Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Phaeded wrote: 16 May 2022, 20:13
But what is sticking in my craw here is "shortly before 1365 is the most probable time for playing cards to have been transmitted"; why ignore the obvious - Alexandria in 1365 - and posit same vague "shortly before"? Based on what? The number of international knights involved and amount of booty, presumably with card decks mixed in, explains the sudden appearance of cards in multiple places in Europe shortly thereafter.
Because a cautious generality is better than a bold assertion upon which fallacious theories may be subsequently built?

Unless we know, in some way, that playing cards - physical object and game - were picked up exactly at that time, why burden the uncertainty with a positive assertion? Can you deny that maybe a certain kind of playing cards and game had come into fashion among the Mamluks recently, and that the Europeans they met prior to October 1365 might have learned the game from them, making it a more gradual association? No, such a scenario can't be denied, so why say it was decisively at this moment and with this specific act, almost to the day and hour, that playing cards came to be known to Europeans?

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Thanks Phaeded for
Phaeded wrote: 13 May 2022, 23:27 [...]
VH,
Thanks for taking the time for the thoughtful response and digging up the Dante reference about the Devil (Lo ’mperador del doloroso regno), however I remained unconvinced for the simple reason that if Dante is the key then these uses of "emperor" for the papacy and the devil remain inconceivable within a schema attributable to Dante. The odd Dantean phrase (e.g., the devil one) taken out of the context of his profoundly imperial worldview simply isn't enough - as his worldview was a single Roman emperor (and witness his letters begging the living Holy Roman Emperor to invade Florence) - that doesn't allow for a multitude of emperors.

You've misinterpreted Dante; yes, he acknowledges the Donation of Constantine, but negatively, almost as a second fall, which is clear in this translation (even the word "rich" is pejorative here):
(Inf. 19.115-17): “Ah Constantine, what wickedness was born—/and not from your conversion—but from the dower/that you bestowed upon the first rich father!” [Ahi, Costantin, di quanto mal fu matre, /non la tua conversion, ma quella dote/ che da te prese il primo ricco patre!]
(nice article here BTW - Dante and the Donation of Constantine: Santi Quattro Coronatihttps://sites.duke.edu/danteslibrary/da ... nati-rome/ )

He's not even beyond putting the living pope in the Inferno; the last thing imaginable for Dante is a imperial pope (and he would never liken the HRE to the Devil). All of his hopes of returning from exile were placed on the singular position of the Holy Roman Emperor, not some heavenly emperor. There simply is no room for emperors in Dante.

Phaeded
Perhaps my English is not sufficient, but I never wanted to express an "imperial pope" or an "imperial Devil" in the sense you propose (which is incompatible with Dante).

I am fully aware of Dante 's position w.r.t. HRE, as elaborated in the commedia and also in the Monarchia - I read both books integrally, and hence, I am also aware of the Constantine Donation and Dante's view on it. Dante wants the two domains being seperated - HRE is the emperor of the earthly world, and the pope should not be it. He should only deal with and dominate the religious world - to reign it, as the HRE for the earthly world.

All I wanted to express is that we have to differentiate between "emperor" denoting the worldly emperor as a Roman one or the HRE, and the other imperatori of different imperia, as the imperium of the pope and the imperium of the Devil. The two latter are not worldly, they are different - the pope is not an emperor of this world, and also the devil is not an emperor of this world. The pope is an imperator of his domain and the devil is an imperator of his domain.

Thereby, "imperator" is to be understood as in the Roman Republic: someone who dominates over his imperium, his domain. This might be military, but it need not to be military.

So the multitude of emperors is possible, but for multiple domains or imperia - each imperator has only one imperium which he rules and which is different from all other imperia.


P.S.: I am also not saying that Dante is the key for "VIII emperadori". I do believe that the pope and the devil being imperatori of their domains was common knowledge in Ferrara in 1423 (for the pope this is clear, and perhaps it might be true, that Dante is the only reference in which the devil is an emperor. But this I don't know. All I know is that Dante was still heavily read also in Ferrara in 1423. My perspective is that Dante is very important for the later developments. Perhaps I should list some observations w.r.t. this point.)

