This post is in reply to Huck's last post, after which I had two that didn't respond to his points (as he posted while I was writing the first post). Huck wrote,

I don't understand Dummett and his 80 years. I assume, 1750-1770 is your typo, you mean 1650-1670.

But the Tarot de Paris is given as c. 1600 by others and 1559 by myself. And the Tarot of Rouen (Leber Tarocchi) has titles at the cards. Well, these are not the common Tarot titles. The Sola Busca has titles, also not the common Tarot titles.

Yes, my typo. The 80 years is from 1572 to 1650. Dummett says," We know from the order of 1572 that the game was already practiced in Switzerland by German speakers; but the practice of writing the names on the cards of the triumphs originated probably eighty years later." If the Tarot de Paris is 1559, then it is the only deck for 100 years that has written titles that are the conventional ones. Dummett does mention the Rouen and Sola-Busca; he doesn't count them because they are unconventional. I agree that a lot could happen between 1572, or earlier, and the first known decks with French standard titles on them in German speaking areas.

Huck wrote,

Johann Fischart, which you call here profanly the "translator of Garantua's list", was a German language giant, something like a 16th century James Joyce. He wrote mainly in the 1570s, not 1590. 1591 he was dead. He didn't really translate Rabelais, but exaggerated Rabelais.

This seemed to be something I could summarize, then quote directly if there was an issue. The descriptor "translator" is Dummett's. What he says is:

La prima edizione della Geschichtklitterung di Johann der Tàufer Fischart, traduttore tedesco di Rabelais, apparve a Strasburgo nel 1575; la seconda edizione uscì nel 1582 e la terza, in versione ampliata, nel 1590, anno della morte di Fischart. Fischart ampliò moltissimo la lista rabelaisiana dei giochi di Gar-[end of 381]gantua, non solo nella prima edizione, ma ancor di più nella terza; deve aver faticato enormemente per mettere insieme una lista così dettagliata di giochi 19. Nonostante ciò, egli tralasciò il gioco dei Tarocchi che Rabelais aveva incluso. È impensabile che avrebbe potuto farlo se a quel tempo il gioco fosse stato noto in Alsazia, la via più ovvia per cui esso poteva giungere dalla Francia alla Germania.

(A very convincing argument suggests that the game was still unknown in Germany in 1600. The Geschichtklitterung, first edition, of Johann der Täufer Fischart, German translator of Rabelais, appeared in Strasbourg in 1575; the second edition came out in 1582 and the third, extended version, in 1590, the year of Fischart's death. Fischart greatly expanded the list of Rabelaisian games in Gargantua, not only in the first edition, but even more so in the third; he must have greatly struggled to put together a list of games (19) so detailed. Despite this, he left out the game of Tarot that Rabelais had included. It is unthinkable that he could do it if at that time the game had been known in Alsace, the most obvious way that it could come from France to Germany.
________________
19. A modern reprint of the third edition of the Geschicktklitterung of Johann der Täufer Friedrich Fischart was published in Dusseldorf in 1963, edited by Ute Nyssen. The chapter on games is XXV, pp. 238-51 in the edition of 1963, and the game list is on pages 239-49.)

Huck wrote,

It's true, that he didn't translate Tarau with Tarot or Tarocchi or similar. But this does't mean, that he didn't know Tarocchi cards.
Actually it seems, that he knew them and that he even knew about their prohibition in Geneve, and that already in the 1570s (well, we know of Troggen prohibitions in Geneve, but not as early as 1570). But we know already of difficulties between Calvin and a playing card producer already in the 1540s.
I gave my position here, 2 years ago:
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=837&p=11911&hilit=fischart#p11911

Actually, Dummett does not say that Fischart didn't know about Tarot. He must have, if he'd read Rabelais and, as you say, been in Italy, etc. Dummett just says it's unthinkable that he would not include a mention of "tarau" of some sort it if the game was known then in Alsace. Under what conditions would he have left it out? I can think of three. One, that it was poorly known. Two, he was afraid of what the censor might say. Dummett never considers the possibility of censorship. But would a censor really look that closely at a list of games? Or three, it was too easy just to list it, when he could have some fun instead. Dummett rarely if ever sees "hidden" meanings, i.e. meanings not spelled out explicitly, in anything, not even jokes. In that context you quote Fischart's "Tonneau, der kein Sternen in der Karten will zulassen: sind doch schöne Farben drin, inn welcher, wann einer gekleidet geht, glück hat unnd Schätz findet, wie D.Thoman von Filtzbach im Planetenbuch schreibt" [Barrel, which no stars in the card will allow: beautiful colors are still there, in which, when one is dressed [in them?], gives happiness and esteem, as Dr. Thoman von Filtzbach writes in his Planetbook] and so on (in your post that you link to). I suppose that could be meant to refer obliquely to the tarot cards (and the idea is indeed sustained for several more lines) and perhaps someone with a name similar to "Fitzbach" (e.g. Fischart). But as it stands, not knowing whether people knew these cards, especially the one with the barrel (as opposed to other cards with barrels, which you say there were) it's hard to say. It's an interesting idea. Thanks for calling attention to your other post.

Huck wrote, about my remark that Depaulis didn't mention Honl:

Wrong. Depaulis notes Honl in his IPCS article at page 69-70 with more than a half page and considerable research.

Thanks. I must have been half asleep when I looked for Honl. I see indeed on Depaulis p. 70 that Honl saw a reference to "Triumphus hispanicus" along with a description of the four suits and the word "Triumphspiel" and thought it was tarot. I know about Spanish Triumphs from Andrea Vitali's essay on the four suits. It is a game with the regular deck where a card is turned over to determine trumps; Depaulis says it was described in a book published in Basel in 1539. Good. One less red herring.

Huck wrote,

The academy 1659 and the King's physian in 1655 might have easily taken Lorraine as a German region, when they talked of Tarot in Germany.

Good point. Lorraine is even better than Alsace, because there is some actual evidence. The Academy would have known that Alsace had been promised France in 1648 and therefore, in their eyes, would have never been German, even though it had been separate from France for centuries. Actually, the Academy quote doesn't say that tarot was played in Germany. It says that "les Allemands" ordinarily do not play at any other game. Perhaps the Academy considered Alsatians to be Germans living in France.

Depaulis (p. 71) points out that Pierre Borel, 1655, uses the same language, in the supplement on "ancient French" to his dictionary: "THAURAVTS and tarots. jeu de cartes des Allemends". Borel was from Castres, in Languedoc, and never went further than Paris, Depaulis tells us. But he got that idea from somewhere.

