Marseille Tarots
by various woodblock artists/printers
 
The Tarots of Marseille is more of a "style" of tarot deck than a specific deck, although more than half a dozen decks bear the name directly and a good couple hundred decks have been produced under various titles that are technically Marseille Tarots.  This deck style is arguably the oldest type of tarot deck still in existence to this day.  While the oldest extant cards are the Visconti cards, it is believed by some (including yours truly) that it is likely that the Visconti cards were better protected and cared for because of the expense of their production, and that the cheap cards produced by woodblock stamping techniques for common use would possibly have been around longer and just not have been preserved.
 
The major differences in the various Marseille tarot decks that are in publication today are that they are drawn from different woodblock originals.  In the days before the modern printing press was invented, each town would have its own printer, or possibly more than one, who also acted as the cardmakers.  Each deck was made by hand from that printer's carved wood block designs.  So everyone in a given town would have the same designs, but you'd go to the next town and that town would have a slightly different version, as the printer in that town rendered his own woodblock version of the same designs.  Some printers achieved quite a good amount of recognition for their card designs, and these have been continued and preserved to this day.
 
This page links to all the various Marseille Tarot decks that are reviewed on this website.  All of these are modern reproductions of ancient designs, and not the actual woodcuts created several hundred years ago.  I hope to eventually have reviews of the older designs themselves but they are, understandably, harder to come by. For more information on historical tarot, please see The Hermitage, an excellent discourse on tarot history by Tom Tadfor Little.
 
Tarot Arista
 
Camoin Tarot of Marseilles
 
Carta Mundi (US Games) Tarot of Marseilles
 
Tarot Classic (US Games)
 
Fournier Le Tarot de Marseille
 
Grimaud Tarot of Marseille
 
Spanish Tarot (US Games)
 
All true Marseille tarots are characterized by the lack of scenes on any of the numbered cards.  Generally the scenes are limited to showing main characters in the court and Major Arcana cards.  There is very little archetypal illustration here; most people who work with the Marseille type of tarots work mainly by intuition and memorization, since there are no real pictures of the meanings of the cards depicted in the decks.  It is my opinion (take it or leave it) that the readings given with the Marseille type tarots are more predictive and fortunetelling-oriented rather than psychologically analytical.  However, this is based on my own experience and many readers are able to access tremendous amounts of information with these cards, so.....
 
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