Huck wrote:

Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote:We don't know they are ostrich feathers.

Wiki states: "The ostrich is farmed around the world, particularly for its feathers, which are decorative and are also used as feather dusters".

I don't seriously doubt that they were meant to be ostrich feathers. I don't imagine falcon's feathers bend that way, or are so long. My point is to highlight the fragmentary basis and somewhat late attestation of things we are liable to take for granted and probably be misled by if we don't know where the information comes from, and what condition it is in.

I'll take Giovio's word for it in this case, since he must have seen these devices in vibrant color. Now much of it is gone, at least the green is completely worn off. Perhaps a tiny bit can be seen here near the bottom of the right feather -


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/images/flor ... detail.jpg

This is the biggest view (a good one too) I can get from the Met Museum:

http://www.metmuseum.org/collections/se ... 6516?img=1

Perhaps some "older source" connected the 7 virtues (cardinal and theological) to specific colors?

Would anyone doubt it? It would seem like a natural thing to do. Virtues have corresponding emotions or states of mind, and emotions and states of mind have colors.

Huck wrote: Perhaps some "older source" connected the 7 virtues (cardinal and theological) to specific colors?

I've always presumed the theological colours at least to be an old one - Dante's dressing of Beatrice in red, white and green has long been interpreted as representing the theological virtues - as have representation in painting such the three angels in red, white and green in for example Sassetta's 'Mystic Marriage of St. Francis' (c.1450), or the theological virtues in 'The Triumph of St. Aquinas' in the Spanish Chapel of the Basilica of Santa Maria in Florence by Andrea da Firenze (14th century), or in Botticelli's 1501 Nativity (with it's illustration of the angels from Savanarola's (last?) Lent sermon, c.1498). Also note that the three Magi were associated with the theological virtues (as the 'Three gifts of baptism'), and as such were sometimes portrayed wearing their colours, as they are in the Procession of the Magi in the Medici Palazzo (in which the three feather device is also to be seen). The Medici were patrons of the Confraternity of the Magi, who held an elaborate annual procession in fancy dress.

A Minchiate Star card:


Does the green top identify this 'follower of a star bearing a gift' as Balthazar - in tradition associated with the Theological virtue of Hope?

Good job on the red feather, Phaeded; I hadn't paid attention to it before. And your theory about the Hanged Man is interesting. It strikes me that if the feather is Charity, it would also apply to Judas: he had been given eternal life by Jesus and betrayed him instead. Given that Lorenzo probably had evidence of the Pope's involvement in the Pazzi plot, he would be a Judss, the same appelation as in the verse he wrote for the shame painting of his brother's murderer at that time. For Judas as the primary, Sixtus as (possibly) a secondary, meaning, I would point to the 11 branch-stubs on the poles, 5 on one side, 6 on the other (like so many footholds on a ladder to heaven; image: http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/ ... 7ce4c4.jpg). Judas was the 12th disciple; that is also the Hanged Man's number, added later on the card, but not long after, in the Charles VI and every other tarot. Given that Lorenzo's attitude toward Sixtus might change, through negotiations, it would be important, if anyone wanted to keep the cards as an heirloom, to have another meaning available.

Your theory, Phaeded, that the Hanged Man is Sixtus gets support in the Death card (image: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... rles6.jpeg). Under Death's horse are the same Pope and Cardinals as on the Pope card (image: http://www.tarothistory.com/compare/ima ... les_05.jpg), plus a bishop or archbishop, plus a monarch. 1478 is not long after the 1476 assassination of Galezzo Maria, although the extended hand to the Pope doesn't quite fit. I would have thought that the Charles VI was earlier than 1478, mor like early 1460s, but maybe not.

On the Fool card, it seems to me that the stones that the small figures are picking up are just ordinary pebbles (image: http://www.tarothistory.com/compare/ima ... les_00.jpg). It was customary in Florence at that time for children to throw stones at natural fools to drive them out of town. even kill them. See SteveM's quote from Emile Male at viewtopic.php?f=23&t=383&p=6993&hilit=stones#p6993, to which I would add my summary, in another thread, of Michel Pleasance on the treatment of madmen and people of low intelligence in Florence:

Michel Pleasance (Florence in the Time of the Medici p. 181) summarizes a story by Grazzini in which a man is persuaded to pretend he is dead, so he can watch his own funeral. But he forgets he is dead, and "people begin to think that he has gone mad. Children start throwing stones and clods of earth at him, shouting 'mad, mad' and try to catch him." If caught, he would probably be killed. Pleasance says of another such victim, that his pursuers are "children and clerks--who, as Grazzini says, would have killed him had they caught him" (p. 184).

