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Ideas of an Egyptian. Cremona 1795

 This note first appeared at http://naibi.net/A/CREM1795.pdf as "Idee di un egiziano. Cremona  - 1795," dated 05-07-2023 (July 5, 2023). My translation follows (corrected from Google Translate), after which I have some additional comments.

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Ideas of an Egyptian. Cremona 1795

Franco Pratesi

1. Introduction

I have recently been conducting studies of pamphlets and almanacs printed at the end of the eighteenth century in the Milanese milieu. One in particular concerns an almanac with important descriptions of the game of tarocco, of interest to me.[1] In that case I had the opportunity to express various comments on that type of publications and their fate for a short-lived and unlikely presence currently in the various libraries; I write among other things that "The very idea of the almanac-calendar is the enemy of preservation!"

In the case under consideration here it is still about tarot, but although the title speaks of a game of tarot, the subject is rather that of the tarot cards used in the game - there is no information on the actual playing practice useful here. If there was a need for proof of the unfavorable fate of these almanacs, this could be cited; in fact, it would appear that in the whole world today only two copies can be found (of which only one for the introductory part), and both in the State Library of the same city of Cremona, where they were produced not by any entrepreneur but by the "printer of the diocese and the city. 

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This is how our Almanac is filed in the catalog:

Ideas of an Egyptian on the game of tarot almanac for the leap year 1796

Cremona : for Giuseppe Feraboli print. of the diocese and the city

Names : Bianchi, Isidoro <1731-1808> (Author). Feraboli, Giuseppe (Publisher)

Physical description [24] c.; 24° long

Notes: The introductory text, from c. [pi]2 to c. [pi]5, is by Isidoro Bianchi

 

2. The letter

I asked the Library for information on the initial part of my interest and they kindly sent me a complete scan, which I transcribe below, inserting capital letters as superscript in the few cases where I intend to add a comment.

SECOND (A) LETTER

My voyage in Europe has filled me with yet another astonishment, which is no less than the one I wrote you about last year. That famous book of ours, which contains the purest doctrine of our Elders, is there in everyone's hands. But no one knows that this is a very rare Egyptian codex; no one tries to penetrate the meaning of the allegorical figures that it depicts. Among us, too, such a book is needed for our entertainment (B); but each of us knows well that our ancient Egyptians turned even the most useful knowledge into a game. The names preserved in this game are all Oriental, such as Taro, Mad, and Pagad. The word Tarrocco is composed of the following Egyptian terms, namely Tar, which means Road, [and] Ro, Ros, or Rog, which means royal, i.e. the royal road of life. In fact, our compatriots find in this game everything that can serve them as instruction throughout their lives. The name of the Madman [Pazzo] comes from the Eastern word Mat, which means drowsy [assopito] ; and the word Pagad, which the Italians call Bagatto, in the East Pa means Head, or Lord, and Gad, Fortune. In fact, the Bagatto is painted at a table like a Player of Bussolotti, which is meant to indicate that the entire life of man is nothing but a dream and a game. The figures that make up that book reach the number of 21, without the Madman, who has no number, thus wanting to show that we all have some branch of the madman. The figure of the Madman, who walks with such speed to escape a tiger which is pursuing him, is as described by Horace. But before him it was well known to the Egyptians, from whom he must have taken it. The first figure which distinguished with numbers, is the Bagatto. Numbers 2 and 3 represent two Women, and numbers 4 and 5 their Husbands. Those are among Us the leaders of Society. No. 4 represents the King, and no. 3 the Queen. Both are seated on a throne with the symbol of the eagle depicted on a shield. Both carry a scepter in their hand, on the end of which a Tau is seen. The King is seen in profile, and the Queen in front. Her throne is higher, and the King with his legs crossed sits on a chest shaped like a gondola. No. 5 represents the high priest, and no. 2 his wife the High Priestess. Everyone knows that in Egypt the Ministers of the cult are married. The dress of the High Priestess is all Egyptian, and she wears a double crown with two horns, as Isis wore; and the scepter with a triple cross, which is held in the right hand of the high priest, is also a wholly Egyptian monument, which can be seen expressed in a marble of the goddess just mentioned [the so-called Isiac Tablet – trans.]. It is carried around among us when we celebrate the feast of having found Osiris, i.e. the Sun, which, having been lost in Wintertime, appeared in Spring brighter than before. Osiris is therefore found in no. 7 in the form of a triumphant King seated on a chariot drawn by two white steeds. In number 6 are seen the figures of a Youth and a Girl, who are united in marriage with a love above them. A similar idea to indicate conjugal faith is found expressed in a marble reported by Boissard in his Antiquities Tom. 3. Plate 26. Numbers 8, 9, 12, 13 refer to four virtues that are too necessary for Man. No. 11 represents Strength. That is a Woman who, having become mistress of a Lion, tears it to pieces, as she might do with the smallest Dog.  In No. 13 is expressed Temperance, who pours hot water from one vase into another to thus temper its heat. In no. 8 Justice is seen, who is placed on her

