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Re: The Hermit

Posted: 22 Nov 2020, 09:28
by Huck
I wrote: "The missing Prudentia in Tarot disguised possibly more as Fame or World and with that as the highest trump."

Firecatpickles wrote: "Why would we have Prudence (with a mirror), Fame and World, and Time in the Minchiate, though, if this were true?"

Hm ... how would you describe the following development:

Situation 1... A sort of Trionfi deck with 21 special cards
----------------------------
0-5: ... Trionfi cards ...
6: Temperance
7: Force
8: Justice
9-15: ... Trionfi cards ....
(16th-18th): ... Trionfi cards ...
(19th): World
(20th): Fame

Situation 2 ... a Minchiate deck with 41 cards
----------------------------
0-5: ... Trionfi cards ...
6: Temperance
7: Force
8: Justice
9-15: ... Trionfi cards ....
16-35: ... additional 20 Trionfi cards including a "17 Prudentia"
(36th-38th): ... Trionfi cards ...
(39th): World
(40th): Fame

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 22 Nov 2020, 10:05
by Huck
For the year 1444 we have the report from Florence, that 2 persons were accused and punished for playing with Trionfi cards.
http://naibi.net/A/424-GIGLIO444-Z.pdf
https://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=245161

For the year 1450 and December we have the declaration in Florence, that the Trionfi game was allowed.
http://trionfi.com/etx-trionfi-games-statutes#05

For the year 1456 we've in Ferrara a juristic text of Trotti, according which Trionfi should be considered a "game of skill" and not a "game of luck" and therefore Trionfi should be an allowed game.
http://trionfi.com/etx-trotti-ferrara-1456

The personal skill of players had with some security had something with their personal Prudentia. According the author Hübsch a similar definition of allowed and forbidden games was already used by emperor Charles IV in 14th century. This might have been the reason, why the virtue Prudentia was handled in a rather special way in the Trionfi decks.

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 22 Nov 2020, 11:33
by firecatpickles
Huck wrote: 22 Nov 2020, 09:28 I wrote: "The missing Prudentia in Tarot disguised possibly more as Fame or World and with that as the highest trump."

Firecatpickles wrote: "Why would we have Prudence (with a mirror), Fame and World, and Time in the Minchiate, though, if this were true?"

Hm ... how would you describe the following development:

Situation 1... A sort of Trionfi deck with 21 special cards
----------------------------
0-5: ... Trionfi cards ...
6: Temperance
7: Force
8: Justice
9-15: ... Trionfi cards ....
(16th-18th): ... Trionfi cards ...
(19th): World
(20th): Fame

Situation 2 ... a Minchiate deck with 41 cards
----------------------------
0-5: ... Trionfi cards ...
6: Temperance
7: Force
8: Justice
9-15: ... Trionfi cards ....
16-35: ... additional 20 Trionfi cards including a "17 Prudentia"
(36th-38th): ... Trionfi cards ...
(39th): World
(40th): Fame
The last five cards I've read being referred to as the "Aires", associated with higher order thinking, or a different set of virtues perhaps?

Time is often shown with antlers, maybe this is prudence associated with accumulation of wealth and not so much the personification of prudence.

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 22 Nov 2020, 14:36
by Renard
Huck,

What's that ?????
Image
It's definitely Fama.
We see her dominating the World, holding in one hand a scepter showing her superiority and in the other a sphere indicating her fragility (in any case it is thus in the representations of Fortuna); but not the trumpet which is his main sign of recognition, probably to avoid any confusion with the Angelo.
Only the Charles VI game explicitly makes her a Virtue (the black spider's web-halo that surrounds her head), which she is not really. In antiquity she was a minor divinity rather of the Gossip Girl genre, but the Middle Ages only retained the Good Fame.

So if it's Fama, it's not Prudentia, of which she does not wear any symbol (mirror, snake, compass, ...).

This is normal since they do not come from the same possible source of the Trionfi's trumps.

Fama comes from the eponymous suite of Petrarch where each allegory triumphed over the previous one :
- Love
- Chastity
- Death
- Fame
- Time
- Eternity.

Prudentia would have figured in a suite of Cardinal and Theological Virtues.

