Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Thanks Phaeded for
Phaeded wrote: 04 May 2022, 01:07
vh0601,
I'm glad you resurfaced...
My main problem is that my spare time is close to zero or even below. And in that less-than-zero time I read in the background to get more and more in the understanding of that Renaissance time. My belief is that we have to try to understand how they thought and felt, not what we project from our time to their time [Ok, changing this perspective is quite impossible, but at least let's try..] And I am very curious what you are going to say on the old post of mine you cited.

Then:
Phaeded wrote: 04 May 2022, 01:07

As for your Imperatori theory - too many leaps of faith. Of course no issue with the HRE Emperor, but these three are beyond fanciful:

* In world dominated by the Empire and Papacy, no one is ever going to call the Pope an "emperor." Not with the burning debate of who has civil power as laid out in Dante's Monarchia still lingering.
I propose - and that is full Dante -- to see, that the pope, following the Augustinean idea of civitas terrena and civitas dei, is evidently not the Emperor for the earthly world, but a kind of Emperor for the the civitas coeli as the representant of Jesus on earth. This is symbolized by the Donation of Constantine -also Dante treats this-, after which the pope had the right to wear the clothes of the emperor:

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

In his gratitude, "Constantine" determined to bestow on the seat of Peter "power, and dignity of glory, vigor, and imperial honor," and "supremacy as well over the four principal sees: Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Constantinople, as also over all the churches of God in the whole earth". For the upkeep of the church of Saint Peter and that of Saint Paul, he gave landed estates "in Judea, Greece, Asia, Thrace, Africa, Italy and the various islands". To Sylvester and his successors he also granted imperial insignia, the tiara, and "the city of Rome, and all the provinces, places and cities of Italy and the western regions".

[..]

In his Divine Comedy, written in the early 14th century, the poet Dante Alighieri wrote:[17]

Ahi, Costantin, di quanto mal fu matre,
non la tua conversion, ma quella dote
che da te prese il primo ricco patre!

(Ah, Constantine, how much evil was born,
not from your conversion, but from that donation
that the first wealthy Pope received from you!)
— Dante Alighieri, Inferno, canto 19, lines 115–117.

If Dante wrote about it, then it was in the consciousness of his time.

On Dante: All my reading in the background leads me to the conclusion that Dante is heavily in the game and I do believe that I can show it, certainly for Minchiate, very probably for Tarot de Marseille Typ II. The problem is that one has to understand the fourfold sense of interpretation of Mediaveal times of the Holy Scripture. This is also what Dante elaborates in his Letter to Cangrande. I will need the nexts weeks and months for displaying it.

But a first hint, based on your post:
Phaeded wrote: 04 May 2022, 01:07
* "Emperor of Hell" seems like an unprecedented idea - and since you mention Dante in this context: those stuffed into Satan's mouth were the killers of a would-be emperor (Brutus and Cassius, along with Judas). Caesar himself is in Limbo, among the noble heathen. There is no emperor of hell.
The "Emperor" of Hell is simply the name Dante gives to Devil in his Commedia in the inferno: "imperador' del regno doloroso" (quoted from memory, I can look it up). And, when talking about people being stuffed in his mouth, there is this famous Devil card from Agnolo Ebreo:

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collectio ... 8-2041-a-b

Image

As my time permits, I will answer your other points point by point. [Sorry for my brevity].

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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[Continuing last post]:

I owe you the right citation for the Devil being an Emperor in Dante’s Inferno:
It is in Inf. XXXIV, 28:

https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante ... nferno-34/
Lo ’mperador del doloroso regno

