Tarot History Forum

I attempted to identify anything about a Anselino di Salimbeni, who according Ortalli, "The Prince and the Playing Cards" ...

"Further proof of the Este interest in mechanical card production comes […] from a note of 4 June 1459 concerning objects lent to a certain Anselino di Salimbeni by the prince; among them was a box containing "stampe for trump cards"

http://trionfi.com/0/e/19/

... might have been a potential Trionfi card producer. The search for Anselino di Salimbeni was negative, but an Anselmo di Salimbeni (possibly/probably the same person) could be located in ..

http://www.archive.org/details/guarinod ... 00bertuoft
Guarino da Verona fra letterati e cortigiani a Ferrara (1429-1460) (1921)
Bertoni, Giulio, 1878-1942

... a report to the letter exchange an Anselmo Salimbeni had something to do with a Lancelot text in 1458, and a Petrarca-Trionfi text in 1471, page 99 and 179. From this it seems, that Anselmo appears in the letter exchanges from Guarino und is a person with literary connections in Ferrara.

Then Anselmo Salimbeni appears as a literary figure (!!!) in a novella of Bernardo Illicini or Illicino or Ollicino or Licinio or complete Bernardo di Pietro Lapini di Montalcino and also Bernardo Lapini da Siena, the text with different titles, one of them "Anselmo Salimbeni and Angelica Montanini", which was presented by Roscoe 1824 with praising words as the work of Bernardo ...

http://www.elfinspell.com/RoscoeIllicini.html

... whereby we also learn, that Bernardo Illicino, from Siena, where also the story of the literary figure Anselmo plays, had been a medicus at the court of "Gio. Galeazzo" (who shall this be? Probably Galeazzo Maria) Sforza (where he surely learnt about Trionfi cards; this so should have happened after March 1466) and went then to the court of Borso d'Este, in a time, when the Milanese-Ferrarese relations were rather disturbed (this must have happened before 1471).

The Novella is a love story between members of two hostile families and it creates peace between the families, somehow involved is the hostile brother Carlo of Angelica ... and it is said, that this became a famous story and a large literary topic.

Indeed I find it of interest, that Boiardo at the same Ferrarese court a few years later begins his Orlando innamorato with a brother-sister pair, which visits the court of Charlemain (Carlo) and the sister has then the name Angelica (Angelica) and the brother not A-nselmo, but A-rgalia.

Isn't this a nice and somehow unusual picture?



And what about this?

55. Petrarch (b. 1304-d. 1374), Les Triomphes (The Triumphs) Left page - Right page, anonymous French translation with the commentary of Bernardo Illicino, Rouen, around 1503, Manuscripts Department, Western Section, Fr. 594, Parchment

This manuscript's script and style of illumination confirm that it was produced in the northwestern city of Rouen. Its illustrations represent the first serious attempt by a French artist to illustrate Petrarch's poem. The artist depicted, in a series of diptychs, the triumphs of Love, of Chastity, of Reason, of Death, of Fame (portrayed here), of Time, and of the Trinity.

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/bnf/bnf0004.html

That's strange, if one looks for a humble Trionfi card painter Anselmo and finds instead another person with some bigger influence on the Petrarca "Trionfi poem" development. Illicino has the name to be the first commentator of Petrarca's Trionfi. The pictures above are from a later date, 1503 and from France, but in 1473 or 1474 he worked on a commentary (publishing dates) and dedicated it to Borso, but Borso was dead in 1471 (so it was written before, yes, this seems confirmed).
His commentary was then given to many later Trionfi editions, and in 1478 an edition appeared, in which his text was combined with Filelfo commenting the Canzonieri (Filelfo had died 1477, so it was Illicino's activty with security). It became then tradition to publish the Trionfi together with the Canzonieri, first the Trionfi and then the Canzonieri.



"Illicino" is the older name of a Pico Sacro or Monte Sacro near Santiago da Compostela in NW Spain. There lived in old times a dragon and there was gold. If Bernardo Illicino knew this ... .-) ... I don't know, but he had a damn lot of names.

Roscoe thought in 1824, that Illicino wrote the Novella about Anselmo and Angelica, but actually Gentile Sermine had made in 1424 or little later totally 40 Novellae and the Anselmo/Angelica story seems to have been the first of them. The story played end of 14th century, perhaps referring to real persons.

Illicino alias "Bernardo di Pietro Lapini di Montalcino" "from Siena" sounds, as if Illicino had reason to feel himself a relative of "Angelica Montanino", also from Siena. Actually there is a real hilltown Montalcino 42 km from Siena. Possibly the Montanini in Siena came from Montalcino, it sounds like this.

Pietro Lapini di Montalcino had been his father, also working as a physician, and he had worked in Milan in 1443 at a commentary to the Canzonieri of Petrarca. Illicino in his Trionfi commentary partly involved his father and answered to his fathers ideas.

The first complete commentary to the Canzoniere is now lost. It was compiled in 1443 by Pietro Lapini da Montalcino for Francesco Maria Visconti, and apparently argued for an allegorical interpretation of Laura. The most important 15th-c. commentary followed in 1444–7, again compiled for the same Visconti; it is by Francesco Filelfo , who has doubts about the acceptability of love as the major theme, and covers only poems 1–135, discussing linguistic difficulties, classical sources, and poetic technique, though he recognizes only sonnets and canzoni, and treats the overall structure of the collection as arbitrary.

http://www.jrank.org/literature/pages/1 ... aries.html

Ille-cino - Montal-cino ; Mont-alchino - Mont-e Sacro

A good Italian biography of Illecino
http://www.treccani.it/Portale/elements ... 005218.xml

It isn't confirmed, that Illicino any time worked as physician for Galeazzo Maria Sforza or his son Gian Galeazzo (as given by Roscoe).

