XXI - Le Monde

Well - here we are!

This card certainly has had some transformations through history, and yet remained, on the whole, reasonably consistent in its iconography (the Visconti-Sforza illustrations which Kaz will hopefully also post being the other main type of depiction).

The main change has been, from my perspective, the possible ambiguity or 'maleness' of most early depictions modified to clearly feminine depictions. There are numerous depictions of Christ which are so similar to this one that, to my mind at least, the card undoubtedly depicted Christ in its early renditions. I say this even more because, of all late mediaeval depictions one would expect, a depiction of the crucifixion would have been 'expected' - unless one is dealing with some Christian view either deemed heretical, or closely aligned to such. In such cases, Christ's depiction would have been included in its fulness of spiritual being - as Logos.

The four living creatures from Ezekiel are also the four Evangelists, arranged in one of their traditional order, and the order aligned with the four fixed signs of the zodiac.

But enough of my brief introduction - attached is the 1701 Dodal rendition.

jmd:

Welcome back.

An androgynous Jesus is definitely the central figure on the earliest Marseilles World cards. This is as obvious, or maybe even more so, on Jacques Vieville's card as on the Dodal representation. But an evolution toward a female figure began early on, so by the time of Conver's 1760 deck, that figure had become an unambiguous woman.

We might initially expect a crucifix to occupy that spot, but further reflection leads, I think, to the conclusion that this is Christ triumphant rather than Christ the victim and Man of Sorrows. The Vieville and Dodal pictures remind me of late Roman portraits of a beardless, very young Jesus as the Good Shepherd, holding a lamb across his shoulders. These portraits were very closely related to, and quite obviously derived from, classical representations of Apollo.

I can't help but think, because of its relationship to the card that precedes it, that this is a picture of the world to come, as described in Revelation 21, rather than the one we're living in. That world would actually be trump X, which in some decks like the Builders of the Adytum (although not in any Marseilles deck I'm aware of) contains the emblems of the four evangelists, otherwise identified as the four heads of Ezekiel's tetramorph, as does the World card. Thinking of trump XXI this way places the card in an otherworldly sphere, along with the rest of the cards that follow Death and Temperance: first we encounter the lower regions (XV, XVI), then the celestial sphere (XVII, XVIII, XVIIII), then Judgment and the World to come.

This picture conveys a message of transcendent hope, even more so than the Star.

I suspect that the World was an image that any number of people in the tradition didn't quite know what to make of. It has been interpreted in a number of different ways.

The seventeenth century Paris Tarot depicts the World as a female figure balanced on an orb. Within the orb, there is a sun, a moon, and what may be the land and the sea. The orb is surmounted by a cross. The orb is divided into three parts by an equatorial band and a half-band supporting the cross, like a royal orb. Around the orb, there are four cherub heads that apparently represent the four winds. The female figure is naked, and carries a drape attached to a rod. She seems unambiguously female, but is not particularly attractive.

The flat T in a circle was also the basis of a standard mediaeval map of the world. The arms of the T represented water; the areas they enclosed were land. The upper quarter made by the T was Europe; the bottom was Africa; Asia was the remaining half. This allowed Jerusalem to stand at the centre of the world, at the crux of the T. Symbolism ws more important than geography in making this map, it seems.

I suspect that the Paris Tarot image is fairly close to the original, insofar as we can glimpse it. At least with this image, there is some recognisable relation between the name "Le Monde" and the image on the card, something that seems much harder to figure from the Marseilles image. The four symbolic Evangelist animals may have originally represented the four winds.

Likewise, the Visconti image has cherubs holding aloft a globe. This too seems more likely as a representation of the World than the Marseilles design does.

Which begs the question: where did the Marseilles design come from?

I was hoping for additional input prior to making further comments myself - but I guess others are doing the same!

As I do not have the Paris Tarot deck mentioned by ihcoyc above, I thought I would post a very similar card from a Flemish deck (by F.I. Vand). As can be seen on that card, the figure is probably male, the orb has the 'T' cross, surmounted by the Christian 'Latin' Cross - standard symbol of the imperial orb, implying that this covers the whole world.

As catboxer mentioned, the Marseilles deck representation (unlike the attached alternative version) is also reminiscent of some representations of Apollo - and of course, both Christ and Apollo are closely connected to the Sun. Christ Triumphant or Ascended or Resurrected, as can be variously seen in this card, seems at odds with its title 'Le Monde', and one could very well then deduce that the Visconti or Flemish type representations to be more accurate reflections of the words, so let me 'play' a little.

The image surrounding the central (and possibly androgenous) figure is certainly reminiscent of the vesica piscis - better known as a mandorla, or almond. I wonder if there wasn't a play on words here between 'al mondo' ('the world') and 'mandorla'. In French, this same play would have been between 'L'amande' and 'Le Monde'. If we also consider that this homophonic 'play' was also considered important by certain alchemists (and termed the 'language of the birds' - La Langues d'oiseaux), then 'the World' suddenly becomes something of far greater and deeper significance, for the almond was certainly considered the fruit of the sacred Tree of Life amongst the Phrygians (& others).

Here again, then, the Marseilles version incorporates within it not only its incredibly worthy symbolic representation of the world to come, the initiate's integrated Christ self, and the fourfold enclosure of the Spirit (the figure within the mandorla within the four elements), but by its very un-expected title reveals deeper 'secrets'.

Before I post other Marseilles type representations, here is the Flemish version, which is quite similar to the Paris Tarot, and also has similarities to the Visconti-type decks.

Another related representation, for which I shall make additional comments when I get to scan one of Mithras, is of a figure within the zodiacal band - in the attached version, at the angle of the ecliptic.

Here we can also consider that the world is drawn from within the sphere of the stars, and that their influence is upon all we do.

Another pertinent factor is that the four living creatures, astrologically considered, form not only the four fixed signs of the zodiac, but their 'natural' 2nd, 5th, 8th and 11th houses. These add to 26, which Kabbalists would instantly recognise as standing for the tetragrammaton (YHVH).

One can see from the image, then, that the central figure of Christ is birthed from within the configuration of the God of the Old Testament.

Reflections on each card certainly yields many insights - and this card leads to many paths to be variously travelled.

Attached, then, is the 1625 woodcut by Ripa.

edited

visconti sforza

kaz

cary yale visconti

kaz

soprafino

kaz

The World card is as undoubtedly of a female figure as it is, to my mind, of the resurrected Christ figure. That there is a long tradition which states of this figure its androgenous character also adds to both of these.

Alchemically, the union of the male (Sun) and Moon (female) leads to putrefaction (XX) and to an integrated Rebis (Sun + Moon = Mercury). And so here we are also faced with the transformed mercurial Magician to his integrated accomplished unified hermaphrodic self.

It is also interesting, since you mention Hermes Trismegistus, that Hermes - none other than the Roman Mercury and Egyptian Thoth - has also been linked to Mithra and Christ. The unified integrated hermaphrodite, then, is, through alchemy, connected to Mercury; through history, Mercury is connected to Hermes; and through gematria, Hermes is connected to the Solar Logos and Christ.

Certainly the Marseilles card maintains the gender ambiguity - and thus both veils and reveals what lies beyond.

Attached is the Fournier version of the card.