I did not follow Depaulis's point about German dictionaries. That they didn't know of an identifiably German word for tarot in the 17th century doesn't mean they didn't play the game and have a word for it. The visual encyclopedia by Comenius that he cites thinks that the French word for tarot is "tarocs". Likewise the 1711 German-French dictionary from Leipzig has "TARAUX. Deutsches oder Welsches cartes." Some Germans, at least--of the social circle of writers of dictionaries--might have used the French word or what they thought was the French word for the game, just as they used cards with French titles but not French suits. Dictionaries tend to be conservative and copy each other. So that taraux was thought of by Germans as German is unsettling. The 1740 Frankfurt dictionary has "TAROTS. triplix-carte, auch auch eine Deutsche oder Italienische carte." Here they think of tarot as German or Italian. So they know where the the suits come from, not France, even though they have only the French word. Depaulis only looked in French-German dictionaries. I wonder what the German-only dictionaries said. Do you know, Huck?

However Depaulis's failure to find literary references in German books of the early 1700s in places one would expect to find them, where numerous card games are described, does suggest that by then, if tarot had ever been played in Germany, it was largely forgotten. Tarot, with its Catholic roots and fearful images, seems to me the kind of game that could easily be a casualty of inter-religious warfare, and there was all too much of that in 17th century Germany. For the same reason, documentation before the 17th century will also be hard to come by, because of so much destruction.

Mikeh,
Wow - need to go back and reread through your lengthy excerpt translations (thanks!), but a few comments from your earlier notes:

Here I ask, which cities in Italy had the closest connection with Germany in the first half of the 15th century? Milan, Mantua, and Modena (and hence Ferrara) had court connections.

You are forgetting the 1441 Venice law limiting German imports so that the local card trade could flourish. 1441 was of course the same year of the Sforza-Bianca wedding - as I have written elsewhere, that couple was feted in Venice for an extended stay there after their wedding and so it is plausible to connect the Venetian legislation and the CY deck if the latter can be connected to that wedding. Essentially Venice and Visconti were pitted against one another for Sforza's services; Venice won out and even had to help protect Sforza's dowry city of Cremona from his father-in-law Visconti's invasion. An elaborate deck featuring Visconti and Sforza stemma to cement that relationship would have mattered to Venice, if nothing else as propaganda that had to be countered. I see the same propaganda on the reverse of Filippo's 1440 Pisanello medal.

Finally, on the disputed CY white cross on red background pennant on the Love/Wedding card's tent: the case for Pavia is strong because before he assumed the dukedom Filippo was Count of Pavia (thus Pavia was a hierarchal place of succession to the dukedom); in marrying off his daughter that bigger dowry, implicit in the marriage, was Pavia/Milan. This promise, however duplicitous, was how Filippo sought to win Sforza over for good. Of course Sforza had no ducal succession document (which did not stop him from forging a Filippo will at all events in 1448), only the marriage to Filppo's only child (which is why she is featured in the later PMB - the armored woman on the chariot is a reference to her renowned defense of Cremona, without Sforza, against Venice, IMO). It is of interest in light of this hypothesis that the first city Sforza took for his own when employed by the Ambrosian Republic was Pavia, the "crown-prince" university city to Milan. The Republic simply missed that implication since Sforza was under contract with them. And it is likely there, the primary ducal palace in Pavia, that the Marziano deck was found in 1449 (the palaces in Milan were sacked by Republican mobs). That discovery in turn spurring the creation of the novel PMB deck.

Phaeded

mikeh wrote: If the Tarot de Paris is 1559, then it is the only deck for 100 years that has written titles that are the conventional ones.

Well, one should say, "then it is the only deck for 100 years that has written titles that are the conventional ones, that we know of".
There's a big difference between that, what we know of and that, what really had been there.

Dummett does mention the Rouen and Sola-Busca; he doesn't count them because they are unconventional. I agree that a lot could happen between 1572, or earlier, and the first known decks with French standard titles on them in German speaking areas.

The Hofämterspiel (1455) also had names for the cards. Likely there was the natural rule, that, if the presented objects were "unusual", that they got titles. If they were common, so, that enough persons recognized them immediately, it wasn't necessary to give the names.

Fischart etc.
The question, which neither Dummett nor Depaulis don't ask, is, why didn't the Germans take Tarocchi games? They assume, that they didn't know it. That's not plausible. There was enough traffic between Germany and Italy, pilgrims, students, soldiers, business men, persons of the church.
The simple reason might have been, that they had enough creative objects on playing cards in Germany, the eye wasn't especially surprized, if it detected Italian Tarocchi playing cards. Germans reacted on the Mantegna Tarocchi figures, which became very popular, cause these presented "high humanism", which they hadn't. They didn't react on "low humanism", as presented by Tarocchi cards. Some Tarocchi scenes appear modified in the Ship of Fools, perhaps they were amused, but that's all. They had an own playing card culture and weren't interested to exchange this.
This doesn't mean, that they didn't get some imports ... even, when it is difficult to prove that.

I gathered some literature with "Welsch Karten", which means in old German mostly "italienische Karten" or "(playing) cards from Italy".
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=836&p=11891&hilit=welsch#p11891
Naturally there is no guaantee, that these were Tarocchi cards. But in some cases they might have been Tarocchi cards.

Generally there has to be stated, hat Fischart had an overboarding fantasy. If all his games were really "played games", might be doubted. He just made a fun with this list and with other things, too, and also with Rabelais and his translation.

Huck wrote,

The academy 1659 and the King's physian in 1655 might have easily taken Lorraine as a German region, when they talked of Tarot in Germany.

Good point. Lorraine is even better than Alsace, because there is some actual evidence. The Academy would have known that Alsace had been promised France in 1648 and therefore, in their eyes, would have never been German, even though it had been separate from France for centuries. Actually, the Academy quote doesn't say that tarot was played in Germany. It says that "les Allemands" ordinarily do not play at any other game. Perhaps the Academy considered Alsatians to be Germans living in France.

Actually I think, that even Louis Gonzaga from Mantova (duke of Nevers in France), from whom I believe, that he influenced the Tarot de Paris, was possibly considered a "German", either by marriage or even by birth.

I did not follow Depaulis's point about German dictionaries. That they didn't know of an identifiably German word for tarot in the 17th century doesn't mean they didn't play the game and have a word for it. The visual encyclopedia by Comenius that he cites thinks that the French word for tarot is "tarocs". Likewise the 1711 German-French dictionary from Leipzig has "TARAUX. Deutsches oder Welsches cartes." Some Germans, at least--of the social circle of writers of dictionaries--might have used the French word or what they thought was the French word for the game, just as they used cards with French titles but not French suits. Dictionaries tend to be conservative and copy each other. So that taraux was thought of by Germans as German is unsettling. The 1740 Frankfurt dictionary has "TAROTS. triplix-carte, auch auch eine Deutsche oder Italienische carte." Here they think of tarot as German or Italian. So they know where the the suits come from, not France, even though they have only the French word. Depaulis only looked in French-German dictionaries. I wonder what the German-only dictionaries said. Do you know, Huck?

Generally I think, that Depaulis' article is VERY GOOD and very informative. I learned a lot from it. His conclusion on the base of his material is justified, but meets not naturally the correct reality. Generally we haven't enough material to make "big final conclusions", and its a question, if we can improve the situation.

