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Fascinating Deck from the BNF

Discussion of the symbolism, history and how to read with the Marseilles
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testpattern
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Fascinating Deck from the BNF

Post by testpattern »

Some of you must have seen this: it's a deck by Bernard Sarramon of Strasbourg, dating from the Revolutionary era. There is an old thread that mentions it here, http://forum.tarothistory.com/viewtopic.php?p=20037, but that is all that I can find out about it. Apparently the annotations relate it to Etteila's system. What find most interesting is the inclusion of ranks like "Égalité de Deniers" and Liberté de Batons:"
egalite.JPEG
liberte.JPEG


The L'Impereur and L'Imperatrice are replaced with the Grand Mère and the Grand Père:
grandpere.JPEG
[Jeu_de_tarot_mis_à_[...]Isnard_François_btv1b10511145z.JPEG
Pretty cool stuff.

https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b ... m.r=tarot#
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_R_
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Re: Fascinating Deck from the BNF

Post by _R_ »

There were a bunch of so-called revolutionary decks, usually modified older decks. You can see some other examples on Gallica. D’Allemagne gives the briefest of descriptions: https://archive.org/details/McGillLibra ... 3/mode/2up
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testpattern
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Re: Fascinating Deck from the BNF

Post by testpattern »

_R_ wrote: 27 Apr 2021, 02:27 D’Allemagne gives the briefest of descriptions: https://archive.org/details/McGillLibra ... 3/mode/2up
Do you know what D'Allemagne means by " l'oeil indien?" Is there a specific term of art in use, or is he saying something about the way the eyes of the faces look? Thanks for sharing; this looks like a fascinating source in general.

All of the revolutionary era tarots I have seen have been based on Isnard designs. Was this just because they were already Besançon pattern?
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_R_
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Re: Fascinating Deck from the BNF

Post by _R_ »

testpattern wrote: 03 May 2021, 16:52 Do you know what D'Allemagne means by " l'oeil indien?" Is there a specific term of art in use, or is he saying something about the way the eyes of the faces look? Thanks for sharing; this looks like a fascinating source in general.

All of the revolutionary era tarots I have seen have been based on Isnard designs. Was this just because they were already Besançon pattern?
D'Allemagne's book is a standard reference work, although there have been further developments in the intervening century since then.
"l'œil indien" does not appear to be a special term, more likely it is just a descriptor.
Yes, the revolutionary tarots on the BNF site are all Besançon types. It would be worth exploring the historical reasons for this.
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