[The emperor of the despondent kingdom]
But if the Devil can be an Emperor in his reign, the God is another Emperor in his reign, and his representant on earth, the pope, can also be one.
We have to ask for the definition of “emperor” at the time of the cards. The wordly definition is, that an emperor reigns over the whole earthly world, also over kingdoms within his empire. He dominates kings. He triumphs over kings, over all four kings of the kingdoms from north, south, east and west. This holds true for HRE, roughly: north is Germany, east is Bohemia, south is (northern) Italy, west is France. This gives explicitely
Definition of Emperor: whenever a person triumphs over a king, he is an emperor.
This holds true for the pope in his reign. I cite again
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donation_of_Constantine
In his gratitude, "Constantine" determined to bestow on the seat of Peter "power, and dignity of glory, vigor, and imperial honor," and "supremacy as well over the four principal sees: Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Constantinople, as also over all the churches of God in the whole earth". For the upkeep of the church of Saint Peter and that of Saint Paul, he gave landed estates "in Judea, Greece, Asia, Thrace, Africa, Italy and the various islands". To Sylvester and his successors he also granted imperial insignia, the tiara, and "the city of Rome, and all the provinces, places and cities of Italy and the western regions"
Note “imperial honor”, “supremacy […] over four principal sees […] over all churches of God in the whole earth”, “To Sylvester and his successors he also granted imperial insignia” – so no doubt that the pope is a kind of emperor. He triumphs over every king in the sense that he can excommunicate him at every time – he can exclude the king from God’s domain (see e.g., the road to Canossa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_to_Canossa , where even the HRE was excommunicated by the pope).

Now I come to your remark
Phaeded wrote: 04 May 2022, 01:07 * As for "Carnival Emperor" - is this attested anywhere in cards? And I say that because I see survivals of details of suggested in JvR in the likes of Flötner's late card deck of 1545 (where an Emperor and three kings are suggested, one being a Sultan).
The Carnival Emperor is not attested in the cards as a depiction [Perhaps you might see the noble bagatella of Visconti-Sforza as one, at least he wears a hat similar to a pope’s winter hat].

In another post in this very forum, I proposed to see the bagatella –card less like a person, more like a situation, a situation in which even a king is deceived and hence someone tricks him and reigns him and his senses – for a short moment, following the above definition, a bagatto is an Emperor, because he dominates a king.

There is even more to this, since a “Carnival Emperor” really existed in history. We are in Renaissance times, hence we have to look into the roots of Carnival in the Saturnalia:

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

Role reversal
Saturnalia was characterized by role reversals and behavioral license. […] slaves feasted first, or that the masters actually served the food. […] Saturnalian license also permitted slaves to disrespect their masters without the threat of a punishment.
[…]

King of the Saturnalia
Imperial sources refer to a Saturnalicius princeps ("Ruler of the Saturnalia"), who ruled as master of ceremonies for the proceedings. He was appointed by lot, and has been compared to the medieval Lord of Misrule at the Feast of Fools. His capricious commands, such as "Sing naked!" or "Throw him into cold water!", had to be obeyed by the other guests at the convivium: he creates and (mis)rules a chaotic and absurd world. The future emperor Nero is recorded as playing the role in his youth.

Since this figure does not appear in accounts from the Republican period, the princeps of the Saturnalia may have developed as a satiric response to the new era of rule by a princeps, the title assumed by the first emperor Augustus to avoid the hated connotations of the word "king" (rex). […]

Io Saturnalia
The phrase io Saturnalia was the characteristic shout or salutation of the festival […] It was a strongly emotive ritual exclamation or invocation, used for instance in announcing triumph […]
Note the role reversal, note “the princeps of the Saturnalia may have developed as a satiric response to the new era of rule by a princeps, the title assumed by the first emperor Augustus” word “, note the “triumph” associated with the shout “Io Saturnalia”.

In the same Wikipedia article, the connection between emperor and saturnalian princeps is discussed by the picture
Image

Ave, Caesar! Io, Saturnalia! (1880) by Lawrence Alma-Tadema. The painting's title draws a comparison between the spontaneous declaration of Claudius as the new emperor by the Praetorian Guard after the assassination of Caligula and the election of a Saturnalicius princeps.
So the Carnival Emperor is not only a fantasy, it is history. Whether he is in the cards or not is another story. But if Carnival is the bagatella situation – and there were imposters at Carnivals—then the personification of Carnival can be the Carnival Emperor. Note that up to day, German Karneval has its Karneval Prince, its Carneval Princeps.