In that case the four figures would be four powerful figures who are against Sixtus, although, like this Fool, he thinks they are friends. One holds his leg to keep him from running away when the others start throwing. I don't know who they would be, but I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to find four candidates.

Ross,
I’ll be turning 50 this December 8th and have spent countless hours in major research libraries over the years (namely the University of Chicago’s Regenstein, Newberry [private] and Notre Dame) so save your “internet researcher” insinuations for somebody else; I also regularly purchase volumes for my personal library (about the only thing I appreciate about my “day job” – it allows that luxury). Not that it matters whether one is looking at a book or a screen…

As for my primary source for the disputed ostrich feathers signifying the theological virtues, it is of course Ames-Lewis; although somewhat dated the study is consistently referred to by current scholarship (e.g., Dale Kent, Cosimo De' Medici and the Florentine Renaissance: The Patron's Oeuvre, 2000). However, I recently purchased Franco Cardini’s The Chapel of the Magi in Palazzo Medici (Florence: 2001) which included the unexpected surprise of a tacked on essay by Lucia Ricciardi on the heraldic, symbolic and allegorical imagery related to the Medici family. On p. 92 she too adopts the case for the significance of the ostrich feathers (although I have reservations about some of her other assertions).

The thornier problem for me is the relationship of the feathers to the diamond ring, also apparently adopted by Piero at the same time (don’t have her article in front of me – its at home – but I believe she says it first shows up in S. Pancrazio, but with just two feathers). My best guess here is that the ring is borrowed from Sforza who may have first adopted the more elaborate three ring device when he received Cremona in 1441; that city is mentioned on his Pisanello medal and you must know of the precedent for the three device on the reverse of that rare coin from Cremona (from a previous ruler of Cremona that Visconti had removed/killed). It supposedly signified the unity of the local ruler, church and empire (I know you’ve seen this link to an image of that coin – but it here it is for others: http://www.liv.ac.uk/~spmr02/rings/sforza.html; the source relied on there is D. Sant'Ambrogio, `Dell'impresa araldica dei tre anelli intrecciati', Archivio Storico Lombardo, 7 anno xviii, 1891: 392-398). Perhaps Sforza “re-purposed” the meaning of that device, now his own as lord of Cremona, to symbolize the unity of empire (initially as a fully entitled vassal of Visconti – that name too, in its Latin version, appears on the medal), church and his closest allies? In effect he may have granted the use of this device to these allies, or a version of it (1 ring or 3 rings), to his financial backers; thus we find the Milanese Borromeo (after the Medici, possibly in 1450 when Filippo Borromeo was knighted by Sforza?) and Florentine Medici both with versions of it, after Visconti’s death in 1447 (and Sforza made his claim on Milan). Since Piero used only one ring and purportedly added the three feathers/theological virtues that would associate him with the church (still leaving the meaning of the other two rings for Sforza and the imperial connection). The Medici were explicitly connected with the three theological virtues in a papal context in the John XXII tomb, the money for which was first supervised by Giovanni di Bicci and then Cosimo. In 1447 the soured relations with Eugene VI (the killing of Baldaccio, etc.) went away as Nicholas V brought the Medici fully back as his papal bankers. The Medici could then hope to manage the neutrality of the Papal armies in 1447 while Sforza pursued his own claims to Milan.

Piero was sent on diplomatic missions to Sforza and in 1450 was sent with Neri Capponi, Luca Pitti, and Diotisalvi Neroni, to congratulate the new duke: "They proceeded in triumph through the Milanese territory, and all their expenses were paid. The number of horsemen was so great when they arrived within five miles of Milan that it seemed like a manoeuvring ground. Then the Duke in person advanced to meet them, and embraced and kissed them. Never was greater honour paid to Florentine ambassadors" (Historie di Giovanni Cambi, Delizie degli Eruditi Toscani, xx. 273). It seems logical that Piero, who readily used the French fleur de lys in his coat of arms when that was granted to him in 1465 (the top palle), accepted the right to bear a symbol of Count Francesco (already VICEOMES MARCHO ET COMES AC CREMONE, per his medal) at the time he made his play for the Duchy of Milan.

