The first known Use of the Word "Trionfi"
(in relation to a card game)
1442: 10th of February, the painter Sagramoro is paid 20 lire "for having coloured and painted the cups, swords, coins and batons and all the figures of 4 packs of trump cards and making the backs for a pack of red cards and 3 packs of green ones, embellished with roundels painted in oil, which our Lord has for his use".
The original entry reads: "MCCCCXLII Maistro Iacomo depentore dito Sagramoro de avere 10 fiebraro per sue merzede de avere cholorido e depento le chope e le spade e li dinari e li bastoni e tute le fegure de 4 para de chartexele da trionffy, e per farle de fora uno paro de rosse e 3 para de verde, chargate de tonditi fati a olio, le quale ave lo nostro Signore per suo uxo; tanssa i prexii per Galiota de l'Asassino chamarlengo de lo prefato Signore de chomissione de lo Signore, in raxone de lire zinque per paro .......... L.XX"
A second entry in one of the Ferrarese account books is done 1/2 year later:
1442: July, for a pack of "carte da trionfi" intended for Ercole and Sigismondo (two of Leonello's brothers), delivered to their servant Iacomo "guercio", the "merciaio" Marchione Burdone received the sum of 12 soldi and 3 denari.
The original entry reads: "E adi dicto per uno paro de carte da trionfi; ave Iacomo guerzo famelio per uxo de Messer Erchules e Sigismondo frateli de lo Signore. Apare mandato a c, - , L. 0.XII.III"
Ercole I d'Este, later Duke of Modena and Ferrara (1471-1505), *1431, and Sigismondo, * 1433, later Signore of San Martino, are the only surviving legitime sons of Niccolo III. out of his third marriage. In 1442 they are 9 and 11 years old. The above mentioned "cheap" deck is a Trionfi deck dedicated for the use of children.
A third note (and much more notes)
In 1449 Jacopo Antonio Marcello writes his letter and documents in it, that Trionfi cards are relatively farspread.
1450 "Trionfi" is an allowed card deck in Florence (where before had been a strong phase of card playing prohibtion). In Ferrara between 1450 - 1463 appear around 30 entries about Trionfi cards in the account books. In Milano the name Trionfi apppears 1450/1452 in the correspondences of Francesco Sforza and Bianca Maria Visconti.
About this Special Moment of Time (February 1442)
We see a start of the use of the word Trionfi (in relation to card decks) in Ferrara in February 1442:
1. after the visit of Bianca Maria Visconti at the court of the d'Este (September 1440 - April 1441)
- she got 14 figures painted by Sagramoro as present from Niccolo III at 1st of Januaray 1441
(the visit of Bianca Maria in Ferrara is very delicate; Bianca Maria is promised to Francesco Sforza, but Filippo Visconti also considered to marry her to Leonello d'Este, Niccolos III.s son and heir; it is unclear, if the present was "from Niccolo to Bianca Maria" or "from Leonello to Bianca Maria")
2. after the marriage of Bianca Maria with Francesco Sforza in October 1441
- the marriage is one of the logical dates for the commission of the Cary-Yale deck
3. after the death of Niccolo III. d'Este (December 1441), under the new Signore Leonello
This coincidences in time might lead to various conclusions, how these Trionfi related actions influenced each other:
Possibility 1
(under the condition, that the Cary-Yale was already painted earlier , for instance in 1428):
Bianca Maria already knew the card productions of her father (Michelino and Cary-Yale) at her visit in Ferrara and with her knowledge she influenced the Este court to develop a 14-cards-set, which was considered to be added to the normal decks "just as an idea". Niccolo III. showed only small interest, but gave a present to Bianca Maria of "14 figures" (1st of January 1441), just painted by Sagramoro, who some time later (February 1442) edited the first 4 decks (as mentioned in the note above).
