Cranky McCranky Pants, or the People of the Tarot de Marseille

The other day, I threw some cards and asked if blogging was a good idea.  I didn’t exactly get the answer I wanted, but that’s ok, I never listen to anyone anyway, one of my issues I suppose.  But I enjoyed the process, and I particularly enjoyed using my Tarot de Marseille deck, Tarot de Marseille Jean Dodal 1701 restored by Jean-Claude Flornoy.  Today, I thought I’d talk about the parameters of what I mean when I say “Tarot de Marseille” versus Marseille style tarot versus modern pip decks so there’s no confusion going forward.

The oldest known Tarot de Marseille deck, the Jean Noblet of 1659 (ok, so there’s talk of an older Tarot, but based on the conversations going on on the web, I’m not convinced – not that it matters what I think, but I’m sticking with the Noblet being the oldest) was made in Paris.  The Jean Dodal Tarot de Marseille was created in Lyon, again not Marseille.  Tarot decks weren’t manufactured in Marseille until 1856.  So “Marseille” does not actually refer to the birthplace of the Tarot de Marseille, but rather a style of tarot, characterized by woodblock prints, limited to eight colors, and characterized by four suits (Cups, Coins, Swords and Batons) with the cups or coins or whatever arranged in a particular pattern and 22 Trump cards, with the Fool not being numbered.  And that’s it.  If a deck deviates from this formula, some may consider it a Marseille deck, others, not so much.  Going deeper down the well, there are Type I Marseille decks and Type II decks.  There are only 3 Type 1’s – the Noblet, the Dodal, and the Payen.  The Type II decks are the later decks.  You can google the differences, but they’re things like the Moon being in full face rather than profile, and the Chariot having curtains or not.  If you want to read scholarly analysis about the differences, join the Tarot de Marseille Facebook group, and check out their files, and you’ll find the two most quoted articles by Thierry Depaulis, The Tarot de Marseilles, part I and II.

None of this really matters to me, unless I’m say, asking a question about whether I should get tinted windows on my car, and the curtained Chariot appears – yes, I should.  The thing I care about between the older decks and the new decks are the personalities of the people.

The Noblet and the Dodal are full of crumpy pants people.

The Type II decks have people with sweet little faces.

Let’s take a look, particularly at the women:

Here we have the Noblet, the Dodal and the Gassman, a deck from Geneva, Switzerland 1840, restored by Yves Reynaud.  Which La Papesse do you want to go to learn a secret, check the sports book, get a reading recommendation, do your books at work?  The stern woman in the Noblet and the Dodal, or the soft welcoming Papesse of the Gassman?

How about the Queen of Batons:

OMG, life is killing our queen in the Dodal.  She is tired, man.  She is nearly done.  And that would be right.  The last years of Louis XIV were marked by natural disasters, bad harvests, famine and disease.  But what about our newer Queen, the Gassman Queen.  She’s got this. Her throne does not have tacks on it.  And it makes sense right?  The 1840’s was the end of the Romantic period, the time of Byron, and soft portraits.

And what about the Star?

The Star went from looking like a weirdo to a woman conforming to the beauty standards of the time, in her face, hair and figure.

So, when I want quirk, I go to the Noblet or the Dodal.  When I’m not about quirk, but I want pretty, I go for the later Marseille decks.  And that brings me to the Marseille style decks – I have a lot of older historic decks that don’t quite live up to the Marseille standard, but I wouldn’t call them simply pip decks (meaning decks that don’t have narrative pictures on the numbered suit cards), so I’ll be refer to them as Marseille style decks.  And then, I have historic decks that are in fact closer to pip decks than Marseille style decks, and those I just call historic tarot, like the Vachetta Tarot which is fully illustrated, but is certainly not an RWS deck, but it’s not Marseille style deck either.

To sum up, I’ll be referring to Type I and Type II decks as Tarot de Marseille or Marseille decks.  Historic decks that don’t quite fit the rigid pattern of traditional Tarot de Marseille, I call Marseille Style decks.   Historic decks that don’t look like Marseille decks I call historic decks.  Modern decks without “illustrated” ie RWS imagery or narrative scenes, I’ll be calling pip decks.

In the end, it doesn’t really matter what I call them, they’re all tarot.  And, I have my favorites.  For instance, I prefer the Dodal over the Noblet.  Why, you ask?

Because I prefer the Fool with his junk covered up.  Simple.