Phaeded: I'm not against the Pavia interpretation of the cross. I just think that its placement might refer back to something else, a Savoy-Visconti wedding, as so many earlier commentators thought. There is no need, once we have gotten a satisfactory explanation, to insist that there can't be others that are also valid. Also, a previous card commemorating Filippo's wedding is consistent with Dummett's dating of the invention of the tarot to c. 1428 Milan. I can't see that the Giusti note affects that. He had put the tarot spreading to Bologna by 1435, and the manufacture of inexpensive decks at 1440. The Giusti note just makes the spread to Florence earlier than he thought. And why shouldn't it be? If it spreads to Bologna from Ferrara or Milan, why seven more years to get to Florence? It's not far from one to the other, and both are republics with similar interests. Or why not skip Bologna and go directly to Florence with the condottiere, as I suggested?

As far as connections to Germany and the restrictions against imports in Venice. I also wrote, in the same paragraph,

There were, to be sure, connections via the printing of cards, both in Germany and by Germans moved south. But they normally printed whatever the local market wanted.

I was thinking specifically of Venice. The question I was dealing with was, where might the idea of having females in all three ranks have come from? I was proposing Germany north of Milan. I was proposing that Milan did not distance itself socially anad culturally from Germany in the way that Florence, and now Venice, did.

There were also connections the other way, in the courts and among artists. I see tarot subjects in numerous Bosch paintings. Bosch is said to have gone to Venice in the 1480s. He may have sold some paintings there, the ones in the Doge's palace now. Hungary was particularly connected with Ferrara; painters went back and forth, and Ippolite d'Este received his "golden triumphs" there, sent by his mother (for the letter, see http://www.associazioneletarot.it/page.aspx?id=453#, newly translated). And how did the "Budapest" cards get to Budapest? Also, a Milanese princess went north to Innsbruck. Surely she would have had the tarot to help her survive the Innsbruck winters. And another to Poland. German soldiers came south as part of the League of Cambrai, 1508-1516. Charles V took over Milan, 1521, and then much of Italy; although the troops were mainly Spanish, surely there were Germans, too. German troops, I hear, visited Rome in 1527 with sacks and brought back trinkets, those they couldn't sell for a good price to Italians on their way home. One Italian writer even thought that "tarocchi" was a "barbarian", i.e. German, word (http://www.associazioneletarot.it/page.aspx?id=263#). I expect that the game was played by Italophiles in Germany, even if the cards weren't worth saving. But the game apparently didn't catch on among the masses; too much competition, as Huck says.

Note: an hour after first posting, I expanded the first paragraph somewhat.

I want to enlarge the discussion of why the Pope/Popess were dropped to include western France and Flanders during the 17th and 18th centuries.

In the 17th century, Dummett reports (in Chapter 15), there are more impositions of taxes in Rouen and Lyon, more protests, more cancellations, and repetitions of the cycle. With the impositions, more card makers go to a warmer welcome in Turin (Piedmont) and Chambery (Savoy), as well as Switzerland and Besancon. When taxes are lifted, some card makers return.

In France in this century, tarot production spread to Marseille, Toulon, Nancy, Marseilles (all p 384), and Bordeaux (1669, p. 385), as well as continuing in Lyon, Paris, Toulouse, and Rouen (p. 384). He estimates, based on d'Allemagne, "a million or so" tarot packs produced in France in the 17th century. Dummett writes (p. 374):

In 1622 the Jesuit Francois Garrasse wrote that in France the game of Tarot was more popular than chess.

Here is Dummett's overview of tarot production and practice in France up to the end of the 18th century (p. 385f). It has one observation that is puzzling to me:

Come abbiamo già osservato, nel XVI secolo Lione era il centro principale dell’influenza culturale italiana in Francia; il gioco dei Tarocchi pare essere stato praticato senza soluzione di continuità nella parte orientale, del paese e nelle zone limitrofe dalla sua prima introduzione fino ai giorni nostri.

Nel XVI secolo, tuttavia, era praticato in un’area molto più vasta, anzi, probabilmente in tutta la Francia. Abbiamo visto che mazzi di tarocchi venivano fabbricati, dal XVI secolo in poi, a Rouen e Parigi e, dal 1669, anche a Bordeaux. Le frequenti menzioni di giochi dei Tarocchi da parte di Claude Gauchet sono una prova evidente del fatto che erano ben noti nell’area parigina alla fine del XVI secolo: Gauchet (1540-c.1622 ), nato a Dammartin o Dampmartin, 35 km. a nord-est di Parigi, trascorse la maggior parte della sua vita lì e a Senlis e i suoi primi anni alle corti di Carlo IX ed "Enrico IH; pare che la località più lontana da Parigi da lui visitata sia stata Bayeux in Normandia, dove fu arcidiacono per qualche tempo. Nella stia annotazione già citata sulla popolarità del gioco in Francia, Francois Garasse non specifica a quale regione faccia riferimento. Ci sono quindi tutti i motivi per supporre che prima del XVIH secolo il gioco dei Tarocchi fosse praticato in tutta la Francia, sicuramente in molti modi diversi.

Dopo il 1700, tuttavia, sembra essersi estinto dovunque, tranne nella parte orientale del paese, ed essersi nuovamente diffuso in tutta la Francia solo dopo la Seconda Guerra Mondiale. La Maison académique fu riedita più volte, a intervalli di soli pochi anni. Il resoconto del gioco dei Taros fu ristampato in tutte queste edizioni fino al 1702. Ci fu poi un lungo intervallo; quando la pubblicazione riprese con 1’Academic unìverseìle desjeux del 1718, il gioco dei Tarocchi era stato eliminato. I libri dì carte da gioco erano prodotti principalmente per il pubblico parigino alla moda; l’ovvia deduzione è che a quella data avesse perso interesse al gioco. L’ipotesi trova valida conferma nel fatto che il curatore dell’edizione del 1726 di Les facétieuses nuits di Giovanni Francesco Straparola, tradotte da Jean Louveau e da Pierre Larivey Champenois, che aggiunse materiale suo, avvertì la necessità di glossare: «il gioco dei Tarocchi», risposta all’indovinello di Champenois, con: «gioco di carte or-[end of 385] mai obsoleto» 13. Questo accadeva in un’epoca in cui grandi quantità di mazzi di tarocchi venivano prodotti a Marsiglia e in altri centri e il gioco stava per entrare nella sua fase di maggior popolarità, il periodo compreso fra il 1750 e il 1850; ma a Parigi era obsoleto. Analogamente, Court de Gébelin dichiarò, nel Volume Vili del suo capolavoro, che il gioco era «sconosciuto a Parigi», e spiegò così questo fenomeno:

Se non ha raggiunto Parigi, la causa deve essere ricercata nel carattere bizzarro dei suoi disegni e nel numero delle carte, che non sono tali a soddisfare la natura vivace delle dame francesi 14.

Egli si imbattè per la prima volta nel gioco quando lo vide praticato da un gruppo di dame svizzere che, presumibilmente, egli riteneva meno vivaci.