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Sorry for answering late, Ross, and thanks Huck for the support w.r.t.
Ross Caldwell wrote: 14 May 2022, 12:35
Huck wrote: 14 May 2022, 11:22
Ross Caldwell wrote: 14 May 2022, 10:52 Can you give us the passage from Ulrich von Richenthal that describes the popularity of cards at the council? I can't find an edition of the chronicle online. I've checked Schreiber, but he doesn't mention it, at least searching under the name "richenthal."
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=1843&p=22719&hilit ... hal#p22719

Actually we have only the prohibition of playing cards during the rather short election of the pope Martin ...

The note "we know from the Richenthal chronicles that playing cards was THE game at the Council! " is a plausible conclusion, but the documentary evidence is thin.
As far I know it and I would love, if I could say more.
Thank you very much! I didn't remember the connection with the name "Richenthal." Now it is in my mind.

"No one was allowed to play in secret or in public, whether with cards or other things, while the Pope remained unelected." Well, the prohibition was promulgated on Sunday 7 November (read in churches), and Pope Martin V was elected on Thursday 11 November, so it was not long at all.

Yes, card play was popular enough that Sigismund banned it during the mini-Lent of the election process.
In my perspective, we have some more documents to support "we know from the Richenthal chronicles that playing cards was THE game at the Council! ":

First, we have the ban on card playing in Constance of 29.12.1379 (see, e.g. Hellmut Rosenfeld: "Zur Vor- und Frühgeschichte und Morphogenese von Kartenspiel und Tarock", Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 52 (1970), p.75). We have no other document until 1414, hence we have to assume that the city kept the ban until then. During the Council, other rules applied which overruled the city rules [for Nördlingen we have –quoted from memory- that nobles had the right to play cards in the city when passing by. Constance was full of nobles at the Council.]. Hence card playing was reintroduced to the city, perhaps by the foreign attendants from Italy, Spain, etc.

Second, we have the Richenthal Chronicles, of which I repeat the English translations from
vh0610 wrote: 13 Apr 2021, 21:35 And in the Aulendorf-Version (https://edition.mgh.de/001/html/edition ... $hl=karten) you can read under the rubrum 251
Und solt och da zwüschen nieman spilen noch karten, noch kainerlay spil tuͦn, weder haimlich noch offenlich, biß ain baͧpst erwellet wurd.
[My translation: And noone should also in the meanwhile play cards, not any other game, neither secretly nor openly, until a pope is elected]

And also in the Konstanz-Version (https://edition.mgh.de/001/html/edition ... $hl=karten) you can read under the same rubrum 251
Es solt ouch dazwüschen nieman mer weder spilen noch karten, noch dehainerlay handspil nit tuͦn, haimlich noch offenlich, bis der bapst erwelt wurd.
[My translation: Noone should also in the meanwhile play cards, not any other game played by hand, neither secretly nor openly, until the pope is elected]
Note the “not any other game played by hand” which puts a strong emphasis on the importance of cards at the Council since they are solely mentioned specifically over “other game played by hand” (in the sense: “card games and the [negligible] rest of games played by hand”).

Third, we have that the mayor of Constance forbade specifically to play cards for one full year in private rooms after the Council was over, as stated by the Council-Expert Ansgar Frenken, Das Konstanzer Konzil, Kohlhammer Verlag, 2015, p.131:
„Nach der Beendigung des Konzils ließ die städtische Obrigkeit sogar für ein Jahr jegliches Kartenspielen in privaten Räumen untersagen.“
[My translation: After the termination of the Council the city magistrates even forbade for one year any game playing of cards in private rooms].
The “any” in “any game playing of cards” gives rise to the interpretation that there were several types of card games played at the Council (interpreted in the sense: “not even a simple variant” or “not even for pleasure and without money” or “and certainly not the wild new variant [later on called Kayserspiel/Karnöffel]”)

