Number of copies of 18th century Conver TdM in existence?

I was curious how many complete ... or partial ... copies of 18th century Conver Tarot de Marseille tarot decks are in existence? The only ones I know about is the complete museum specimen for the Héron reproduction (Bibliothèque nationale, Paris) and the 77/78ths complete Italian museum specimen for the Lo Scarabeo Ancient of Marseilles.

Thanks!

I may be incorrect, but reading between the lines of various things Thierry Depaulis has written suggests that only the two you mention are so far known about.

The other early 'Marseilles' type decks from the period (or earlier) are not quite true to the Marseilles, and include the Vieville and the Paris decks.

Thanks, jmd.

Somehow I couldn't help thrinking that there might also have been some very partially incomplete Conver 1760-1800 sets (e.g., one or just a few cards) in existence besides those two Conver museum specimens. (That, however, is based on gut feeling rather than anything factual.)

I tend to go along with you...

Problem is, however, is how to definitely name them 'Conver' unless there is sufficient similarity to specifically Conver renditions, or better still, have the 2 Coins pop up.

Depaulis does mention that there are various independent Marseille cards here and there. I would need to try and find my sources - but hope that those better informed than I also post

18th-century cards by Conver(?) in Japan

Hello

There is a public museum named "Miike Playing Card Museum" in Omuta city,
where the first Japanese playing cards were published in 16th century,
and there exist 9 cards which are seemingly part of Nicola Conver deck.

5 of them can be seen in the pamphlet they publish.
(VIIII, XIIII, XVI, XVII, and the ace of cups).
I compared them thoroughly with the reproduction by Heron.
It seems almost every single detail is identical in design!

In addition, there's a very interesting fact.
Unlike the Heron & Lo Scarabeo decks, the angel's face of the trump
XIIII(TEMPERANCE) is "entire", with every feature existing.

So, if these cards in Japan are indeed part of a Conver deck, they
should have been printed earlier than the two complete decks in Europe.

Re: 18th-century cards by Conver(?) in Japan

kenji said:

Hello

There is a public museum named "Miike Playing Card Museum" in Omuta city,
where the first Japanese playing cards were published in 16th century,
and there exist 9 cards which are seemingly part of Nicola Conver deck.

5 of them can be seen in the pamphlet they publish.
(VIIII, XIIII, XVI, XVII, and the ace of cups).
I compared them thoroughly with the reproduction by Heron.
It seems almost every single detail is identical in design!

In addition, there's a very interesting fact.
Unlike the Heron & Lo Scarabeo decks, the angel's face of the trump
XIIII(TEMPERANCE) is "entire", with every feature existing.

So, if these cards in Japan are indeed part of a Conver deck, they
should have been printed earlier than the two complete decks in Europe.

Click to expand...

Hi Kenji,

That sounds like an incredible find!

Could you scan the pamphlet photographs?

Ross

kenji: Welcome to the Aeclectic Tarot forums.

I second Ross here. If you could share these pictures with us somehow, we would be very grateful to you indeed.

Only subscribers to the forum are able to make attachments, but if you could scan them and put them on a web-page somewhere, it would be wonderful. Otherwise you could send the scanned pages to one of us by e-mail and we could put them up.

hello kenji ... welcome to Aeclectic Tarot. I third Ross; that's an incredible find. Looking forward to seeing any scans.

By the way, guys, I found a link to the Miike museum through google, but the link doesn't seem to work on my computer. There are supposed to be some playing card (and hopefully tarot card) images at that link.

http://www.kyu-teikyo.ac.jp/cartax/index.html

Great to have you on board, Kenji.

The link given by Rusty Neon did not work for me. Doing a quick search, the only related cards I could see from the Museum are the ones deriving from Portuguese sailors, and similarly noted in Andy's Playing Cards site (well worth revisiting from time to time).

The cards, which show their distinct closeness to Tarot's minor arcana, may be viewed here.

Being able to view the Major Arcana remains would indeed be a wonderful blessing!

Thank you all for your replies
To tell the truth, I'm a bit astonished to see your warm reactons.

I want you not to forget that I may be wrong;
for I'm by no means an expert...

So sorry I don't have any scanning machine now,
but I've just asked Miike Museum to upload the images
of the cards to some webspace or send me by e-mail.
Please wait a little longer until they answer me.
On receiving their answer, I'll let you know here.
(Probably it won't take much time, I suppose.)

P.S. I told them about this forum!