Were these suites originally in the same Trionfi game ? For what reason or by what chance were certain cards kept and others rejected from the archetypal suite of 21 trumps ? Debating it is a pleasure constantly renewed, but for the moment it is enough to note
- that only the game of Charles VI promotes Fama to the rank of Virtue,
- that this name was quickly dropped to become Il Mondo, probably for the same reasons that Father Time was downgraded to Gobbo,
- and that the absence of Prudentia made it possible to endow this old man with part of the attributes of this Fourth Virtue.

(PS: Excuse me, please, if my argument is sometimes too detailed ; it's not that I doubt the knowledge of my readers but it's my way of moving forward. Excuse my bad English too, Google not improving much.)

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 22 Nov 2020, 20:30
by Huck
Only rarely Fame is dressed with the polygonal halo.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cate ... ph_of_Fame
Image
Virtues in contrast have it very often. And when there are 3 cardinal virtues at one place with the specific halo, one should be sure, that the 4th figure with a polygonal halo is also a cardinal virtue.

Other Tarot researchers found it appropriate to call the card "World". Probably cause they were used to the condition, that Tarot cards included the card World, but not the card Prudentia. But the Charles VI. is a very old deck, we cannot rely on the condition, that it had the same cards as it was common in the later period.

Image

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 23 Nov 2020, 01:13
by mikeh
My speculation is that Prudence with mirror and snake was originally in the deck and in Ferrara 12th in the order, out of 16 before the 5 between Devil and Sun were added. So Temperance would be 6th, Fortitude 9th, and Justice 15th. Prudence fills the missing space at 12. Then the duke, having problems with traitors, put the Hanged Man, already associated with the number 12 (as in anti-pope John's famous poster) in its place (vaguely remembered in Imperiali's poem, where prudence. and not the hanged man per se, is mentioned between death and the old man), a change adopted everywhere except in the proto-Minchiate, if it existed then.

Now Prudence was conspicuous by its absence. As a result, the World's halo in Florence, although also used for Fame, also suggested a representative of Prudence's third face, not that it was "really" Prudence but that it represented the reward of Prudence, Fama. Time is a good representative of the second face of Prudence, namely Prudence in the present, represented by the hourglass and arrow, which acts with an eye to the future, represented by the crutches and stag (the longing for God, in the psalm) . Then it is necessary to identify a representative of the first face of Prudence. the past that Prudence takes account of (and which she looks at in her mirror, seeing behind her). My candidate for that is the Popess, with her book, and probably a cross-staff early on, both frequent accompaniments of Prudence in medieval imagery. So we have cards at the almost-beginning, middle, and almost-end of the sequence, corresponding to past, present, and future.

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 23 Nov 2020, 12:53
by Renard
Huck,

Superb representation of the Virtues. Thank you.


Image

I tried to guess the identity of the men in the front row, especially that of the old man with the white beard (haw, haw) sitting at Prudenza's feet.

After research, I came up with the following list:
- Isaiah (Prudenza)
- Solomon (Justicia)
- Peter (Fides)
- John the Presbyter (Caritas)
- James the Major (Spes)
- Samson (Fortitudo)

For the seventh, I have no answer. Probably an Old Testament prophet, but which one? If anyone knows ...

But this is not the most important.
In my research I leafed through the « Traité d'Iconographie chrétienne » (Treatise on Christian Iconography) by Mgr Barbier de Montault, which I recommend you to read.
https://livres-mystiques.com/partieTEXT ... ite_T1.pdf
https://livres-mystiques.com/partieTEXT ... ite_T2.pdf

And there I found confirmation of a hypothesis.
You asked me the question:
Image
What's that?

And I replied :

It's definitely Fama.
We see her dominating the World, holding in one hand a scepter showing her superiority and in the other a sphere indicating her fragility (in any case it is thus in the representations of Fortuna); but not the trumpet which is his main sign of recognition, probably to avoid any confusion with the Angelo.
Only the Charles VI game explicitly makes her a Virtue (the black spider's web-halo that surrounds her head), which she is not really. In antiquity she was a minor divinity rather of the Gossip Girl genre, but the Middle Ages only retained the Good Fame.