I don't find any data, when he was born, probably unknown. He studied in Siena. In 1464 he married in Siena a wife with the name Aldobrandini (should be a Florentine family ?). In 1468 he arrived in Ferrara. In 1471 he knew Anselmo Salimbeni, probably the intended Trionfi card printer:



This is one of the 3 notes, that I found to the Ferrarese Anselmo Salimbeni. The second is the note of 1459, that he borrowed the printing utensil, the third is in the context of a Lancelot text (see Bertoni above):



The two pictures above are of interest, as they mix Fama with Death in one picture. At one of the pictures Fama has elements of the card Judgment, also called "Angel" ... Angelica ? ... .-) But the French formed headlines like "Fama overcomes Death", and this seems to be presented by the both pictures.
http://www.studiolo.org/BSProject/PETRA ... NFI-02.htm

I think, that this is unusual, but it is French and from 1503, but possibly in some way indicated and provoked by Illicino's commentary (? ... not likely).

The following I found to the father of Illicino, Pietro Lapini da Montalcino:

Pietro Lapini da Montalcino era stato medico dell’anti-papa Giovanni XXIII, ossia del cardinale Cossa, ma deposto dal Concilio di Costanza nel 1415. Due anni dopo il Lapini si spostò al servizio di Filippo Maria, per il quale svolse missioni diplomatiche, ma per lo più rimase a Pavia dove insegnò nel locale Studio.

http://www.storiadimilano.it/Personaggi ... omaria.htm

Lapini had been the physician of the Anti-Pope John XXIII, who was abdicated in 1415 in Constance. After two years (should be 1417) Lapini appears in the service of Filippo Maria Visconti, by whom he is used for diplomatic missions (likely he had been till this time in Constance ?). After some time he appears as a teacher (likely for medical science ?) in Pavia in the "local studio" ...(= university ?).

Marziano (da Tortona) morì nel
1425, lasciando il suo pupillo a Pietro Lapini da Montalcino,
che era stato medico dell’anti-papa Giovanni XXIII, e che per
Filippo Maria svolse anche missioni diplomatiche, insegnando
a Pavia.

http://www.lauramalinverni.net/sforza.pdf

When Marziano da Tortona died 1425, he left his "fosterling? fosterlings? nurse childs? pupils?" to Lapini ... the meaning of the sentence is not clear to me. Either Lapini got the charge of children of Martiano da Tortona himself, or Tortona had build a similar institution as Vittorio da Feltre in Mantova educating pupils in Pavia, or what?
This matter is rather important for Tarot History, as it indicates a strong relation between Martiano da Tortona and Lapini in the time of Martiano's death, and that's the probable time, when Martiano wrote his treatise, which one might call "the first Tarot book" - some years ago translated by Ross Caldwell ...

http://trionfi.com/0/b/11/

If we regard this moment and make a jump of ca. 50 years to the first Trionfi-poem commentary by Lapini's son Illicino 1471/74, we have a certain important relation between the two moments.

Il corso degli studi prevedeva numerosi insegnamenti tra cui uno dedicato all'astronomia/astrologia. I documenti ci tramandano i nomi di vari lettori di questa disciplina. Il primo è il senese Pietro Lapini che insegnò anche all'Università di Pavia e fu astrologo ufficiale di Filippo Maria Visconti. Di lui ci sono rimasti molti judicia, cioè previsioni ovvero oroscopi, uno dei quali relativo all'anno 1421 è riconducibile ad un insegnamento senese Footnote 7. Altri lettori di astrologia nel periodo considerato furono Domenico da Ragusa, Leonardo da Montichiello, Luciano Bellanti e Cristofano da Chianciano, quest'ultimo attivo anche nei primi decenni del secolo successivo.

Footnote 7
Nel XV secolo in tutte le università l'incarico di astrologia prevedeva anche la produzione di previsioni astrologiche generali per l'anno successivo, relative alle condizioni metereologiche, ai raccolti, alle malattie alla situazione politica. Cfr. Gianfranco Fioravanti, Le "arti liberali" nei secoli XIII-XV, in L'Università di Siena: 750 anni, p. 264 e Alcide Garosi, Alcune notizie e documenti su Pietro Lapini medico senese, «Rivista di storia delle scienze mediche e naturali», 25 (1934), p. 161-191.

http://www.cisui.unibo.it/annali/10/tes ... ameset.htm

According this Lapini worked as teacher at the university of Pavia and had been official astrologus of Filippo Maria Visconti, at least for some time. Some activity as astrologus is documented around 1421. More info about Lapini promises a 30-pages article Alcune notizie e documenti su Pietro Lapini medico senese in «Rivista di storia delle scienze mediche e naturali», 25 (1934), p. 161-191. (This text seems to be from "Rivista di storia delle scienze mediche e naturali" (Siena, 1923-1956), compare:
http://www.imss.fi.it/biblio/irivista.html )


http://www.archivi.beniculturali.it/Bib ... /C2tom.pdf
Document p. 15
Mond Lucis, Mons Umbronis, Mons Lucinus, Ilcinus, Monte Elcinus are names of the mountain, at which the city of Montalcino was build. The community is addressed Ilcinensis Civitas and Civitas Icinea.
Document p. 17
Pietro Lapini is addressed as Pietro Lapini Mattematico

With this the mystery of the name Illicino should be clear ... it's not relating to the Spanish Monte Sacro. And Pietro Lapini gets a further profession, beside commentator and writer, physician and astrologus he also gets the title Mattematico.

