Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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mikeh wrote: 26 Jan 2019, 11:49 About planetary gods vs. Olympic gods, I didn't mean to imply that the planetary aspects of gods dropped out of consideration - far from it. As far as Manilius being the impetus for Maziano, what I was suggesting was that before Manilius was discovered, the Olympian gods were not considered as such, as a group, more or less, in the way that planetary gods were, before Poggio's discovery. That see to me the logical explanation for why Pluto isn't included in the 12. But I don't know medieval accounts of the gods as well as some participants here.

It is not important that Manilius was not part of the Visconti library. It wasn't even necessary that anyone in Milan or Pavia have a copy. All Manilius provided was a list, as part of a few lines of his poem, maybe twelve, with a few epithets thrown in. That alone proved, later on, to be the significant thing. Unfortunately I did not scan that page of the book. Decker in his book made use of Manilius in another way, a way which I thought was quite arbitrary, and those were the pages I scanned. If the epithets related to Manilius's descriptions, that would be significant, but I don't recall that they do.
I didn't think you were implying that the planetary gods were superseded or anything; just pointing out the facts I mentioned, for whatever they are worth. These are that the first twelve gods are what we recognize as "Olympian", absent Vulcan but including both of the alternates Vesta and Bacchus; and that Manilius was not present in the otherwise large astronomical collection of the Pavia library.

You are surely right that the notion of "Olympic gods" was a late development. But the notion of these twelve as a group was present in Latin literature as the Dii Consentes; in Livy, Apuleius, and Arnobius. These are the same as the Olympic twelve, but with Vulcan and Vesta, excluding Bacchus. Notably, they are paired male-female in the lists of Livy and Apuleius (quoting Ennius), which matches the balance of Marziano, Bacchus male replacing Vulcan male.

Here are the sources -

1.
Livy Ab Urbe Condita 22,10,9

sex puluinaria in conspectu fuerunt, Ioui ac Iunoni unum, alterum Neptuno ac Mineruae, tertium Marti ac Ueneri, quartum Apollini ac Dianae, quintum Uolcano ac Uestae, sextum Mercurio et Cereri.

Six couches were publicly exhibited; one for Jupiter and Juno, another for Neptune and Minerva, a third for Mars and Venus, a fourth for Apollo and Diana, a fifth for Vulcan and Vesta, and the sixth for Mercury and Ceres.

(translation William Masfen Roberts (aka Rev. Canon Roberts), The History of Rome, 1905)

Alternate –

Six couches were displayed: one for Jupiter and Juno, a second for Neptune and Minerva, a third for Mars and Venus, a fourth for Apollo and Diana, a fifth for Vulcan and Vesta, a sixth for Mercury and Ceres.7

7 The twelve great Olympian gods, arranged in pairs as with the Greeks, here make their appearance together for the first time in Roman history.

(Benjamin Oliver Foster, Titus Livius, The History of Rome,
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... apter%3D10 )

---------------------------------------------
2.
Apuleius, De Deo Socratis II,9-19

Est aliud deorum genus, quod natura uisibus nostris denegauit, nec non tamen intellectu eos
rimabundi contemplamur, acie mentis acrius contemplantes. Quorum in numero sunt illi duodecim
[numero] situ nominum in duo uersus ab Ennio coartati:
Iuno, Vesta, Minerua, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars,
Mercurius, Iouis, Neptunus, Vulcanus, Apollo

ceterique id genus, quorum nomina quidem sunt nostris auribus iam diu cognita, potentiae uero
animis coniectatae per uarias utilitates in uita agenda animaduersas in iis rebus, quibus eorum sin-
guli curant.


There are gods of another kind whom nature has withheld from our sight, and yet whom we contemplate by intellectual inquiry, contemplating them all the more clearly by our keenness of mind. In their number are those twelve that Ennius, by his arrangement of their names, packed into two lines:
Juno, Vesta, Minerva, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars,
Mercury, Jupiter, Neptune, Vulcan, Apollo,

and the others of that sort, whose names indeed have long since been familiar to our ears, but whose powers in those areas that each of them individually governs are inferred by our intellects as we pass our lives.

