AUTHORITATIVE COLLECTION ONTOLOGY
The Deck Genome
Every historically significant deck modeled as a living structural entity. Trace creator lineages, printing technologies, iconographic breakthroughs, and direct museum holdings across 500 years of cartomancy history.
Select Deck Genome:
DECK GENOME ACCESSIONHISTORICAL FACT
Visconti-Sforza Trionfi (Colleoni-Baglioni Suite)
c. 1450–1455Milan & Cremona, Duchy of Milan, Northern Italy
Creators & Attributions:
Bonifacio Bemboartist
Filippo Maria Viscontipatron
Francesco Sforzapatron
Card Count:78 (22 Trumps + 56 Pips)
Printing Technology:Hand-painted luxury court miniature (pre-typographic / pre-woodcut)
Artistic Medium:Tempera and gold leaf punchwork on layered pasteboard with gesso ground
Public Domain Status:public domain worldwide
CURATORIAL THESIS & HISTORICAL CONTEXT
“Created not for occult prognostication, but as an aristocratic humanist parlor game and dynastic didactic device celebrating courtly alliances, Neoplatonic virtues, and mortal impermanence.”
MAJOR ICONOGRAPHIC INNOVATIONS
- ✦Earliest surviving near-complete archetype sequence of the 22 Trionfi
- ✦Female Pope (La Papessa) drawn in monastic habit reflecting Sister Manfreda of the Guglielmite heresy
- ✦The Hanged Man (Il Traditore / The Traitor) hung by one ankle according to Italian civic shame painting (pittura infamante)
COLOR PALETTE & CHROMATIC SYNTAX
Imperial ultramarine lapis lazuli, burnished gold leaf, vermilion, malachite green
Influences & Lineage:
- ↳International Gothic style (Pisanello, Gentile da Fabriano)
- ↳Petrarch's allegorical poem 'I Trionfi' (Triumphs of Love, Chastity, Death, Fame, Time, Eternity)
- ↳Heraldic emblems of the Visconti (biscione viper) and Sforza (quince, lion) dynasties
Later Decks Influenced:
- ➔Charles VI Gringonneur Tarot
- ➔Cary-Yale Visconti
- ➔Tarot de Marseille