I now think I was wrong on two points.
The first is that Fama is not represented on this card as a Virtue (she does not appear in any list of moral or social Virtues that I have been able to consult) but as a Domination, another angelic creature, of the same rank in the celestial hierarchy.
Indeed in Volume II of the above-mentioned treatise, Book X (Angels and Demons), Chapter V, I read about them :
“In Milan, they have the scepter and the globe. "
I know the Charles VI is supposed to come from Ferrara, but yet this is exactly what we can see on the card.
The sphere that Fama holds in his left hand, and this is my second mistake, would therefore not be a fragile crystal ball but a golden globe indicating the extent of its power.

Therefore, i adopt for the moment the idea that the card called "The World" of the deck of Charles VI represents Fama, not as a Virtue but as a Domination. Therefore, she is not our fourth Virtue and, therefore, the place freed up by Prudentia remains to be taken.

Q. E. D.

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 23 Nov 2020, 19:38
by Huck
The author of the virtues-picture is Francesco Pesellino (ca. 1450, so somehow close to the of the earliest Florentine Trionfi decks). Perhaps you find with the name a hint for the presented heroes of the virtues.

You can think, what you want with this figure. Prudentia, World, Fama.

The idea, that the Charles VI is a deck from Ferrara, was skipped by some researchers around 2007. At that time the most old Trionfi deck notes were known from the Ferrarese context and the most old Trionfi cards came from Milan. Florence played only a minor role in the theories about the origin of the Trionfi decks (beside the personal opinion of Franco Pratesi, but Pratesi had retired from his playing card researches and wrote a grandious history book about the start of the game of Go playing in Europe then).
In 2007 the idea developed, that the Charles VI was produced in Florence instead. The polygonal halo observed for the virtues played a role in the change of the opinions.

End of 2011 the growing interest in Florence urged Franco to return to his playing card interests, which was especially the role of Florence in the development of the Tarot game. In a rather short time Franco wrote a lot of articles , which revolutionized the situation of early Trionfi card history. Since then Florence is the location with the most early Trionfi card documents. Around 2005 we could count around 35 documents for the first 25 years, after Pratesi's return the number was increased to above 100. Then Arnold Esch entered the discussion in 2013. He had guided an art project in Rome, in which the remaining custom registers of the city Rome during 15th century were controlled. He had listed in a relative short article Trionfi card and playing card imports via land transport. 107 Trionfi card notes became known by this for the period 1453-65, increasing the total number to more than 200 ... for the first 25 years, 1440-1465. In most cases the imports came from the North from the direction from Florence. Since then not much has happened with the list.

For the Charles VI a theory exist, that the original deck had only 16 special cards and the 16 cards were related to the 16 chess figures. A similar theory exists for the Cary Yale Tarocchi, which has 16 cards for each suit (10 numbers, 6 courts) and it is in the theory assumed, that trump suit also had 16 cards. Although there are many arguments, which relate Chess to Tarot, the both theories didn't found much acceptance ... .-)

Cary-Yale Tarocchi
Image
with a larger and readable version at ..
http://a-tarot.eu/pdf/cy-jpg.jpg

Charles VI Tarot
Image
with a larger and readable version at ..
http://a-tarot.eu/pdf/ch-jpg.jpg

In this theory it makes sense to use Prudentia as the meaning of the 4th card with polygonal halo in the Charles VI deck.

In the total context it should be observed, that the Michelino deck, made for Filippo Maria Visconti probably at some time between 1418-1425, also used 16 trumps, which were presented by 16 Greek/Roman gods. 16 Greek-Roman gods were also used by an extremely extended chess-poem explanation from Evrart de Conty in 1398. And Greek/Roman gods were used also n other (later) chess literature. The oldest larger work about playing cards by John of Rheinfelden used a scheme similar to the chess figure interpretation of the chess book author Cessolis to construct a 60-card deck with 5 courts and 10 number cards with professions (Cessolis had connected the chess pawns to professions).