The youth at the court (under them Leonello) had more interest than Niccolo (old man and chess-player, not very interested in cards), but not the power to make anything with the new idea. When Niccolo died in December 1441, the way was free for Leonello to establish a Trionfi-production. First they tested the game with some private editions (February 1442), but already in July 1442 they had done a step in mass production (the deck mentioned in July 1442 had as price only 1/8 of the price of the decks produced in February 1442 - the low price indicates mass production).
The new deck had difficulties to be accepted as a "great idea" in the beginning (there is no further note in Ferrara until 1450, instead of this the interest in Imperatori-decks is well documented), but on a slow way it established itself as the most interesting deck around 1450.
Possibility 2 (under the condition, that the Cary-Yale was produced 1441):
Bianca Maria visited Ferrara, a court with many youth, much life and much interest to play cards. In the contrary Bianca Maria had have in her childhood a lonesome stay on some country castles of her father, she even was not allowed to visit Milano (probably due to the paranoic character of her father - who had reason to to be careful, earlier members of the Visconti-family were often murdered).
She knew of the worthful deck, that Filippo Visconti, her father, had produced before (Michelino deck).
She experienced at the d'Este court the great interest in the Imperatori-deck with only few special cards and mentioned the special deck of her father. The idea was taken but modified at the card table in long discussions between the youth. The present to Bianca Maria (1st January of 1441) was the result.
Bianca Maria carried this idea to her father, who made an own creative step and issued a 5x16-deck at Bianca Marias marriage (Cary-Yale in Oktober 1441). Sagramoro/Leonello knew in February 1442 both: The 14 cards of the discussions in late 1440 and the deck of Filippo Visconti in October 1441, but they prefered the 5x14-version and started a mass-production (cheap decks) in 1442.
Possibility 3 (Trionfi were 1441 already farspread around Ferrara; Cary-Yale in 1441):
Bianca Maria visited Ferrara and became known to a new deck with 5x14-structure (which was invented either in Ferrara or somewhere else, perhaps in Venice). She got a Trionfi set of her own as present and took that to her father, who responded with a production of his own in Oktober 1441 as marriage present (Cary-Yale). The account book entries in 1442 in Ferrara only accidently correspond to the other dates.
The Prohibition Theory: We know, that in 1441 in Venice it became necessary to protect Venetian card producers against cheap playing card imports - probably from Germany (German producers were leading in printing techniques and could produce cheaper). A strategy of defending against these imports might have been to specialise in inventing "Italian decks", so "card playing was forbidden", but playing cards with Italian decks (or decks from Venice) was allowed (only in the theory, there is not enough evidence).
.As German card producers imitated Italian decks and suits (examples of this are known from later times), it was hard to decide, whether a deck was imported or not. So it was started to specialise the decks: with heraldic devices and finally with Trionfi cards (hypothetical idea of the prohibition theory). So we get from 1450 in Florence the information, that Trionfi are allowed, but card playing stayed prohibited (although with a Trionfi deck you could play any card game, that you desired, and from 1456 by the Ferarese jurist Ugo Trotti we know, that various plays were done with the Trionfi deck), and from other cities we do know, that they followed in their laws this specification: Trionfi were allowed, but card playing was prohibited. Later on in card history tax stamps were invented, either to protect the homeland production but also to get some income for the government.
As Venice was a center of trade, it might be, that the problem to protect against imports occured here for the first time. The Trionfi specification might have happened here in first hand as a protection measurement, Ferrara - near to Venice - might have followed the practice in second place. So - perhaps - Ferrara got Trionfi-decks from Venice, already before 1442.
4. Other scenarios are imaginable - but we've no documents. Actually one has to conclude, that a lot of movements of playing card development should be lost forever. The use of the name "Trionfi"
is only one sign of life of Tarot-simliar decks - they might have existed before without carrying this name. However, around 1442 it is probable, that these decks had not 22 trumps as later usual but only 13, 14 or 16 in decks with 5x13, 5x14 or 5x16 -structure.
