Tarot History Forum

Huck wrote: For 1437 we have ...

Simone di Ser Antonio Fazi (likely father of Antonio di Simone, who often worked for the silk dealers) sold 4 expensive decks for 20 Soldi each to the silk dealers at 1437-11-02. The note stands very isolated, as there are no records at all in 1433, 1434, 1435, 1436 and 1438 in the known account books of the silk dealers.

The note is isolated for silk dealers, but not in the larger context of Florence's relation to regulating card-playing, per Pratesi's research:

Borgo San Lorenzo....In 1428 it is regretted that a card game named "alla condennata" is becoming the fashion of the village and it is prohibited as dice games. In 1437 naibi are explicitly prohibited with the exception of the "standard" game of alla diritta e alla torta."
[Further on Pratesi adds, I believe relevant for the above incidence:]
"Here the best game is 'alla diritta o alla torta; the worst, and the most frequently named, is certainly the 'condennata'. http://trionfi.com/card-playing-laws-florence

Outside of the proscription against specific modes of card-playing, Borgo San Lorenzo is significant in being the largest town in the Medici homeland of the Mugello. From this it might be inferred an interest on the part of the Medici in controlling how their most loyal minions would relate to cards. And then of course we have to consider if there is any relationship between the 'isolated' production of an expensive deck in the 1430s (for whom? a significant enough of a recipient that the Medici would have taken an interest?) and the law passed in the same year; just a coincidence?

The most notable events in 1437 seemed to have happened late in the year - 18 September 1437, Pope Eugene pronounced the dissolution of the Council of Basel and summoned the fathers to Ferrara and 9 December 1437 Emperor Sigismund died.

Phaeded

Phaeded wrote:

Huck wrote: For 1437 we have ...

Simone di Ser Antonio Fazi (likely father of Antonio di Simone, who often worked for the silk dealers) sold 4 expensive decks for 20 Soldi each to the silk dealers at 1437-11-02. The note stands very isolated, as there are no records at all in 1433, 1434, 1435, 1436 and 1438 in the known account books of the silk dealers.

The note is isolated for silk dealers, but not in the larger context of Florence's relation to regulating card-playing, per Pratesi's research:

My note meant the context of the silk dealers and their observable activities and nothing else. It's a possibility, that the silk dealers weren't active with playing cards in 1433, 1434, 1435, 1436 and 1438. In 1433/34 a lot of things changed in Florence.
But it's easily possible, that the silk dealers also dealt with playing cards in this time, but didn't record these actions. It's very clear, that the actions weren't complete recorded. The aquire list isn't in concordance with the sales list.

Borgo San Lorenzo....In 1428 it is regretted that a card game named "alla condennata" is becoming the fashion of the village and it is prohibited as dice games. In 1437 naibi are explicitly prohibited with the exception of the "standard" game of alla diritta e alla torta."
[Further on Pratesi adds, I believe relevant for the above incidence:]
"Here the best game is 'alla diritta o alla torta; the worst, and the most frequently named, is certainly the 'condennata'. http://trionfi.com/card-playing-laws-florence

Outside of the proscription against specific modes of card-playing, Borgo San Lorenzo is significant in being the largest town in the Medici homeland of the Mugello. From this it might be inferred an interest on the part of the Medici in controlling how their most loyal minions would relate to cards. And then of course we have to consider if there is any relationship between the 'isolated' production of an expensive deck in the 1430s (for whom? a significant enough of a recipient that the Medici would have taken an interest?) and the law passed in the same year; just a coincidence?

The most notable events in 1437 seemed to have happened late in the year - 18 September 1437, Pope Eugene pronounced the dissolution of the Council of Basel and summoned the fathers to Ferrara and 9 December 1437 Emperor Sigismund died.

Phaeded

As I understood the article (an old article, when Franco definitely didn't know as much as he did later), the rules in the different Tuscany cities could have been different at the same time. The cities made their internal laws, reacting on local problems. That makes it difficult to conclude anything from this collection.

Condannato was usually a name for a dice game, and card games - if prohibited - had smaller fines than dice games. If a card game was named "condannato" it likely had a big luck factor.
The name alla condennato appears 1693 in a dictionary and is then played with cards.

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Mikeh, Steve,
thanks for the Fiorini info.

Huck wrote: http://trionfi.com/parisina-playing-cards
based on the report of Gherardo Ortalli in Ludica 1996

Card history knows Parisina from 3 documents, which means, that most of the early card documents of Ferrara are related to Parisina.
1422: In the oldest Ferrarese card document Parisina is not mentioned.
1423: Marchesa Parisina Malatesti orders, that the painter Giovanni dalla Gabella should be paid 40 gold ducats for an extreme valuable pack of cards.
1423: October, Parisina wrote to Florence to get "a pack of VIII imperadori cards made with fine gold". The costs are 7 florins plus some expenses for bringing them to Ferrara. It is the first appearance of the name "Imperatori" as a card deck, the "8" associates, that these are additional cards.
1424: 18th of September, Parisina wrote from the Portomaggiore residence to Ferrara asking for two packs "cartiselle de quelle de docena", worth around 4 or 5 soldi per pack (relatively cheap). 3 days later she wrote again and notes, that she had received the two packs "sent to be used by our girls", probably referring to her daughters (both ca. 5 years old).

