[Added next day: my post is at
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=906&p=13377#p13355]
Well, are you satisfied, Lorredan?
Myself, I don't have a clue where the tarot was invented, other than Northern Italy, including Tuscany--or when, other than between 1410 and 1440.
If there were a catalysmic war, and all of Europe, North America, Japan, Australia/New Zealand, and a few other places were destroyed, and an archeologist found 20 high-tech hard-drive plants in Thailand, he wouldn't conclude that the hard-drive was invented by some genius in Thailand. That's an extreme example, of course, just to illustrate a way of thinking other than "hard data." But look at Northern Italy. Florence survived the Renaissance pretty much intact. There was no Ambrosian Republic burning the Visconti palace, followed by French looting a half century later, no pro-papacy fanatics burning the Bentivoglio's and other noble families' palaces in Bologna. There are good records in Florence, and among many strata of people; there are pretty good ones, of the court, in Ferrara. There isn't much, many other places. It's amazing how much Renaissance art has been destroyed, too.
To determine if hard drives were invented in Thailand, an archeologist would dig further, see if the culture needed to invent and market a hard-drive existed in Thailand earlier on. So in lieu of anything else, we have to look at what there was before the time in question, i.e. before 1440. If there was not much leading to the tarot already in the culture, compared to other places, I don't say, see, when the records stop, that's when it must have been invented. I say, well, we have to keep digging, not only there but other likely places, too, for the culture necessary to create the product. Complex cultural products don't appear out of thin air, and neither does the tarot appear out of just "dances of death" and mystery plays.
Production records at a particular point in time, when something becomes popular, don't show a lot about origins. If we went by production statistics, we'd say that the automobile, in the sense of a gasoline-propelled passenger vehicle with four wheels, was invented in the United States (as I think some US president did say not too long ago). We'd say the computer was invented in the United States, too, when in fact it started in Poland, among other places, and was perfected in England during World War II, as a code-breaking device. That fact was kept secret for a while, too, because of the Cold War. The computer was suddenly created out of "science," but a lot more was involved besides "science."
If all the German patent office records had been destroyed for 1885 and thereabouts, we could still figure out that probably the automobile was invented in Germany as opposed to other places, just by looking at other inventions, would-be inventions, and theoretical discussions before then. At least we'd know it wasn't the U.S.
And sometimes it turns out that something was invented in several places, different bits in different places, which then merge (e.g. automobiles and computers). Words get invented, too, which doesn't mean that the thing that got a certain name at a certain time was invented at the same time as the word.
Andrea Vitali, who has actually taught medieval iconography, says that medievalists estimate at least a 20-25 year time-lag between the invention of something and when it actually is numerous enough to appear in records now extant. Here is what Andrea says, in a footnote to his essay
Il Principe. I don't know when he wrote it, but it's the first essay in his list:
Poiché i documenti più antichi conosciuti riguardanti il gioco dei Trionfi risalgono al 1440 (Firenze) e 1442 (Corte Estense), per congettura storica si deve far risalire la loro creazione ad un periodo precedente non inferiore ai venti/venticinque anni, epoca che corrisponde alla presenza del Principe a Bologna. Tale congettura, in riferimento alla pratica d’uso, è comunemente avvalorata dagli storici del medioevo. Nello specifico, è concorde con lo scrivente il Prof. Rolando Dondarini, docente di storia medievale all’Università di Bologna. Occorre infatti considerare il tempo necessario affinché questo gioco acquisisse una tale popolarità da divenire oggetto di realizzazione artistica miniata presso le corti. Inoltre il loro contenuto deve essere messo in relazione con i contesti culturali del tempo, un contenuto che, nello specifico, viene fatto risalire dal prof. Franco Cardini alla fine del Trecento o inizi Quattrocento.
(As the oldest known documents about the game of triumphs date back to 1440 (Florence) and 1442 (Estense Court), by historical assumption they must date back to at least twenty/twenty-five years earlier, a period which matches with the Prince being in Bologna. This type of conjecture, with reference to practice of use, is commonly confirmed by the historians of the middle ages. Specifically, professor Rolando Dondarini, teacher of medieval history at the University of Bologna, is an agreement with the writer. We should actually consider the time needed for this game to become so popular that it is the object of artistic illuminated production in the courts (that is, currently practised). Also, their content must be compared with the cultural contexts of the time, a subject that in specifics has been dated back to the end of the XIVth century or the beginning of the XVth by professor Franco Cardini.
(I welcome suggestions to improve this translation.) He also quotes from Decker, Dummett, and Depaulis'
Wicked Pack of Cards:
A lower bound for the date of the invention is harder to determine. It probably occurred around 1425; the earliest date with any claim to be plausible would be 1410." (p. 27)
Maybe it's different now. But it is certainly true that for many things now there is just such a time lag, between invention and popular production, e.g. the automobile and the computer. And new things typically are expensive at first and get cheaper.
A lot can happen in 15-20 years. Or maybe
Wicked Pack (published 17 years ago) is out of date.
Probably different researchers have different mind-sets, as to what constitutes evidence and how conclusive any given evidence is. So I don't expect these issues will ever get resolved. Meanwhile I enjoy accumulating what data I find, mostly from scholarly sources (as a pygmy standing on giants, as Michael says), and looking at what others have found and how they see it, not necessarily for "origins", but for "connecting dots," so to speak, in the history. I've been digging in Florence, Bologna, Ferrara, Milan, Venice, Cremona, Monza, Brandenburg, and other places, trying to extend what I know relating to the tarot and its place in the culture. I even dig in 14th century Padua. But I don't want to be wasting my time. So if I am, please disabuse me.
[added next day: two other significant things about Florence (1) it is where Franco does his research; and (2) it is where, right before 1440, a major church council was held, where people from all over, anticipating boredom, would have brought their favorite pastime.]
No I am not satisfied.
(I am joking of course)