(translation Christopher Jones, Apuleius, Apologia, Florida, De Deo Socratis (Loeb Classical Library, 2017)

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3.
Arnobius, Adversus nationes liber III, 40

40.1. Nigidius Penates deos Neptunum esse atque Apollinem prodidit, qui quondam muris immortalibus Ilium condicione adiuncta cinxerunt. Idem rursus in libro sexto exponit et decimo disciplinas Etruscas sequens, genera esse Penatium quattuor et esse Iovis ex his alios, alios Neptuni, inferorum tertios, mortalium hominum quartos, inexplicabile nescio quid dicens. 2. Caesius et ipse id sequens Fortunam arbitratur et Cererem, Genium Iovialem ac Palem, sed non illam feminam quam vulgaritas accipit sed masculini nescio quem generis ministrum Iovis ac vilicum. 3. Varro qui sunt introrsus atque in intimis penetralibus caeli deos esse censet quos loquimur nec eorum numerum nec nomina sciri. Hos Consentes et Complices Etrusci aiunt et nominant, quod una oriantur et occidant una, sex mares et totidem feminas, nominibus ignotis et miserationis parcissimae; sed eos summi Iovis consiliarios ac principes existimari. 4. Nec defuerunt qui scriberent Iovem, Iunonem ac Minervam deos Penates existere, sine quibus vivere ac sapere nequeamus et qui penitus nos regant ratione, calore ac spiritu. Ut videtis, et hic quoque nihil concinens dicitur, nihil una pronuntiatione finitur, nec est aliquid fidum, quo insistere mens possit veritati suae proxima suspicione coniciens. Ita enim labant sententiae alteraque opinio ab altera convellitur, ut aut nihil ex omnibus verum sit aut si ab aliquo dicitur, tot rerum diversitatibus nesciatur.

40. Nigidius taught that the dii Penates were Neptune and Apollo, who once, on fixed terms, girt Ilium with walls. He himself again, in his sixteenth book, following Etruscan teaching, shows that there are four kinds of Penates; and that one of these pertains to Jupiter, another to Neptune, the third to the shades below, the fourth to mortal men, making some unintelligible assertion. Caesius himself, also, following this teaching, thinks that they are Fortune, and Ceres, the genius Jovialis, and Pales, but not the female deity commonly received, but some male attendant and steward of Jupiter. Varro thinks that they are the gods of whom we speak who are within, and in the inmost recesses of heaven, and that neither their number nor names are known. The Etruscans say that these are the Consentes and Complices (8), and name them because they rise and fall together, six of them being male, and as many female, with unknown names and pitiless dispositions, but they are considered the counsellors and princes of Jove supreme. There were some, too, who said that Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva were the dii Penates, without whom we cannot live and be wise, and by whom we are ruled within in reason, passion, and thought. As you see, even here, too, nothing is said harmoniously, nothing is settled with the consent of all, nor is there anything reliable on which the mind can take its stand, drawing by conjecture very near to the truth. For their opinions are so doubtful, and one supposition so discredited by another, that there is either no truth in them all, or if it is uttered by any, it is not recognised amid so many different statements.

(translation James Donaldson, The Seven Books of Arnobius Adversus Gentes, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, 1871, pp. 178-179
https://archive.org/details/thesevenboo ... /page/n205 )

Donaldson’s note (8) – “Consentes (those who are together, or agree together, i.e. councillors) and Complices (confederate, or agreeing) are said by some to be the twelve gods who composed the great council of heaven; and, in accordance with this, the words una oriantur et occidant might be translated “rise and sit down together,” i.e. at the council table. But then, the names and number of these are known; while Arnobius says, immediately after, that the names of the dii Consentes are not known, and has already quoted Varro, to the effect that niether names nor number are known. Schelling (über die Gotth. v. Samothr., quoted by Orelli) adopts the reading (see the following note), “of whom very little mention is made,” i.e., in prayers or rites, because they are merely Jove’s councillors, and exercise no power over men, and identifies them with the Samothracian Cabiri – Κάβειροι and Consentes being merely Greek and Latin renderings of the name.”

