Early Playing Cards Research: L. A. Mayer - Mamluk cards

<table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="2" cellpadding="0"> <tr><td><a name="a"><b><font size="3" color="#0033ff" face="Verdana, Arial Narrow">    A</font></b></a><a href="http://autorbis.net" target="_blank"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial Narrow">UTORBIS.net </font></a> - <a href="http://trionfi.com" target="_blank"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial Narrow">TRIONFI.com </font></a> </td> <td align="right"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial Narrow">created 2003 - 2006       </td> </tr></table><hr size="1" width="90%"> <table width="100%"><tr><td rowspan="2" width="30%" align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#dddddd"> <h3>PLAYING CARDS</h3> <b><font size="+1">Very early references <br>     - 1370/80</font> <ul><br> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/90/">Introduction and list of Links</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/91/">Stuart Kaplan's list</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/92/">Huck Meyer's opinion</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/93/">Marseille 1337</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/95/">Playing Cards in Bohemia 1340 (?)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/94/">Old German/Swiss notes</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/21/">Early Paper Mills in Europe</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/01/">Early Prohibitions (- ca. 1420)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/02/">Other early Notes (- ca. 1420)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/22/">L. A. Mayer: Mamluk Playing Cards</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/96/">References Muslim World</a> </ul> <font size="+1">Germany</font><br><ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/10/">Johannes of Rheinfelden 1377</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/20/">Early German Card producers</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/25/">German Decks (15th cent.)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/07/">Notes to Karnöffel, Keyserspiel </a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/c/05/">The Name Karnöffel </a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/06/">(Imperatori decks / Ferrara)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/mi/00/" target="_blank">MEISTER INGOLD</a> </ul> <font size="+1">France</font><br><ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/03/">France and Burgund (14th/15th century)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/15/">The Gringonneur Case</a> <LI><A HREF="http://trionfi.com/0/p/26/">Valentina Visconti and the French Court 1392 - 1397</A> </ul> <font size="+1">England</font><br><ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/45/">Earliest reference in England in 1413</a> </ul> <font size="+1">Milan</font><br><ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/08/">Prohibitions Filippo Maria Visconti</a> <li><a href="http://geocities.com/research_of_tarot/doc08.html" target="_blank">Vita di Filippo Visconti</a><br><br> </ul> <font size="+1">Ferrara</font><br><ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/04/">Notes about Printing (Ferrara)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/06/">Notes about Imperatori decks</a> <br>    in Ferrara (1423 - 1452) </ul> <font size="+1">Florence</font><br><ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/05/">Prohibition around Florence</a><br>    (1377 - ca. 1500) <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/14/">Conclusions about Florence </a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/09/">Notes about Minchiate </a> </ul> <font size="+1">Further Articles to <A HREF="http://trionfi.com/0/l/50/" target="_blank">CITIES</A></font><br><br> <font size="+1"><A HREF="http://trionfi.com/0/e/" target="_blank">TRIONFI DOCUMENTATION</A></font><br><br> <font size="+1">Further Articles <br>     and Conclusions </font><br>related partly also to the theme "Trionfi"<br><br> <ul> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/27/">Early Printing dates (in development)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/12/">Trionfi-Kids</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/13/">Trionfi and Church</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/18/">Count Parravicino 1903</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/25/">First appearance 5x14-theory 1974</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/23/">Early Notes to "Tarot" (provisional)</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/28/">Tarocchi appropriati</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/17/">Sermones de Ludo cum aliis<br> - Information</a><br><br> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/24/">Knights Orders</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/19/">Ronfa - Notes</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/16/">The Cardplaying Wheel</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/29/">Felix Fabri / Playing Card Notes</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/40/">Il Cortegiano / Castiglione</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/70/">Franco Pratesi: Bibliography</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/41/">Oldest Divination with Playing Cards</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/82/">Collection Playing habits</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/42/">5 Decks in Ambras Collection</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/89/">Unusual Tarocchi cards, described 1849</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/87/">Jehan Bresson, 4 Spanish Tarocchi 1570</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/43/">Vespasiano da Bisticci - gambling notes</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/44/">Connaisseur 1754 - Gambling Satire</a> <li><a href="http://trionfi.com/0/p/71/">Links to Playing Tarot/Tarock</a> </ul></b> </ul></td><td height="50" align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#dddddd"> Playing Cards - Documents and Articles </td></tr><tr><td align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#eeeeee"> <h1>L. A. Mayer: Mamluk Playing Cards (1939)<br> <font size="3"> - from <i>Le Bulletin de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale</i></font></h1> The complete article is given at the <a href="http://www.ifao.egnet.net/doc/PubEnLigne/BIFAO/Sommaires/BIFAO_038.php" target="_blank">page of the Institut</a>, the common name of the source is BIFAO 38, p. 113-118. The article has specific fame in playing card research, as it strengthened the Orient hypothesis after various attempts have considered earlier an European origin of Playing Cards.