This deck isn't based on an existing deck, rather it uses elements from a 14th Century document.  It's designed to be a mini-deck right now but I'm looking at making it a poker deck.  The design for the backs of the cards is taken straight from the document.


The border on the faces of the cards is also taken straight from the manuscript.  I'm changing the red interior border to match the red on the backs of the cards.


I've also, since I made these test images, darkened the 'parchment' background on the faces to more closely reflect the current state of the document.  It also makes the colors pop a little better.  The early decks didn't have queens, particularly the German and Swiss decks, but since Printer's Studio mini-decks have so many extra cards in the standard order I decided to put in four courts: King, Queen, Knight (mounted on a horse), and Knave/Page (man on foot).  The players can customize their deck and decide which cards to leave out (German/Swiss decks didn't have aces either, just for example).


I also had a wide variety of possible suits to choose from.  Since print-on-demand offers that sort of flexibility I'm making six: cups, roses, leaves, swords, hawks, and crowns.  All can be documented in the 15th Century in Germany and Switzerland.  I'll let the customer choose which four suits he wants his deck to contain.

I have PrinterStudio make the cards.  I've worked with them and Arts Cow in the past and have always been happy with PrinterStudio.  I plan to give MPC.com a try in the near future and see if the price difference is reflected in a superior card.  Following the PrinterStudio templates gives consistent results.  I will note that PrinterStudio (and Arts Cow) cards tend to have a duller, more matte finish to them.  This is a drawback when producing cards for the modern card collectors market, but it's actually a bonus where producing cards for historical card collectors is concerned.  One of the mini-decks had a smear where the ink hadn't dried before going over a roller.  This was a minor issue for the deck concerned and, of course, you get what you pay for.  So far as handling goes, I'm not a magician or cardist (I'm an amateur historian) so I don't feel qualified to give an opinion on that.  They shuffle well enough to be played with and they don't stick together when I deal them and that's about as far as I'm prepared to go.

I got these test decks from the printer.  The card backs (with a green standard poker deck for comparison)


The card fronts.


From left to right I have:
-A simplified version of the Topkapi/Mamluk cards from the 12th-15th Centuries.  I went with a decorated back rather than leaving it blank as the original cards were.  Why?  Blank was too boring.  These came out very nicely and I'm very happy with these.
-The next big deck and the two mini-decks in front of it are reproductions of the Moorish/Barcelona/Wintle deck from the 15th Century.  You're looking at the ace of coins.  The tarot size deck I'm happy with.  The mini-decks not so much.  There's just too much white-space.  I love the colors on the one mini-deck though.  I tried different variations on the backs on these cards and like both of the patterned backs.  I was right about the blank back being too boring.
-The last mini-deck is based on a Swiss deck from the 15th Century.  The mini-deck is the actual size the original cards were so that worked out well.  You're looking at the ace of acorns (Swiss suits varied and included: hawks, bells, crowns, flowers, shields, acorns and more) which a proper Swiss deck wouldn't have had but I added aces to this deck to increase the number of games that could be played.  The back is historically accurate, though not for the particular deck this design was based on.  Again, blank is boring.  I messed up the back by not extending the design far enough.  I'll fix that in future prints.  You can't see them in this picture but I messed up the courts.  They are far too sloppy so I'm going to have to re-do them.  Oh well.

Several months of work with more work to go.  At least I'm having fun.

And I found an e-bay sale, long since completed, which details the 1977 reprint of the cards.  Apparently Carta Mundi had left over supplies after the 1972 print run of the reproductions and rather than discarding them they used them up in a small print run of approximately 250 decks.  These are numbered 1-~250 with the prefix B.

I was also, courtesy of some of the images posted, able to confirm that Carta Mundi created a decorated back for the cards (which I feel is rather stylistically weak) and they printed the deck with the erroneous 'assistant' cards.

Yes, the cards were hand-painted, and metallic foil was used as well.  This is apparently the case for most/all playing cards pre-1360.  They were also huge, the original cards were almost 8in high.  Again this seems to be the case for early playing cards; we can see illustrations of early playing cards in Europe that are very large.  It's only after block-printing on paper becomes standard that we see cards shrinking to sizes we would consider normal.

My designs are an intermediate step.  I laid out the designs to make sure I had all my proportions correct and to see if the designs filled the space properly.  The next step is to refine these layouts a little and start adding color and detail.  I printed a copy of the layouts for myself because I liked the stark contrast of the black and white and the simplicity.

I've got a friend who travels in the area who has promised to visit the Topkapi and take whatever pictures he can when he next visits.  Other than that I'm relying on images other people have taken and there is a wide variety of color shades given the vagaries of light conditions.  It can also be difficult to determine if you're looking at an original card or a Carta Mundi reproduction.

My market is fairly tiny.  I'm mostly doing these for myself but I might be able to sell a few, reduced in size to fit on a tarot-size deck, to a couple of people.  Another friend, who lives in Egypt, says he'll sound out a few of his acquaintances to see if there's any interest in what is a uniquely Middle-Eastern design but neither of us thinks there will be.

I found a company in Japan that's selling the Aurelia Books/Cartamundi cards.  But at $170 a deck plus shipping, that's a little rich for my blood.  So I've been working on making my own.  It's been a process and it's far from complete.  I have most of the detail elements ready to go and was working on the layouts. I liked the layouts so much that I went ahead and printed a deck for my own use.