At all events, I’ve not seen a source that disputes the ostrich/theological colors identification and if the Florentine CVI dates anywhere from 1460 to 1480 (when the Medici were firmly in control) then it would be exceedingly difficult not to juxtapose the red feather on the hanged man with the details of Piero’s device (which his son Lorenzo continued to use).

Phaeded

Mikeh,
Just a caveat on the CVI death card being different from what must have been in the ur-deck: With the Council of Florence continuing on until 1442 (Armenians and then Ethopians/Copts were included in successive bulls through that year) and the papal army involved in Anghiari, it is unimaginable that the Florentine ur-deck Death would have shown the CVI version with clergy underfoot of death (even though it was already a known convention that could have been employed). A version of the PMB Death card, just a generic skeleton with no clerics, would have been much more likely. The 1441 CY deck, produced by Visconti who had just lost in battle to the combined Papal/Florentine at Anghiari, would have feltl no compunction in showing the pope and his minions trod underfoot of Death at that time.

Mikeh wrote:
It was customary in Florence at that time for children to throw stones at natural fools to drive them out of town. even kill them

But this fool is not being driven anywhere - he is standing there smiling, looking down, while continuing to entertain. Like the d'Este fool, the people below the Fool are libidinously drawn to him; one of the youngsters even dry-humps his leg like a dog; his pubic hair is visible above his underwear. The PMB fool gestures towards his own genitals with his left hand, his pubic hair also showing; the d'Este Fool appears to have exposed his entire member towards which the others reach. The card is almost a graphic representation of Bruni's later theories of the power of sexuality and the "magic" control of the public/crowd (see Ioan Culianu's fascinating study: Eros and Magic in the Renaissance, University of Chicago Press, 1987).

I do have to agree that two of the others below the Fool can be interpreted as rearing back to throw stones while at the time being sexually attracted. It’s a mixed metaphor not easily deciphered. But if the Fool is a stand-in for the Pope and the children as his four nephews he put into power then the sexual nature of the card perhaps points to that genetic relationship. As for the rock throwing - of which the Fool seems unawares – then the additional message would be that these familiars placed in power can turn on you. As recently as 1440 a Captain General of the Church, Vitelleschi, was killed after rumors he was attempting a coup of sorts of Pope Eugene IV while the latter was in Florence (i.e., a well-known anecdote in both Rome and Florence). Relevance to the card and the pope’s nephews? One of his nephews was Girolamo Riario who served as Captain General of the Church under his uncle Pope (from 1471 on) and was an intended beneficiary of the Pazzi Conspiracy. The general point of the card would have been to paint the pope and the relations he placed about him as decadent and uncontrolled – the Papacy itself unstable (and led into war, which it was, which could be its undoing).

Phaeded

SteveM wrote:

Huck wrote: Perhaps some "older source" connected the 7 virtues (cardinal and theological) to specific colors?

I've always presumed the theological colours at least to be an old one - Dante's dressing of Beatrice in red, white and green has long been interpreted as representing the theological virtues - as have representation in painting such the three angels in red, white and green in for example Sassetta's 'Mystic Marriage of St. Francis' (c.1450), or the theological virtues in 'The Triumph of St. Aquinas' in the Spanish Chapel of the Basilica of Santa Maria in Florence by Andrea da Firenze (14th century), or in Botticelli's 1501 Nativity (with it's illustration of the angels from Savanarola's (last?) Lent sermon, c.1498). Also note that the three Magi were associated with the theological virtues (as the 'Three gifts of baptism'), and as such were sometimes portrayed wearing their colours, as they are in the Procession of the Magi in the Medici Palazzo (in which the three feather device is also to be seen). The Medici were patrons of the Confraternity of the Magi, who held an elaborate annual procession in fancy dress.

A Minchiate Star card:

Does the green top identify this 'follower of a star bearing a gift' as Balthazar - in tradition associated with the Theological virtue of Hope?

Hi Steve,

I've argued in the past for a relation between 3 theological virtues and the symbols Sun-Moon-Star and the 3 Magi, just following my own analysis of "Trionfi card facts".

It's new to me, that " the three Magi were associated with the theological virtues (as the 'Three gifts of baptism')". That's interesting and confirming my own ideas. Who said so?

I remember to have read about a text written around the 1450s inthe region of Naples (or Spain), which had colors for virtues. I don' remember more details.