<br><br> In our personal context the important message lies in Mayer's description of the deck, from which it turns out, that the described Mamluk deck has a 5x14-structure (which would be of importance for our favoured <a href=" http://trionfi.com/0/f/" targe="_blank">5x14-theory</a>. <br><br> "The pack consists of at least five suits: the cup, the coin, the sword, the polo-stick and the staff. It is obvious that pl. XIV b (of which we have two specimens in this set) is only a variation of the staff, as conceived by the other designer, a shape which became typical for the Italian cards. There is also an odd card, with a crescent as its only figure. This may or may not have been the Islamic equivalent of the joker. The two best preserved suits are those of the cup and the coin, and by puttinng them together, we can surmise that each suit originally consisted of four court cards and ten numerals . The court cards represent a King (malik), a Governor (na'ib), a second Governor (na'ib thani) and one of his Helpers (ahad al-arkan). They are indicated by actual drawings of these persons, but by inscriptions which are placed, invariably, at the bottom of each court card. As a rule the mark of each suit appears on the court cards only once and occupies practically all the space available, notably exceptions being the Governor of the cups, displayed on a card showing 2 cups, and the Governor of the swords on a card showing nine swords, but the second Governor is shown with one cup only. In the case of the King and the Helpers, the mark appears over an ornamental panel, identical on all the cards before us; in the case of the Governor of swords, and Governor and Second Governor of polo-sticks, without any distinguishing panel, in the case of the Governor and Second Governor of cups, with an ornamental band across the stalk. In the top register of all court-cards as well as of some numerals, we find other inscriptions, warning, encouraging or exhorting. We would have to know something substantial about Saracenic card games in order to understand the real meaning of these phrases. The pack of the Top Kapu Saray Museum is obviously not complete; it is composed of 47 cards (including the crude secondary ones) and it is described as follows:<br><br><ul> <li>Cup: G-2G-H 1-10 <li>Coin: K-2G 1,3,4,5,7,8 <li>Sword: K-G 1-3-4-5-6-7-8 <li>Polo-Stick: G-2G-H 1,4 <li>Staff: 7 numerals, showing between them only 3 numbers but different with regards to the ornamental dragon-heads, 3 cards with four, six and eigth staffs, with one dragon head each; and one card showing eight staffs, with 2 dragon heads. Of the second type of staffs there are only two cards, one with nine and one with 10 staffs. The odd card is a crescent with two dragon heads, although it might be interpreted as a variation of the polo-stick."</ul> <br><hr width="90%"><br><br> <b>Michael Dummett and Abu-Deeb </b>looked at the cards again and came up with a different explanation. Their research was published as M. Dummett and K. Abu-Deeb, "Some remarks on Mamluk playing cards", _Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes_, vol. XXXVI (1973), pp. 106-28. The Journal is on-line for subscribing institutions, but not for individuals.<br><br> Here is what Dummett has to say about it in "Game of Tarot", p. 39 (shortened text): <br><br> "Mayer's own analysis of the pack was faulty, but, when this is corrected, it proves to be an almost complete pack originally containing 52 cards (of which 48 survive), consisting of four suits, Swords, Polo-Sticks, Cups and Coins, each composed of ten numeral cards and three court cards headed by the King [M. Dummett and K. Abu-Deeb, "Some remarks on Mamluk playing cards", _Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes_, vol. XXXVI (1973), pp. 106-28]. Five of the surviving cards have been borrowed from another pack (or perhaps from two others), to replace lost cards; Mayer thought that these five secondary cards had been specially painted for that purpose, but, if that were so, the artist would surely have have tried, if not to imitate the general style, at least to make the shapes of the suit-signs conform to those of the original pack, which, particularly in the Swords suit, they do not. The numeral cards are pip cards in the sense of showing the number of suit-signs corresponding to their values. The Swords and Polo-Sticks are very highly stylised, and their arrangement is similar to that of the Italian Swords and Batons. In detail, the Polo-Sticks intersect, forming, on the cards from 4 to 10, a kind of trellis pattern. On the 4 to 10 of this suit, most fo the shafts of the Polo-Sticks from an obtuse angle with the heads, but the sides are otherwise straight; but on all the odd-numbered cards of the suit the odd Polo-Stick is S-shaped, as are two of them on the 10, and on all cards of the suit besides the 4 to 10 every Polo-Stick has a curved head; except on the two cards of the suit which come from the secondary pack, all curved heads end in a dragon's head shape. The two cards of the Swords suit (the 9 and 10) from the secondary pack show crescent-shaped swords, intersecting only once on the 9 but twice, in the Italian fashion, on the 10 (on the 9 one sword is straight). In the main pack, however, the Swords are S- shaped, and are arranged side by side, extending for most of the length of the card, but without intersecting: in this they resemble the exceptional version of the Swords suit mentioned in the last chapter as found in a few fifteenth-century Italian packs. On some of the odd-numbered cards of the Swords suit in the Istanbul pack, the odd sword is S-shaped, and on others it is straight."<br><br> Dummett with Abu-Deed contradict the hypotheses of Mayer (a 5x14-deck), he changes (likely with good reason) the exspectation about these cards (now a common 4x13-deck). <br> From our current perspective (we haven't seen these cards and only incomplete informations) we cannot add anything worthful to the case. <br><br> <b>(collected by Ross Caldwell / autorbis)</b></td></tr></table> <hr><br><br> <center><b><font size="1">Trionfi.com </b>has its focus on Tarot History and especially the origin of Tarot in 15th century, also the representation of about 100 000 Tarot and other playing cards in the Tarot Museum. <br><b>The Chapter "Playing Cards - Documents and Articles"</b> presents specific material to the situation of playing card development in late 14th and 15th century. <br> Author: when not otherwise specified, autorbis. 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