Arnold Esch Important Contributions to Playing Card History
Roman Customs Registers 1470-1480: Items of interests to historians of art and material culture.
Arnold Esch (Jstor article), Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 58, 1995, p. 72
Aus der Frühgeschichte der Spielkarte. Der Import von carte da giocare und trionfi nach Rom 1445-65.
Arnold and Doris Esch
Gutenberg Jahrbuch 2013, 88. Jahrgang, p. 41-53
"1428 – NAIBI COMING TO ROME" An article by Franco Pratesi about the custom register in Rome and two documents, which are the oldest playing card notes from this source.
The Esch article relates to Bartolomeo Seragli (active 1453) and a certain Johanni de Giovanni merciaro as merchants of the first Trionfi card import to Rome (active 1452-53). Seragli is otherwise documented as commissioner of likely 2 Trionfi decks in March/April 1453 in Florence from Filippo di Marco, likely these had been the same 2 decks, which Seragli imported. A Giovanni di Domenico is recorded as the first name of a Trionfi card producer in Florence in December 1449 (active till 1453). Later (1455) he appeared in a business cooperation with Seragli and Filippo di Marco in a documented Trionfi card production (5 documents) as Giovanni di Domenicho. There is reason to assume, that Johanni Domenico merciaro in Rome had been the same man, who was also the father of the artist Francesco Botticini.