Huck wrote: It's new to me, that " the three Magi were associated with the theological virtues (as the 'Three gifts of baptism')". That's interesting and confirming my own ideas. Who said so?

I'll have to look that up for you - but in general it was typical of medieval number symbolism to associate anything of the same number together - in the case of the Three Magi this can frequently be found reflected in their representation in several ways, for example as well as dressing them in the colours of the Medici/Theological colours, they were also associated with the three ages of Man, and one might be represented as a youth, one middle aged and one as on old man for example, they were also associated with the three (known) parts of the world, which might be represented by a variety of caps and/or skins tones, with one as a black man for example to represent Africa, the other two representing Europe & Asia.

(Note : In art blue would sometimes be substituted for green, and yellow or gold for red - especially in Northern countries.)

As well as Beatrice being dressed in the theological colours in Dante - the three virtues also appear at the right wheel of the chariot:

Tre donne in giro da la destra rota
venian danzando; l'una tanto rossa
ch'a pena fora dentro al foco nota;

l'altr' era come se le carni e l'ossa
fossero state di smeraldo fatte;
la terza parea neve teste/ mossa;

Three maidens at the right wheel
Came onward dancing: the one so red
as to be hardly noted in the fire;

the other was as if her flesh and bones
they were made of emerald;
the third like newly fallen snow;

SteveM wrote:

Huck wrote: It's new to me, that " the three Magi were associated with the theological virtues (as the 'Three gifts of baptism')". That's interesting and confirming my own ideas. Who said so?

I'll have to look that up for you - but in general it was typical of medieval number symbolism to associate anything of the same number together - in the case of the Three Magi this can frequently be found reflected in their representation in several ways, for example as well as dressing them in the colours of the Medici/Theological colours,

Thanks, I hadn't noticed that in Gozzoli's depiction of the Magi.


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/images/flor ... gicomp.png

Here is some work I've done on the background of the association of the three colors with the three Theological Virtues.


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/colors.jpg

This turned out to be an interesting question - what is the origin of the association of red, green and white with the Theological Virtues?

The short answer is that the earliest explicit equation of the three Theological Virtues with three colors that I can find is in the earliest commentator on Dante's Purgatorio, Jacopo della Lana (1290-1365). writing in 1324-28 (see below for the texts). During the vision of the sacred procession, at the end of Canto XXIX, tre donne appear (ll. 121ff), who are not named, but described as being colored red, white and green respectively. They are followed by four others, all dressed in purple. The commentators from Jacopo della Lana onward are unanimous in interpreting them as the three Theological Virtues and the four Cardinal Virtues respectively. See the top picture above for a late 14th century interpretation of this scene (Bodleian ms. Holkham misc. 48). In the next Canto Beatrice appears (xxx, 31ff), wearing red, white and green. The Italian commentary tradition is unanimous is assigning red to Love, white to Faith, and green to Hope, but there is another tradition that assigns red to Faith and white to Love. Ms Holkham misc. 48 above follows this latter system of correspondences (as written in the captions above the images).

I can not find that Dante himself ever made this equation or explained the symbolism of these verses, but he seems to take it for granted that his readers would understand what he was referring to; and although Jacopo della Lana cites no authority for his interpretation, he seems to take it for granted as well , so I assume it was a well-established poetic convention in Italy already when Dante wrote.

My working hypothesis at the moment then is that this correspondence of colors and Virtues is a secular poetic convention, relating to the allegorical interpretation of texts. It would have been well-known in Italy, and the Medici use was based on it. Perhaps an earlier source can be found in commentaries on texts such as the Romance of the Rose.

I took a roundabout way in coming to this conclusion, starting with ecclesiastical writers.

It didn't seem like something any Church Father or medieval theologians would have done, since these three colors don't appear together in the Bible; if they had, in a positive way (as opposed to the diseases of clothing and houses in Leviticus 13 and 14, where "greenish" and "reddish" appear as symtoms), they could have been interpreted allegorically, and that might have been the origin of the association. But it isn't.

My next tack was with Church symbolism, the Ecclesiastical colors. Writers who interpreted liturgical symbolism (and often had a hand in creating it), based themselves in the Bible, particularly the description of the Temple furniture and priestly garments, and the Song of Songs (for sponsus-sponsa symbolism).