*****************************************

Who was Gentile Sermini, whose name, if I take the "G" from the first and all letters from the second without the first, so ERMINI, transmutes to the name GERMINI , which, as we know, addressed the game of Minchiate in 15th century.

In this context the following is of interest:
Novellae with a scheme based on 10

"Decamerone" was a famous text of 14th century, made by Giovanni Boccaccio, 100 stories told by 10 persons (10 for each person) during the plague 1348-50.

Franco Sacchetti (Florence) collected 300 stories, from which 222 survived.

Gentile Sermini wrote his Novellae after 1424 (I don't know, how they got to this), and it's said, that they were 40 (although in an older text I found, that it would have been 45), but the general tradition agrees, that it are 40. The stories circle - as in the Decamerone - around erotic situations in Siena

Masucchio was published in 1476 posthumus with his "Novellino with the help of Roberto Sanseverino, the famous condottieri, in the time, when the poet Luigi Pulci, having trouble espececially with Marsilio Ficino in Florence, had become his secretary. The number of the stories was 50, parted in 5 blocks of 10, identical to the scheme of Mantegna Tarocchi, which according Trionfi's theory was likely produced ca. 1475. The content of the stories was erotical in Decamerone style, playing in Naples.

It's easy to recognize, that 3 of them (100, 40, 50) have a preference for erotical stories and 4 of them a preference for mathematical orders based on 10 (100, 300, 40, 50) ... similar to the scheme, that we found also in the structure of playing card decks in the number cards.

The first note of Minchiate appears in 1466 in a letter of Luigi Pulci to Lorenzo de Medici. Pulci had written the first part of his Morgante (funny knight story around the heroes of Charlemain) in 1461-1463 (15-16 chapters were ready against 28 of the final version, which was ready ca. 1482).
In this time Pulci had some educational function for the boys (and their friends) of Lucretia Tornabuoni, between them Lorenzo de Medici. The boys were too young then to be poets themselves, but some years later some of them developed own interests for literary activities (also Lorenzo). One of their favored topics were love stories in Siena connected to some mockery about the people in Siena (there was an old competition and hate and wars between Florence and Siena), this all around 1467.
It should be recognized, that they surely by this somehow reflected on the stories, which Gentile Sermini earlier had written, but attempted to turn it to something, which favored Florence against Siena.

Ahem ... the Minchiate, at least in the later state, as it has come to us, is based on 40 trumps and 40 number cards. At least from one poem (from the other Michelangelo, not the famous artist) it is known, that it it was connected to erotic. It was discussed here recently (in other words, I made a monolog about it) ...

viewtopic.php?f=11&t=420

... together with the observation, that Gherminella was an older expression for a betting game in Florence, noted as early as 1324 and 1415, and the game needed a small stick and two cords on top of it. According one of the 300 novellae of Franco Sacchetti (a Florentine) it was used by an early Florentine person with the name Gherminella to trick everybody.

Gentile Sermini of Siena ...
more or less nothing is known about this person, an indication, that it's a pseudonym of somebody else (naturally it's only an indication, not a guarantee, that it is a pseudonym), and considering the topics of the novellae it seems imaginable, that the author simply didn't love to be known with his name in the context.

Gentile means Italian for "friendly", and ...
Sermo means Latin for "conversation", and Sermini might be a pun on Sermo with the association "small talk"
and together Gentile Sermini might mean simply "friendly small talk", not a bad title for a text or a pseudonym for an author.

Latin-Italian language mix became later in the XVth century known as Maccaroni literature ... and Gemelli is a "twin noodle", a type of pasta similar in form to the two cords used in the Gherminella game. The Italian 15th century society accepted to address "funny literature" with noodle expressions.

So there are some indications, that the name Gentile Sermini is a consciously chosen pseudonym.

Contradicting to the pseudonym assumption is ...

One Tuscan source yet to be examined for such urban views of
mountain people is the story (novella) by the Sienese notary Gentile
Sermini written about the time of the plague of 1424. More than a
story, it is a primitive ethnography of the mountain people south of
Siena, probably Monte Amiata. To escape the plague, Sermini fled to
the supposedly more salubrious air of the mountains where he visited
an old friend, the village’s parish priest, Ser Cecco from the city of
Perugia. There Sermini lived with the villagers and described their
habits and manners. However, unlike the modern anthropologist (at
least in principle), he made no attempt to study these people in their
own terms, to shed the prejudices of his own culture. Part of Sermini’s
scorn for these people is that they knew nothing of the city and its
mores, and therefore talked, dressed, and acted in an uncivilised
manner. He mocks their speech and crude language and includes in his
novella an ode to the mountain villagers, which is a cacophony of
animal noises. He ends his treatment of each subject, be it mountain
hair style or cuisine, with the same refrain: ‘little separated these men
from the beasts they governed’. In fact, they became indistinguishable.
His mountain hosts were oily and unwashed; the stench of warmed feet
was enough to cause one to commit suicide or kill one’s brother.
Further fetid smells came out of their months from the disgusting,
bitter things they ate garlic, leeks, and radishes. Their hair was oily
and beards shorn only twice a year with ‘scissors for castrating [sheep]’,
which left them appearing like the billy goats they bred. They were
clothed badly, possessing only a single pair of worn-out underwear, and
shod even worse. Their hovels were dark, dirty, and oily, filled with the
fumes of their animals and the stench of human manure. These
highlanders were greedy and ready to cheat at every opportunity on the
halves they owed their landlords.
Some of the most striking passages of this account concern the
mountain villagers’ religious practices and attitudes, their fear of
crossing the threshold of the church, and when they did, their screams
of joy at particularly solemn points in the mass, and their anguish and
torment at the more celebratory moments. Their pounding of their
chests, yanking of their hair, hands shoved down their mouths, raised
arms and bellows and alienation from their parish priest suggests that
Christ may not have reached the mountains of fifteenth-century
Tuscany. Sermini concludes his account by lamenting that it would
have been better to have died in the 1424 plague in civilized Siena ‘than
to have died a thousand times every day’ with these beasts of the
mountains who had never seen a city.

http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/scottishstudi ... 20cohn.pdf

... whose author assumes, that this part of the novallae is a realistic and "true" autobiographical statement
of the author. But the whole work are "novallae", so it's somehow realistic to assume some poetical freedom.

