Catholic wrote: What a nightmare!!! It means that we don't have a single deck showing anything of the Tarot de Marseille style for at least 150 years after it was created.

I think that's pretty much the situation. Of course, there is the Cary Sheet, showing something of the Tarot de Marseille style on several cards. But otherwise, it's the Noblet 150 years later.

Catholic wrote: I still think that of all candidates known to me (Aquarius, Virgo, Venus and Cassiopeia), the Nymph/Pleiades/Alcyone hypotheses fits better for the naked girl pouring water. But this is because the other candidates fail in at least one point: for do not appear naked, not being a girl or do not pour water.

I think a point in favour of a variation on Aquarius is that the other two celestial cards, the Sun and Moon, also bear zodiac like tableau (the crustacean on the moon, gemini on the sun) which suggest it as motif for these three cards in the Tarot de Marseille.

Hi Steve,

Yes, you can be right. But, as I said before, I don't search much between cards of the same deck. The whole copy and contributing thing makes, for me, unlikely that the Tarot de Marseille have much consistence intra-deck.

So even if the Cary Sheet author had Aquarius-Cancer-Gemini on his mind, the Tarot de Marseille has a girl pouring water. It seems that the Aquarius theme, was intentionally or not, abandoned. Aquarius is a boy. Also. Why Gemini on Sun? It should be Lion. And why Aquarius on the Star, of all constellations?

Bertrand wrote:
I don't think that pictures from the Bibliotheque Nationale can be copyright free, regarding the Chosson, I think the pictures from this specific copy of the deck are not copyright free at all neither.

Hi Bertrand. I was just repeating what Dennis Clay, the page author said on the site. But It is hard for me to understand on what criteria a card from XVIII century should be copyrighted. If seems completely arbitrary and wrong for anyone to claim it. The modern recreations, like the Fourier's, is a different ball game. There are contemporary artists involved. But for how long the Bibliotheque Nationale should have the copyrights of something that was created centuries ago and was once on public circulation before being put on the Bibliotheque?

robert wrote:
We have the Two Coins from the Sforza Castle cards, which seems very like a Tarot de Marseille card but we can not be certain, dated to 1499.

Robert, I am having big trouble researching the Sforza Castle cards on Internet. No one seems to show the two of coins. People also speak of several cards belonging of different decks. And, on top of all, there are those that date it around 1700, coming from the south of France, where the Tarot de Marseille was long established. Since the decks we have travel from Paris to south, it looks reasonable enough. The two of Coins could have a this date for other reasons or it could belong to other deck. It is hard for me to say anything without looking at all cards found, not only those two or three.

Are there any thread discussing the Sforza Castle cards here? Are they anywhere on the Internet? How sure are of the 1499 date for the two Major Arcana?

Happy Easter !!!!

Hello,

Catholic wrote:Hi Bertrand. I was just repeating what Dennis Clay, the page author said on the site.

I understood that don't worry.

But It is hard for me to understand on what criteria a card from XVIII century should be copyrighted.

in France at least, a picture of a copyrighted work is copyrighted.

But for how long the Bibliotheque Nationale should have the copyrights of something that was created centuries ago and was once on public circulation before being put on the Bibliotheque?

They don't. They have copyright (well here it's more an author's rights perspective here) on the picture taken : if you could access the original document and take your own picture, then you could give them away for free. The only problem is that you can't access the documents and they won't sell you pictures without a strict contract specifying in what context you could use them.
That's also why they try to forbid taking pictures in museums.

Bertrand

Hi Catholic,

There are a lot of cards from different decks in the Sforza Castle group. Basically, they were dumped in a well or toilet, can't remember which now, so there are bits and pieces and it's rather a mess. They are illustrated in one of the Kaplan books. Basically... a World card, and a Sun card are almost certainly Tarot de Marseille, but we don't know from when. Most of the cards we don't have a date for. There is a Two of Coins that looks very, very much like a Tarot de Marseille, and it has the date 1499. I think that's about all we can date with certainty, and many of the decks look much older. I'm occupied on an assignment at the moment, but perhaps someone else knows where there are some images, or can scan a couple pages from Kaplan.

I do have the Sun, World and a Knight of Batons

Bertrand wrote:
They don't. They have copyright (well here it's more an author's rights perspective here) on the picture taken : if you could access the original document and take your own picture, then you could give them away for free. The only problem is that you can't access the documents and they won't sell you pictures without a strict contract specifying in what context you could use them.

Lol. I understand. But it still seems cheating. I assume that the Bibliotheque Nationale is owned by the France Government and not by a private company. If so, the original cards belong to the French people. They forbid access of something that belong to the people and the intention behind it is to earn money from selling copyrighted pictures of it. It may be legal, but it is wrong.

At least, maybe 70 years from now, the copyright of the pictures will expire. I am all in favor of copyright laws, being books author myself (not about Tarot) but I don't want to forbid access to my books should anyone of the XXIII century think it is worth looking at them. (On the somehow likely event I will be long dead by then.lol)

Thank's for the explanation Bertrand.

Catholic wrote:If so, the original cards belong to the French people.

That's what I keep telling them but they won't let me in !

Bertrand wrote:

Catholic wrote:If so, the original cards belong to the French people.

That's what I keep telling them but they won't let me in !

Catholic wrote:And why Aquarius on the Star, of all constellations?

I don't know, it's a good question. I guess others have given attention to it (e.g. O'Neill). I just think the constellations of the Zodiac and the seven planets were good candidates to illustrate the concept of "the star(s)": they were well know for instance from the numberless astrological almanacs that were printed in Europe.



Do these two images look similar to you? The one on the left is Aquarius from one of those almanacs, posted by Pen at the beginning of this thread.
Could you please post some XV century example of the iconography of Alcyone and the Plaiades?

And, why the Pleiades on the Star, of all constellations?

Good question, if Kronos, the god of Rain, contributed to the idea of Aquarius (Saturn reigns in Aquarius)

There are indeed lots of Aquarius figures, though usually only with one jug.

Perhaps the idea of the milky way mutated the earlier Star pictures?

Andrea Vitali found this picture in the Palazzo del Te, Sala di Psyche.


http://www.letarot.it/page.aspx?id=129&lng=ENG


http://vascello-stelleperdute.forumfree.it/?t=45466991

Here it are two jugs and the figure looks female or at least like a hermaphroditus.


Actually more female. "Two jugs - two female breasts - milky way" might be the common association, and then we have the astronomical idea again. But I don't know the common interpretation of the big picture in the Palazzo del Te.

http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palazzo_Te
Palazzo del Te was build 1524-34 (I don't know about the paintings ?) and in Mantova and Mantova was ruled by the Gonzagas. One of the Gonzaga (Louis Gonzaga, * 1539) is assumed to have influenced French Tarot development. But the Tarot de Paris (assumed to be influenced by Louis Gonzaga in 1559) had an astronomer on the star card, a motif, which already was used by the d'Este c. 1475 in a period, when the Este had great interest in astronomy.

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