Fourth, we have
Gisela Wacker “Ulrich Richentals Chronik des Konstanzer Konzils und ihre Funktionalisierung im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert”, PhD Thesis, Tübingen 2002.
She shows, based on documents of the Constance archives, that Konrad Witz attended the Council in person, he was in Constance from 1416 onwards (see op. cit. p. 111). Furthermore, there is highest probability that Konrad Witz was the painter of the original Richental-Chronicles and the painter of the later Ambraser Hofämterspiel (see op. cit. p. 84, 106f, 108,109, 111, 113), which she shows by comparison of style in Witz paintings, the Richental-Chronicles and the Ambraser Hofämterspiel (See, for instance, a comparison between a King of this deck and a depiction of King Sigimund, op. cit. p. 109).
The Council was THE place of cultural inventions of this time due to pan-European exchange of cultural ideas in the large, as well for art and for music (op. cit. p. 113). In this light, we are tempted to add: also for the cultural invention of playing cards as manifested in the Kayserspiel.

To sum up: in Constance, cards were first banned in 1379, then reintroduced in the Council as the primary game played by hand (“play cards, not any other game played by hand”), then especially heavily forbidden even in private rooms (!) directly after the Council (“After the termination of the Council the city magistrates even forbade for one year any game playing of cards in private rooms”). This ban puts a special strong emphasis on the game in the Council time. Finally, an artist attendant of the Council, Konrad Witz, is later on the artist of one of the most famous card games, the Ambraser Hofämterspiel –linked to Bohemia of which Sigismund was king of. Note that Konrad Witz was from Basel, not too far away from JvR’s Freiburg [The depiction of the Hofämterspiel is as if Witz had read JvRs treatise Part II and Part III].
How and where does an artist from Basel get in contact with a duke or king from Bohemia for whom he later on paints a card game?

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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vh0610 wrote: 16 May 2022, 21:28 To sum up: in Constance, cards were first banned in 1379, then reintroduced in the Council as the primary game played by hand (“play cards, not any other game played by hand”), then especially heavily forbidden even in private rooms (!) directly after the Council (“After the termination of the Council the city magistrates even forbade for one year any game playing of cards in private rooms”). This ban puts a special strong emphasis on the game in the Council time. Finally, an artist attendant of the Council, Konrad Witz, is later on the artist of one of the most famous card games, the Ambraser Hofämterspiel –linked to Bohemia of which Sigismund was king of. Note that Konrad Witz was from Basel, not too far away from JvR’s Freiburg [The depiction of the Hofämterspiel is as if Witz had read JvRs treatise Part II and Part III].
How and where does an artist from Basel get in contact with a duke or king from Bohemia for whom he later on paints a card game?
VH (is there a better name we can call you by? I think of "Van Halen ;-),

The cards Witz is associated with are not the Hofämterspiel but the Hofjagdspiel; the former has a Bohemia connection - the latter Witz-associated one does not.

This c. 1440-45 Hofjagdspiel deck represents the primary variation from the "common" deck of King/Ober/Unter knaves (or marschali) described by JvR that matches the Mamluk court cards, by inserting a queen after the king. The four suits of falcons, lures, hounds and herons keeps the ten pip cards format with the '10s' being represented by a banner like many south German and Swiss playing cards.

What uncontestably singles out 8 cards within this deck is this: only the Kings and Queens have gold backgrounds, the knaves simply have the same backgrounds as the rest of the pips.

So again, I restate my premise - the only one backed up by the actual surviving cards - that the 8 imperatori resulted from the insertion of the queen, who with the king, represented four houses/suits vying for emperor, and thus "imperatori."

Image
Phaeded
Last edited by Phaeded on 17 May 2022, 14:49, edited 1 time in total.