 

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throne holding a sword in one hand and scales in the other. In no. 12 we have Prudence, a virtue too necessary in human life. Such a virtue could not be expressed better than by keeping our eye on a young man who, placing one foot on the ground, keeps the other suspended, in order to carefully examine where to place it safely. However, the foolish Card makers, not understanding the beauty of the allegory expressed in this figure, had the temerity to alter it by painting a man hanged by his feet. No. 9 represents a venerable old man who, with a lantern in his left hand, seeks virtue and justice. In view of this ancient painting, many writers then imagined the story of Diogenes. In numbers 19, 18, 17 we have depicted the Sun, the Moon, Sirius, or rather the Canicole [Dog-star—trans.] with various emblems all conforming to the doctrine of the Egyptians. The sun distills from its rays tears of gold and pearls, as does the moon to indicate that it also contributes to the productions of the earth. Pausanias in the description of Phocis assures us that the tears of Isis, according to the Egyptians, were stars, which swelled the waters of the Nile every year, and which thus made the countryside of Egypt fertile. At the foot of the figure representing the Moon we see a Crayfish, or a Cancer [Cancro], and this either to symbolize the retrograde motion of the Moon itself, or to indicate that since the Sun and the Moon arise from Cancer, the floods caused by their tears occur. Beyond the Crayfish two towers can be observed, which express the two famous pillars of Hercules, and in the middle of the same, two dogs are seen, which seem to bark at the moon. These ideas are perfectly Egyptian. Our Ancients, always fond of allegory, compared the two Tropics to two Palaces, each of which was watched over by a Dog, who, like faithful Gatekeepers, held the two Luminaries in the middle of the sky without allowing them to move towards one or the other Pole. The  Canicule [Dogstar] is also an allegorical figure, and absolutely Egyptian, called the Star, which rises when the Sun rises from the sign of Cancer; and the seven stars which surround her are the planets, among which she triumphs as a queen. The woman who spills two rivers from two vases, in whom Isis must be recognized, and the other objects that can be seen around her, are all Egyptian emblems. It is no wonder that in no. 13 we see Death. This is a war game. Number 13 represents an Egyptian personage, namely Typhon, brother of Osiris and Isis; and number 16 is a lesson against greed. The tower full of gold falls to ruin, and its worshipers are overthrown. No. 10 is a satire against Fortune. It is badly expressed in the no. 20 the Final Judgment. Rather, this figure represents the creation that took place at the beginning of Time. The time of facts, and not the world, is expressed in no. 21. All the other cards are divided into four suits, which signify the four estates into which the Egyptians were divided. A certain (C) Court de Gebelin was the only one in Europe who understood the allegory of this game.

I didn't keep the dots after the numbers, as was the custom at the time, but I didn't introduce any other writing update changes.

A. There is initially talk of a Second Letter, because in the previous year's almanac the author had initially inserted a similar letter, in which instead of an Egyptian there appeared an Oriental and instead of the game of tarot that of pharaoh.

B. In these terms, it would seem to mean that no one has raised the problem of the possible meaning of the tarot before; confirmed by the following “only in Europe”.

C. “A certain Court de Gebelin” sounds strange to us, because today it would have been more familiar if we had read about a certain Isidoro Bianchi who reproposed the thought of the well-known Court de Gébelin.

3. The author

It is very rare that the author of writings present in almanacs of this type is known. In this case there is a convergence of opinions that assures us of the authorship of the text, attributed to Isidoro Bianchi. On this Camaldolese friar who traveled a lot and taught and wrote a lot, we find more information than strictly necessary in the Biographical Dictionary of Italians.[2] Beyond

 

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remembering the dates of his birth and death, 1731-1808 in Cremona, I will focus only on a couple of points. The first concerns his long final stay in Cremona with a close relationship with the publisher Manini. In Cremona he bonded closely with the publisher Lorenzo Manini, collaborating on the patriotic Novellista and on the almanac he published (with writings on the freedom of the grain trade, on the "influence of commerce on talents", on "common sense," “on the game of the pharaoh,” and “of the tarot”). In association with Gian Rinaldo Carli, he procured, from the same publisher, a re-edition of the American Letters, preceded by a dedication to B. Franklin (1781) and followed by an apology of this work against Clavigero's attacks (preface in the edition of the Works of G. R. Carli, XI, Milan 1785). He also gave an edition of Opuscoli eruditi by G. Allegranza (1781). It can be noted that what refers to the tarot does not match the name of the publisher and the date with what can be verified in the Almanac in question; it may be that earlier editions existed, even closer to the French original.