(As we have already noted, in the sixteenth century Lyon was the center of the main Italian cultural influence in France; the game of Tarot seems to have been practiced seamlessly in the eastern part of the country and neighboring areas since its first introduction to the present day.

In the sixteenth century, however, it was practiced in a much wider area, in fact, probably in the whole of France. We have seen that Tarot decks were manufactured, from the sixteenth century onwards, in Rouen and Paris and, from 1669, also in Bordeaux. The frequent mentions of Tarot games by Claude Gauchet are a clear proof of the fact that they were well-known in Paris at the end of the sixteenth century: Gauchet (1540-c. 1622), Born in Dammartin or Dampmartin, 35 km away. northeast of Paris, he spent most of his life there and Senlis, and his early years at the courts of Charles IX and Henry IIII; it seems that the location farthest from Paris he visited was Bayeux in Normandy, where he was archdeacon for some time. Annotating the aforementioned popularity of the game in France, Francois Garasse did not specify tp which region he referred. These are all grounds to suppose that before the XVIIIth century the game of Tarot was practiced throughout France, certainly in many different ways.

After 1700, however, it seems to have been extinct everywhere except in the eastern part of the country, and to have once again spread throughout France just after the Second World War. La Maison académique was reprinted several times, at intervals of just a few years. The account of the game of Taros was reprinted in all of these issues until 1702. Then there was a long interval; when publication resumed with l'Academie unìverselle des jeux of 1718, the game of Tarot had been eliminated. Books of playing cards were produced mainly for the fashionable Parisian public; the obvious inference is that at that time it had lost interest in the game. The validity of the hypothesis is confirmed by the fact that the editor of the 1726 Les nuits facétieuses of Giovanni Francesco Straparola, translated by Jean Louveau and Pierre Larivey Champenois, who added his own material, felt the need to gloss "the game of Tarot " answer to the riddle of Champenois, with "game of cards by now [end of 385] obsolete" 13. This happened at a time when large quantities of Tarot decks were produced in Marseilles and in other centers, and the game was about to enter its period of greatest popularity, the period between 1750 and 1850; but in Paris it was obsolete. Similarly, Court de Gébelin declared, in Volume VIII of his masterpiece, that the game was "unknown in Paris," and explained that this phenomenon:

If it did not reach Paris, the cause must be sought in the bizarre nature of its designs and the number of cards, which are not such as to satisfy the lively nature of French ladies.

He came across it for the first time in the game when he saw it practiced by a group of Swiss ladies who, presumably, he believed less lively.
_______________
13 « Sorte de jeu de cartes aujourd’hui hors d'usage»: Night VIII, story 7.
14 C. de Gébelin, Le Monde primitif, Vol VIII, Paris, 1781, pp. 365, 380.

But oddly enough, Dummett has advanced a similar explanation for why the game of tarot died out in much of France in the 18th century: The lively ladies of France and their male companions, in need of new stimulation, "lost interest" in the game. Although stubbornly tenacious elsewhere, in western France the game is the victim of fickle fashion!

A HYPOTHESIS

For myself, I can't believe that people in western France were any more fickle than the people of Ferrara, where the game also quickly became extinct, just when it came under direct Papal rule. That is, I suspect that the threat of sanctions was placed on this game, by either Church or State or both. This was the time, just after the Evocation of the Edict of Nantes, when the Protestants had left or been forcibly converted, and his Most Catholic Majesty was clamping down on challenges to authority. But rather than taking away the Pope and Popess from a population already familiar with these personages, someone decided to get rid of the game entirely: not in all of France, but only in its western part. Yes, that's very strange. But I can't believe, without more investigation, that everyone just lost interest, when that didn't happen elsewhere. Perhaps someone else knows more about this.

As further evidence for my hypothesis, I point to neighboring Belgium (the Southern Netherlands, it was first called, then the Austrian), where in the 18th century there were numerous card makers. It was of a variety much like the non-Tarot de Marseille of western France, to the extent we know it from the Anonymous Parisian and the Vieville, except that, without exception (per Dummett), the Pope and Popess were replaced. I detect here not the free choice of an exceptionally conformist populace, but the same Hapsburg policy evidenced in Constanz, except that instead of Juno and Jupiter we see Captain Fracasse and Bacchus. This seems to me is a case of Catholic rulers--not Louis XIV, who apparently thought less of the game or had a firmer grip on his country--from outside, in this case Spain and/or Austria, imposing themselves upon a largely Catholic population in a country with a history of Protestantism.

It is sometimes argued that Flemish decks were only for export, and that tarot was not played in that country. It is true, Dummett says, that there are no documents about tarot games in Flanders, and it is possible that the decks were produced for Switzerland (altough if I recollect they had their own producers), and that the "cartes de suisse" label found on Flemish packs originated from that fact (and not, as we might think, that the style had been associated with Switzerland). All the same, Dummett concludes (p. 388):

. Ma è più plausìbile supporre che nelle Fiandre si giocasse ai Tarocchi in una maniera andata perduta — una maniera tanto diversa dai modi di giocare degli altri paesi quanto diverse erano le carte da gioco.

(But it is more plausible to suppose that in Flanders the Tarot was being played in a manner that is lost - a way as different from the ways of playing in other countries as its playing cards were different.)

I totally agree. But why there and not in France in the same time period? It is a mystery.

Rouen might be an exception to Dummett's generalization that tarot was not played in western France during most of the 18th century. The de Hautots, which Dummett says are documented as being in the card business as far back as 1618 (p. 368), put out tarot decks in Rouen right up until 1791 (pp. 368f). The ones left to us are of the "Captain Fracasse/Bacchus" variety (Kaplan vol. 2 p. 323). Perhaps that kind was allowed--but only there, because of its long history with the tarot. Or perhaps it was only for export; Flanders was close by.

It is not clear when de Hautot adopted the change of dropping the Pope and Popess. Dummett says that Captain Fracasse is based on a c. 1639 drawing (p. 369), so probably not before then. The Vieville and Anonymous Parisian packs, as has often been said, have much in common with the de Hautot and the Belgian ones, which in turn aren't much different from each other, although there are differences (p. 373). The Vieville and Anonymous have the Pope and Popess; the 18th century de Hautot and the Belgians have the Captain and Bacchus.

I've a somewhat different opinion than Dummett and Depaulis to Tarot in France. I see the development less optimistic.

But I'm eager to learn, why they developed their different opinion. Likely I suffer from missing information ... so let's see.

Dummett notes Gauchet as a strong promoter of Tarot ...

The frequent mentions of Tarot games by Claude Gauchet are a clear proof of the fact that they were well-known in Paris at the end of the sixteenth century: Gauchet (1540-c. 1622), Born in Dammartin or Dampmartin, 35 km away. northeast of Paris, he spent most of his life there and Senlis, and his early years at the courts of Charles IX and Henry IIII; it seems that the location farthest from Paris he visited was Bayeux in Normandy, where he was archdeacon for some time. Annotating the aforementioned popularity of the game in France, Francois Garasse did not specify tp which region he referred. These are all grounds to suppose that before the XVIIIth century the game of Tarot was practiced throughout France, certainly in many different ways.