But he notes Monte Amiata as the probable location of the adventure ... and that's 15 km from Montalcino. Sic.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source= ... 34589&z=10

I hope you got it.
Gentile Sermini might be the pseudonym of Pietro Lapini, father of the poet Illicino, who became the first Trionfi poem commentator in 1471, who was definitely acquainted with an Anselmo Salimbeni, who in 1459 got some printing utensils for Trionfi cards from duke Borso. The name "Anselmo Salimbeni", however, appears in as a literary figure in one of the Novellae of Gentile Sermini, and this specific Novelle appeared also with one of the author names of Illicino. In the Trionfi poem commentary Illicino, the son, refers variously to the work of his father (Pietro Lapini, possibly alias Gentile Sermini), who wrote a commentary to the Canzonieri from the the same Petrarca (who also wrote the Trionfi poem) ... so why he shouldn't have taken one of the Novellae of his father?
Pietro Lapini (= Gentile Sermini ?) on the other hand was a friend of Tarot book author Martianus da Tortona and got something like a fosterling from him, when Martiano died ... if Lapini adopted this fosterling, Illicino might be even the late son of Martiano da Tortona (as birth year for Illicino is assumed ca. 1430, which easily might be also before 1425). All what we really know, is, that Illicino had a splendid education.

All what we else know of Gentile Sermini seems to come from the above given story: 1424 he was in Siena and escaped to the country near to Montalcino.

The plague of 1424 but has the following background:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Siena

In the Catholic Church, the Council of Siena (1423 - 1424) marked a somewhat inconclusive stage in the Conciliar movement that was attempting reforms in the Church. If it had continued, it would have qualified as an ecumenical council. In the official List of ecumenical councils, the Council of Siena is no longer listed, as the conciliarism expressed there was later branded as a heresy.
According to the terms of the Council of Constance calling for periodic ecumenical councils to discuss church policies, Pope Martin V convened a council at Pavia, which was hardly inaugurated on April 23, 1423, when plague broke out at Pavia and the council was hastily adjourned to Siena.

In 1423 the plague arrived in Pavia and Pavia was the intended place for the council ... in Pavia, as noted before, was Lapini and he had some experience with councils (1415 in Constance) and experience with diplomatic missions for Filippo Maria. The duke - who was in this time at the height of his power - was probably lucky to have the council "at home" under his control and probably unlucky, that it had to leave for Siena, but he naturally had a diplomatic delegation following it. As Lapini was from Montalcion in the Sienese region and had the necessary diplomatic experience (he had been before in Constance), it seems VERY probable, that Filippo Maria did choose him (and some others) to accompany the entourage and to observe (and influence) the decisions.

At Siena, the procedure of the Council followed that established at Constance. Right at the start, certain formalities of the safe conducts issued by the city for the members of the Council were the cause of jurisdictional friction with papal prerogatives. Nevertheless, on the eighth of November four decrees were published, all of them directed against easy targets: against the followers of the heretical reformers, Jan Hus, recently burnt at the stake at the Council of Constance, safe conduct or no, and against the English followers of John Wyclif, who claimed that the highest authority was the Bible; against the followers of the schismatic Antipope Benedict XIII; a decree postponing the negotiations with the Greeks and other Eastern Orthodox churches (which were later worked into acceptable compromises in the long working sessions of the Council of Florence, 1438 to 1445); and a decree advising greater vigilance against heresy, the easiest target of all.

Proposals for genuine institutional reform within the Catholic Church hung fire ominously. French proposals for more local control ("Gallican" proposals, generally speaking) produced resistance from the loyalists of the Papal Curia. Nothing was accomplished at Siena in that area.

On February 19, 1424, Basel was selected as the place of the next Council and the Council dissolved itself the following day (the decree published March 7). The French members would have preferred to continue the Council until a thorough reform of the church had been accomplished, both "in capite et in membris" ("in its head and its members"), but whether in order to avoid a new schism, or whether on account of fear of the Pope (since Siena in southern Tuscany was near the Papal States), they departed. The selection of the venue for the next council, far from the armed temporal authority of the Papacy, is significant.

The magistrates of Siena took care not to let anyone depart until he had paid his debts.

The council article doesn't mention a plague in Siena, but it was there in 1424 (possibly after the council, which was ended in early 1424), as this page tells in a footnote ...

http://books.google.com/books?id=QwFMpY ... 24&f=false

... "(about Siena) The plague of course became endemic, reappearing in 1400, 1411 and 1424, and thereafter, but with a greatly diminished rate of mortality." In the plague of 1348-50 Siena had been reduced from 42.000 to 15.000 inhabitants, the death rate in the region of Siena and Florence was considerable higher than at other places.