The second point of notable interest is his connection with Freemasonry, although not precisely defined. B. could already be in contact with Freemasonry since the time of his travel and stay in southern Italy and in Denmark, even if we do not have probative documentation in this regard. The importance of the Cremonese lodge and the intense Masonic activity of Manini could make these links closer. He then collected a vast material for a history of the Eleusinian mysteries and of the ancient arcanum and in 1786 he published a pamphlet, with the false indication of Ravenna, with Pietro Martire Neri, but printed in Cremona, Dell Istituto dei Veri Libero Muratori. He continued to be interested in Masonic life even later.

It is not strange that an ancient Bolognese cartomancy-type writing was also found together with Masonic documents.[3]

4. Checks on the reputation and originality of the Almanac

A double comparison was necessary: on the one hand it was necessary to verify whether there were previous studies on this specific almanac; on the other hand, what in the text contained could be considered an original and personal contribution by Bianchi. Let us first look at the notoriety of the Almanac; it would be useless to report it here if it were already known by all interested parties. I have been informed by the Library that studies in this regard are not known, but articles in local periodicals and even in general works cannot be excluded. As it happens, the bibliography on tarot cards is vast, and it is precisely so because of the many fantasies of the genre that begin here. Since tarot has always interested me as a card game, I decided to limit the necessary check to a few but good sources. So I checked the existence of Isidoro Bianchi's text in the bibliographies of the first three volumes of Stuart Kaplan's Encyclopedia,[4] and I couldn't find it. Then I looked in vain for traces of it in a rigorous book by authors worthy of the maximum respect.[5] Finally, I looked for Isidoro Bianchi in the Tarot History Forum.[6]  with the answer “0 matches” – something that happens very rarely in that kind of hodgepodge with an infinite number of discussions and information of all kinds. I finished here this type of checks. It may turn out that with this Almanac, it is as if I have rediscovered the wheel, but I cannot read hundreds of books and articles of which I hardly appreciate anything. It remains to be seen how original Isidoro Bianchi's "theory" is. In this case I find something vague already in the depths of my memory, but pages 57-64 of the book mentioned[4] were enough to

 

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confirm its full source in Court de Gébelin. Obviously, it would have been better if it had been an unknown original reconstruction, better if sufficiently credible, but the Letter itself referred to the Frenchman "only in Europe." However, in my opinion the Second Letter copied here retains some documentary value.

5. Concluding comments

First of all, the date of this Almanac is important, because Court de Gébelin had only published his pioneering text in 1781, a few years earlier. It is not easy to reconstruct exactly the passage from Paris to Cremona, but Bianchi had more than one possible channel at his disposal. He had traveled extensively and had also maintained close relationships with Parisian circles; he was connected to Freemasonry; he had access to bookstores and libraries internationally, and so on. The possible acceptance of these ideas is not clear, however, but the mere fact of using them as an introduction to the year's almanac makes it clear that a considerable appreciation from the public was being counted on. It remains uncertain how much tarot players were looking for explanations of this kind; if it really involved innovative interpretations, the easiest situation to imagine is that scholars and neophytes of esoteric cultures were decidedly more interested than the "real" tarot players. But this too is an important step: until then tarot cards only attracted the interest of those who used them to play with, but from then on anyone, even those who did not play with them, could find great, let's say philosophical, interest in them.

In the moment when the ideas of an Egyptian on the tarot somehow arrived in Cremona, a notable importance of our Almanac derives precisely from its nature, being addressed to the entire citizenry as a booklet for useful daily consultation. What better advertising initiative could you imagine, capable of immediately spreading this new "philosophy" throughout an entire city?

Florence, 05.07.2023

 

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[1] “Per chi tarocca ‒ Milano 1793” (For those who tarocca -Milan 1793). To be inserted on www.naibi.net.

[2] https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/isidoro-bianchi_(Dizionario-Biografico)

[3] F. Pratesi, L’As de Trèfle, N. 37 (1989) 10-11. http://www.naibi.net/A/22-BODIVADT-Z.pdf.

[4] Stuart R. Kaplan, The Encyclopedia of Tarot. Vol. I-III U.S. Games Systems, Stamford, CT 1979-1990.

[5] R. Decker, Th. Depaulis e M. Dummett, A Wicked Pack of Cards. Duckworth, London 2002

[6] https://forum.tarothistory.com/search.php?keywords=Isidoro+Bianchi&sid=8fd486a031c562a5c5bcf804f0b0d9f1