Who's for giving "the Gypsies" their due?

I think there's a book or two that explores the suggestion...

...but as a belief, I think.

Tarot for the Green Witch refers to the Roma/Romani and she might be using the Buckland Romany Tarot as a resource. I've not bought this book yet...

Playing with the idea of how beautifully the Latin-suited Spanish decks retained a tarotlike prettyness in their pips does give me pause to think of how people grew to 'reading' with the minors and playing cards...but it seems the majors were not used in European playing-type-cards with their various regional preferences for the 48 to 62 pip-cards structures and variations in the use of court cards...

But I also don't know enough of folkloric Italian traditions or the Romany to really link such ideas up. There's a few beautiful 'romany'-style tarots, but not certain if they are considered 'authentic' or just romantic idealism.

If something fun or curious or historical comes out of the ideas presented here, I'm all ears!

Cerulean

Northsea, I want to apologize for being condescending in the tone of my last post. It was unwarrented.

Fulgore, I'm still uncertain as to what you're saying.

Lets say that the diaspora of the Rom peoples to Europe carried with them the Tarot.What I cannot get my head around is that they were vilified and dispised whereever they went. There are a couple of instances where that did not happen but in general they were considered not fit people to be seen with.They also did not tell fortunes for each other by the way. How could their knowledge spread to say the high classes in Italy and the woodblock printers in France? They were traditionally metal workers-just as the North west Indians are today. They were casual blacksmiths and made small wooden trifles like pegs and toys. They were mistaken for Egyptians because of their skin colouring and their self promoting of a mystical background of kings and queens to get patronage of European states they landed in. In most places you could not hire them in the local workforce due to edicts to move them on and out of each country. It seems to me that it was Court de Geblin who made the association with Egyptian ancestry? and we have the points game with Mamluk cards and the pretend royalty of the Roms and cartomancy - it came together as an incorrect theory.
On the other hand I believe in a Phoenician association with the 22 Trumps- so I guess anything is possible- I would just like to see where you are coming from Fulgour, and why you see this strong connection.Hehe I have oft wondered if the article in hand of the Valet de coupes was a tambourine! ~Rosanne

Myths & Legends

I have always considered it likely that well-meaning, "God-fearing", European Christians found it useful to tarnish both tarot cards and the Rom by not only connecting the two, but claiming that the Rom brought the cards with them to Europe in the first place. Morally, it would have "killed two birds with one stone". Both the people and the cards could then be described as agents of evil.

Who could then blame the Rom for using any available type of card deck to "tell fortunes" for the gullible and the believers of the Euro-Christian legend?

"American Indian culture vanished in a few centuries,
and by the time Europeans began keeping records of
"traditions and beliefs" they had all been transformed."

Fulgour, are you referring to Native American culture?

Is there any record of, or surviving, trump-taking card games in ancient India (pre-1400 A.D.)? If so, does it, or they, resemble the tarot, at least in number of cards used?

...and who brought chess (chauturanga) from India to Europe? (My understanding is that the gypsies began migrating to Europe during renaissance times.)

Lyric said:

Fulgour, are you referring to Native American culture?

Click to expand...

Many 'Native Americans' nowadays call themselves
'American Indians' and are tired of politically correct
flip flops at their expense. AIM has kept their name.

Rosanne said:

How could their knowledge spread to say the high classes in Italy and the woodblock printers in France? They were traditionally metal workers-just as the North west Indians are today.

Click to expand...

We all know about papyrus... but the beginnings of printing
were designs made for clothing, stamped and dyed on fabric
much like later letter printing. Call 'em what we may choose,
the Gypsies were famous for their patterned clothing designs.

Maybe they liked Tarot cards right from the start and began
printing and distributing them as a natural part of goings on.

Historic records are NOT reliable, they never have been, and
here we are simply "using our imaginations" to think broadly.

"What if?" is always more accurate than "According to."

In other words, let's just make up history.

I still maintain that actual history is much more interesting than Fulgour's fantasies pretending to be history.

-- Lee

dream a little dream

Lee said:

In other words, let's just make up history. I still maintain that actual history is much more interesting than Fulgour's fantasies pretending to be history. -- Lee

Click to expand...

Oh c'mon... this is Tarot, not the Spanish Inquisition.