What's so great about the Jacques Vieville Tarot?

le pendu

In a recent "only ONE deck" thread, I chose the Jacques Vieville as the one deck I would keep if I could keep only one.

And that's a bit odd. I tend to love the TdM decks, and while the Vieville is obviously related in most of its cards to the TdM, there are also several cards that seem more related to the Bologna Tarot, and some of his design choices are just plain odd.

Take the Chariot, possibly the strangest image in the deck, for instance:

vieville_VII.jpg


When I first saw this image, I thought.. wow.. those are sphinxs pulling the chariot! And then I thought.. nah.. those are probably horses. Then I noticed his Knights, like the Knight of Batons:

vieville_BC.jpg


But wait a minute, Vieville OBVIOUSLY knew how to draw a horse.. so why did he choose what he did for the Chariot? This is 1650 remember, as far as I know, way before the connection of tarot to Egypt was discussed, and before any Egyptian craze. So maybe they aren't horses, and they aren't sphinxs, and they mean something else entirely. I don't know. But aren't they curious?

And what of the Knight? At first sight the Vieville cards can seem to be very crudely drawn, but a few minutes looking at the details, and the cards really come to life. Notice the feather in the hat of the Kinght, and on the head of the horse. We see traces of that sometimes in the TdM, but here they are clearly intended. Look at the spurs on his feet, the armor on his knee, the design on his clothes, the intricate work on the horse's gear. Notice the red spot where the feather is held to the horses cap, now look at the TdM.

Most of the cards are like this. The more you look, the more you see. Here's the Trumps online, but they are so small it is hard to make out just how beautiful these images really are, you can click on the images to get bigger versions.. but they still are too small to see all of the details:
http://membres.lycos.fr/tarobat/mesjeux/vieville/lagaleriedestriomphes.htm

I love that Vieville doesn't have titles on his cards, no distraction there. The numbers look added as an afterthought, I ignore them.

What's in the Hermit's hand? How cool is the Fool's backpack stick? Look at the top and bottom of Strength.. you can see to top of her hat, and her foot and the lion's tail! What a fantastic devil, and a beautiful Star, what is in the Popess's hand.. a book? Are you sure?

This deck is not commonly found everywhere.. Barnes and Noble probably won't have it in stock. ;) But it is fairly easy to find at most good tarot retailers. No need to compete in heavy bidding wars on ebay for it.. ;) ;) ;)

I've noticed several other people mention this deck.. so What's so great about the Jacques Vieville Tarot? Let's enable a reasonably priced deck, that's still available, that's over 350 years old, (think about that.. Paris.. 1650.. and we can still buy this deck and have it to learn, play and read with!). Why do you like the Vieville? What features are intersting? What makes this such a great deck?
 

prudence

Funny, you had me sold on this deck months ago, Robert, I did actually attempt to get one but the TG was all out of stock...I will go have a look and see if it is back in stock now.

I will have to come back to this thread when I have gotten my Vieville to comment on how much I love it....and what I may love about it. I have a feeling it will be the title-less images. Well, that and its similarity to the Bologna, which I love. (I have an Il Meneghello version)

Thanks. :)
 

prudence

OKay, so I just ordered one. :D

It will help ease the pain and suffering of not getting that Dodal.

I wonder is the finish like the Heron Conver?
 

le pendu

YAY!

Personally, I'd say it is more like the Dodal's finish! There's no "added" border. What you see on the scans is what the cards look like.

On the Knight of Batons above, the white is my scanner not the card.
 

prudence

Oh, good then! It looks on the scanner like an il Meneghello or Vandenborre Bacchus (finish wise).
 

le pendu

It's coated, more like the Dodal than the Il Meneghello decks, but not OVERLY coated. Enough to protect the images but not make them slippery. It's a very good product.
 

Rosanne

Could the creatures on the chariot be Ba and Ka? They are the soul and spirit or the vital essence of oneself. They are birds with human heads, and arms and have sphinx like headwear. They were often depicted drawing the Sun Barque across the Sky. ~Rosanne
 

le pendu

prudence said:
Well, that and its similarity to the Bologna, which I love. (I have an Il Meneghello version)

Oooops.. I hope I haven't misled you. I SHOULD have said Tarocco Bolognese, or even Tarocchino Bolognese. This isn't the same as the TdM Bologna by Il Meneghello or L.S. It's the one discussed here....
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=46917

And also similar to the "Charles VI", like this
http://expositions.bnf.fr/renais/grand/048.htm
and this
http://expositions.bnf.fr/renais/grand/047.htm

It's odd that these images, old, Italian, end up in a Paris deck, mixed in with TdM images. I have NO idea how this happened. It's one of the mysteries I'd love to have a better grasp of.

Make sure you look at Jean-Claude Flornoy's page about it too, and see the marvelous job he did of restoring a couple of the cards. I'd love for him to create an entire deck for the Vieville.
http://www.tarot-history.com/Jacques-Vieville/pages/page-2.html
 

le pendu

Rosanne said:
Could the creatures on the chariot be Ba and Ka? They are the soul and spirit or the vital essence of oneself. They are birds with human heads, and arms and have sphinx like headwear. They were often depicted drawing the Sun Barque across the Sky. ~Rosanne

Can you tell us more about them?

Everything else in the deck (that I can think of right now), is pretty straight forward.. then suddenly we have this card where two creatures are pulling the chariot. It seems to me it has to have come from somewhere, it has to have had meaning. It just doesn't seem like something that he would just "make up" for one card in the deck. I'd bet anything he's referencing "something".

I think anything is possible.

Edit - I did a search for Ba Ka Chariot.. and keep finding references to Mer Ka Ba and Merkaba. This looks interesting! For example (I don't know how verifiable this is..)
http://execonn.com/matt/Docs/Merkaba.htm
 

prudence

le pendu said:
Oooops.. I hope I haven't misled you. I SHOULD have said Tarocco Bolognese, or even Tarocchino Bolognese. This isn't the same as the TdM Bologna by Il Meneghello or L.S. It's the one discussed here....
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=46917

And also similar to the "Charles VI", like this
http://expositions.bnf.fr/renais/grand/048.htm
and this
http://expositions.bnf.fr/renais/grand/047.htm

It's odd that these images, old, Italian, end up in a Paris deck, mixed in with TdM images. I have NO idea how this happened. It's one of the mysteries I'd love to have a better grasp of.

Make sure you look at Jean-Claude Flornoy's page about it too, and see the marvelous job he did of restoring a couple of the cards. I'd love for him to create an entire deck for the Vieville.
http://www.tarot-history.com/Jacques-Vieville/index.html
oh, okay, I understand now (and remember why I wanted it so much many months ago) it reminds me of the Vandenborre Bacchus (the Tower card and Hermit images come to mind)...but I notice this is the one deck you have *not* mentioned in the above post.:D (I know you do not share my enthusiasm for the weird and slightly squished look of the Vandenborre)