What Are Imperali Cards?

Rosanne

gregory said:
Naipe is just the Spanish for playing card; I'm guessing naibe is the Italian version, though it isn't in my HUGE dictionary.
:D Nor is it anywhere in my ones either Gregs. It is in an encyclopedia though as Naipes.

~Rosanne
 

Bernice

Rosanne said:
Visconti 16 Honours + 4 Aces + 4 Sevens + 4 Sixes = 28 and maybe + the four diased Popesse/Empress/Emperor and Pope =32.

Interesting thought about those strange plinths in the Visconti.

~Rosanne
Hah! Maybe you've just solved the 'strangeness'. Very reasonable explanation.

I hope no-one will 'chuck it out the window' before giving it full consideration :)


Bee x
 

Rosanne

I have just looked at the cards carefully ( yet again :p )

There are 12 white plinth cards 4 Kings/ 4 Queens/ 4 Majors PEEP lol
There are 16 numbered cards with the Bon droit blazon
Ace 2,3,4,5 Wands
Ace 2,3,4,5 Swords
2,3,4,5 Coins
2,4 Cups
Ace Coins and Ace Cups have devices but no Bon Droit But clear as Aces
So looking for two more cards that have white plinths, or something that replaces 3 and 5 Cups. Chariot and Magician? Now you have a "l'mperiale"
deck.

Might be what we would call a jack up-( making something artificial fit- like Kabalah and Tarot for example)- but I have often wondered why the blazon Bon Droit is on a select few of the cards.
Interesting concept though.

~Rosanne
 

Huck

http://jducoeur.org/game-hist/wicksontarot.html

It's not naturally sure, that the "Imperiale" of 1637 is the same Imperiale as ca 1495, or the Karnöffel game, also called Keyserspiel, of Geiler von Kaisersberg around the same time was the same game as of 1537 or 1450 or 1426. Similar a French Tarot game is not identical to Austrian Tarock versions or Italian games with Tarocchi cards. But similarities one may assume as likely.
 

Rosanne

So it might be possible an Englishman called Tarot Imperali Cards; It would seem his anglicising of Italian was quite rife throughout the book. He may have meant Imperiale Cards, meaning cards that are combinations to make a hand of cards as given in The Wickson translation of Tarot rules- for a particular Tarot game.

I am least happy to find there was a connection with Tarot and the word Imperiale, that I had not heard of before.

~Rosanne
 

Huck

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/25622/25622-h/25622-h.htm
Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497
Author: Julia Mary Cartwright


The summer months were spent in the Castello of Pavia, [Page 206]where Beatrice nursed her husband in a slight attack of fever, and afterwards received a visit from her father and brother. They arrived on the 25th of August, bringing with them a troop of actors to perform the Menæchmi and some of the other comedies which had pleased Lodovico so much at Ferrara. Duke Ercole himself, as usual, took keen interest in these theatricals, and before he left home sent to borrow two complete Turkish costumes and turbans from the Marquis of Mantua, in order to supply deficiencies in his actors' wardrobe. Three days after his arrival, Borso da Correggio, a young nephew of Niccolo, who had travelled to Pavia with the duke, sent the following note to give his cousin Isabella the latest news of her family:—

"Most illustrious Sister and honoured Lady,
"We arrived on the 25th at Pavia, and were received by these excellent lords and ladies with the usual formalities. We find both of the duchesses well and happy, one of them, indeed—her of Milan—expects the birth of another child shortly, but our own duchess is as gay and joyous as ever. On the 27th the comedy of The Captives was acted, and the performance went off very well. To-day The Merchant is to be given, and will, I hope, prove equally successful. To-morrow we are to have a third. Our way of living is as follows. Early in the morning we go out riding. After dinner we play at scartino, or else at 'raising dead men' and 'l'imperiale,' and other card games, till it is bed-time. The players are, as a rule, the Duke [Ludovico il Moro] and Duchess of Bari [Beatrice d'Este] together, Ambrogio da Corte, and some third man, whoever may happen to be present. To-day your father the duke, Don Alfonso, and Messer Galeaz Visconti are playing at pall-mall against Messer Galeaz Sanseverino, Signor Girolamo Tuttavilla, and myself. The Duchess of Milan does not join us in these games, and only appears at the theatricals. The Duke of Bari is more devoted to the duchess than ever, and is constantly caressing and embracing her. My lord your father is altogether intent on the comedies. When they are ended, hunting-parties will begin, and we shall all be ready for the quails."

These amusements were unexpectedly interrupted by the news of Duchess Leonora's [Eleanor d'Aragon] serious illness, a gastric affection [Page 207]which ended fatally on the 11th of October.

So this happened in 1493, the year, when Bianca Maria Sforza was send as a future Empress to Germany in December.