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Very good ...

vh0610 wrote .....
Third, we have that the mayor of Constance forbade specifically to play cards for one full year in private rooms after the Council was over, as stated by the Council-Expert Ansgar Frenken, Das Konstanzer Konzil, Kohlhammer Verlag, 2015, p.131:
„Nach der Beendigung des Konzils ließ die städtische Obrigkeit sogar für ein Jahr jegliches Kartenspielen in privaten Räumen untersagen.“
[My translation: After the termination of the Council the city magistrates even forbade for one year any game playing of cards in private rooms].
Ansgar Frenken ...
https://books.google.de/books?id=w2wiEA ... n.&f=false
The selected text has the Footnote 269 ....
269 Keupp - Schwarz, Konstanz 160-164. Über die Bestrafungen gibt das Ratsbuch [der Stadt Konstanz) zuverlässig Auskunft.
Translation: The council book [of the city of Constance] provides reliable information about the punishments.
... at page285:
Keupp, Jan - Schwarz, Jörg, Konstanz 1414-1418. Eine Stadt und ihr Konzil. Darmstadt 2013 [Populär gehaltene Darstellung mit Ungenauigkeiten im Detail und mit manchmal schiefen und nicht zutreffungen Wertungen!]
Translation: "Popular depiction with inaccuracies in detail and sometimes skewed and incorrect ratings!"
https://www.konstanzer-konzil.de/de/ind ... ihr-konzil
... explains, that the Keupp-Schwarz text doesn't contain footnotes

**********

Ansgar Frenzken has a lot of publications related to the council of Constance, the probability is high, that his judgment is reliable.
http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/voll ... l_2013.pdf
Huck
http://trionfi.com

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Phaeded wrote: 17 May 2022, 00:22 So again, I restate my premise - the only one backed up by the actual surviving cards - that the 8 imperatori resulted from the insertion of the queen, who with the king, represented four houses/suits vying for emperor, and thus "imperatori."
Image
Hofjagdspiel suit of falcons.jpg
Well, a good observation.

Another good observation is, that Master Ingold observed 2 decks, which he didn't like.

In one the Ober and Unter are replaced by a Queen and another woman, which Master Ingold dentified as a Mätresse for the King. For this reason Master Ingold doesn't like it. The deck has totally 52 cards.
In the other there were 8 professions, which seem to present a trump order. And 4 kings. Between the 8 professions are a riffian (a pimp) and a täppelweib (a prostitute) and Master Ingold didn't like it.
"Nun sind auf dem kartenspil fier küng mit iren wauppen, und hat ieglicher under im XIII karten, das macht an ainer sum LII, und hat ieglichü das zaychen irs küngs. Etlich kartenspil hat dar zu fier küngin und fier junkfrawen, etlich haben den ackerman, den edelman, den wuchrer, den pfaffen, die toypel, den riffian, den wirt; und gewint ie ains dem andern ab: dem edelman der wuchrer, dem wuchrer der pfaff, dem pfaffen das täppelweib, dem täppelweib der riffian, dem riffian der wirt, dem wirt der weinman, dem weinman wider umb der pauman der den wein pauwen sol, der nimpt das gelt wider von dem wirt."
http://trionfi.com/0/mi/00/

There were researchers, who suspected, that this would be Karnöffel cards.

Further we had 60 cards in a deck of John of Rheinfelden, with 5 court cards and 10 number cards for each suit.
And we have the Michelino deck, which possibly also had 60 cards, but 4 of the courts are (possibly) replaced by a trump row of 16 Greek-Roman gods.

Well, there is more than one way to interpret the terminus "8 Imperatori cards in Ferrara" and this clearly says, that there were deck variants and we probably don't know all the variants.
Huck
http://trionfi.com

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Huck wrote: 18 May 2022, 03:50
Phaeded wrote: 17 May 2022, 00:22 So again, I restate my premise - the only one backed up by the actual surviving cards - that the 8 imperatori resulted from the insertion of the queen, who with the king, represented four houses/suits vying for emperor, and thus "imperatori."
[only king and queen having gold backgrounds in this deck = 8 "gold" cards]
Image
Hofjagdspiel suit of falcons.jpg
Well, a good observation.

Another good observation is, that Master Ingold observed 2 decks, which he didn't like.

In one the Ober and Unter are replaced by a Queen and another woman, which Master Ingold dentified as a Mätresse for the King. For this reason Master Ingold doesn't like it. The deck has totally 52 cards.
In the other there were 8 professions, which seem to present a trump order. And 4 kings. Between the 8 professions are a riffian (a pimp) and a täppelweib (a prostitute) and Master Ingold didn't like it.
How common was that format, both knaves replaced by a woman?

