Ancient Rubber Stamps?

On some pip decks (e.g. Ancient Italian decks?) at least ONE card carries an ink stamp impression of some kind. These appear to indicate some sort of "official" revenue paid? The ancient Lombardy Tarot is one such example, with a "Giuoco Privato" stamp legend - Declaring it to be a "private game" presumably! Does anyone know the more precise significance of such things?

Macavity

A tax stamp? I think I read somewhere that England was doing this quite often, on cards. I don't know if this meant it was an import fee, or what.

Maybe someone else knows more.

From Kaplan's Encyclopedia of Tarot vol. 3:

"One of the most reliable methods of dating a tarot deck is to locate and identify the tax stamps, which may appear on one or more cards in the pack. Since the 16th century, governments of certain European countries, notably Austria, France, Germany and Italy, have imposed taxes on playing cards, including tarot. [...]
"The history of tax stamps on playing cards in preunification Italy (before 1860) is made more complicated by the changing boundaries of the various kingdoms, by the vicissitudes of the governments, and by the intricate customs and duties upheld by each kingdom to protect its own industries. After the unification it is considerably easier to identify Italian tax stamps and to use the information as a means of dating decks of cards.
"The tax stamps on Italian tarot decks generally appear on the ace of coins or on the king of batons [...]
"Laws granting concessions to gather taxes on playing cards started in the various Italian states at the end of the 16th century: 1588 in Bologna, 1606 in Lombardy, 1616 in Venice, 1619 in Tuscany and thereafter in Piedmont. By the beginning of the 18th century the practice of tax collection on playing cards was widespread in Italy. By the end of the 18th century all but a few small states had abolished the concession system of taxation, and the government gathered taxes directly through its own agents."

-- Lee

Lee, What more could (any) one say? (rather hoping it wasn't all typed)
Thanks indeed for filling us in on a topic I hadn't seen discussed before.

Macavity

There are one or two websites that give some information about tax stamps (I haven't looked at one of these for a while, but I have a feeling there is information on the Andy's Playing Cards site).

We very often see old tax stamps on decks here - probably simply because it's still comparatively easy to pick up really old decks. I don't always do exact dating - sometimes the tax stamp is a lot later than the printing of the deck in any case (e.g. if the decks sat around for years before being sold) but I do try to date when the deck looks particularly interesting.

We had one deck once with THREE tax stamps on it. I never quite worked out why.

Macavity said:

Lee, What more could (any) one say? (rather hoping it wasn't all typed)
Thanks indeed for filling us in on a topic I hadn't seen discussed before.

Click to expand...

Yep, all typed. There's lots more, it goes on at mind-numbing length about tax stamps in different countries, but my fingers got tired.

-- Lee

Oh dear - and I couldn't be bothered to look for the link! Well, to make amends, here it is:

http://www.unics.uni-hannover.de/rrzn/endebrock/pc-taxes.html

Probably far, far more detailed stuff there than you want really.

This is the page I mostly use (occasionally!) We have decks showing examples of just about all these stamps:

http://www.unics.uni-hannover.de/rrzn/endebrock/stamps/st-cs.html

Hi everybody

Just an exemple http://letarot.com\pages\60-cartouches-de-cartiers.htm

Best regards
JC Flornoy

Many thanks for posting that, it's beautiful.

However, I think we are talking about two different things here. What you have posted is a maker's mark, whereas what Lee and I have been talking about is tax stamps - stamps (a little like postmarks in a way) that show that the local tax on a deck of cards has been paid.

Now - I wonder which Macavity was referring to? I'm no longer sure!

Both subjects are very interesting in different ways. Tax stamps are rarely things of beauty (though I quite like our old local ones with lions) but they are a useful way of dating older and antique decks. Maker's marks, as your example shows, are likely to be much more interesting visually.

baba-prague said:

Many thanks for posting that, it's beautiful.

However, I think we are talking about two different things here. What you have posted is a maker's mark, whereas what Lee and I have been talking about is tax stamps - stamps (a little like postmarks in a way) that show that the local tax on a deck of cards has been paid.

Now - I wonder which Macavity was referring to? I'm no longer sure!

Both subjects are very interesting in different ways. Tax stamps are rarely things of beauty (though I quite like our old local ones with lions) but they are a useful way of dating older and antique decks. Maker's marks, as your example shows, are likely to be much more interesting visually.

Click to expand...

Your right, excuse me for my maker's marks, it is not your subjet!
friendly
Flornoy