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 24 Nov 2020, 10:48
by mikeh
Renard wrote,
now think I was wrong on two points.
The first is that Fama is not represented on this card as a Virtue (she does not appear in any list of moral or social Virtues that I have been able to consult) but as a Domination, another angelic creature, of the same rank in the celestial hierarchy.
Indeed in Volume II of the above-mentioned treatise, Book X (Angels and Demons), Chapter V, I read about them :
“In Milan, they have the scepter and the globe. "
I know the Charles VI is supposed to come from Ferrara, but yet this is exactly what we can see on the card.
The sphere that Fama holds in his left hand, and this is my second mistake, would therefore not be a fragile crystal ball but a golden globe indicating the extent of its power.

Therefore, i adopt for the moment the idea that the card called "The World" of the deck of Charles VI represents Fama, not as a Virtue but as a Domination. Therefore, she is not our fourth Virtue and, therefore, the place freed up by Prudentia remains to be taken.

Q. E. D.
Your argument is as follows:
Premise: Dominations have the scepter and the globe.
Premise: The lady on the Charles VI has the scepter and the globe.
Therefore: The lady on the Charles VI is a Domination.

This argument is of the form, A is a B, C is a B, therefore C is an A. That form is quite fallacious. It is perfectly appropriate that Dominations should get scepters and globe, because "domination" means "rule" and scepters and globes are symbolic of rule. But lots of figures, usually rulers, or at least "kings for a day", are shown with scepters and globes. It is like saying "Emperor Maximilian is shown with a scepter and globe. The Lady on the Charles VI has a scepter and globe. Therefore The lady on the Charles VI is Emperor Maximilian.

It takes more than a scepter and a globe to establish the identity of that lady. And perhaps I am unfair in assuming your "QED" implied a deductive argument. It is a question of finding enough qualities in the picture to narrow down the identification. On your side you have the fact that she is standing on a model of the cosmos, the earth with rings around it. She is rather far up, where you would expect some kind of angelic being to be. Not only that, the previous cards also represented particular spheres in the cosmos. In that respect, a Domination is in the right spot. And the title suggests the appropriateness of scepter and globe. But it would be nice to have a Ferrarese source, if you think the card is Ferrarese, or a Florentine one, in case it is Florentine, or at least something suggesting that the Milanese practice noted is generally followed. And what about Thrones and other types of angelic beings, like Divine Providence? How are they shown? And what is the particular function of this angelic being in relation to the card after it (if Florence) or before (if Ferrara), namely the Angel card?

Actually, I think we should deal not just with this card but its cognate in the "Alessandro Sforza", many of whose cards look very much like the Charles VI. Here they are side by side:

Image

As you can see, the octagonal halo is not all that essential, just a nice addition. The "Alessandro Sforza" may have a golden headpiece, or just blond hair; it is not quite clear.

One possible identification is with the guide in Boccaccio's Amorosa Visione, his predecessor poem to Petrarch's I Trionfi. Boccaccio was a rich source of imagery, at least in Florence. I quote (Ch. 1, lines 36-42):
…alzai gli occhi alla sua bionda testa
ornate di corona e più che ‘l sole
splendida e vaga, ed oltre mi parea
il bel vestir suo tinto di viole.
Ridente in vista, nella destra avea
un real scettro ed un bel pomo d’oro
chiuso nella sinestra sostenea.
English translation (Hollander et al):
.
..I raised my eyes to her blonde head
Adorned with a crown and more splendid
And fair than the sun, and her comely
Clothing seemed to be of a violet hue.
Smiling, she had in her right hand
A royal scepter, enclosed in her left
She held up a beautiful golden apple.
So who is she? We are not told in so many words, but she is some sort of guide not of this world, like Dante's Beatrice or Lucius's Isis in the Golden Ass (just then among the first printed books in Italy), but in Boccaccio beckoning the narrator away from scenes of earthly triumphs toward a narrow gate that leads to the heights, and to "Gloria", cognate to Fama. She is in that respect like Prudence, the highest of the cardinal virtues, the one leading them all toward the apprehension of duty, or Plato's Wisdom, directing the other virtues, even if she doesn't have Prudence's or Wisdom's attributes. It's OK to leave a little mystery and ambiguity.

Re: The Hermit

Posted: 24 Nov 2020, 16:21
by Huck
Alessandro Sforza Tarot / Temperance
Image


Charles VI Tarot / Temperance
Image


There are differences .....