So we have the court of Ferrara under Niccolò III d'Este providing decks for girls in 1423 and then something 'similar' (XIIII figure depinte in carta de bambaxo) in 1441 to 15 year old Bianca Maria Visconti.

Again, my reasoning for no mention of the word 'trionfi' on 1/1/1441, as we do a year or so later in Ferrara (para de chartexele da trionffi), is that the additional suit of trumps was novel (born in Florence) and had not taken on a universal name yet. The diverse range of subjects making up the trumps could not be easily summed up by one word, as in 'imperatori', yet in both cases it was still important to call out the number (i.e., the 1423 reference to the same - paro de carte da VIII imperadori), therefore the generic word 'figure' should not be considered all that odd, given the diverse subjects. Now if there was an older reference to trionfi establishing a connection to a new suit of trumps and long-term use of said word...but one hasn't been found, just one three and a half months earlier than Bianca's visit to Ferrara (16 Sept. 1440 - Giusti's un paio di naibi a trionfi).

Huck wrote,

Mikeh, Steve,
thanks for the Fiorini info.

You're welcome. I have translated the whole article, with links to the original Italian, at the very end of my dal Ponte/Rothschild blog, along with Bellosi, original and translation, 1985. See http://rothschildcards.blogspot.com/, or specifically, http://rothschildcards.blogspot.com/201 ... orini.html.

Frieze from the Alhambra Palace, Granada, with Adarga (Spanish/Moor bilobial shield)



A Nasrid Knight with Adarga



At the crucifixion!



15th century Fresco, Granada

And on the way to the crucifixion:



Another Nasrid Knight



Soldiers with Adargas at the resurrection:

Alfonso the Magnanimous, putting Muslim knights to flight,Book of Hours,c1440

and spanish playing cards



Alfonso the Magnanimous defeats the infidels

F.78r of the Book of Hours of Alfonso of Aragon.
MS28962 manuscript in the British Library.

The book was commissioned in 1436 by Alfonso confessor, Cardinal Juan de Casanova, the workshop Crespi Domingo Valencia. After various vicissitudes the book arrived in Naples in 1447. The text is in Latin, written in Gothic letters.
Alfonso never himself was in such a battle, the scene is after the Battle of Puigi, at which it was said St George, the Patron Saint of Aragon, came to give a hand:

http://www.napoliaragonese.it/alfonso-i ... -infedeli/

Battle of Puig - Altar of St. George - Jerica



Saint George: Patron Saint of Aragon
St George Altarpiece, Valencia, c.1400


http://www.vam.ac.uk/blog/news-learning ... ncia-c1400

Saint George and the Adarga shielD (on a defeated saracen) suggests perhaps an Aragonese influence?

As well as the similarities between the Book of Hours Grenadien/Saracen of the backward glance, bearded face, adarga with two tassles note too both have wound on rear hump of the horse:

Eitelberger ...
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=1143#p18472
... notes something, which I interpreted once as Eitelberger's opinion, that Leopoldo Cicognara sold the Rothschild cards to Durazzo. I saw this opinion nowhere else.



Possibly Eitelberger spoke of other Trionfi cards, which went from Cicognara to Durazzo. Or Eitelberger had just an error, or the whole had other confusing details.

Durazzo got the Rothschild cards before 1794. If Cicognara had really his hands in this (he was quite young then) he might have gotten the cards in Naples or Sicily (he had journeys to this places in his youth).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopoldo_Cicognara

Cicognara resided for some years at Rome, where he devoted himself to painting and the study of antiquities and galleries; later he visited Naples and Sicily, and published at Palermo one of his first works, a poem of no merit. After exploring the island, he betook himself to Florence, Milan, Bologna and Venice, acquiring a complete archaeological knowledge of these and other cities.

The strange shields of the Rothschild cards let one think of Aragon influence. Giovanni dal Ponte has worked also in Rome (I don't know details), near enough to Naples.

****************

Added: I would be nice to know, when Giovanni dal Ponte had been in Rome. Alfonso arranged mid 1423 a "peaceful" Trionfo (intended to celebrate the political unity between him and Jeanne II of Naples; a good opportunity for a triumphal deck), which became then reason for a new war 2 weeks later.
Jeanne II, soon later, declared Louis of Anjou to her heir instead.