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Thanks Ross, for your remarks in your post
Ross Caldwell wrote: 04 May 2022, 08:52 […]
Interesting in this context is an overlooked remark by Arne Jönsson, in his 1998 essay on JvR in Schweizer Spielkarten 1. It suggests that something like the disruptive social symbolism in Karnöffel was already present in a card game in 1377 - […]
(Arne Jönsson, “Der Ludus cartularum moralisatus des Johannes von Rheinfelden,” in Detlef Hoffmann, ed., Schweizer Spielkarten 1. Die Anfänge im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert, Schaffhausen, 1998, pp. 135-147; 141, 143)
[…]
For example, he compares the card game in various contexts to a war among several parties, and the player who wins the majority of the cards is the victor. In another place, John points out that some cards present nobles, but others present commoners, and their encounter in battle is such that sometimes the nobles, sometimes the commoners, win the victory and triumph. […]

The reason for the corruption of the world is, of course, the general depravity of man. Exactly this degeneration is shown and represented by the pack of cards, for "the court cards signifying distinguished persons surpass in value the cards with common people, and yet they often lose so much respect in the game that one of the cards with common people is worth more and valued more highly than a card with the nobles of one of the kingdoms".

Since John's morality makes the numeral cards into common professions, like Cessolis for the pawns in chess, it could be that he is speaking of games where a number card, a common person, becomes a "trump" or the most valuable card in the game, even higher than a King.
I always read this passage in the following sense: when playing a trick taking game, in which you have to follow suit (or color), it might happen towards the end of the game that you do not have this suit or colour any more, but since you wanted to take another trick later on, you kept a face card like a king which now you have to give to a lower number pip card since one has to serve suit – and if not, you lose any other card you have to throw in, even if it is a King, a Queen etc.

Your remark gives a new very interesting perspective
Ross Caldwell wrote: 04 May 2022, 08:52 On the other hand, it could be that he is referring to a Jack or Knave, which would bring it closer to Karnöffel.
I use this passage to bolster my theory that the early name for cards, naib, naipe, etc., comes from the name of the game that the Mamluks transmitted to Spanish and Italians. That is, it might have been called "Naib" because the (lower) Na'ib in the game played a special role just like this, usurping the position of the King. The Mamluks themselves did this, and it would not be surprising that sailors and traders would play a game with this kind of subversive message.
Which makes a lot of sense to me as a plausible possibility.

Perhaps your remark could also inspire the following line of thoughts: even if JvR himself did not refer “to a Jack or Knave, which would bring it closer to Karnöffel.”, it could be that others read him like that later on and invented Karnöffel based on this reading (especially when considering that the Evil Carnival in Basel was in 1376 and JvR wrote in 1377, at least the first part as a war game). This invention was perhaps especially possible because at the Council of Constance you had lots of people from Italy and some of Spain which brought the tradition of the Mamluks to the place – and hence the Unter becoming the highest trump would come from the naib-Tradition. The pope, the emperor and the devil as pip cards are then a special introduction of the Council situation, as already discussed.

What do you think?

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I start this post by acknowledging that I make unfortunately unconscious errors in view of a very fast time. Especially in this very forum (Lastly I wrote that the 5th element of Aristoteles is love, which is not true – the quintessence is supralunar celestial ether https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintessenz_(Philosophie). It is close to love in renaissance alchemy, since it is close to God who is Love). I am very grateful to everyone who helps me with my errors.