So not Olympic gods, but dii Consentes. The pairings of male and female deities, the eternal virgins with non-virgin males - Vulcan and Vesta, Neptune and Minerva, and Apollo and Diana - shows that there is not sexual connotation to their being together.
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Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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What I wanted to know was whether the 12 Olympians, whether by that name or not, and whether including Vesta or Bacchus, were treated as a group in medieval literature or art before Marziano. I am not aware of any. You've shown nicely that they could have been, since Livy and Apuleius were available in the Middle Ages. But were they, as opposed to the planetary gods or a collection of various gods. What I am getting at is the hypothesis that Manilius stimulated the interest in the Olympians which we know followed, or whether it was there all along in medieval literature and art.

While I am here, there is the question of what stimulated Marziano's division into the four "orders" of virtues, riches, continences, and pleasures. My tentative answer is that it was Boccaccio's Amorosa Visione, in which the four worldly triumphs are wisdom, fame, wealth and carnal love. For wisdom, he had Athena, but nothing after that, so he changed it to Continences. For carnal love he had Venus, but had to generalize to pleasure. For glory, now changed to Virtues, he had the most renowned of the gods, Jupiter, plus others of his sons who were not more suitable elsewhere.

In the Anonymous Discourse, which of course is later, these four Boccaccian triumphs are associated with the four suits, except for replacing carnal love with carnal pleasurex generally, The writer identifies Coins with one who “tries as much as he can to accumulate money.” Then Swords is where “the profession of arms is practised in order to gain glory.” Batons is then for another type of person who wants to gain glory, namely “those who gained, thanks to their eloquence, the name wise.” So literature and science were invented, and also laws, together with magistrates. Finally, since cups are “used in banquets in order to serve both delicate foods and very precious wines,” that suit represents such pleasures.

Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

53
mikeh wrote: 27 Jan 2019, 08:29 What I wanted to know was whether the 12 Olympians, whether by that name or not, and whether including Vesta or Bacchus, were treated as a group in medieval literature or art before Marziano. I am not aware of any. You've shown nicely that they could have been, since Livy and Apuleius were available in the Middle Ages. But were they, as opposed to the planetary gods or a collection of various gods. What I am getting at is the hypothesis that Manilius stimulated the interest in the Olympians which we know followed, or whether it was there all along in medieval literature and art.

I don't know that they were treated as a group in art, whether as Dii Consentes or Olympians. It just remains the fact that Marziano picked twleve that happen to be those gods, minus Vulcan but including an alternative, Bacchus. It would be quite a coincidence if these 12 just happened to be Olympians, especially since it is not demanded by the fourfold moral ordering principle. It is as if he had in mind the group of 12, and found some way to correspond them to the fourfold morality, and then added four more.

If he had followed the literary sources like Fulgentius, the Second Vatican mythographer, or Albricus, he would have had Saturn, Pluto and Proserpina, who are always mentioned, and who could correspond to one of his categories, just as much as Mars does Riches, which is not the first thing that comes to mind with Mars, or Mercury with Virtue, which is also not a quality associated particularly with him, who is rather more often called the god of merchants. But he doesn't follow the canonical lists; he just happens to choose 12 Olympians; given how some of the associations between god and moral category seem artificial or forced, it is as if he wanted to have that group, and only that group.

Since Marziano himself doesn't identify these 12 as a group by any name, I don't think it is necessary to find precedent in literature or art. But if any explanation is needed, we can be comforted that these twelve are grouped in literature known to the era.
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Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

54
mikeh wrote: 27 Jan 2019, 08:29 While I am here, there is the question of what stimulated Marziano's division into the four "orders" of virtues, riches, continences, and pleasures. My tentative answer is that it was Boccaccio's Amorosa Visione, in which the four worldly triumphs are wisdom, fame, wealth and carnal love. For wisdom, he had Athena, but nothing after that, so he changed it to Continences. For carnal love he had Venus, but had to generalize to pleasure. For glory, now changed to Virtues, he had the most renowned of the gods, Jupiter, plus others of his sons who were not more suitable elsewhere.

