Meanwhile I've read or better scanned the whole Trotti text for relevant words, which I anderstand (which are not so much) and my impression is, that it is mainly a juristic text (something I wished to know). It's not the interest to describe games which lead to the this text ... there's a lot about prohibition, blasphemy etc ...

The passage about cards is astonishingly short, also the chess parts are small ... in contrast dice games (which had been the recognized "great enemy" in prohibitions) are mentioned much more.

The deciding great question is about the the "correct date" of the text. I've searched for a peste in the relevant time, and found for 1463 one documented in England and one for the German region, till now its relevance for Italy or Ferrara is not confirmed.
Generally we have, that the owner of the text (the Houghton library), who should have studied the object in detail, cause it should be an object of some worth, dates the text on 1475 - 1500 ... and that what is running through the internet inclusive our own documentation repeats the 1456 .. for unknown reasons.

Also I found this very old note at books.google.com

"Vi fu un Ugo Trotti ferrarese professor di Canoni nella universita di sua patria nel 1456 benche omesso dal Borsetti, com osserva il Sig. Cav. Tiraboschi, il quale scrisse de ludo et joco un trattato che serba mss. la bibliot. de' Min. Osserv. di Busseto."
Note: "sto. della litt. T. 6 P.2 lib. 2 caps 5 n. 28 ..." (?)

Memorie per la storia di Ferrara By Antonio Frizzi, p. 186
http://books.google.com/books?id=jFgOAA ... ti&f=false

I don't know, if this helps, it's from end of 18th century. But perhaps it's observable, how and when the (possible) error "1456" developed.

http://books.google.com/books?id=qNEOAA ... ti&f=false

The general impression researching "Ugo Trotti" is, that there is not much known about this man, who according a not readable snippet "married Lucia ..." and the snippet is closed. In Mantova around 1480 is a rich Trotti family, which controls the banking business of the local Jews (and gets the better part of the income), according an Ugo Calefini.

A life description would be nice. A date of the birth ....

hi Marco, hi Ross,

at the Folio 11 in the mentioned manuscript (same folio which has the year-number 1463) at the end of the same chapter (before the red Q) appears the name Ricardo followed by an i and then something, which might be possibly interpreted as a III (though could be IIII), resulting in the suspicion, that it speaks of Richard III. of England, reigning 1483-85 and then dying in a manner, that it was surely also in Italy told about it. I remember from my reading, that I've seen the same name at another position of the text, but can't remember in the moment, where.

The context of the text are "somehow" tournaments, the Latin word torneamenta shortened to torneamta.







If Richard III. could be confirmed, it should be obvious, that the text was not written before 1483 ... or had there reason to call him before Richard III ?

Hello Huck,
the "i" with a "minus" sign above likely is the abbreviation for "in". The following word is another abbreviation for a word ending with an "o": it could indeed be "IIIIo" i.e. "quarto" (fourth).
"& hoc affirmat Ricardus in quarto" "and Ricardus says this in (his) fourth (book)". I think Trotti is quoting some other jurist.

Marco

Hi, sorry to be getting to this thread late.

About the date -

The Busseto ms. reported by Tiraboschi is dated 1456, and appears to be an autograph of Trotti -
"Datus est per me editus libellus iste anno Domini nostri 1456" - This book is dated by me in the year of our Lord 1456.
http://books.google.com/books?id=wWULAA ... 22&f=false

Berti and Vitali (Le carte di corte: I tarocchi (1987 catalogue), p. 125, catalogue number 42, know three manuscripts. The one they cite is titled "De multiplici ludo, Ferrara, 1456; Biblioteca Ariostea, ms. 105 cc. 202". Ortalli seems to use the same ms., from the same library, but he calls it "ms. cl. I,185." I don't know what might account for the difference in cataloguing numbers.

Berti and Vitali also know one in Milan, "with corrections, which seems to be an autograph; a third copy was noted in Busseto (Tiraboschi).

They didn't know our copy, which must of course be dated after 1463. Since the one in Milan has corrections, they are perhaps Trotti's own, and it's possible he continued working on it for several "editions" - it could be that the Houghton copy is also a Trotti autograph.

This may be seen in Tiraboschi's entry, where he quotes part of the Busseto ms. on "Venatione" (hunting), referring to some edicts passed by Borso. In the Busseto quote, it is longer than the same passage in our ms., on folio 11v (right the bottom). So if the Houghton is still Trotti, it appears that he edited that part slightly. But the part about Triumphos seems to have been untouched, judging by its appearance in Ortalli and the 1987 catalogue.

hi Ross, hi Marco,

thanks, that looks more satisfying. What's your personal impression ... is it of worth to translate the text or parts of it to understand Italian "prohibition culture"?`

What I understood from the text ... it shows similarities in the juristic concept, which is mentioned by the author
F. L Hübsch, that it existed already for the time of Emperor Charles IV and even already for the time of his father King Johann der Blinde.

http://trionfi.com/0/p/95

Games with a dominant factor of skill were allowed, games with a dominant factor of luck are prohibited.
Playing cards were countted as skill games, dice games as luck games.

So I searched for a relation between Trotti text and this "unknown earlier text", but I found no reference, which looked interesting enough.

I think the distinction among games of skill, mixed skill and chance, and pure chance, is a juristic commonplace by this time. Antoninus of Florence makes the same points as Trotti at the same time, mid-50s - but he believes cards are more chance than skill - he doesn't mention Triumphs -, and hence to be prohibited (only to clerics? I'll have to check). Before cards were known, I think the game of tables or backgammon would be the pre-eminent "mixed" game (and chess with dice?), but many jurists and moralists I think hated grey areas, and preferred only the distinction between skill and chance.

Alfonso X's Book of Games (1280s) is arranged by these three categories - with Chess, Dice and Backgammon (IIRC) the three exemplary games.

hi,

I see the probably small chance, that Trotti referenced older texts and possibly even the source, which Hübsch saw and possibly based his comment on. Finding this text would change the our view on European playing card development in 14th century.
Hübsch's comment alone stays a weak argument- but if only one of his source texts could be found, his comment becomes more substantial.