I on my list have only ....
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=807&p=11524&hilit=Gauchet#p11524

1583. Le Plaisir des champs (en vers)... par Cl. Gauchet Dampmartinois... ou est traicté de la chasse... (Sonnets de P. L'Escallay, J. Le Hericy)
by Claude Gauchet
http://books.google.de/books?id=vPL18Cu ... ot&f=false
see a two line note at p. 252
"Gauchet describes a company of people in wintertime passing the day indoors playing games, of which mentions three: flux, draughts and Tarot" (Dummett 1980)

What else? Does Dummett give references? Yes, at page 202 in Game of Tarot, and Dummett's list of references is longer than the passage in the text (which has two lines and notes 3 games). It's indeed not so remarkable, that people played in winter time, they likely already did so in 1440, and the poem is called "Winter".

But Gauchet is not the point, he was too old, when Tarot (according my opinion) went into decline in France. A height of interest is given with 1615. That's okay.
But 1615 is the time, when the young French king, Louis XIII became adolescent and wanted to reign and he didn't like the Italian dominance at his court.

So there's the decline of Tarot already starting, cause Tarot was Italian.
With the time his hostility becomes stronger. He puts his mother in prison, and has two Italians of massive influence executed, Concino Concini, a marshall of France, who never fought a battle, and his wife, the favorite lady of Maria de Medici at her court. One could call this a rather strong antipathy.

In 1622 a tax on cards was raised, and many card producers left the country. One could call this a national antipathy against cards. It happened, and Dummett knew this.

Well, the young king was reconciled with his mother, but a really good relationship never returned. Around 1630 the mother left the country. There was too much antipathy between them. Mantova became troublesome around that time. Louis controlled massive the descendents of Louis Gonzaga, who once likely made Tarot popular in France. The family daughters were send to a cloister, nearly in prison. One could call this an antipathy.

The daughters were released, and one of them ordered Marolles to write down her family's way to play with the cards. Marolles makes the job, but one can note, that he already isn't the same fan of the Tarot game as hisfather, who had died a few years ago. 1637, the first rules of Tarot, Depaulis detected it.

The whole was published in 1657, in the time, when already Louis XIV was young king in France. The actual ruler of France was then Mazarin, a man of Italy, and a man with a lot of connections to playing cards. He did his best to make the young Louis love the cards.
So the antipathy had been gone for some time. But Marolles writes a ballet and in the ballet "normal playing cards" fight against "Tarot cards". 1657. The normal playing cards win ... I wrote about it ...
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=751&p=10705&hilit=marolles
There's again this strange antipathy.

1661 Mazarin died ... I assume, that Poilly around this time made the Minchiate Francesi, possibly at the opportunity of the marriage of the heir of Toscana with a French princess.

Tuscany and Florence ... Tarot had died in Tuscany, which is clear with a new playing card rule in Tuscany in 1638. There are then no Tarot card tax stamps, only tax stamps for Germini/Minchiate. And this stays so till 1861, when Minchiate is rather close to have disappeared there. Franco Pratesi has collected a lot of numbers, which document this development. No Tarot production in Tuscany since 1638.

The last note of Tarot in Toscana is from 1606 ...
http://trionfi.com/evx-germini-tarocchi-minchiate

Translated this means, that something should have happened between 1605-1638, which caused the total disappearance of Tarot in Tuscany. Well, there was this antipathy of the young French king in this period, Louis the XIII.
As long Maria de Medici was wife of Henry IV, France-Tuscany relations were well, naturally. Maria was a girl from Tuscany. After the death of Henry IV the relations might have been even better, cause the French court was dominated by Italians. But then followed the fiasco: The young king and his antipathies became suddenly an important factor.

Tuscany stopped all relations with Tarot. Somhow the relations between Florence and France stayed well.

Back to the year 1661. Young Louis XIV attempted his luck on the battle fields. Objects of his aggression were (also) regions, from which one can assume, that Tarot was played there. For instance the Franche-Compte ..

The name Franche-Comté (English: Free County) did not officially appear until 1366. It had been a territory of the County of Burgundy from 888, the province becoming subject to the Holy Roman Empire in 1034. It was definitively separated from the neighboring Duchy of Burgundy upon the latter's incorporation into the Kingdom of France in 1477. That year at the Battle of Nancy during the Burgundian Wars, the last duke Charles the Bold was killed in battle. It was incorporated into the territories of the Habsburg monarchy with the marriage of Mary of Burgundy with Maximilian I. The territory was inherited by Philip II of Spain, from his father the emperor Charles V. Free County was captured by France in 1668 but returned under the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. It was conquered a second time in 1674, and was finally ceded to France in the Treaty of Nijmegen (1678). Enclaves such as Montbéliard remained outside French control.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franche-Comt%C3%A9

One could call this an antipathy.
Louis in all his glamour loved playing cards. Weekly. He celebated card playing evenings. These festivities helped to keep the nobility close to the court and hindered them to fall in hostile political actions. There is no record, that Tarot was played then. At least I don't know of one.

One could call this a strong sympathy for ... normal French playing cards.

It isn't really difficult to understand, that a French king of the power and eminence of Louis XIV had difficulties to be lucky about an emperor on a card deck, which with was played with in his own country.
The French kings of 1559 and later had had long wars with Habsburg, which they had more or less lost. They could agree with these emperors on the cards, they were in a weak position.

The Minchiate Francesi had no emperor, as far I know.

Dummett with his explanation about the fashion of the French ladies looks in the wrong direction, I would say in my humble opinion.

Naturally Louis XIV might have made direct prohibitions of Tarot. But, maybe, he considered it politically unwise, the playing card habits of the people had only secondary importance. Factual territory expansion had higher values.

Thanks, Huck, very useful history of French courts' attitudes toward tarot and Italy. You emphasize Florentine influence here, which is a nice counterbalance to Dummett's emphasis on Milan--at an earlier time, to be sure, but then not saying more. When you say "Italian" influence in the French court, is that Florentine or more general? And if more general, what cities in particular?

I object slightly to your conclusion, that Louis XIV was more interested in external affairs than internal. He is a major architect of the French centralized state--centralized around the king--which other kings attempted but he carried through like no one before him. Also, he revoked the Edict of Nantes even though that act aroused much disfavor from neighboring states. He's not afraid to stifle his subjects at the expense of external affairs. So it would be of interest to find out whether tarot prohibitions were part of this internal program.

I want to start adding other aspects of the French picture from Dummett, starting with Milan. His chapter 13, which I have up to now avoided, is on Milan, focusing on the trump order, the Cary Sheet, and the Sforza Castle cards. In this post I want to focus on the trump order and the Sforza Castle cards, just to get them out of the way.