The insertion of a single queen per suit - no removing of knaves (albeit, one becomes a knight) - is what ends up as the trionfi standard. And to reiterate my notion for the Imperatori, the Unter and Ober knaves are opposed (one with a sign held upwards, the other downwards), so the king could have been paired with the "good knave" to form a group of 8 before the queen was inserted, forming a new group of 8 singularly marked cards: kings and queens.

Queens in early luxury decks from Holy Roman Empire dominions
Stuttgart: 2 suits of 3 males, 2 suits of 3 females; queens only cards singled out with a silver border (deck somewhat matching the CY, which has 3 males and 3 females per suit, vs the 3 males or 3 females).
Hofjagdspiel (courtly hunting deck): King, queen and 2 knaves - only king and queen on gold background.
Hofämterspiel: (courtly household card): Only King and queen court cards, on thrones. What are arguably the knaves - what JvR calls marshalls - have been pushed down into being the 10 and 9 pips, the Hofmeister and Marshal respectively: https://cards.old.no/1455-hofamterspiel/

In this small group of examples we have queen singled out by a precious metal paint (gold or silver) or a throne; even the king is only singled out by a throne or the gold (not the silver in the case of the Stuttgart). In the Hofämterspiel the knaves (now a Master of the house and Marshall), have been pushed down into the pips with the insertion of the queen.

The queen - an innovation from the original Mamluk king/ober/unter format - is arguably the one variable changing the format of playing cards.

Phaeded
Last edited by Phaeded on 18 May 2022, 22:12, edited 1 time in total.

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Ross Caldwell wrote: 16 May 2022, 20:50
Phaeded wrote: 16 May 2022, 20:13
But what is sticking in my craw here is "shortly before 1365 is the most probable time for playing cards to have been transmitted"; why ignore the obvious - Alexandria in 1365 - and posit same vague "shortly before"? Based on what? The number of international knights involved and amount of booty, presumably with card decks mixed in, explains the sudden appearance of cards in multiple places in Europe shortly thereafter.
Because a cautious generality is better than a bold assertion upon which fallacious theories may be subsequently built?

Unless we know, in some way, that playing cards - physical object and game - were picked up exactly at that time, why burden the uncertainty with a positive assertion? Can you deny that maybe a certain kind of playing cards and game had come into fashion among the Mamluks recently, and that the Europeans they met prior to October 1365 might have learned the game from them, making it a more gradual association? No, such a scenario can't be denied, so why say it was decisively at this moment and with this specific act, almost to the day and hour, that playing cards came to be known to Europeans?

Each time an event is identified (the Florentine triumph of 1440 at Anghiari spawning trionfi in Florence, the capture of the Mamluk's richest city for Mamluk playing card diffusion in 1365) you tacitly acknowledge the date while then hedging it by pointing to slightly earlier. You don't qualify the event by "circa" which would be reasonable, but always specify before which would implicitly negate the event in question. You are adverse to events affecting card playing for reasons I don't understand, despite the clear evidence of events in card decks (e.g., the arms of the two houses married in the d'Este deck).

A working hypothesis needs specifics from which one extrapolates from and both of those events don't have better alternatives.

Again, I think vh (and Dummett) reasonably points to there having been a significant event that allowed the rapid and widespread diffusion of playing cards:
Petrarch’s De remediis utriusque fortunae (1366) discusses a number of games but says nothing about playing cards; a Paris ordinance of 1369 forbids numerous games, but does not mention card games, although one of 1377 was to forbid cards to be played on work days; similarly, a St Gallen ordinance of 1364 forbade dice games, and allowed board games, but left cards unmentioned, although an ordinance of 1379 prohibited them as well.