In this light, I thank you Ross for correcting me with
Ross Caldwell wrote: 04 May 2022, 09:56 Just two corrections here.
1.
Of course it was only after Rome gained a princeps and perpetual "Imperator" in the person of Octavian that the celebration of triumphs started to become limited to the emperors. Before that, from the 8th century to the early first century, they were awarded mostly to victorious generals.
[…]
2.
The second refers to a decree issued by the Vicar of Provisions (Vicario di provvisione) of Milan (not Ferrara), Giacomo Teseo Bussone da Carmagnola, doctor of laws, on 24 February, 1420.
[…]
With respect to your first correction, I have a remark which might be beneficial: When writing
vh0610 wrote: 03 May 2022, 21:33 Remember furthermore that in Roman times, the triumph was granted only to emperors.
I was too fast and too imprecise. What I wanted to write is
Remember furthermore that in Roman times, the triumph was granted only to imperatori.
This holds also true for the Republican generals, which had their own imperium
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperium
In ancient Rome, imperium was a form of authority held by a citizen to control a military or governmental entity. […] One's imperium could be over a specific military unit, or it could be over a province or territory. Individuals given such power were referred to as curule magistrates or promagistrates. These included the curule aedile, the praetor, the consul, the magister equitum, and the dictator. In a general sense, imperium was the scope of someone's power, and could include anything, such as public office, commerce, political influence, or wealth.
For being granted a triumph they had to be acclimated as imperator first:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperator
In Roman Republican literature and epigraphy, an imperator was a magistrate with imperium. But also, mainly in the later Roman Republic and during the late Republican civil wars, imperator was the honorific title assumed by certain military commanders. After an especially great victory, an army's troops in the field would proclaim their commander imperator, an acclamation necessary for a general to apply to the Senate for a triumph. After being acclaimed imperator, the victorious general had a right to use the title after his name until the time of his triumph, where he would relinquish the title as well as his imperium.
This imperator-title was later on taken by Augustus for the emperor only (he did not wanted to be named “rex”), so only emperors had the right to triumph in imperial times.

Perhaps as a last word w.r.t. the pope being an imperador:
The Wikipedia reference to imperium clarifies this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperium# ... y_imperium
Divine and earthly imperium
In some monotheistic religions such as Christianity (the Catholic Church where the official language, Latin, used terms as Imperium Dei/Domini) the Divine is held to have a superior imperium, as ultimate King of Kings, above all earthly powers. Whenever a society accepts this Divine will to be expressed on earth, as by a religious authority, this can lead to theocratic legitimation. [..]
The chief minister of Henry VIII, the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer, suggested removal of the Roman Catholic papacy's imperium in imperio (Latin for 'state within a state') [...]
The “Latin for 'state within a state'” translation of papacy’s “imperium in imperio“ should be better “Empire within empire”. The pope is an emperor in his empire.

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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vh0610 wrote: 10 May 2022, 17:01 Thanks Ross, for your remarks in your post
Ross Caldwell wrote: 04 May 2022, 08:52 [Jönsson on JvR]
... "the court cards signifying distinguished persons surpass in value the cards with common people, and yet they often lose so much respect in the game that one of the cards with common people is worth more and valued more highly than a card with the nobles of one of the kingdoms".

Since John's morality makes the numeral cards into common professions, like Cessolis for the pawns in chess, it could be that he is speaking of games where a number card, a common person, becomes a "trump" or the most valuable card in the game, even higher than a King.
+
Ross Caldwell wrote: 04 May 2022, 08:52 On the other hand, it could be that he is referring to a Jack or Knave, which would bring it closer to Karnöffel.
I use this passage to bolster my theory that the early name for cards, naib, naipe, etc., comes from the name of the game that the Mamluks transmitted to Spanish and Italians. That is, it might have been called "Naib" because the (lower) Na'ib in the game played a special role just like this, usurping the position of the King. The Mamluks themselves did this, and it would not be surprising that sailors and traders would play a game with this kind of subversive message.
...the tradition of the Mamluks to the place – and hence the Unter becoming the highest trump would come from the naib-Tradition. The pope, the emperor and the devil as pip cards are then a special introduction of the Council situation, as already discussed.

What do you think?
Do either of you have references that explains what I underlined? The Mamluks definitely had the original version of Ober and Unter knaves but they also had card rules that allowed the Unter knave to take the king? I'm not following VH's proposal of a transition of these court cards into trumps when we still have court cards in every deck.

But the first step please - the original and "common" court cards JvR describes has a King, a Ober knave (with a sign literally held "over") and a Unter knave (with a sign held "under")...in your theory the latter gets associated with the people versus the elites, and perhaps in that "common" card-playing milieu trumps the king (perhaps in the condition of a certain tricks).