ORDERS OF THE C TYPE

First, besides the Tarot de Marseille he cites two Lombard pieces of evidence for the C order. One is a "tarot appropriati" called the "Susio poem", from Pavia sometimes between 1525 and 1572. The other is a poem by Alciati. He says it's 1547. but actually, it's 1544. Alciati was in Milan or Pavia then, after some years in France before that. Other evidence of the C order comes from c. 1570 Piedmont00the Discorse of Piscina--the 1558 Catelin Geoffroy tarot of Lyons, the 1659 list from the Maison Acadamique, Vieville's deck of c. 1650, and of course the Tarot de Marseille itself, starting with Noblet c. 1650-70 Paris.

Here are two charts giving the C order in various sources, the first Dummett's in 1980 and the second Marco's here.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lFAy3bKySz0/U ... .16+PM.png

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rEbZ-DxvUhs/U ... rders2.jpg

For our purposes, somewhat broader than that for which Dummett developed his lists, there are two other orders that are of some importance, both of the 18th century, namely, de Hautot and the Belgian. The de Hautot, like the Maison Academique (c. 1655, but also in the 1702, reproduced in Kaplan II, p. 190), has the Emperor below the Empress. Also, it is like the Vieville in calling the Tower card "Foudre" (shared with Anonymous Parisian). And like the Anonymous Parisian only, it has the odd spelling for X (ATENPERANCE). And there is one more important change in de Hautot: the Fool is now the highest trump, numbered XXII. Of course the Popess and Pope are now the Captain and Bacchus. (These are both reasons for thinking that the de Hautot is later than the Maison Academique order and the Paris decks.) The Belgian order and titles are the same as de Hautot, including the Fool as XXII, except that it has the Empress below the Emperor and spells the word TEMPERANCE. (a reason for thinking that the Belgian comes after the de Hautot type). The change to Fool as high trump is not unique to these two; the practice is followed in some other places in the 18th century, notably certain places in Switzerland.

THE SFORZA CASTLE CARDS

Fortunately Robert has posted pictures of the cards on this Forum, scans of the relevant pages in Kaplan II, in the thread starting at viewtopic.php?f=14&t=802. But they have not been discussed much on THF. I will simply refer to the relevant page number of Kaplan in what follows.If you want to look at the cards as I go along with Dummett, just open this post in another window and click on the link just given, then switch back and forth between windows.

Dummett, in a discussion much the same as in Game of Tarot, compares these cards to the Tarot de Marseille. The numeral cards are similar in design to the Tarot de Marseille; the 2 of Coins gives a 1499 date and producer (289), verified independently for this time and place (http://www.tarothistory.com/compare/ima ... 2coins.jpg).

I want to say a little more. At that time, there were other ways of representing the 2 of Coins. The Minchiate has two large coins, one on top of the other, with faces on them. The "Budapest" has two large coins in the same configuration, separated by a bird, presumably an eagle, with wings out. The Minchiate style 2 of Coins is continued in the Anonymous Parisian, the de Hautot, and the Belgian. Vieville is more like the Marsaille, but the lettering does not extend the full length of the "belt" (that is de Mellet's word: he of course calls it the "belt of Isis"). So it does seem that this Sforza Castle 2 of Coins uniquely connects to the Tarot de Marseille version in France, and corresponds almost exactly.

But was this design in 1499 Milanese from the start or imported from France or Burgundy? It is not from the same deck as the other Sforza Castle cards, as the back is plain and the card is of different dimensions. But the style of the coin is exactly the same as on a 6 of Coins with a scene apparently from Ariosto's Orlando Furioso on its back (that part first published 1516; although Ariosto was Ferrarese, there is no reason to suppose that the cards are Ferrarese or Venetian, Dummett argues). The main argument for Milan as opposed to France is that there are no other cards from before 1499 known definitely to be non-Italian. But since most of the earlier Italian cards are hand-painted, it might be, it seems to me, that the fashion for hand-painted cards did not extend to France or Burgundy.

Next, there are several that have different Greek gods on their backs. That would certainly have given players a clue as to what cards their opponents held! One, as I have mentioned, has what looks like a scene from Ariosto's Orlando Furioso (293 bottom), where Ruggiero is trying to get his armor off so he can have his way with Angelica, and meanwhile Angelica disappears, using a magic ring. This theme suggests Italy rather than France or Burgundy, as Ariosto's poem was in Italian. Also, the style of the second illustration that Marco posted at viewtopic.php?f=11&t=753&p=10763&hilit= ... tle#p10763 is very similar.

There are several court cards in this group. Of them, the three incomplete Jacks (Pages) all are similar to their Tarot de Marseille counterparts (291-2), Especially characteristic is the wide-brimmed hat on the one of p. 291, a Jack of Coins. As far as I can see this wide-brimmed hat is found on all French Jacks of Coins except the Anonymous Parisian. So again we have a good link to the Tarot de Marseille. The Anonymous Parisian is again linked to a non-Milanese design.

Also similar to the Tarot de Marseille is least one Knight (292), probably of Cups, but with a plume on the horse's head (292), which he says shows Spanish influence. I don't see plumes on horses' heads in French cards, but perhaps I haven't seen enough. Well, France and Spain were always at odds. Burgundy and Spain were not at odds. This suggests an Italian or Burgundian design.

There is also a King (290 top left), about which Dummet says (p. 337):

Dell’unico Re, ci è rimasta quasi esattamente la metà superiore. La sua posa non è identica a quella di nessuno dei Re del Tarocco di Marsiglia, ma egli indossa esattamente lo stesso grande cappello floscio sormontato da una corona, a ulteriore conferma del rapporto fra i due mazzi. Siede su uno scranno a schienale diritto e ha lo sguardo volto leggermente a destra; non indossa armatura e regge sulla spalla sinistra una verga di cui non si scorge l’estremità, poiché l’angolo superiore destro della carta è danneggiato. Potrebbe trattarsi di uno scettro, che manca su tutti i Re del Tarocco di Marsiglia; oppure di un segno di seme dì Bastoni, anche se come tale pare piuttosto sottile. L’ipotesi più probabile è che si tratti di un Re di Denari o di Coppe; in entrambi i casi, il disegno doveva essere un po’ diverso da quello del Tarocco di Marsiglia.

(Of the only King, there has remained almost exactly the upper half. His pose is not identical to that of any of the Kings of the Tarot of Marseilles, but he is wearing exactly the same great slouch hat surmounted by a crown, a further confirmation of the relationship between the two decks. He sits on a chair in the back right and his face look slightly to the right; he does not wear armor and holds a rod on his left shoulder of which we cannot see the end, because the upper right corner of the card is damaged. It could be a scepter, which is missing on all the Kings of the Tarot of Marseilles; or of the suit sign of Batons, although it seems rather thin. The most likely hypothesis is that it is a King of Coins or Cups; In both cases, the design must have been a bit different from that of the Tarot of Marseilles.)

I haven't seen a King like this one anywhere.

