletto (and Galvano Fiamma who created the basis that Castelletto filled in a little) could only have been thinking of the third Venus and the Cretan or third Jupiter.
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Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Phaeded wrote: 01 Aug 2020, 16:58
But why is Venus is singled out for silver leaf? Boccaccio says she has a "Phlegmatic complexion" (III.22.5, Solomon p. 383) which can be bloodless/white but that hardly seems to warrant silver. I think it has to be because this is her planetary aspect, white and the brightest "star" in the sky: "Hesperus among the Greeks is a name appropriate for the planet, especially when it sets after the sun, and therefore she is also called Vesper, as is clear in Vergil: 'Sooner would Vesper set the day's close on Olympus.'" (Boccaccio III.22.19-20, Solomon 395-397).
Yes, I agree with your reasoning and representative selection of quotes. I imagine that she was singled out to shine like this because of her divinity - and not Jupiter! (but why not in gold?), and the brightness of the planet Venus. As euhemerists, they didn't believe she was actually the planet, they just thought that because several deified Venuses were so dazzlingly beautiful, they named the most dazzling planet after her.

The Q.v.XVII 2 artist even avoids showing Anchises.

Perhaps the silver helped set off the blond hair too. We can still believe that Aeneas' hair was red, though, can't we? Those two, Venus and Aeneas, must have that hair to explain those traits in the Visconti. Bueno de Mesquita says it about Gian Galeazzo, although I am still trying to find references to it elsewhere. I know the blond, it is all over their Tarots and everywhere else they are shown, but not so much the "red."
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Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Venus appears first in the genealogical tree of Galvano Fiamma, Politeia Novella (Ambrosiana 275A inf - https://ambrosiana.comperio.it/opac/det ... alog:27351 ) in 1337.

This chart from Jörg Busch shows the evolution of the genealogy chronologically from the sources (I also attach the notes), from:

DIE MAILÄNDER GESCHICHTSSCHREIBUNG ZWISCHEN ARNULF UND GALVANEUS FLAMMA
Die Beschäftigung mit der Vergangenheit im Umfeld einer oberitalienischen Kommune vom späten 11. bis zum frühen 14. Jahrhundert

Milanese Historiography Between Arnulf and Galvano Fiamma
The Engagement with the Past in the Context of a Northern Italian Commune from the Late 11th to the Early 14th Century
(Munich, 1997)
https://digi20.digitale-sammlungen.de/d ... 00001.html


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/marzianotex ... 97p232.jpg


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/marzianotex ... 97p233.jpg

Here is what Busch is referring to with the "Tafel" of Politeia Novella. The genealogy starts with Venus Iunior and Anchises Troyanus. Ambrosiana A275 inf, folio 12r, Link to online version above)


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/marzianotex ... lio12r.jpg
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Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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One more on the genealogy, not covered by Busch's self-imposed dates. This was one written into the beginning of the "coronation" missal commissioned by Gian Galeazzo for the church of Saint Ambrose. It includes more than the direct line, so it belongs to the older tradition from the Chronica Danielis and Galvano Fiamma. It lacks the "Kings of Angleria" from Abida to Lutius, which Castelletto inserted between Anglus Junior and Ubertus Vicecomes.

NOTE - Kirsch, Five Illuminated Manuscripts, p. 92, calls this "Lat. 6,"

It shows that Pietro Castelletto, writing only two years later, really innovated.

