The Tarocco Bolognese is a

tarot The tarot (, first known as '' trionfi'' and later as ''tarocchi'' or ''tarocks'') is a pack of playing cards, used from at least the mid-15th century in various parts of Europe to play card games such as Tarocchini. From their Italian roots, ...

deck found in

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nat ...

and is used to play

tarocchini Tarocchini (plural for ''tarocchino'') are point trick-taking tarot card games popular in Bologna, capital city of the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy and has been confined mostly to this area. They are the diminutive form of ''tarocchi'' (plural f ...

. It is a 62 card Italian suited deck which influenced the development of the

Tarocco Siciliano The Tarocco Siciliano is a tarot deck found in Sicily and is used to play Sicilian tarocchi. It is one of the three traditional Latin-suited tarot decks still used for games in Italy, the others being the more prevalent Tarocco Piemontese and the ...

and the obsolete

Minchiate Minchiate is an early 16th-century card game, originating in Florence, Italy. It is no longer widely played. ''Minchiate'' can also refer to the special deck of 97 playing cards used in the game. The deck is closely related to the tarot cards, but ...

deck. The earliest mention of tarocchi in connection to Bologna was in 1442 when a Bolognese merchant sold two decks of trionfi in the city of

Ferrara Ferrara (, ; egl, Fràra ) is a city and ''comune'' in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, capital of the Province of Ferrara. it had 132,009 inhabitants. It is situated northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream ...

. The earliest known mention of trionfi in Bologna itself dates to 1459. Local tradition dating from at least the 17th century, ascribes the invention of tarot to Prince Francesco Antelminelli Castracani Fibbia (1360-1419), great-grandson of

Castruccio Castracani Castruccio Castracani degli Antelminelli (; 1281 – 3 September 1328) was an Italian ''condottiero'' and duke of Lucca. Biography Castruccio was born in Lucca, a member of the noble family of Antelminelli, of the Ghibelline party. In 1300 he w ...

. This is one of the oldest decks in continual use, dating back to at least the 15th century. The oldest surviving uncut sheets, dating from the late 15th or early 16th century, are held in the Rothschild Collection in the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

and in the

École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts The Beaux-Arts de Paris is a French ''grande école'' whose primary mission is to provide high-level arts education and training. This is classical and historical School of Fine Arts in France. The art school, which is part of the Paris Science ...

. It is an expansion of the pre-existing Bolognese deck by adding

queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...

, the Fool, and an extra suit of 21

trump Trump most commonly refers to: * Donald Trump (born 1946), 45th president of the United States (2017–2021) * Trump (card games), any playing card given an ad-hoc high rank Trump may also refer to: Businesses and organizations * Donald J. T ...

s. The regular and tarot decks began to diverge during the 16th century. The Tarocco set removed ranks 2 to 5 bringing down the number of cards from 78 to the present 62 perhaps to simplify the game. The regular set removed ranks 8, 9, and 10 to create the 40-card pack as they are not needed to play Primiera. All ranks that they share in common appear very similar but are not identical. The tarocco deck then underwent a few more modifications. The imperial and papal trumps, having been of equal rank, were converted to four moors, two of which are identical, in 1725. Later in that century the

face cards In a deck of playing cards, the term face card (US) or court card (British and US), and sometimes Royalty, is generally used to describe a card that depicts a person as opposed to the pip cards. They are also known as picture cards, or until the e ...

and trumps became reversible and most trumps added Arabic numerals. None of the cards are labelled and only trumps 5 to 16 are numbered. Historically, this deck and its games have been confined to the city of Bologna yet there are decks in France and Belgium that show traces of designs borrowed from the Tarocco Bolognese. There are also tarot games played in present-day Piedmont that show the influence of tarocchini. In most games played with the

Tarocco Piemontese The Tarocco Piemontese (''Tarot of Piedmont'') is a type of tarot deck of Italian origin. It is the most common tarot playing set in northern Italy, much more common than the Tarocco Bolognese. The most popular Piedmontese tarot games are Scarto ...

, players treat trump 20 higher than 21 reflecting that the Angel outranks

the World In its most general sense, the term "world" refers to the totality of entities, to the whole of reality or to everything that is. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the worl ...

in Bolognese games. There are also regional games in Piedmont where pip cards are removed and the imperial and papal trumps are treated equally. The only surviving record of a tarot game being played in Ferrara showed it to be a three-player tarocchini game. The Tarocco Bolognese is also the earliest tarot deck to be used in

cartomancy Cartomancy is fortune-telling or divination using a deck of cards. Forms of cartomancy appeared soon after playing cards were first introduced into Europe in the 14th century. Huson, Paul (2004). ''Mystical Origins of the Tarot: From Ancient R ...

, predating de Gébelin and

Etteilla "Etteilla", the pseudonym of Jean-Baptiste Alliette (1 March 1738 – 12 December 1791), was the French occultist and tarot-researcher, who was the first to develop an interpretation concept for the tarot cards and made a significant contribution ...

by at least thirty years. Due to similarities in Bolognese cartomancy and Etteilla's system, it is possible the latter learned it from some Italian source (he claimed to have been taught by a Piedmontese man named Alexis). Unlike cartomantic traditions elsewhere, Bolognese practitioners have always used the same deck as local players instead of inventing dedicated decks and do not make a pretense of a mystical origin of their pack. The hierarchy of cards in the long suits (swords and batons) goes from King (highest), Queen, Knight, Knave, 10 to 6, and Ace (lowest). For the round suits of cups and coins it is King (highest), Queen, Knight, Knave, Ace, and 6 to 10 (lowest).McLeod, John
Rules for Ottocento
at

pagat.com Pagat.com is a website containing rules to hundreds of card games from all over the world. Maintained by John McLeod, it contains information for traditional, commercial, and newly invented card games from all over the world. It has been described ...

. Retrieved 17 January 2016. Prince-castracani-fibbia

The trump cards are as follows:

References

External links

Accademia del Tarocchino Bolognese
Organizer of official tarocchini tournaments
17th century cards
at the

Bibliothèque nationale de France The Bibliothèque nationale de France (, 'National Library of France'; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites known respectively as ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository ...

{{Tarot and Tarock card games Tarot playing card decks