There is also another king, but with a different back, of which we see the bottom half, with his legs crossed and apparently holding a cup (Kaplan 289). He says (p. 339):

We cannot see any link between this card and the Tarot of Marseilles.

In the Tarot de Marseille, it is only the King of Coins who has his legs crossed. But the Sforza Castle card seems to be holding a cup. Perhaps there was a switch at some point. I don't know any other King exactly like this one.

In this group is also a World card (293 top), which he says is quite similar to the Tarot de Marseille I's in that there is a cloak rather than a scarf. Robert once posted these three for comparison: Sforza Castle, Vieville, Dodal, along with Noblet and Chosson (see viewtopic.php?f=12&t=45#p299). Dummett says (p. 340f):

Questo disegno è estremamente simile a quello del Tarocco di Marsiglia. C’è la stessa ghirlanda ovale che racchiude la stessa figura di donna nuda, ci sono i simboli dei quattro Evangelisti ai lati, disposti allo stesso modo. L’unica sostanziale differenza è che non c’è una scritta in fondo alla carta che ne fornisca la denominazione. Ancora una volta, la versione variante del Tarocco di Marsiglia pare più vicina della versione definitiva al disegno milanese: la figura indossa un mantello gettato indietro sulle spalle e, pur avendo il ginocchio sinistro piegato, non accavalla la gamba sinistra sulla destra. Questo fatto conferma che la variante rappresenta uno stadio più antico nell’evoluzione del Tarocco di Marsiglia in Francia rispetto alla sua versione definitiva.

La collocazione del numerale su questa carta attesta l’introduzione relativamente tarda di numerali sui trionfi dei mazzi di tarocchi milanesi, perché, al contrario di quanto avviene nella maggior parte dei primi tarocchi italiani — quando pure essi presentano numerali — esso non è inserito a forza dovunque il disegno gli lasci uno spazio. Novati fa risalire queste carte al tardo XVI secolo: è probabile che abbia ragione. I.[end of 340] bordi punteggiati fanno pensare al XVI piuttosto che al XVII secolo; il numerale sul trionfo suggerisce una data posteriore ai primi anni del secolo. La nostra ipotesi, cioè che prima del Cinquecento ai trionfi milanesi mancassero i numeri, è confermata dal foglio Cary e dall’Eremita nella Bibliothèque Nationale. Tuttavia, nel primo mazzo di tarocchi francese pervenutoci, del 1557, i trionfi hanno numeri romani nello stesso luogo del Mondo milanese, cioè in cima alla carta, nel centro del bordo. (Nel mazzo del 1557, comunque, c’è anche un numero rovesciato in basso, ancora nel centro del bordo.) La pratica francese probabilmente era copiata da quella milanese. Si può dunque datare l’introduzione dei numeri sui trionfi dei tarocchi milanesi al 1525 circa.

(This design is extremely similar to that of the Tarot of Marseilles. There is the same oval wreath enclosing the same figure of a nude woman, there are symbols of the four Evangelists on the sides, arranged in the same way. The only substantial difference is that there is no inscription in the bottom of the card that provides the name. Again, the variant version of the Tarot of Marseilles seems closer than the final version to the design in Milan: the figure wearing a cloak thrown over his shoulders and back, while having the left knee bent, crossing the left leg on the right. This fact confirms that the variant represents an older stage in the evolution of the Tarot of Marseilles in France compared to the final version.

The location of the numeral of this card attests to the relatively late introduction of numerals on the triumphs of tarot decks from Milan, because, contrary to what happens in most of the early Italian tarot cards - when they even have numerals - it is not inserted by force anywhere on the drawing that leaves a space. Novati has these cards going back to the late sixteenth century: he is probably right. The [end of 340] dotted borders make one think rather of the sixteenth than the seventeenth century; the numeral on the triumph suggests a date later than the early years of the century. Our hypothesis, that is, that before the sixteenth century the triumphs of Milan lacked numbers, is confirmed by the Cary Sheet and the Hermit in the Bibliotheque Nationale. However, in the first extant deck of French tarot, in 1557, the triumphs have Roman numerals in the same place as on the World in Milan, that is, on top of the card, in the center of the border. (In the deck of 1557, however, there is also a number upside down at the bottom, still in the center of the border.) ​​The French practice was probably copied from that of Milan. Therefore the introduction of numbers on the tarot trumps in Milan can be dated to about 1525.

But how do we know whether it was first French or Italian? All I can say is that the design of the World card seems borrowed from the "Tarot of Mantegna" 2nd series.This series came to the attention of German buyers but not, so far as I know, of the French. On that basis I would say the design is Italian.

Also, in this case, as in the case of the 2 of Coins and the Jack of Coins, the relationship is to the Tarot de Marseille--here specifically, the Tarot de Marseille I--and Vieville but not to the Anonymous Parisian/de Hautot/Belgian packs, which have a different design for this card (the lady on a globe).

There are also Sforza Castle cards with plain backs: knights, numeral cards, and a Sun card. Of these, the Knights are quite similar to the Tarot de Marseille (294 bottom, 296); but one is "Spanish style" (p. 294 top). All but the "Spanish" look later, too, Dummett reasonably suspects them of being imports from France around 1700. Other researchers have gone as early as 1650, he says.

Again, I don't know "Spanish" knights in France of that time. Also, it seems to me as likely a coin as a plume, which would clearly fit the Tarot de Marseille at that time.

In this group is also a Sun card, which Dummett says has "two young men" in front of the brick wall (343). This card was most likely imported from France, too, he says. I can't tell what the gender is of the one on the right. That might be a woman's breast. If so, we know where Noblet got his impression of the card. On the other hand, it might not be female, as it is otherwise similar to the Dodal. I once made a composite of various pairs, at http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Lu-6PwakMv0/S ... erDET5.jpg. As you see, the Conver has little dots for male nipples. So either Noblet or Dodal mistook the card.

There is not much to conclude from this examination of the Sforza Castle cards, except that the earlier cards are probably Italian and proto-Tarot de Marseille, and the later ones French Tarot de Marseille or Italian copies of Tarot de Marseille. Whether the earlier cards are originally Italian designs or French ones is not clear, except that the World card, and hence the Tarot de Marseille World as well, is most likely of Italian design, by c. 1525 if Dummett is right about the dotted borders.

Added later in day: Another conclusion: there is something definitely un-Milanese about the Anonymous Parisian, de Hautot and Belgian tarots.

(A note to anyone keeping up with these posts: I made a correction to my post at viewtopic.php?f=11&t=1019&p=15211#p15211. Huck pointed out to me in a private message that I had conflated two people, the one certainly from Lyon and the other only perhaps from Lyon, into one.

mikeh wrote:Thanks, Huck, very useful history of French courts' attitudes toward tarot and Italy. You emphasize Florentine influence here, which is a nice counterbalance to Dummett's emphasis on Milan--at an earlier time, to be sure, but then not saying more. When you say "Italian" influence in the French court, is that Florentine or more general? And if more general, what cities in particular?