1. There is no use known of the word "Trionfi" in relation to a card-game before 1442.
2. There is clear evidence, that the Michelino-deck was painted for Filippo Visconti at least before 1425 (Martiano da Tortona, who described the deck in an accompanying manuscript and is said by Decembrio to have received 1500 ducatos for it, is dead at this time), is existent and later in 1449 is called a ludus triumphorum by Jacopo Antonio Marcello. The Michelino deck had 16 unusual cards (gods), which are interpreted by Marcello as trumps (Trionfi).
3. There is clear evidence of a card deck called Imperatori (Emperors), which seemed to be a rather new invention in 1423 and which with some probability developed in Florence (imported from Florence to Ferrara). In the entry from 1423 it is spoken from "VIII Imperatori cards" (8 Emperor cards), and the interpretation of this note is very difficult.
a. One interpretation possibility assumes "8 Emperors", possibly used as additional court cards (2 Emperors added to each suit).
b. Another interpretation assumes 8 "special cards, under these one Emperor".
c. Another interpretation assumes 8 "special cards, under these two Emperors" - a Western and an Eastern Emperor, as they were proceeded in the later Minchiate.
d. Another interpretation assumes a "floating number" (4, 6, 8 or others) of few Imperatori cards with the character of special cards, which were used with special functions inside various games. In this scenario a relationship between Imperatori deck and the earliest known game Karnöffel (first noted 1426) might be assumed - one of the later Karnöffel-variants is called "Kaiserspiel" (Kaiser = Emperor = Imperator). In the Karnöffel game special functions are given to individual cards - Emperor, Pope, Devil and others are known names of this special functions.
4. There are plausible arguments, that the fragment of the Brera-Brambilla deck with only 2 remaining trumps (Emperor and Wheel of Fortune) is earlier than 1442, but there is also the possibility, that this deck is "only" an Imperatori deck. The Brera-Brambilla deck was made with very high probability as the Michelino deck for the Duke of Milano, Filippo Visconti.
5. There are plausible arguments, that the fragments of the Cary-Yale deck with 11 remaining trumps were produced before February 1442 again for the Duke of Milano, Filippo Visconti. 3 dates of production are in the discussion, from which possibility c. is considered to be only a minor, less probable, variant:
a. 1428, at the 2nd marriage of Filippo Visconti with a princess of Savoyen.
b. Oktober 1441, at the marriage between Bianca Maria Visconti and Francesco Sforza.
c. 1468, at the marriage of Galeazzo Maria Sforza with another princess of Savoyen.
6. There is a note in the Ferrarese account books, that Sagramoro received some money for painting "14 figures" for Bianca Maria Visconti (1st of January 1441), who spend at this time a sort of "education holidays" in Ferrara for half a year. Accompanying to this note playing cards are not directly mentioned, but the term "figures" (fegure) appears also in the note of 10th of February in 1442 (then clearly in relation to the card deck "Trionfi") and it is noted, that these figures are made for "enjoyment in the evening"- which might be an indication of playing cards.
1. The 14 trump cards painted by Bonifacio Bembo probably under the influence of Bianca Maria Visconti short after 1450 indicate, that at this time Trionfi decks had a 5x14-structure.
2. Another note from Ferrara from 1457 also knows only 14 trumps and totally 70 (not 78) cards in a Trionfi deck.
The entry about "14 figures for Bianca Maria" in the Ferrarese account books from 1st of January in 1441 has a good chance to be the earliest reference to Trionfi decks in the original 5x14-form. The name "Trionfi" and its use for a card deck, however, developed probably later in the course of the following year.
Gherardo Ortalli: The Prince and the Playing Cards, which is based upon the researches of Adriano Franceschini about the d'Este account books.
The importance of the visit of Bianca Maria Visconti and the entry of 1st of January 1441 in the account books was detected by Ross Gregory Caldwell by the study of the Franceschini text. Its possible relation to the history of playing cards could only be discovered by the hypothesis, that the origin of the Tarotcards with the structure 4x14 + 22 took its course of development from a deck with a 5x14-structure (including 14 special cards used as "trumps" or Trionfi).
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