In the Anonymous Discourse, which of course is later, these four Boccaccian triumphs are associated with the four suits, except for replacing carnal love with carnal pleasurex generally, The writer identifies Coins with one who “tries as much as he can to accumulate money.” Then Swords is where “the profession of arms is practised in order to gain glory.” Batons is then for another type of person who wants to gain glory, namely “those who gained, thanks to their eloquence, the name wise.” So literature and science were invented, and also laws, together with magistrates. Finally, since cups are “used in banquets in order to serve both delicate foods and very precious wines,” that suit represents such pleasures.
We have to keep in mind that the deck of cards inspired moralization from the very start. It's a set of images, in a rational arrangement; it just cries out for an explanation of its meaning. John of Rheinfelden was inspired to make his moralization based on Cessolis' for Chess. The fourfold nature of the standard game provided an obvious list of correspondences. The earliest surviving morality of cards in Italy, excepting Marziano, is a negative one, in a 1424 sermon of Bernardino of Siena. He moralizes the symbols of the four suits as standing for the fighting, gluttony, and lust of the players (I'll edit this later with the precise citation). But we can assume that the habit of moralization was common and varied, although not extensively documented. For example, Fernando de la Torre around 1450 moralizes the suits as four kinds of women - swords for nuns, batons for widows, cups for wives, coins for maidens. And we have Boiardo as well. We might also add the implicit moralization of the suit of Arrows replacing Batons in the Cary Yale deck, and in the Brambilla courts (either for Swords or Batons, since one or the other does not survive; Kaplan gives the three Arrow-courts to Staves).

Thus, I don't think that we have to assume that the Anonymous discourse writer was inspired directly by Boccaccio, although his morality of the suits is more imaginative tha Piscina's (Batons and Swords - ancient and modern wars; Cups and Coins, things that make men happy). Anonymous says that his inspiration came from the fact that both Chess and Ball have been moralized, but not Tarot; his purpose is to remedy that ommission. Associating the suit-symbols with four moral qualities is not a difficult thing to do.
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Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote: 25 Jan 2019, 16:10
Phaeded wrote: 25 Jan 2019, 05:20 But what prompted the inventing onto the medium of cards, when otherwise the rage was manuscripts, often illuminated?
Why not? But it's a strange question you ask. Filippo Maria liked card games. Marziano implies that it was on the duke's prompting that he invented the game; Decembrio tells us he liked the game so much that he paid 1500 ducats for it to be made; we know he liked the ludus triumphorum.
Visconti's love of cards had to begin at some point - he'd only been ruler for 6 years by c1418. Decembrio entered the service of Filippo Visconti in 1419 so it may be tarot proper (the CY and Brambilla) he was referencing. BTW - this should be available now from I Tatti:
Lives of the Milanese Tyrants, Decembrio, Pier Candido Ianziti, Gary Zaggia, Massimo, HARDCOVER, 2019, $29.95, Available 01/15/2019.

Harvard's link malfunctions, but Amazon is advertising it for 2/1 availability: https://www.amazon.com/Lives-Milanese-T ... 674987527
Lives of the Milanese Tyrants brings together two biographies by the most important Milanese humanist of the early fifteenth century. Pier Candido Decembrio (1399–1477) served as secretary and envoy to the bizarre and powerful Filippo Maria Visconti, Duke of Milan. As a member of the duke’s inner circle, Decembrio was in a privileged position to write what historians agree is a unique masterpiece of Renaissance biography, based on his decades of direct experience. Also included in this volume is a work of homage to Visconti’s successor, Decembrio’s flattering account of the deeds of the most successful mercenary captain of the Renaissance, Francesco Sforza, who secured for himself and his heirs the disputed position of Duke of Milan through guile, force, and willpower. Both works are translated into English here for the first time from new Latin texts prepared specially for this edition

Back to the potential German catalyst for the Marziano creation - I'm still struck by these facts:
* For the time period in question it seems Italian playing cards were uniformly swords/batons/cups/coins but Marziano chose all birds and there is a near contemporary German deck featuring all birds (again, if you count the duck-winged Lures of one of the suits, used to "lure" the hawks back to their keepers). I don't think the heraldic dove sufficiently explains four bird suits.

* Visconti was heavily invested in the politics going on in all the Councils, beginning with Constance, and managed to get the Council briefly transferred to Pavia in 1423. Constance is about 110 kms as the bird flies from the card production center of Basel, and likely lots of down time in Constance for card-playing. Its not unlikely one of Visconti's envoys brought him home a deck (just as Marcello was struck by the idea of sending one across the Alps in the other direction - royalty have leisure).

