- How many woman can you count about the 22 ?

The number of women represented on the trumps in part varies with the deck used.

jmd wrote:The number of women represented on the trumps in part varies with the deck used.

Well let us say in the three main historical patterns...

There are even differences between the noblet and the conver.

And, is there a point???

robert wrote: And, is there a point???

The point of the unicorn's horn? And don't we need a (virgin) maid to catch it? (...and the clinic to cure it, virgin, ha ha ).

There may not be a point, but it is an interesting question.. and would one count the World?

Nicole wrote:There may not be a point, but it is an interesting question.. and would one count the World?

As has been said, depends upon the deck... VS, Tarot de Marseille (II)....

Nicole wrote:There may not be a point, but it is an interesting question.. and would one count the World?

Would depend on the deck!

Vieville, nope.
Dodal and Noblet? Not sure
Conver.. yup!

And what of the Lovers? And what of the Sun? And the minions on the Devil?

And certainly, I know some who insist that Mr. Death is really a Mrs.

So, lots of fun counting women on the different decks, but of course, still lots of conjecture.. and I suspect there must be some suggested meaning to all of this, but then, I also suspect that the meaning only works under certain decks, and certain interpretations.

robert wrote:And, is there a point???

Well, the main idea I get from all of Eugim’s post is that the Tarot de Marseille includes a set of alchemical instructions that weren’t present in the Italian decks but were added when the tarot took its final shape, and order, in France. This is, the Tarot de Marseille translated the tarot’s Renaisance aesthetic into a Gothic one, and also, is the deck that finally established the final ordering of the trumps sequence. All of these changes had one purpose: to create a secondary level of meaning in the tarot in which the human soul is compared to the alchemical gold. The number of women in the deck, as well as the colors used in it (them?), the presence of bars aside certain names, the change of letters U for letters V, and all of these details he has been carefully pointing out in separate threads are the evidence he is collecting to demonstrate this.

I am getting it right Eugim?

If so, which deck do you think is the most perfect example of it?


Best,


EE

I agree there certainly seems to be some suggestion going on below the surface that there is something "special" about the Tarot de Marseille.. and surely, that's no surprise... I've been hearing that for years now. I remember when I first started on AT about 6 years ago and didn't own a single Tarot de Marseille, the main talk at the time was that the Tarot de Marseille was THE tarot, that.. if it wasn't the First (which it was! really, it was!), then it was the most perfect and authentic Tarot and all of the other tarot decks were just corruptions of the Tarot de Marseille. I sort of believed it myself, since so many people seemed to think it was the truth.

I started collecting the decks, and now own about 15-20 or so versions of the Tarot de Marseille and related cousins... and I'd spent countless hours studying them and comparing them... and then I even spent several months working with a friend to create a new Tarot de Marseille... so I redrew several cards and had to study the lines and the colours and.. and.. and..

I found nothing. In fact, what I found was a lot of sloppy craftsmenship and dodgy work and started to see signs that the Tarot de Marseille might not only not be "the" tarot, the versions that we do have seem to be somewhat late and distorted. I didn't find the master cardmakers that hold all of the secrets, I found the sloppy cardmakers who seemed to be basically copying and recopying and mostly putting out slock stock at a discount price.

So, I guess you could say I went from an eager willing-believer to disillusioned but enthusiastic realist who thinks the Tarot de Marseille is pretty wonderful, but also finds at least as much wonder in the Besançon, Vieville, Belgian, Italian and other decks.. and sometimes thinks that the "secrets" of tarot might be best sought elsewhere.