At least I cannot ignore Dummet’s argument, we have to deal with this observation. My proposition is hence to logically intersect Dummet’s argument with Decker’s argument about the “flurry”: there was an event sometimes after 1369 which introduced the cards to Europe, which then consecutively led to Decker’s “flurry of notices” after 1375.
There's no reason for "after 1369" except for the Paris ordinance, but cards may have not taken off for 5 years after their acquisition (and who knows in which cities they were first adopted; clearly "Upper Rhine" - Strasbourg, Freiburg, Basel, etc. - must have been early, at least one of those cities).

The 1365 crusade has an international group of knights that could have acquired and diffused Mamluk cards from the Mamluk port of Alexandria throughout Europe. As hypothetical as that is, there isn't a better explanation - it perfectly fits in with the earliest records of cards, and there is no reason to privilege a date before 1365.

Phaeded

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Phaeded wrote: 18 May 2022, 21:16 How common was that format, both knaves replaced by a woman?
Hm ... how common was it, that Queens and Kings were 8 cards, that had a golden background ?
And there were two women who replaced 2 men in the Ingold deck.

And how common were Imperatori cards, if they only appeared at one location (Ferrara) and were limited to a period of 30 years.?

Phaeded ...
The insertion of a single queen per suit - no removing of knaves (albeit, one becomes a knight) - is what ends up as the trionfi standard. And to reiterate my notion for the Imperatori, the Unter and Ober knaves are opposed (one with a sign held upwards, the other downwards), so the king could have been paired with the "good knave" to form a group of 8 before the queen was inserted, forming a new group of 8 singularly marked cards: kings and queens.

Queens in early luxury decks from Holy Roman Empire dominions
Stuttgart: 2 suits of 3 males, 2 suits of 3 females; queens only cards singled out with a silver border (deck somewhat matching the CY, which has 3 males and 3 females per suit, vs the 3 males or 3 females).
Hofjagdspiel (courtly hunting deck): King, queen and 2 knaves - only king and queen on gold background.
Hofämterspiel: (courtly household card): Only King and queen court cards, on thrones. What are arguably the knaves - what JvR calls marshalls - have been pushed down into being the 10 and 9 pips, the Hofmeister and Marshal respectively: https://cards.old.no/1455-hofamterspiel/

In this small group of examples we have queen singled out by a precious metal paint (gold or silver) or a throne; even the king is only singled out by a throne or the gold (not the silver in the case of the Stuttgart). In the Hofämterspiel the knaves (now a Master of the house and Marshall), have been pushed down into the pips with the insertion of the queen.

The queen - an innovation from the original Mamluk king/ober/unter format - is arguably the one variable changing the format of playing cards.
I just perceive, that there were lots of variants. And I feel sure, that - if we would find more old playing cards - that we would get more deck variants.

The golden color was used also for cheaper decks, as we can see from the material, that was collected by Franco Pratesi.
DOR means "dorati, messi a oro" ... I see it 3 times used in these commissions.

Image

http://trionfi.com/naibi-silk-dealers

.... and also 3 times in this list from ...
http://trionfi.com/naibi-aquired

Image
Image
Image
Huck
http://trionfi.com

Re: Imperatori sources and discussion

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Phaeded wrote: 18 May 2022, 21:16
In this small group of examples we have queen singled out by a precious metal paint (gold or silver) or a throne; even the king is only singled out by a throne or the gold (not the silver in the case of the Stuttgart). In the Hofämterspiel the knaves (now a Master of the house and Marshall), have been pushed down into the pips with the insertion of the queen.
I'm trying to find Franco's discussion of Chorone/Corone cards. Your comments reminded me of an interpretation he had.

He could never find references to Imperatori in the records he searched, despite their otherwise fulsome detail, with much new information. One hitherto unknown kind of cards was called "Crowns," which came in a variety of sizes and qualities. From the prices and the gold on the cards, he theorizes that these are not decks with extra cards like trumps, but instead that the crowns of the king and queen were gilded, making them finer and more expensive. In other words, a retail luxury brand.

This reminds me of your solution to the VIII Emperors. Maybe the cards had not merely gilded crowns, but also backgrounds like the German style you refer to, and perhaps Ferrarese called this deck Emperors, while the Florentines continued to call it by its brand name, Crowns? So Imperatori and Corone could be the same thing.
cron