What's with the Camoin Maison-Dieu door?

[Sophie]

I have just purchased the Camoin-Jodorowski deck, to go with Jodorowski's book The Way of the Tarot, which I find fascinating, very humane, if a bit far-fetched in some ways - though of course, being right at the onset of my journey with the TdM, I'll take it all in.

I looked through the deck - and come to XVI-La Maison-Dieu, a card I've been thinking about quite a bit lately (see literary thread in Talking Tarot). And there...a door on the side of the tower! I take out the Héron deck I've had a couple of weeks - no door. I flick through all the scans on the readings thread - Hadar, Dodal, Payen, Noblet. No door.

In the chapter "La Maison-Dieu" of his book, Jodo explains he and Camoin based the door on "alchemical records and masonic texts", with no more details, except to say the door was the door of the initiate. Well, how about that? Anyone know anything more about this? Are alchemical records and masonic texts regularly used in recreating TdM decks? Are there other masonic or alchemical sign in existing decks, including the orginal Conver, that might justify such an inclusion, by analogy?

I'm open to all sort of interpretations, and would like to hear more about that famous door, and what you think of it. Doors are not innocuous objects, after all, they have huge symbolic significance - and in the Maison-Dieu, most of all.

 

[Fulgour]

What's behind the Green Door ?

The Camoin XVI La Maison Dieu may be seen on this page:
http://www.tarot-numerologie.com/16-xvi-maison-dieu.html

from Tarot Numerologie

What I've often wondered is, what are those two "potatoes"
doing there on the ground in front? hot rocks... footprints?

 

[ihcoyc]

What I've often wondered is, what are those two "potatoes"
doing there on the ground in front? hot rocks... footprints?

IIRC, in the Camoin/Jodorowsky book, they are indeed footprints. (I rather prefer potatoes, myself.) OTOH, the potatoes are also on the 1963 Grimaud, and on the Conver deck as well.

 

[Fulgour]

The two funny potatoes are something I will look for
with each Marseille XVI La Maison Dieu deck image.

I didn't want to overly distract from the Green Door,
so I just kind of slipped them in. There are similar
blob-things on almost all XVIs so far as I know...

 

[Sophie]

The two funny potatoes are something I will look for
with each Marseille XVI La Maison Dieu deck image.

I didn't want to overly distract from the Green Door,
so I just kind of slipped them in. There are similar
blob-things on almost all XVIs so far as I know...

Thanks Fulgour. Potatoes shmotatoes, what's with the door, I'd like to know

But potatoes? really? Jodo also talks about gold chips.

 

[ihcoyc]

Jodorowsky's book wants us to remember that the green door he has discovered or added to XVI has a half-moon (demi-lune) on it. This is something I always remember, because a small building whose door is decorated with a half moon is a very different symbol in the United States.

 

[Sophie]

Jodorowsky's book wants us to remember that the green door he has discovered or added to XVI has a half-moon (demi-lune) on it. This is something I always remember, because a small building whose door is decorated with a half moon is a very different symbol in the United States.

Compare and contrast, please?

And what would Jodo's half-moon mean. That door (and the demi-lune) are driving me a bit crazy. Why did they add it???

 

[kenji]

As far as I know, the earliest example of the "door" in LA MAISON DIEU
is that of Tarot de Besancon by Jean Jerger, circa 1800.

Here's a picture of the same trump by Renault.
(Reanult is Jerger's successor and used the same woodblocks as Jerger.)
http://www.gambler.ru/sukhty/decks04/d03337/d0333716.jpg

Can you see something like an "upturned crescent moon" on the door?
(I can show you finer pictures of another TdB deck, If you're interested.)

Interestingly enough, in "Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie" Eliphas Levi
has this trump astrologically correspond to the Moon!
It is said that Levi was influenced by Athanasius Kircher on this point,
but I suspect this actual design of TdB also affected his thought.
(Levi thinks highly of Tarot de Besancon in "Histoire de la Magie".)

 

[Sophie]

As far as I know, the earliest example of the "door" in LA MAISON DIEU is that of Tarot de Besançon by Jean Jerger, circa 1800.

Fantastique! Thanks Kenji. I've heard your praises sung by many here, and now I know why. So Jodo and Camoin pinched it from Jerger's Besançon, sneaky pair (not that there is anything wrong with that, but they did claim their deck was an exact reconstitution of the Conver deck). Does anyone care to speculate the reason why? Metaphysical reason? I just find the "alchemical records and masonic texts" explanation rather vague (and, it appears, partially untrue). What does that door evoke in you?

Can you see something like an "upturned crescent moon" on the door?(I can show you finer pictures of another TdB deck, If you're interested.)

I do just about see it - not very clear - has it a face like the moons on the Chariot's shoulders? That would link it to the Chariot, somehow - action and reaction? Or what?

Yes, please, if you can show something finer, I would be very interested.

Jodo talks about "the door of the initiate" - it could be that he got that idea from the crescent moon? but I don't know the link to initiation, I can only guess at it, and my idea goes via the Papess.

 

[Rusty Neon]

So Jodo and Camoin pinched it from Jerger's Besançon, sneaky pair (not that there is anything wrong with that, but they did claim their deck was an exact reconstitution of the Conver deck).

I took a quick boo at the LPB (little purple booklet) that comes with the Jodorowsky-Camoin deck to refresh my memory (page 10). What Jodo and Camoin set out to do was, in their view, to "restor[e] the Tarot of Marseille such as it originally was". Obviously, this is a subjective thing. Not everything done will please everyone, nor please anyone all the time.

They are forthright about iconographic sources used: "We studied and compared on computer innumerable versions of the Tarot of Marseilles, among which were the Tarot of Nicolas Conver, the Tarot of Doodle [note that this is a typo in English text: French text correctly shows it as Dodal], the tarot of François Tourcaty, the Tarot of Fautrier, the Tarot of Jean-Pierre Payen, the Tarot of Suzanne Bernardin, the Tarot of Besançon by Lequart, etc."

The Jodo-Camoin deck is a redrawing that uses linework from the 1760 Conver plates and uses the 1760 colour scheme of the Conver as the basic starting point of the restoration, and then adds interesting details from various of the other versions of the Tarot of Marseilles, such as the door from the Lequart's Tower card and devil's body-art from the Devil card of the Dodal/Payen patterns, etc., or details inspired by "ambiguities" in the linework. I understand that some of the details in cards of the Jodo-Camoin deck that differ from the cards of the 1760 Conver are inserted to follow oral tradition concerning certain card details.