From Marco Petoletti, "Il Messale di Gian Galeazzo Visconti per S. Ambrogio (Milano, Archivio Capitolare della Basilica di S. Ambrogio, M 6)" Aevum 83 (Settembre-Dicembre 2009) pp. 657-658
https://www.jstor.org/stable/20862252?seq=1
Anchises-Venus
Eneas
Ascanius
Anglus
Anglus iunior (Castelletto fills in the break between Anglus iunior and Ubertus)
Ubertus Vicecomes
Maximianus
Millo
Rolandus
Millonus
Alionus
Galvanicus
Cosmas
Andreas
Perideus
Astulfus
Dexiderius
Bernardus
Guido
Otto
Berengarius
Ugo
Fulcus
Obizo
Fazius
Heriprandus Vicecomes
Otto Vicecomes
Cosmas
Vivianus
Galvaneus
Ubertus Vicecomes iunior
Obizo Vicecomes
Tibaldus Vicecomes
Matheus magnus Vicecomes
Galeaz Vicecomes -Azo-Marchus-Iohannes
Stephanus-Matheus Vicecomes iunior
Bernabò-Galeaz Vicecomes
Iohannes Galeaz Vicecomes-Iohannes Galeaz iunior-Azo-Iohannes Maria
Philippus Maria
What is interesting in Castelletto's addition of the Anglerian kings is that he omits a number of those given in Fiamma. This is where Sacco's comment in his dedicatory preface to the Semideus, that there are 60 generations, which reflects the 60 of the Virgin's line, sheds light on Castelletto, think. Perhaps we should attribute the same motive to Castelletto, so that he abridged the Anglerian list in order to make the number 60. Perhaps he did this at the suggestion of Gian Galeazzo, who, after all, was devoted to the Virgin Mary.
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Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote: 02 Aug 2020, 16:42
Phaeded wrote: 01 Aug 2020, 16:58
But why is Venus is singled out for silver leaf? Boccaccio says she has a "Phlegmatic complexion" (III.22.5, Solomon p. 383) which can be bloodless/white but that hardly seems to warrant silver. I think it has to be because this is her planetary aspect, white and the brightest "star" in the sky: "Hesperus among the Greeks is a name appropriate for the planet, especially when it sets after the sun, and therefore she is also called Vesper, as is clear in Vergil: 'Sooner would Vesper set the day's close on Olympus.'" (Boccaccio III.22.19-20, Solomon 395-397).
Yes, I agree with your reasoning and representative selection of quotes. I imagine that she was singled out to shine like this because of her divinity - and not Jupiter! (but why not in gold?), and the brightness of the planet Venus. As euhemerists, they didn't believe she was actually the planet, they just thought that because several deified Venuses were so dazzlingly beautiful, they named the most dazzling planet after her.
Despite Maziano's caveat about euhemerism, I'm not so sure about the astrologically-obsessed Filippo Visconti's own views. And Marziano still satisfies that interest when the first words out of his mouth for Venus are "perfect likeness of the morning star (Lucifer)." Ascent/descent from the stars is arguably part of the myth behind the genealogy featuring Jupiter and Venus. Both the Venus in the Besozzo genealogy and the PMB "Star"/Venus show hands placed over their respective bellies in the del parto gesture of being pregnant; the star's longest ray pointed at Venus's pregnant belly in the PMB.


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The question of course is if the astral connotation that is clear in the PMB is also implied in the genealogy? Considering Filippo's organization of literary projects for his 1430 Sol quadriga, I have to believe he always though of Venus in an astral as well as mythic notion. Its the later Semideus's elaboration of the connection to Saturn that fleshes this all out in more detail, making her almost cosmological at that point. At all events, this astral material pre-dates Sforza.

Phaeded

PS Sorry about being checked out a bit - been pursuing an old problem also related to Venus: why Revelations' concluding chapter 22 has Jesus declare he is the morning star. Qumran scrolls, Enoch, etc. are all rabbit holes I've been going down....but nothing to do with tarot, just an interesting puzzle.
Last edited by Phaeded on 05 Aug 2020, 20:48, edited 1 time in total.

Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Phaeded wrote: 05 Aug 2020, 20:13 Both the Venus in the Besozzo genealogy and the PMB "Star"/Venus show hands placed over their respective bellies in the del parto gesture of being pregnant; the star's longest ray pointed at Venus's pregnant belly in the PMB.
Great observation on the Michelino genealogy! And also on the PMB Star. Sforza would have none of it, of course, as his origins were never mythologized. But Galeazzo Maria always wanted to emphasize more the Visconti side, and so one has to wonder what his mother instilled in him.

Yes, Venus is always pregnant with the heir. This makes it even odder that Filippo Maria didn't try harder.

For Marziano's invocation of the planet, remember that he was no doubt an astrologer. Most of the humanists were not.
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Re: What are the documents for Marziano's dates?

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Phaeded wrote: 05 Aug 2020, 20:13 PS Sorry about being checked out a bit - been pursuing an old problem also related to Venus: why Revelations' concluding chapter 22 has Jesus declare he is the morning star. Qumran scrolls, Enoch, etc. are all rabbit holes I've been going down....but nothing to do with tarot, just an interesting puzzle.
For Apocalypse interpretation, my first stop is usually R. H. Charles for the International Critical Commentary (ICC) series -
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100319411
And J. Massyngberde Ford, in the Anchor Bible series of commentaries -
https://archive.org/details/revelation0038unse

Ford's commentary is generally dismissed because of the thesis that John the Baptist is the original author, and the Christian parts are interpolations. But whatever the weakness of the theory, Ford still presents the necessary historical exegetical commentary for research.

Americans and Canadians are lucky if they want to research most things biblical, because of Christianbook.com. At one point, half of my library came from the great deals they offered. There is nothing like it over here. You probably know it, but I'll put it up here just in case - https://www.christianbook.com/page/acad ... t=Academic

I see that Charles' commentary (two volumes) is 144 dollars, still pretty steep. They often have sales though.
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