Wicce's Tarot Collection

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Ancient Tarots of Marseilles
(Antichi Tarocchi Marsigliesi)
by Nicholas Conver

Another of the fine historical reproductions produced by LoScarabeo, this deck is a modern copy of the original woodblock deck created by Nicholas Conver in Marseilles, France, circa 1760. Incidentally, for those who are interested, this is a reproduction of the original deck from which the Camoin Tarot de Marseille is offered today. Nicholas Conver's legacy to the House of Camoin, then, is responsible for a lot of tarot tradition and history. It makes for extremely interesting comparison to see how the original deck looked (with this deck) and then look at how the cleaned up restoration comes out (with the Camoin).

In comparison to modern decks, the Ancient Tarots of Marseilles have an extremely primitive and crude style of artwork and look very strange indeed. One must bear in mind that these are modern reproductions of an original which is several hundred years old. The printing press had been *invented* by this time but was by no means in widespread use in Western Europe at the time this deck was created; therefore, the rough quality of the artwork is due to the process used, which was carved woodblock printing. A printer could make up several copies of a deck at once using this method, but none would be exactly identical, and the color process as it was applied was very sloppy.

The Major Arcana cards feature the series of titles which we have come to know as "traditional" and in fact forms the basis by which all other decks are compared. Justice is 8 and Strength 11. Since Roman numerals are used to number the Major cards, the Fool is unnumbered; there is no Roman numeral concept of zero. Furthermore, the old style Roman numerals are used, with IIII for the number four, instead of the subtractive IV. The border areas around the images on these cards are often incomplete and tight with faded and distressed areas. If it's an authentically old look you want, this deck has it and more!

The Minor Arcana cards feature the now traditional numbered pip cards and highly ornamental aces, with court cards that feature full-length figures crammed into the card area. I always laugh at the lack of proportion used to make the knight on horseback fit into the same size image area that the King on his throne fits into; it always makes the Knights look like they are riding circus ponies or something. Aside from the fact that these are really old looking (complete with faded background color like parchment) the numbered cards in this deck are even more boring looking than usual. Suits are Cups, Batons, Coins and Swords, and the court titles are King, Queen, Cavalier (Knight) and Valet (Page).

The cards themselves are slightly smaller than standard but are printed on a thin flexible cardstock and don't make you feel like you are handling a valuable antique that must be treated delicately. You can shuffle this deck with ease and not feel like you will damage it. The edges and corners are cut smoothly and rounded. These cards have a blandish olive and light sage green patterned back design which is such a small tight pattern it will make your eyes cross looking at it. It is definitely reversible. If you stare at it long enough it becomes a solid color *grin*. There is no little white booklet but rather the series of instructional cards at the end of the deck which are printed in five languages and present the "Simplified Cartomancy Method" of reading the cards. Somehow this is less of a disappointment with a deck that obviously works better with fortunetelling type instructions than a more modern deck would.

I highly recommend this deck for tarot historians, and if you are going to get the Camoin Tarot de Marseille then this is a definite must just for the fact that this one is the granddaddy of the other. Many students of esoteric occultism are encouraged to use Marseilles-type decks; this would be as good as any other, I suppose, in that pursuit. I wouldn't necessarily recommend this for a beginner, unless they were getting it for instructional comparison with another deck. There is a shortage of material for learning tarot with a Marseilles deck, and I can' t think of a much faster way to lose interest than to try and learn something without having any idea whether you're doing it right or not.

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Ancient Tarots of Marseilles by Nicholas Conver, 1760
published by LoScarabeo, Torino, Italy, in 1995