I have been myself arguing for the early primacy of the opposition of Ober and Unter Knave, perhaps with the king associated with one or the other in card play (as in historical reality - good and bad advisors); some combination of card tricks (perhaps the King and Ober knave are an especially high trick but a number of pips with the Unter knave can trump them or at least the king by himself). This would remain a steady component, especially in luxury decks where there was a constant war of noble houses among the elites. This format had a long life and can be explicitly seen in the c. 1541 Flötner deck where the Ober knave is an elite, the Unter knave a commoner occupation - such as in the suit of leaves where the Ober knave is perhaps a chancellor type figure (the Met offers "secretary") while the Unter knave is a cook: https://collectionapi.metmuseum.org/api ... restricted

And since the nominal subject here is Imperatori, note that three of the Flötner suit's have normal kings but the fourth king has a tall-peaked Byzantine-type imperial tiara/crown but feathered and placed on an "Indian" (even though the reigning HRE is one of the suit's normal kings, Flötner's biting satire has removed the idea of "Empire" to its geographical representation of colonization, where the "Indian king" remains the non-European world awaiting to be acquired as part of a European empire and thus oddly depicted with the emperor's tiara; contrast the c. 1454 El juego de naypes deck that Ross has translated - the Emperor has also been removed entirely out of the suits' court cards, yet they both indicate one emperor, not 8, which still begs that question...but I digress here).

Your additional interpretation here seems to be the taking of a king, almost as the goal. That is conceivable among commoners playing the game, especially as social protests peak at the same time as the arrival of cards (for instance, see Samuel K. Cohn, Jr., ed. and trans., Popular Protest in Late Medieval Europe: Italy, France and Flanders, Selected Sources Translated and Annotated, Manchester University Press, 2004).

Notable revolts preceding the arrival of cards, c. 1365, and shortly thereafter:
* The revolt of Cola di Rienzo in central Italy in 1347-1354 (he essentially disrupted the elite Orsini and Colonna families control of Rome, knighting commoners in the process, but clearly wanted the Holy Roman Emperor to remain as the head and relocate to Rome, and tried to get the Church to follow his lead, with even Petrarch advocating for him...all which failed and lead to his ashes in the Tiber).
* The Jacquerie peasant revolt in northern France in 1356-1358, during the Hundred Years' War.
[the arrival of playing cards: 1365-1370]
* The Bruco/weavers revolt of 1371 in Siena
* The Revolt of the Ciompi/weavers in 1378 in Florence.
* The Hammermen's revolt in Rouen and Paris in 1382.
Etc.

All of these movements had notable common man leaders, such as Rienzo, and I can see the Unter knave loosely associated with the phenomenon.

The phenomenon of reclassifying pips, however, as the pope, the emperor or devil was taken from another card game that had those cards - trionfi; not Mamluks. That innovation had to come later, after c. 1440 with the creation of trionfi. My main interest here being the earliest adaptation of the Mamluks by Europeans and the development to 8 emperors, but again, the Mamluks would have nothing to do with those pope/emperor/devil trump themes; they were simply court cards.

Phaeded

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Phaeded wrote: 10 May 2022, 19:01
Ross Caldwell wrote: 04 May 2022, 08:52 [Jönsson on JvR]
... That is, it might have been called "Naib" because the (lower) Na'ib in the game played a special role just like this, usurping the position of the King.
Do either of you have references that explains what I underlined? The Mamluks definitely had the original version of Ober and Unter knaves but they also had card rules that allowed the Unter knave to take the king? I'm not following VH's proposal of a transition of these court cards into trumps when we still have court cards in every deck.
I mean here a function of trumping, not extra cards. That "trump" could be a Jack/Unter, or a number card. JvR's moralization follows Cessolis in ascribing common professions and conditions to the pawns/number cards.

I'm just theorizing that maybe those who transmitted the Mamluk game to Spain and Italy played a game they called "Na'ib," not "Kanjifeh." I speculate that this could be a game in which one of the second na'ibs/Unters "trumped" the king and all the other cards. I then read JvR as evidence that such a rule was known even in the 1370s.

So not references, just interpretation of that passage in JvR.

Notable revolts preceding the arrival of cards, c. 1365, and shortly thereafter:
* The revolt of Cola di Rienzo in central Italy in 1347-1354 (he essentially disrupted the elite Orsini and Colonna families control of Rome, knighting commoners in the process, but clearly wanted the Holy Roman Emperor to remain as the head and relocate to Rome, and tried to get the Church to follow his lead, with even Petrarch advocating for him...all which failed and lead to his ashes in the Tiber).
* The Jacquerie peasant revolt in northern France in 1356-1358, during the Hundred Years' War.
[the arrival of playing cards: 1365-1370]
* The Bruco/weavers revolt of 1371 in Siena
* The Revolt of the Ciompi/weavers in 1378 in Florence.
* The Hammermen's revolt in Rouen and Paris in 1382.
Etc.