* Marziano was otherwise very card-traditional in his approach to his invention - merely replaced the 16 court cards while keeping four suits, and the court cards and "celestial princes" are comparable as rulers. The deviation of changing the suits is equally notable, and again, parallels fairly contemporary German decks (assuming prototypes preceded the surviving luxury decks that have come down to us.

I haven't followed your and Mike's back and forth on Manilius as it seems tangential to the main suit theme of the Marziano - Riches/Pleasures vs Virtue/Virginities, with the last two gods underscoring that Petrarchan theme: Daphne and Cupid. And in the c. 1430 Stuttgart deck (a different German deck has all birds) there seems to be a similar dichotomy in the suits: the woman seem to embody some level of virtue - not hunting but rather befriending their animals - while in the men court cards there are definite signs of animals are just quarry. At all events, the suits are split between men and women, and Marziano also observes a 2 vs 2 suit split.
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Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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Phaeded - thank you very, very much for notifying us of the Gary Ianziti edition of Decembrio's Vitae of Filippo Maria and Francesco Sforza. Now Amazon says 22 February. I Tatti are to be commended for their lovely editions, both in format and price. The facing-page format, like Harvard's Loeb classical series, is invaluable.

There was a time when I considered starting the translation myself, since Elia Bartolini's Italian translation would provide a guide to Decembrio's subtle Latin. And Polismagna's (Carlo di San Giorgio) 15th century Italian translation for Borso d'Este is not scanned up at the Modena Este library website yet. It's probably only a matter of time.

Modena, Biblioteca Estense – universitaria, Estense, It. 99 = alfa.P.6.9, folios 27r-71r, "Vita del duca de Milano Filippo Maria Vesconte"
https://manus.iccu.sbn.it//opac_SchedaS ... 0000216813

Ludovico Muratori copied some of it, which is online, here -
http://www.internetculturale.it/it/16/s ... =magindice
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Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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Phaeded wrote: 28 Jan 2019, 01:42 Visconti's love of cards had to begin at some point - he'd only been ruler for 6 years by c1418. Decembrio entered the service of Filippo Visconti in 1419 so it may be tarot proper (the CY and Brambilla) he was referencing.
He could have been playing cards since he was a boy. There is no way to know exactly when he first started playing. What is the relevance of such speculations?
Back to the potential German catalyst for the Marziano creation - I'm still struck by these facts:
* For the time period in question it seems Italian playing cards were uniformly swords/batons/cups/coins but Marziano chose all birds and there is a near contemporary German deck featuring all birds (again, if you count the duck-winged Lures of one of the suits, used to "lure" the hawks back to their keepers). I don't think the heraldic dove sufficiently explains four bird suits.

* Visconti was heavily invested in the politics going on in all the Councils, beginning with Constance, and managed to get the Council briefly transferred to Pavia in 1423. Constance is about 110 kms as the bird flies from the card production center of Basel, and likely lots of down time in Constance for card-playing. Its not unlikely one of Visconti's envoys brought him home a deck (just as Marcello was struck by the idea of sending one across the Alps in the other direction - royalty have leisure).
Sure - German decks in the palaces of the wealthy is not implausible. It just doesn't seem necessary to guess about that, and then to guess from that to Marziano and Filippo being inspired by some bird-suited German deck to creating their own. Marziano explains why he chose those birds.

Visconti may have seen a German bird deck. He may have owned one. He may have thought "that's lovely, I'll have to make my own". He may have told Marziano to base himself off of the German deck. He may have told Marziano not to just use any birds, but to pick ones for a different symbolic reason.

For myself, there is no value in this idle speculation, since it does not clear up any difficulties. The highest gods themselves seem to answer better the question "Why birds?", since Jupiter suggests an eagle, Juno suggests a peacock, and Venus suggests a dove. More than other animals, these gods suggest birds first. The fact that the suit corresponding to Riches is not peacocks but phoenices raises a more interesting question.
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Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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Phaeded wrote: 28 Jan 2019, 01:42

Back to the potential German catalyst for the Marziano creation - I'm still struck by these facts:
* For the time period in question it seems Italian playing cards were uniformly swords/batons/cups/coins but Marziano chose all birds and there is a near contemporary German deck featuring all birds (again, if you count the duck-winged Lures of one of the suits, used to "lure" the hawks back to their keepers). I don't think the heraldic dove sufficiently explains four bird suits.