Clapton Crabb Rolfe, in his survey of the history of liturgical colors, The Ancient Use of Liturgical Colours (1879), used the term "Levitical Church" for the Old Testament symbolism (e.g. on Exodus 28:8 and passim). He gives two charts which show the general symbolism of the garments and colors that are attested in the early sources:


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/rolfelevitical.jpg


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/rolfecomp.jpg

For example, a writer often cited as the earliest witness to a systematized Ecclesiastical vestment or seasonal color scheme is Giovanni Lotario di Segni (later Pope Innocent III) in De Sacros Altaris Mysterio (ca. 1195), lib. I. cap. lxv.
Lotario derives his symbolic reading of the liturgical colors from the Bible, Rolfe's "Levitical Church", and makes no reference to the Theological Virtues as such, but does associate wearing red vestments for feasts of martyrs who are also virgins, by referencing John 15:13 in paraphrase (he replaces the word dilectionem with charitatem):

Cum autem illius festivitas celebratur, qui simul est et martyr et virgo, martyrium
praefertur virginitati, quia signum est perfectissimae charitatis, iuxta quod Veritas ait: Maiorem
charitatem nemo habet, quam ut animam suam ponat quis pro amicis suis (John 15:13)

Lotario knows green among the vestments, but he assigns them to "weekdays and common days, because green is a middle color between white, black and red. This color is expressed where it is said 'flowering henna and spikenard, spikenard and saffron' (cypri cum nardo, nardus et crocus (Cant. 14:13-14)).

Other churches adopted different schemes, and many are discussed in a still useful 1885 paper of John Wickham Legg, "Notes on the History of Liturgical Colours", which first appeared in the Transactions of the St. Paul's Ecclesiological Society, volume I, pp. 95-134.

As I summarized above,the earliest direct equation of colors to the Theological Virtues is in the earliest commentator on Dante's Purgatorio, Jacopo della Lana, commenting on Purg. xxix, 121, at the appearance of the tre donne in the vision of the chariot:


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/1481b ... ixcomp.jpg
(the text on the left is from the first Florentine printing of Dante's Comedia, 1481; the right text is from the first English translation of the Purgatorio, Henry Boyd, 1802)

He comments (all of the commentaries on Dante can be found at the Dartmouth Dante Project: http://dante.dartmouth.edu/ )

Jacopo della Lana (1324-28), Purgatorio 29.121-126

Cioè Fides, Spes et Charitas, com'è detto. L'una tanto rossa, cioè Charitas. L'altra era, etc., cioè Spes. La terza parea, cioè Fides.


http://www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/1481boyd.jpg

In Purg. xxx, 31ff. Beatrice appears wearing a red dress, green cloak and white wimple, which Jacopo also read as symbolizing the three Theological Virtues:

Jacopo della Lana (1324-28), Purgatorio 30.31-33

Dice ch'ella avea sovra lo velo una ghirlanda di foglie d'ulivo, e avea uno manto verde, sotto lo quale stava ammantata, e lo suo vestimento era di colore di fiamma, cioè vermiglio. Lo quale velo hae a significare la candidezza della fede, lo manto verde lo indumento della speranza, la veste rossa la caritade infiammata, la ghirlanda d'ulivo pone per segno che poetriamente s'incoronava a quel tempo di Minerva di foglie d'ulivo. Quasi a dire: io pogno Biatrice per allegorìa essere la scienzia di Teologìa e introducola a tale essere un sermone poetico, e però l'adorno di segni poetici.

So finally to answer Huck's question about colors for the Cardinal Virtues, Dante applies purple to all of them, but distinguishes Prudence with three eyes.


http//www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/sevenvirtues.jpg


http//www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/chariot1.jpg


http//www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/chariot.jpg


http//www.rosscaldwell.com/dante/dantebeatrice.jpg

Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote: My working hypothesis at the moment then is that this correspondence of colors and Virtues is a secular poetic convention, relating to the allegorical interpretation of texts. It would have been well-known in Italy, and the Medici use was based on it.

Thanks for looking all that up Ross - I have been searching myself but you have done better than I have so far - but the earliest reference I found too were in commentaries on Dante. While it may possibly have started as a secular poetic convention - by the 16th century it's to be found in religious texts as well, the associations explained as in St. John of the Cross in 'The Dark Night of the Soul' for example:

http://www.catholictreasury.info/books/ ... t/dn36.php