All of these movements had notable common man leaders, such as Rienzo, and I can see the Unter knave loosely associated with the phenomenon.
Interesting list of historical examples. My own take on the low-to-highest rules is that, since it arises spontaneously in a variety of games, it is an example of something intrinsic to games, which I call "ludic logic." The first examples that come to mind is the promotion of the pawn (usually to queen) in Chess, and the crowning of the checker/draughts piece, when each gets to the last row of the opponent. In card games, the tendency to make Ace high, or other games where number cards are chosen for high reward. Then there are "power cards," like the Joker, which arise spontaneously in history. Maybe Fernando de la Torre is indirect evidence of such a game in Florence in the early 1430s, or maybe the Rothschild cards' Emperor is an example of it. There are a couple of extra cards in some Chinese decks, one called "Ghost" for instance, which I don't know if they use like a wild card, but which may be only the maker's special card. Sometimes these can become part of the game, even though not originally intended to be.

I take ordered trump sequences, not based on the suit-system, to be another thing entirely, since only two are known - Marziano and Tarot. I theorize there is a basic conceptual link between these two games. There are no other examples of an extra suit of trumps, which are completely different from the suit system of the basic game, in any other place or time.

I find your historical list of commoners or men of low status rising up to be interesting because I find this ludic logic to be folkoric, suggesting a common underlying psychology.

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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@Phaeded:
Phaeded wrote: 10 May 2022, 19:01 Do either of you have references that explains what I underlined? The Mamluks definitely had the original version of Ober and Unter knaves but they also had card rules that allowed the Unter knave to take the king? I'm not following VH's proposal of a transition of these court cards into trumps when we still have court cards in every deck. […]
I have been myself arguing for the early primacy of the opposition of Ober and Unter Knave, […] This would remain a steady component, especially in luxury decks where there was a constant war of noble houses among the elites. This format had a long life and can be explicitly seen in the c. 1541 Flötner deck where the Ober knave is an elite, the Unter knave a commoner occupation [..]
Your additional interpretation here seems to be the taking of a king, almost as the goal. That is conceivable among commoners playing the game, especially as social protests peak at the same time as the arrival of cards (for instance, see Samuel K. Cohn, Jr., ed. and trans., Popular Protest in Late Medieval Europe: Italy, France and Flanders, Selected Sources Translated and Annotated, Manchester University Press, 2004).
Notable revolts preceding the arrival of cards, c. 1365, and shortly thereafter:
* The revolt of Cola di Rienzo in central Italy in 1347-1354 (he essentially disrupted the elite Orsini and Colonna families control of Rome, knighting commoners in the process, but clearly wanted the Holy Roman Emperor to remain as the head and relocate to Rome, and tried to get the Church to follow his lead, with even Petrarch advocating for him...all which failed and lead to his ashes in the Tiber).
* The Jacquerie peasant revolt in northern France in 1356-1358, during the Hundred Years' War.
[the arrival of playing cards: 1365-1370]
* The Bruco/weavers revolt of 1371 in Siena
* The Revolt of the Ciompi/weavers in 1378 in Florence.
* The Hammermen's revolt in Rouen and Paris in 1382.
Etc.
All of these movements had notable common man leaders, such as Rienzo, and I can see the Unter knave loosely associated with the phenomenon.

The phenomenon of reclassifying pips, however, as the pope, the emperor or devil was taken from another card game that had those cards - trionfi; not Mamluks. That innovation had to come later, after c. 1440 with the creation of trionfi. My main interest here being the earliest adaptation of the Mamluks by Europeans and the development to 8 emperors, but again, the Mamluks would have nothing to do with those pope/emperor/devil trump themes; they were simply court cards.
My answer: I don’t have references for your request, perhaps Ross can elaborate on this.