* Visconti was heavily invested in the politics going on in all the Councils, beginning with Constance, and managed to get the Council briefly transferred to Pavia in 1423. Constance is about 110 kms as the bird flies from the card production center of Basel, and likely lots of down time in Constance for card-playing. Its not unlikely one of Visconti's envoys brought him home a deck (just as Marcello was struck by the idea of sending one across the Alps in the other direction - royalty have leisure).

* Marziano was otherwise very card-traditional in his approach to his invention - merely replaced the 16 court cards while keeping four suits, and the court cards and "celestial princes" are comparable as rulers. The deviation of changing the suits is equally notable, and again, parallels fairly contemporary German decks (assuming prototypes preceded the surviving luxury decks that have come down to us.

I haven't followed your and Mike's back and forth on Manilius as it seems tangential to the main suit theme of the Marziano - Riches/Pleasures vs Virtue/Virginities, with the last two gods underscoring that Petrarchan theme: Daphne and Cupid. And in the c. 1430 Stuttgart deck (a different German deck has all birds) there seems to be a similar dichotomy in the suits: the woman seem to embody some level of virtue - not hunting but rather befriending their animals - while in the men court cards there are definite signs of animals are just quarry. At all events, the suits are split between men and women, and Marziano also observes a 2 vs 2 suit split.
hi Phaeded,

birds and animals had come in various examples on playing cards in the early period of German or North European card development. Possibly one can say, that the Northern region had as their "Trionfi cards" (= luxury decks) the category "Hunting decks in many variations".

Virgil Solis ca. 1550
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Master PW ca. 1500
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Still of some relevance in the later time.

In your argument is missing the connection to the 60-cards deck with 5 court cards mentioned by John of Rheinfelden (actually the major topic of his long work in 1377). It seems probable (not totally clear), that the Martiano work also spoke of a 60 card deck (he only speaks of kings and no other court cards).
The sudden appearance of so many playing cards (as John describes it) in 1377 results to us in the conclusion, that at another location some playing card culture MUST HAVE existed long before elsewhere.
The region of John (Freiburg im Breisgau, nowadays Germany and not the Freiburg in Switzerland) was in this time dominated by Habsburg and not by the Emperor (from the competing house of Luxemburg), which had then its major capital in Prague (with some good relation to playing card artists from Nuremberg). Perhaps the difficult relations between the houses of Luxemburg and Habsburg caused, that playing cards were totally unknown to John in Freiburg, although they might been generally known in some Eastern regions. Generally trade should have had an handicap with the repeating plagues.
The years 1376 and 1377 had 2 important journeys of Emperor Charles IV to the West, one to the crowning of son Wenzel as Roman king in Aachen and another to the French king in Paris. These journeys might have had their role in the quick distribution of playing cards in other regions.
The great attention, that John gave to the 60-cards deck lets us suspect, that this deck had the role of a court card deck, very expensive and only available to upper classes.

A later deck from Prague is the Hofämterspiel (ca. 1455), made for the Bohemian king, the young Ladislaus postumus. In some way it had 6 court cards (4 Kings, 4 Queens, 4 Hofmeister [number 10], 4 Marschalls [9], 4 virgins [6], 4 Fools [1]) against the 5 court cards of the deck of John (4 Kings, 4 Queens, 4 Ober, 4 Virgins, 4 Unter), a clear similarity with a minor difference, the addition of 4 Fools.
The John deck speaks of professions for the number cards, the Hofämterspiel has the Hofämter (professions at the court), another similarity with small difference.
John spoke of a connection of the suits to 4 old Empires, the Hofämterspiel had 4 European Nations (France, German Empire, Bohemia and Hungary), another similarity.

It seems very obvious, that the Hofämterspiel had as its ancestor the 60-card deck, that was described by John, and the Hofämterspiel is clearly from Bohemia. The suspicion, that the 60-cards deck is ALSO from Bohemia is completely justified, just by this.
Additionally we have some insecure evidence for the existence of playing cards in Bohemia since 1340. Insecure evidence is in this case much more than "no evidence at all". All this was discussed here since longer times with the detection of the work of Hübsch about trade in Bohemia.