The plague in Siena 1424 was real, not fiction ... Lapini (alias Sermini) had have good chances to experience the plague there, if he decided after the end of the council for a visit in Montalcino, his home town, as already said, in 42 km distance to Siena. If he was surprised during his stay by the plague, it was logical to take a refugium outside the city , maybe Monte Amiata, another 14 km away. As a delegate at the council in Siena he probably had some free time to collect by some small talk ("gentile sermini") with the inhabitants local details and stories, things, which he partly had heard already in his youth, but possibly not understood or had only half in memory. Siena's university had an excellent medical science and one has to assume, that a boy of Montalcino would study in Siena most probably. As he was a physician for the pope John XXIII., it might be assumed, that he was in 1410 at least 30 years old, as Giovanni probably wouldn't have accepted a young physician with not much experience. A birth year of ca. 1380 would give him for 1443 ... the last year, when we hear of him writing on the Canzonieri commentary ... an advanced age of 63 years. As the commentary commission went from Lapini to Filelfo, (who wrote on it 1444-1447), it might actually be, that Pietro Lapini alias Gentile Sermini died this year.
The parallel between Martiano da Tortona (who got the Michelino deck description possibly also short before his death) and Pietro Lapini give the impression, that Filippo Maria gave such commissions to scholars, when they started to become weak, giving them opportunity for a last great work as a sign of great acceptance.

Filippo Maria selected for this commission the Canzonieri of Petrarca ... in the case, that Lapini was identical with Gentile Sermini, this seems an understandable topic: a research for a specialist in matters of love.

The son Illicino probably himself later added Filelfo's work to his own commentary, and the Trionfi editions included also the Canzonieri.

Well ...

Earlier - March 2010 - I wrote in this thread ...

Huck wrote:

Marziano (da Tortona) morì nel
1425, lasciando il suo pupillo a Pietro Lapini da Montalcino,
che era stato medico dell’anti-papa Giovanni XXIII, e che per
Filippo Maria svolse anche missioni diplomatiche, insegnando
a Pavia.

http://www.lauramalinverni.net/sforza.pdf

When Marziano da Tortona died 1425, he left his "fosterling? fosterlings? nurse childs? pupils?" to Lapini ... the meaning of the sentence is not clear to me. Either Lapini got the charge of children of Martiano da Tortona himself, or Tortona had build a similar institution as Vittorio da Feltre in Mantova educating pupils in Pavia, or what?
This matter is rather important for Tarot History, as it indicates a strong relation between Martiano da Tortona and Lapini in the time of Martiano's death, and that's the probable time, when Martiano wrote his treatise, which one might call "the first Tarot book" - some years ago translated by Ross Caldwell ...

http://trionfi.com/0/b/11/

If we regard this moment and make a jump of ca. 50 years to the first Trionfi-poem commentary by Lapini's son Illicino 1471/74, we have a certain important relation between the two moments.

Ross in these days wrote in ...
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=826&p=11968&hilit= ... ini#p11968

Ross G. R. Caldwell wrote: This quote: "Marziano (da Tortona) morì nel 1425, lasciando il suo pupillo a Pietro Lapini da Montalcino, che era stato medico dell’anti-papa Giovanni XXIII, e che per Filippo Maria svolse anche missioni diplomatiche, insegnando a Pavia", means that the writer thinks that Marziano was Filippo Maria's teacher, and at his death "left" him in the intellectual care of Pietro Lapini da Montalcino.

Marziano da Tortona died in 1425, leaving his pupil to Pietro Lapini da Montalcino, who had been the physician of the anti-Pope John XXIII, and who also performed diplomatic missions, teaching in Pavia.

While Marziano may have died in 1425, he may also have died before; I think the last actual evidence of him while alive dates to 1423, then there is another document which talks about him in the past tense, or about his estate, I'm not sure of the date. I'll have to look that up.

The "teacher" part is because Decembrio states that Marziano read - explained, interpreted - Dante for Filippo Maria, and we know that Lapini wrote a commentary on the Canzoniere for him. It seems a bit overstating the case to call FM Visconti either man's "pupil"; they were savants who discussed works important to him, it's not like he was attending school lessons.

There's in my opinion still some insecurity, what the Italian passage referred to ... maybe only due to the vague feeling, that I earlier made some longer researches, which I partly have forgotten meanwhile and which weren't finished or settled in all points.

As this all is a longer time ago, I repeat some of the earlier developments.

Starting point: Who is Anselino Salimbeni

I attempted to identify anything about a Anselino di Salimbeni, who according Ortalli, "The Prince and the Playing Cards" ...

"Further proof of the Este interest in mechanical card production comes […] from a note of 4 June 1459 concerning objects lent to a certain Anselino di Salimbeni by the prince; among them was a box containing "stampe for trump cards"

http://trionfi.com/0/e/19/

... might have been a potential Trionfi card producer. The search for Anselino di Salimbeni was negative, but an Anselmo di Salimbeni (possibly/probably the same person) could be located in ..

http://www.archive.org/details/guarinod ... 00bertuoft
Guarino da Verona fra letterati e cortigiani a Ferrara (1429-1460) (1921)
Bertoni, Giulio, 1878-1942

... a report to the letter exchange an Anselmo Salimbeni had something to do with a Lancelot text in 1457, and a Petrarca-Trionfi text in 1471, page 99 and 179. From this it seems, that Anselmo appears in the letter exchanges from Guarino und is a person with literary connections in Ferrara.