Please note that I am not proposing “transition of these court cards into trumps”, I am proposing that the Unter-Court card alone is becoming an explicit trump in Ferarra 1423 after being an implicit one in Kaiserspiel/Imperatori.

When reading “the Ober knave is an elite, the Unter knave a commoner occupation”, it came to my mind that in German military –and the card game is initially a military game--, we have the same structure until to date: an Oberleutnant is an officer (elite), and an Unterleutnant is a commoner. So this has a very long tradition in military.

Combining this with “social protests peak at the same time as the arrival of cards” (thanks for the reference of Samuel K. Cohn), is exactly what I wanted to point out for the Council of Constance 1414-1418 situation: people meet from all over Europe, which has seen commoner revolts all over. They have the Hussit revolt as a lingering danger -- which breaks then out directly after the Council (note that this is in the Sigismund’s kingdom, Bohemia). They have close by the Basel revolt of 1776 known as “Evil Carnival”, which leads to the Battle of Sempach of 1786, in which the Duke Leopold is even killed by the commoners. All around the Lake of Constance these revolts of the commoners (Swiss Eidgenossen) continue to be a theme at least up to 1410.

So this is a serious dangerous issue, putting the medieaval social state order (“Ständegesellschaft”) at stake implying Chaos, which all Europeans meeting at Constance can talk about. So the commoner from below “Unter” is the danger to overrule kings in all four European kingdoms – this “notable common man leader[s], such as Rienzo,” being a strange kind of Emperor after my definition.

My proposition was, inspired by Ross’ idea on Mamluk’s naib-Unter usurping the king’s throne in their card game, that the Italians and the Spaniard being at the Council bring this idea with them –and we know from the Richenthal chronicles that playing cards was THE game at the Council!—and combine it with the situation of possible peasant’s uprising as in the Evil Carnival in Basel (which is very close to Constance). So the Unter becomes in the card game an implicit emperor trumping over kings.

Further, and in this light, I do fully agree with “the Mamluks would have nothing to do with those pope/emperor/devil trump themes”, all I tried to say is that the pope/emperor/devil are then additional implicit emperors which also reflect the situation at the Council of Constance: the pope is beaten by the devil when crossing the Arlberg pass (historical fact, also in the Richenthal chronicles), and evidently the pope beats the emperor since he crowns him, and every king, because he can excommunicate him.

My proposition is then that we have four implicit emperors in the card game, all beating kings, hence the name “Kaiserspiel”. The four emperors are: revolting peasants, symbolized by the Unter (and in view of the chaos associated with it: the Evil Carnival), the devil, the pope and the HRE. And Kaiserspiel is taken back home to Ferrara after the Council –remember Ross’ contribution with the interdiction of the new way of playing in 1420— in its Italienized/Latinized version: imperatori.

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@Ross: our posts intersected in time. Thanks for clarifying
Ross Caldwell wrote: 13 May 2022, 09:42
I mean here a function of trumping, not extra cards. That "trump" could be a Jack/Unter, or a number card. JvR's moralization follows Cessolis in ascribing common professions and conditions to the pawns/number cards.

I'm just theorizing that maybe those who transmitted the Mamluk game to Spain and Italy played a game they called "Na'ib," not "Kanjifeh." I speculate that this could be a game in which one of the second na'ibs/Unters "trumped" the king and all the other cards. I then read JvR as evidence that such a rule was known even in the 1370s.

[...] My own take on the low-to-highest rules is that, since it arises spontaneously in a variety of games, it is an example of something intrinsic to games, which I call "ludic logic." [...]

I take ordered trump sequences, not based on the suit-system, to be another thing entirely, since only two are known - Marziano and Tarot. I theorize there is a basic conceptual link between these two games. There are no other examples of an extra suit of trumps, which are completely different from the suit system of the basic game, in any other place or time.

I find your historical list of commoners or men of low status rising up to be interesting because I find this ludic logic to be folkoric, suggesting a common underlying psychology.
Your term "ludic logic" is very appealing to me, great concept!

Then: with your remark "I find your historical list of commoners or men of low status rising up to be interesting because I find this ludic logic to be folkoric, suggesting a common underlying psychology." very important: this is what I wanted to express all the time. And in my view this underlying psychology expresses itself in the new rules of the card game at the Council of Constance - the expression of the energized unconscious is one of the principles of depth psychology.