So, there is at least some plausibility, that Prague played a leading role in the early distribution of playing cards.

In 1395 a Milanese delegation was in Prague and for a lot of money it was bought the title of duke for Giangaleazzo, since then duke of Milan, from Wenzel, Roman king since 1376. The case was very serious and it caused the protests of German nobility and the abdication of Wenzel as Roman king in the year 1400.
Decembrio tells us, that Filippo Maria had playing cards since early youth.
It seems very probable, that the Milanese delegation also bought playing cards in Prague, not only just the duke title. Likely some larger cultural exchange took place at the same opportunity. It's very probable, that the 60-cards-deck from Prague was known to Filippo Maria.

16 Greek/Roman gods were used by Evrart de Conty in his long work about chess (1398), likely with some relation to the 16 chess figures. This work was heavily discussed at the court of Valentina Visconti (half sister of Filippo Maria) in 1402. It seems very plausible, that Filippo Maria was also aware of this arrangement.
In later time other chess books appeared with relations to Greek/Roman gods, it was in some way a general topic, though not very common.
Huck
http://trionfi.com

Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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I went through the first 10 posts ...

Ross wrote:
Although we cannot answer Ludophone's questions directly from Marziano, we can gather some of the standard features of card games played contemporaneously to Marziano's text in Milan, from a ducal decree of February 24, 1420 which prohibits "card games except for those which follow the old and correct method, namely throwing down the figures and other signs for such a sign and such a figure, which may be named swords or batons, thus such a sign against such a sign"

nec ad aliquem ludum carteselarum nisi dumtaxat secundum antiquum et rectum modum, videlicet iactando foras figuras et alia signa pro tali signo et tali figura, nominando enses vel bachulos et tale signum contra tale signum
(from Caterina Santoro, ed. I Registri dell'Ufficio di Provvisione (Milan, 1929) p. 560, n. 40)
See also this post - viewtopic.php?f=12&t=334&p=5187&hilit=foras#p5187

This seems to be a clear description of following suit (signum) and court card rank (figura), which by then, no more than sixty years after playing cards were introduced, was traditional.
Thanks for the note, I wasn't aware of it. The description sounds like a simple "Sansatout". Without trumps. The year is 1420, the council had ended.
Generally I've these suspicions:
The council had a lot of visitors and a lot of things happened, just by the fact, that communication between people from different countries was possible. From the field of music it's known, that Italian music took a strong change after the council, just by the influence of foreign musicians, who were present at the council. The same might be suspected for the theater. Technologies were exchanged. Also playing card habits should have been affected.
Returning visitors caused trouble in their home towns by the change of their world perception.
We know, that San Bernardino started to save the society from this powerful influence (1417) and endured with his engagement for a long time. Fight against card playing became a major topic between the Franciscans

Filippo Maria's decree might be an attempt to react on San Bernardino's preachings. A card game prohibition in 1420 proves, that other ways to play with cards were known and practized.
A specific prohibition for card playing habits in Milan in 1420 doesn't prove the same prohibition at other locations.
Huck
http://trionfi.com

Re: How do you play Marziano's game?

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Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote: 28 Jan 2019, 09:08 ...Gary Ianziti edition of Decembrio's Vitae of Filippo Maria and Francesco Sforza. ...
The latter work interests me as much as the Visconti bio; very interested to see how much space Ianziti gives in the introduction to comparing that work to Filelfo's Odes and Sphortias and any other panegyric work (especially since F. hated Decembrio). As for Visconti bio, most interested in seeing the translation and original of "painted images on cards" in respect to the controversial Ferrara "14 images". And can't say enough good things about Ianziti's work, his webpage and publications: https://iash.uq.edu.au/profile/112/dr-gary-ianziti

Another scholar doing as much quality work as Ianziti is De Keyser, e.g.:
Jeroen De Keyser, Francesco Filelfo and Francesco Sforza: Critical Edition of Filelfo's Sphortias, De Geneunsium deditione, Oratio parentalis, and his Polemical Exchange with Galeotto Marzio. 2015