Then Anselmo Salimbeni appears as a literary figure (!!!) in a novella of Bernardo Illicini or Illicino or Ollicino or Licinio or complete Bernardo di Pietro Lapini di Montalcino and also Bernardo Lapini da Siena, the text with different titles, one of them "Anselmo Salimbeni and Angelica Montanini", which was presented by Roscoe 1824 with praising words as the work of Bernardo ...

http://www.elfinspell.com/RoscoeIllicini.html

... whereby we also learn, that Bernardo Illicino, from Siena, where also the story of the literary figure Anselmo plays, had been a medicus at the court of "Gio. Galeazzo" (who shall this be? Probably Galeazzo Maria) Sforza (where he surely learnt about Trionfi cards; this so should have happened after March 1466) and went then to the court of Borso d'Este, in a time, when the Milanese-Ferrarese relations were rather disturbed (this must have happened before 1471).

It turned then out (let's call it an old hypothesis of mine), that the "real" Anselino Salimbeni VERY LIKELY (well, I thought so) was identical to Bernardo Illicino, son of Pietro Lapini, an astrologer, physician and diplomat for Filippo Maria Visconti.
Well, this was a very productive hypothesis, cause I started to think about Bernardo Illicino and Pietro Lapini, and both were of greater general relevance for the Trionfi development, so that was actually good.
Nonetheless my opinion changed to the point, that Anselino Salimbeni was a pseudonym for Bernardo Illicino. I intensified the research on this person, and I found, that there are too much notes to this person, which clarify the point, that Anselino Salimbeni was likely Anselmo Salimbeni, but Anselmo Salimbeni was a real member of the rich Salimbeni family "from the region of Siena" (one of 5 important families in Siena in 14th century), but living in Ferrara (or Bologna; or in both cities ?).


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My New Opinion about Anselmo Salimbeni alias Anselino Salimbeni

I found the following notes:

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1454:



An Anselmo Salimbeni married 1454 a Pollissena, daughter of Raffeollo Foscarari, who seems to have been the following rich banker in Bologna, who was murdered in Bologna in the year 1440 by Annibale Bentivoglio.
http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/raf ... rafico%29/

This murder case was discussed by us earlier.
search.php?keywords=Foscarari&terms=all ... mit=Search

Polissena came from ...

Il Foscarari. si stabilì con ogni probabilità a Ferrara, città di origine della sua seconda moglie, Cecilia di Bonagrazia, che egli aveva sposato intorno al 1429 (non sappiamo quando la prima moglie, Margherita Ludovisi, sia morta). Da questa unione nacquero i figli Terisio, Francesco, Eugenio Sigismondo e le figlie Polissena, Viride e Dorotea, l'ultima delle quali postuma.

... so likely she wasn't the daughter, which Foscarari offered, that she should have been married by Annibale Bentivoglio in 1440, which caused the murder (from the age she's too young ... but one doesn't know).

Anselmo and Polissena had a son, who became a poet, and he made an alegorical rappresentatione for the marriage between Annibale Bentivogio and Lucrezia d'este in January 1487 (or 1478 ?).
(well, the same event, which caused in my opinion the production of the Tarocchi poem of Boiardo)
Some works of him are listed here:
http://books.google.de/books?id=cQThWI4 ... ni&f=false

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1456:


http://books.google.de/books?ei=nxPKT8u ... rch_anchor

Maccagnino is likely Angelo Maccagnino, painter in Ferrara 1450 - 1456
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angelo_Maccagnino
Possibly responsible for this painting:


The muse Erato

Maccagnino declares Anselmo Salimbeni his heir.

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1457:

I got this snippet ...

Nel 1457 un certo Anselmo Salimbeni suo erede riceve ben 800 lire dalla Camera ducale per crediti pregressi del ...

http://books.google.de/books?ei=WhjKT9K ... rch_anchor

800 Lire ... that's a huge sum.

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1457:
(already earlier noted



In context of the library in Ferrara Anselmo Salimbeni is noted for some interest in a Lancelot edition. This is possibly of interest, as a Lancelot edition was made by Bonifacio Bembo in 1446.
1457 is just the year, when the young Galeazzo Maria Sforza visited Ferrara and actually it's imaginable, that Bernardo Illicino was part of the Milanese delegation (one year later he is noted to be in Siena). Anyway: with or without Bernardo Illicino there was a common Milanese/Ferrarese interest in Lancelot and it might have touched the action, why Anselmo Selimbeni might have looked up the Ferrarese edition.

Generally it's an open question, when Bernardo Illicino wrote his version of the "Anselmo Salimbeni" story, which naturally should have triggered the interest of the real and living Anselmo Salimbeni.

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1459:
(already noted before)

Gherardo Ortalli, "The Prince and the Playing Cards" ...

"Further proof of the Este interest in mechanical card production comes […] from a note of 4 June 1459 concerning objects lent to a certain Anselino di Salimbeni by the prince; among them was a box containing "stampe for trump cards"

http://trionfi.com/0/e/19/

The Trionfi card note of 1459: Anselino Salimbeni is interested in Trionfi card production.

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1471:


http://scans.library.utoronto.ca/pdf/4/ ... oft_bw.pdf

Anselmo di Salimbeni noted in context of a text written by Bernardo Illicino. Anselmo is interested in the work ..

The date is rather significant: "10th of July 1471". Duke Borso had made this year his triumphal journey to Rome (I'm not sure, if he already had turned back at 10th of July). But soon he would come back and then it takes not a long time and Borso was dead (20th of August 1471). And Bernardo Illicino was not only an author, but Borso's personal physician ....
We may assume, that the production of Bernardo's commentary to Petrarca's Trionfi poem stood in a clear relation to Borso's Roman triumph.

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1472:

From
http://durham.academia.edu/StefanoCraco ... ro_Agnelli
Page 19/20
This text is mainly about Filippo Nuvolino (1441-1478), who accompanies his friend Anselmo Salimbeni to Rome, possibly starting in January 1472, to a memoriam of Duke Borso, who had passed away. The journey is prolonged to Siena and there is a wedding ... and suddenly Bernardino Illicino appears in the text.