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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@Nathaniel: Your clarifying post is very interesting for me
Nathaniel wrote: 05 May 2022, 10:35 But there is an important general point I would like to make, regarding what I see as a fundamental error of approach, an error made again and again […] by many […] who are interested in tarot history today. I've made this point before, but it is worth repeating (and I'm sure I will have occasion to repeat it again in the future):

[Placing] far too much importance on the meanings of the details you see on the cards, and not nearly enough on the mere visual appearance of those details.
[…]
Because these images are playing cards. What card players want and need is to be able to immediately identify the cards in their hands. […]
In other words, for both the players and the cardmakers, the visual appearance of the images on the cards is vastly more important than any meaning that those images might have.
To come back to the instance at hand: When I talk about the "pattern" of the Imperatori trumps, I am talking about the visual appearance of the images on the cards, not the meanings of them. I am talking about the visual similarity of the Bagatella, Fool, Emperor, Empress, Pope, and Devil in those early decks where they are shown with two much smaller figures accompanying them. […]
My hypothesis is that the makers of the Imperatori deck decided at some stage to distinguish the trumps of the deck from the court cards by placing two smaller figures on each card, flanking the much larger trump figure. In this way, they created a common visual identity for the trumps, so that all the trumps (possibly with the exception of the Hanged Man) had some visual feature that identified them as belonging to the same subset within the deck, in the same way that all the court cards looked broadly similar, and all the numeral cards looked broadly similar. I hypothesize that this common visual feature was then initially retained when those eight cards were adopted into the tarot deck. But after a while, it was gradually dropped in most cases, because it wasn't present on the other tarot trumps and had therefore lost its raison-d'être: it no longer functioned as a common visual marker indicating their status as trumps, so it could be dropped in order to make the main figure more prominent and more easily visible.
Too many commentators on tarot history are obsessed with the meanings of the images on the cards, to the extent that they overlook the crucial visual dynamics which drove the evolution of those images. It is those visual dynamics which lie at the heart of playing card history.
I reflected on this quite a while. For me, I do believe that you are right emphasizing the practical aspects of card history, i.e. that what you call “visual dynamics” play a major role and some observations –you showed beautifully some examples!— are better explained by them than by putting to much meaning in them.

However, I do not agree that “the visual dynamics lie at the heart of playing card history”, because this statement does not leave enough room for the evolutions which do come from a change in semantic content or meaning. In other words, in my opinion, both is true: evolution by visual dynamics as well as by evolution of meaning. We have to differentiate, case by case.

A note on “meaning”: for me, when playing with tarots and the like, you may consciously “only play cards”. However, you play with the devil, with death, with love, with justice and the like – all big semantic questions for everybody. Jungian depth psychology denoted images related to these kind of question “archetypes”. Following this kind of psychology implies that it is impossible to be in touch with archetypes without being (unconsciously) touched by it. And this happens to every player in all times. Moreover, this is the reason why we still are fascinated by these cards – and why we are too much prone to look for “meaning” than for “visual dynamics”. However, for card history, our task should be to understand what the players of Renaissance time touched -- and for that we need to understand their cultural background. And we should beware as far as we can not to project our “meaning” into the cards.

Based on this background, I thought a while on “My hypothesis is that the makers of the Imperatori deck decided at some stage to distinguish the trumps of the deck from the court cards by placing two smaller figures on each card, flanking the much larger trump figure […]”, which I find a fascinating theory. The structure you address is visible in the cards.

However, I have the following question: is your observation perhaps not a part of a larger structure? Isn’t it foreground (lower part of the card) –middleground (middle part of the card) –background (top part of the card) composition rule which also applies to other cards? Put differently –and perhaps asked strangely: are the two horses on the chariot card also “assistants”? Or: are the human beings on the judgement card “assistants” to the angel? In this light: are the bags of money “assistants” to the hanged man? The structure would be in this case: two objects in the lower part of the card and a large one in the middle of the card. If this holds true, then we would have a triangular structure which point to the top part of the card which is mainly sky/heaven/god.

Perhaps this statement is wrong, I just ask for curiosity.