Of those old Italian engravings there are two series known to amateurs, agreeing in the subjects, but differing in their style of execution; though it is evident that the one has been copied from the other. [231] In one of them, which is considered by Bartsch to be the earliest, the date 1485 is inscribed on a tablet in the hands of the figure named Arithmeticha XXV. [232] In the other series, which is by much the best engraved, and is certainly the earliest, there is no date; and the figure which there represents Arithmetic, appears to be counting money. This series Mons. Duchesne thinks was executed about 1470; and some writers have supposed that the subjects were engraved by Tomaso Finiguerra. Zani, however, is inclined to believe that they were engraved at Padua; while Otley ascribes them to a Florentine artist. Seeing, however, that the names are in the Venetian dialect, and that authorities on the subject of old Italian engraving disagree with respect to them, I am inclined to suppose, without any regard to their style of execution, that they were either engraved by a Venetian artist, or for the Venetian market. It has also been supposed, but erroneously, that they were designed by Andrea Mantegna, to whom a number of other things of a similar kind have, with equal probability, been ascribed; and amongst the dealers in old engravings, at Paris, they are commonly known as Cartes de Baldini. Both the originals and the copies are of great rarity; and though several single subjects are to be found in the possession of amateurs, it is questionable if there be more than four collections in Europe, whether private or national, that have either the one series or the other complete. In the British Museum there is a complete series of the originals, and also forty-five of the copies; the five pieces wanting in the latter are: Misero I, Fameio II, Imperador VIIII, Primo Mobile XXXXVIIII, and Prima Causa XXXXX. There is also a complete series of the originals, in the 'Bibliothèque du Roi;' and copies of them are given in the 'Jeux de Cartes Tarots et de Cartes Numérales,' published by the Society of Bibliophiles Français. Fac-similes of two,—Papa X and Rhetorica XXIII,—are also given by Singer in his 'Researches into the History of Playing Cards.' From their size—about nine inches and three quarters high, by about four inches wide,—as well as from other circumstances, Mr. Singer considers that they were not intended for any game analogous to that of cards, properly so called. Mons. Leber considers them to have been merely "Cartes de Fantaisie," and observes that subjects so delicately engraved on copper, when the invention of the art was still recent, could scarcely have been intended to receive the colouring required for the completion of a pack of cards. [233] It, however, may be observed that colour is not essential to a pack of playing cards; and that several packs of cards of four suits, evidently intended for play, without being coloured, were delicately engraved on copper, before the end of the fifteenth century.
Even Mons. Duchesne, while contending that those fifty old engravings were really Tarocchi cards, admits that they bear no relation to any games played with numeral cards, which, according to the number of players, and the regulations of each game, always consist of a number which is divisible by four; for instance, 20 for Bouillotte; 28 for Brelan; 32 for Piquet, and several other games; 36 for Trappola; 40 for Ombre; 48 for Reversis; 52 for Lansquenet, and several other games; 96 for Comet; 104 for Lottery; 312 for Trente-et-un; and 78 for Tarots. "The ancient Tarocchi cards," he says, "have not then been intended for games of calculation [jeux mathématiques], but solely for an instructive game. In this game, consisting of five classes, we find the seven planets, representing the celestial system; the seven virtues which constitute the basis of all morality; the sciences, which man alone is capable of acquiring, and the knowledge of which raises him above all other animals; the Muses, whose cultivation yields so many charms to life; finally, several of the conditions of life in which man may be placed, from misery, the most painful of all, to that of the most elevated, the Sovereign Pontificate." [234] A complete series of those old engravings consists of fifty pieces, as has been previously observed, named and numbered as follows:
[Class E.—The Conditions of Life.]
| E | Misero I | 1 |
| E | Fameio II | 2 |
| E | Artixan III | 3 |
| E | Merchadante IIII | 4 |
| E | Zintilomo V | 5 |
| E | Chavalier VI | 6 |
| E | Doxe VII | 7 |
| E | Re VIII | 8 |
| E | Imperator VIIII | 9 |
| E | Papa X | 10 |
[Class D.—The Muses.]
| D | Caliope XI | 11 |
| D | Urania XII | 12 |
| D | Terpsicore XIII | 13 |
| D | Erato XIIII | 14 |
| D | Polimnia XV | 15 |
| D | Talia XVI | 16 |
| D | Melpomene XVII | 17 |
| D | Euterpe XVIII | 18 |
| D | Clio XVIIII | 19 |
| D | Apollo XX | 20 |
[Class C.—The Sciences.]
| C | Grammatica XXI | 21 |
| C | Loica XXII | 22 |
| C | Rhetorica XXIII | 23 |
| C | Geometria XXIIII | 24 |
| C | Arithmeticha XXV | 25 |
| C | Musicha XXVI | 26 |
| C | Poesia XXVII | 27 |
| C | Philosofia XXVIII | 28 |
| C | Astrologia XXXVIIII [235] | 39 |
| C | Theologia XXX | 30 |
[Class B.—The Virtues.]