It maybe logical to assume, that Bernardo Illicino returned to Siena after Borso's death. His work as Borso's physician had finished. The first sure stay of Bernardo Illicino in Ferrara is from 1469.







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Later added:

This German work, just found ...

http://books.google.de/books?id=7eQl-Sk ... fi&f=false

... dates the production of the Trionfi commentary of Illicino from 1457 till 1466 (in own words generously estimated) and sees then the start of a circulation of the manuscript since 1466 ... and it notes, that the first clear and documented reader is nobody else than just ANSELMO SALIMBENI, camerlengo of Borso d'Este, who takes it for reading from the Ferrarese library in 1469 at 29th of April.



And then the same text has ...



... that the new edition of the Anselmo Salimbeni story (in essence taken from Gentile Sermini - possibly Bernardo Illicino's father, but arranged with much more sensitivity by Bernardo) didn't exist till 1471.

If this is right, then we've the simple story, that Bernardo Illicino met Anselmo Salimbeni possibly in 1469 in Ferrara, and both arranged in a manner, that Bernardo Illicino became a famous and printed author, and the name Anselmo Salimbeni became famous, too, just by the story, that Illicino wrote possibly in honor of his reader, friend and sponsor Anselmo Selimbeni.

If this is the simple truth, then it's not so urgent, that Pietro Lapini was identical to Gentile Sermini.

Naturally camerlengo Anselmo Selimbeni would have known the text of Gentile Sermini, which opened with the Anselmo Selimbeni story.

How very Shakespearean is that story!

had been a medicus at the court of "Gio. Galeazzo" (who shall this be? Probably Galeazzo Maria) Sforza

You mean the 5th Duke of Milan who married Bona of Savoy?
I loved those pictures- how very like the Death card of both Visconti decks.
~Lorredan

I am posting because you have many hits to your thread and I do not want you to think, I think this is a monologue about Pasta.(which I also consumed)
You have urban humour, and I hope you have less trouble with so many damn names in future.
Now those interesting pictures.....
Printed in 1503?
some 50 years later than the cards?
They have same Pavia cliff edge in front of Elephants (There is those darn Chess pieces again )as the PMB.
Death as Corpse has same wavy innards as the Cary yale Visconti- is that usual? I have been looking at Corpses all day and those are the only two I have found with wavy intestines.
I just do not get the dates in my head.
I can see the connections and have loved your research in this matter.......
~Lorredan

Thinking about, how Anselmo Salimbeni might have come to be in Ferrara ....

Niccolo d'Este, Signore of Ferrara married a woman, who didn't get children. So with 1405 (Ugo), 1407 (Leonello) and 1413 (Borso) he got illegitimate children of "Stella del Tolomei detta dell Assasino", daughter of the Tolomei family in Siena, one of the 5 families who are called the greatest in Siena during 14th century (one of the others was the Salimbeni family, and it's said, that Tolomei and Salimbeni were hostile to each other - then).
During this time Niccolo d'Este and Muzio Attendola became close to each other (after 1406) and had some successful military operations, which enlarged the Ferrarese territory. In this time the young Francesco Sforza (* 1401; oldest illegitimate son of Muzio Attendola) spend some time at the Ferrarese court.
At a not clear date at this time Muzio Attendola married Nobile Antonia Salimbeni, daughter of Cocco Salimbeni (called the most important Salimbeni of his time ... also active as condottiero) and she gave birth to a son, Bosio Sforza. The mother died soon (1411), but Bosio became one of the many family helpers in Francesco Sforza's steep career and lived long, till 1476. Bosio was born in Siena and lived there a longer time.

Generally Muzio Attendola started to engage in Southern Italy (around 1410) and became a very great condottiero there.

Muzio (Giacomo) Attendolo, called "Sforza", Count of Cotignola 1411, Lord of Benevento and Manfredonia (1414-18), *Cotignola 10.6.1369, +drowned Pescara 4.1.1424; 1m: Nobile Antonia Salimbeni, Patrizia di Siena (+1411); 2m: 1414 Catella (Caterina) Alopo dei Baroni Piscopo d’Alopo (+1418); 3m: 1419 Maria Marzani dei Duchi di Sessa, Cssa di Celano (+ca 1440)

A1. Bosio, Sovereign Count of Santa Fiora 1439, Count of Cotignola 1424, Lord of Castell’Arquato, *Siena 1410, +Santa Fiora 1476; m.1439 Cecilia Aldobrandeschi Cssa di Santa Fiora e Pitigliano (+1467). Their issue obtained successively the titles of Marchesi di Proceno, Conti e Duchi di Segni, Duchi di Onano and it is still existant with the surname "Sforza-Cesarini" and bears the titles of Duchi di Segni e Civita Lavinia
http://genealogy.euweb.cz/italy/sforza.html

Bosio Sforza as condottiero
http://www.condottieridiventura.it/inde ... montegiovi

The Salimbeni lost their big influence in Siena with the year 1419 and with a defeat of Cocco Salimbeni (father of Bosio's mother).