Maria de Medici was definitely a girl from Florence.
Concino Concini, her dominant adviser ("the mightiest man in the state"), was "native from Florence".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concino_Concini
Concini's wife was Leonora Dori Galigai (1571 – 8 July 1617, according German wiki "* 19. März 1568 in Florenz; † 8. Juli 1617 in Paris"), daughter of the wet nurse of Maria de Medici. If German wiki is correct, 5 years older than Maria de Medici. About 30 years in the service of Maria de Medici.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonora_Dori
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonora_Galiga%C3%AF
She was accused to be a witch, between other attacks of treason and heresy.



Sizzi, an astronomer, was also killed in 1618, born in Paris with Florentine ancestry. He had detected the rotation of the sun spots.

**********

"Italian influence" in the form, that Italian customs were imitated, started in the early reign of Henry III, so after 1574. So the Tarot fever in this period has some larger context. In this period Lodovico Gonzaga as duke of Nevers had a strong influence.

Before 1574 France already had a Florentine princess as a weak queen till 1559, and the same Katharina de Medici as a stronger king's mother since then. Another Italian influence was Renee, daughter of the French king, earlier the prisoned wife of the duke of Ferrara. She promoted the Huguenots. The exiled Florentine Strozzi were of some importance in France.

I object slightly to your conclusion, that Louis XIV was more interested in external affairs than internal. He is a major architect of the French centralized state--centralized around the king--which other kings attempted but he carried through like no one before him. Also, he revoked the Edict of Nantes even though that act aroused much disfavor from neighboring states. He's not afraid to stifle his subjects at the expense of external affairs. So it would be of interest to find out whether tarot prohibitions were part of this internal program.

One can't state, that Louis XIV was against cards. He promoted card playing. As a result we have French suits dominating in Germany and elsewhere. Also we have, that French became the diplomacy language during 18th century, and many people in Germany spoke French then. He was just very successful. German princes imitated French architecture. Germany had suffered considerably by the 30-years-war, so all own culture had become weak.

A direct prohibition against Tarot cards is not known, at least I don't know. There's just the feature, that the game lost its popularity, and there are signs, how this might have happened.

Things turned with the Austrian success in the war against the Osmans, and the succession war for the Spanish throne (1701-14). Finally Spain got a French king, but the Spanish possessions in Italy more or less turned to Austria. In the interest to keep Italian states on the French side, it was possibly in the interest of France to open itself for the Tarocchi style again.
We have Menestrier, who often had worked for the French traditions, writing about the history of the Tarocchi and suddenly assuming (1704), that the Charles VI deck was a French product (from 1392), and with that Tarocchi became an object of "national pride". That's quite a change against the earlier desinterests.
Similar we see, that Tarot cards production develops in Strasbourg in this period of the war.

Louis XIV had a rather bad phase in this war (1708)...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the ... Succession

The disasters of Oudenarde and Lille led France to the brink of ruin. Louis XIV was forced to negotiate; he sent his foreign minister, the Marquis de Torcy, to meet the allied commanders at The Hague. Louis agreed to surrender Spain and all its territories to the Allies, requesting only that he be allowed to keep Naples (in Italy). He was, moreover, prepared to furnish money to help expel Philip V from Spain. The Alliance, however, imposed more humiliating conditions; they demanded that Louis use the French army to dethrone his own grandson. Rejecting the offer, Louis chose to continue fighting until the bitter end. He appealed to the people of France. They rallied with new soldiers, money and enthusiasm, giving new life to the French cause.[52]

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanischer_Erbfolgekrieg

Diplomatie – Nachdem ein blitzartiger Vorstoß eine kleine Abteilung holländischer Reiter bis vor die Tore von Versailles geführt hatten, war Ludwig XIV. bereit, auf Grundlage des völligen Verzichts auf Spanien über einen Frieden zu verhandeln. Auch als die Verbündeten die Rückgabe des Elsass mit Straßburg, der Freigrafschaft, der lothringischen Bistümer forderten, war der französische Gesandte im Haag, Torcy, noch zu Unterhandlungen bereit. Erst die Zumutung, seinen Enkel selbst durch französische Truppen aus Spanien vertreiben zu helfen, wies Ludwig XIV. mit Entschiedenheit zurück.

Other sources speak of famine catastrophe in France in this period.

France had luck in the following years, cause Austria got own problems. The peace conditions in 1714 were much better for France as in the negotiations of 1708.
https://www.google.de/webhp?sourceid=ch ... 8%20france
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Frost_of_1709

William Derham recorded in Upminster, near London, a low of −12 °C (10 °F) on the night of 5 January 1709, the lowest he had ever measured since he started taking readings in 1697. His contemporaries in the weather observation field in Europe likewise recorded lows down to −15 °C (5 °F). Derham wrote in Philosophical Transactions: "I believe the Frost was greater (if not more universal also) than any other within the Memory of Man."
France was particularly hard hit by the winter, with the subsequent famine estimated to have caused 600,000 deaths by the end of 1710. Because the famine occurred during wartime, there were contemporary nationalist claims that there were no deaths from starvation in the kingdom of France in 1709.

Mikeh wrote:
Phaeded: I'm not against the Pavia interpretation of the cross. I just think that its placement might refer back to something else, a Savoy-Visconti wedding, as so many earlier commentators thought. There is no need, once we have gotten a satisfactory explanation, to insist that there can't be others that are also valid. Also, a previous card commemorating Filippo's wedding is consistent with Dummett's dating of the invention of the tarot to c. 1428 Milan.

The red/white pennant must, of course, be considered in light of the other CY stemmae in the deck – and one thus asks, again, what Savoy has to do with the court figures who are wearing the Visconti radiant dove and ducal crown (cups and coins suits) and the Sforza fountain and “Cotignola”/pomegranate on the batons and swords? The court suits evenly split between the heraldry of two families indicates, at the minimum, an accord of some sort between the two. Dither on the pomegranate and call it a “quince” – it still begs the question as to where is the fountain or quince in Savoy heraldry? Savoy is a red (and white) herring. And there is nothing, besides the prejudices of scholarship that existed before the Giusti discovery, to rule out the invention of tarot in Florence in 1440 with a Milanese iteration for Sforza-Bianca the following year. In fact the tight temporal interval between the two (and the probable third, intervening occurrence in Ferrara on 1/1/1441) simply suggests a fashionable trend.

Phaeded

Phaeded: The heraldics would have been different in 1428, if there were any, aside from the banners on the Love card. In different illuminated decks, heraldics are added and subtracted from what is basically the same standard, such as there was, if any. The Brera-Brambilla is another example, from this point of view. No Sforza heraldics there. From Savoy on the CY, only the banner on the Love card is kept, as a kind of souvenir--and as a deniable nod of respect for Savoy and its Duke, the Basel pope. I am not saying that the Cary-Yale is from 1428, any more than Dummett is when he hypothesizes 1428 Milan as the most reasonable time and place for the invention.

Huck: very good, your reference to Charles VI. I had forgotten that.