Cocco Salimbeni as condottiero
http://www.condottieridiventura.it/inde ... i-di-siena

The fall in 1419 happened here:

The Fortress was permanently handed over to the Salimbeni in 1274, which began a period of struggle, characterized by skirmishes between various families from Siena. In 1380, Catherine of Siena stayed here with the unconcealed mission of convincing the Salimbeni to reconcile with the city. According to Raimondo da Capua, in his The Life of Catherine, it was here that the saint received the gift of writing. The war ended in 1419, when Giovanni Zolla opened the gate at night and brought in the Sienese. Cocco dei Salimbeni is thought to have taken refuge in the tower with a small group of his followers, including his wife and the rest of his family. One tragic night, that proved as cruel as a story from the Iliad and seems reminiscent of a Shakespearean tragedy, Cocco victoriously resisted every assault made upon him. Nonetheless, his subjects gathered together and decided they wanted ‘to be governed in the same way as others in the district’. Thus, they swore allegiance to the Republic, forcing Salimbeni to surrender.

http://www.turismo.intoscana.it/intosca ... 35102.html

Cocco Salimbeni is said to have died in 1436 in Siena, but I saw remarks, that the Salimbeni were exiled from Siena (if it wasn't 1419, I don't know, when it happened).

The big Sienese families (including the Salimbeni) in 14th century attempted an European banking system in competition to Florentine families, something, which was realized by the Medici (in Florence) in greater style in 15th century. So the marriage of Anselmo Salimbeni to the daughter of a murdered great banker in Bologna (1454) has some internal logic, also the once appearing sum of 800 Lira in the context of Anselmo Salimbeni (1457) isn't surprising, when a "banker context" is assumed.

For the Ferrara-Siena connection I saw a remark, that Borso d'Este visited Siena on his journey to the bath of Pretiolo (near Ancona) in 1439.



This looks, as if Borso had (possibly) accompanied the council delegation from Ferrara to Florence in January 1439 and had then taken way to Siena to visit some relatives (of his mother's side; and possibly for other political reasons). Information about Borso's earlier time are rare, Niccolo was still living, and the declared first heir was Leonello, who already had a son. So Borso had some distance to his later position as Signore and duke of Ferrara.

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Well, this consideration made me drop back to an earlier research about "Giovanni dalla Gabella 1423 in Ferrara" ... which I identified (possibly) with "Giovanni di Paolo", a Sienese artist of some fame.
Compare: viewtopic.php?f=11&t=842

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Still in work

Lorredan wrote:I am posting because you have many hits to your thread and I do not want you to think, I think this is a monologue about Pasta.(which I also consumed)
You have urban humour, and I hope you have less trouble with so many damn names in future.
Now those interesting pictures.....
Printed in 1503?
some 50 years later than the cards?
They have same Pavia cliff edge in front of Elephants (There is those darn Chess pieces again :D )as the PMB.
Death as Corpse has same wavy innards as the Cary yale Visconti- is that usual? I have been looking at Corpses all day and those are the only two I have found with wavy intestines.
I just do not get the dates in my head.
I can see the connections and have loved your research in this matter.......
~Lorredan

Well, these pictures are from 1503 and from a French edition, so they are really far away off the topic of Anselino Salimbeni, whom I first perceived as a pseudonym of Bernardo Illicino, but it turned out (more or less secure now), that he wasn't.
Bernardo Illicino as important author of a Trionfi commentary deserves a thread of himself. He and his father are quite important men in the Trionfi development.

Reviving this older discussion, which on my part has been an adventure of trial and error: I stumbled about ...

Apostolo Zeno's Phantom Author: The Strange Case of Gentile Sermini da Siena
Christopher Nissen
Italica, Vol. 74, No. 2 (Summer, 1997), pp. 151-163
Published by: American Association of Teachers of Italian
Article Stable URL:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/480074

The author researched the riddle "Gentile Sermini" and comes to the conclusion, that the 2 original editions of the "Novelle" were from 15th century and both had an anonymous author (and were not by "Gentile Sermini"). One of the surviving texts is given as "from d'Este" and the other from "Marciana", and the latter seems to have been in the possession of the "Marciana", which has gotten it from Apostolo Zeno, who plays a big role in the riddle "Gentile Sermini".
Apostolo Zeno
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostolo_Zeno

I earlier came to the suspicion, that Gentile Sermini would be a pseudonym for "Pietro Lapini medico senese", physician, astrologer and diplomat for Filippo Maria Visconti after 1415 (after his appearance as physician of anti-pope John XXIII alias Baldassare Cossa in Costance). He was father of Bernardo Illicino, famous for his Trionfi poem commentary in the 1470s, which was later in print combined with Filelfo's commentary on the Canzonieri (1445-47, made for Filippo Maria Visconti). Bernardo's Trionfi commentary likely was based on that of his father, made in 1443 (on demand of Filippo Mara Visconti).

A pseudonym "Gentile Sermini" is now not more necessary, as the relevant originals seem to be just anonymous.

Son Bernardo Illicino then got some fame for a nice version of "Anselmo Salimbeni", one of the stories in the "Novelle" (of the so-called "Gentle Sermini). This fame started at the d'Este court .... in Ferrara lived then a Salimbeni family and a real person "Anselmo Salimbeni", which was involved in a Ferrarese Trionfi card document in 1459.

In the above mentioned research (by Christopher Niessen) a specific passage is of importance:



A person Frosino Lapini appears, which is known to the web (lived in Florence during 16th century). A relation between this Lapini and the earlier astrologer Pietro Lapini is not recognizable (by myself). Curiously a theater play "I Bernardi" of an author d'Ambra, presented 1547/48 and printed in 1564, is the object. In this context a "Claudio Sarmini" is noted, which Zeno took as a relative from Gentile Sermini and other later authors in the matter as a brother of Gentile Sermini. Especially funny, as the real name seems to have neither Sermini nor Sarmini, but Saracini.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostolo_Zeno
... the biography of Zeno gives 1669-1750 as his life dates. Niessen sees indications, that Zeno got the text rather late in his life (which he ended with 81 years), so maybe it's just based on some errors in old age.