This deck is based on the Stukeley decks that were produced in the 15th and 16th Centuries and copied by artists in the 17th and 18th Centuries.  This deck is based on two decks held by the British Museum with the color scheme being based on the later, 17th Century deck.  Because the images are in the public domain I have made the greatest possible use of the original images wherever possible.  Some cards were missing from the deck and had to be created from scratch or filled in to various degrees.

In monkeying with the contrast on the images I found what I believe to be the original green color used in the decks.  Without the contrast change the green simply looks like blue.  This is probably due to the way the green was produced using period pigments and the effects of time.  The cards have plain backs.

Ulrike Worner refers to this as 'the censored deck'.  Apparently because of a belief that the missing unters and obers were cut out to censor them.

In 1937 W. Schreiber published a catalog of 14th and 15th Century playing cards.  The book was republished in 1968.  Among the cards featured was a deck from around 1470.  This deck was in the collection of Mr. Alvin W. Krech and consisted of a single sheet that contained the entire deck.  The deck is in the suits of hearts, leaves, bells, and acorns.  These are standard suits for central Europe.  The courts are unusual in that there are four court cards: a mounted king (male), a seated queen (female), and an ober (over) and unter (under) of each suit.  Normally there would be three court cards and they are predominantly male.  They are also, typically clothed.  Nudity is not unknown and has a long, long tradition in playing cards but the nudity of some of the figures is part of what sets this deck apart.  You can see the sheet below:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B15SAMYZtejMb1hpZVVvRUNJa2s/view?usp=sharing
Photo taken from Schweizer Spielkarten by Mr. Detlef Hoffman.

Shortly after the sheet was cataloged by Mr. Schreiber it was lost.  I've been trying to track it down without any success.  The odds are the sheet was sold to another private collector when the Krech family was apparently liquidating assets shortly before WWII.  You'll note the deck has no 10s or aces.  The lack of aces is pretty standard.  In German and Swiss decks of the time the two or the ten frequently took over the functions of the ace.  Tens, however, are pretty standard in German/Swiss decks and it's unusual to find a deck without them.  Was there a second sheet to this deck?  Probably not, but I can't rule out the possibility.  In any case it's just another of the little details that sets this deck apart.

In 2005, or thereabouts, Mr. Jorge Kelman of The Guild of Saynt Luke undertook to recreate this deck using the techniques of the period.  He handcarved wood plates, manufactured his own paper, made his own pigments, and produced a limited run of these cards.  Each deck was handmade from start to finish.  You can see one of his decks for sale here:

http://www.spielkartenonline-shop.de/en/non-standard-e-k/2106-guild-of-saynt-luke-wk-14553.html
European re-seller of collector playing cards.

In 2014 I was talking with Mr. Kelman, who was kind enough to address my fumbling efforts to re-create card decks, and he sent me an old proof sheet done with a different paper and different pigments.  It had the entire courts and most of the twos.  For me this was an amazing gift.  Printer's cast-offs are the primary source of information about early decks and having one of my own, even a modern one... That print is framed and on the wall of my bedroom.  I had the opportunity to buy one of Mr. Kelman's decks and, because of financial constraints, passed it up.  I'm currently trying to convince my wife I need to buy the one for sale above.

But because I take printer's cast-offs and attempt to re-create decks from them, I gave it a shot with the sheet that Mr. Kelman had sent me.  You can see my efforts below.  I'm not selling these decks, I'm just sharing this.  I made a copy on modern cardstock for myself and another to send to Mr. Kelman and that's all.


Image on Facebook of my copy of Mr. Kelman's work.

I used the arrangement provided by the original proof sheet.  I used Mr. Kelman's artwork in all cases but I know my arrangements of the pip cards differ from his.  I kept the original color of the paper he was experimenting with but, as you can readily see, his finished product was done on a paper which was much lighter in color.  Papers of the time were sized and smoothed with a mixture of starch and chalk and even a mass produced product like playing cards was probably printed on relatively smooth paper.

This is a really nice deck and I'm glad to have even a cheap reproduction of an excellent reproduction to play with.

You are correct.  There's some doubt as to the dating (as the website makes clear) but 15th Century does seem to be the strongest case.

I like this idea and look forward to seeing more.

Is this the same Topkapi deck you have been working on recently?

The black and white 'simplified' Topkapi deck listed for sale on our website was done when I was laying out the cards.  I had to make some decisions on card sizes for production purposes.  The resulting layout was so compelling that I made a couple of copies for myself and then made them available to anyone who wanted some.  Below you can see a very low resolution, partial card that's closer to the final product I'm aiming for.  This image was created when I was testing colors and floral arrangements.  These cards are slow work because of the the detail involved.  Each card is about 1GB in size before I combine all the elements and produce a final, more manageable image.  I've got eight cards completed so far.  The plan right now is to go with a plain back.

A couple of examples of people re-creating playing cards by hand can be found at LadyHeatherHall.com and Cervus Trading.  In the case of Cervus Trading, they will sell you a handmade deck.  Prices reflect the labor.

Cervus Trading 15th Century Provencal/Italian deck:


Cervus Trading handmade reproduction of the Cloisters' Deck:

The hand-painted ones were only for the wealthy. I was mainly referring to the mass production ones used by the general population. The cheapest and most common ones seem to stick to the RYB scheme. I know certain dyes were cheaper than others, English soldiers wore red uniforms for 250 years for this reason.

BTW, are you still working on your Topkapi or minchiate decks? I was planning on making a Mamluk poker deck until I saw your posts and saw you were further ahead. I couldn't find any pictures on the internet of what the backs of the Topkapi cards are but I assume they were plain backs. Otherwise, I can't explain the atrocious blue pattern Cartamundi selected for their 1970's reproductions.

Still working on both of those decks.  I've mostly been slowed by the fact that I've got all the artistic skill of a sloth.  I finally nailed down the designs on the Topkapi cards and I'm slowly finishing them up at the rate of about 1 per day.  Each image is approximately 1GB in size before I finally put everything together and send it to a PNG file of manageable size.  My hat is absolutely off to the professional card makers who made these decks by hand.

The backs of the Topkapi cards are indeed blank.  I agree the pattern Cartamundi went with for the backs on their reproduction of the deck is... awful.  You should go ahead and make a deck, btw.  Because I do print in demand I'm totally insulated from financial risk.  If no one buys any of my designs I still had fun making them and I've got the copies I want and no more.  Even if that wasn't the case I strongly encourage people to keep the old designs alive and enjoy the study of them and the process of re-creating them.

The Italian deck is unlikely to go to Tarot or Minchiate size because my attempts at producing the trump cards have been... horrendous.  Given that it would cost at least $600 to have a decent artist produce them for me I've pretty much given up on that idea.  I'm going to finish the court cards and just put this deck out there as an Italian deck.

There is an artist of my acquaintance who is currently working on a minchiate deck based on the Rosenwald deck.  Cardmaker Lady Heather Hall does some stunning work (really, my jealousy is absolutely ugly) and produces reasonably priced decks.  Her website is a little difficult to maneuver but she's currently got eight historical decks available to buy.  http://ladyheatherhall.com/

As regards the rights I know Jeannette got permission from the museum to produce this deck using imagery supplied by them.  I have no idea what contract the museum has with Piatnik.  Given that I've seen at least two producers selling copies of this deck I suspect the museum needs to act to preserve copyright or risk losing it altogether.

As regards the price I'll go out on a limb and say that playing card consumers have been somewhat spoiled by the economies of mass production.  This deck will never find the audience that modern, small print playing card runs find.  But, to be fair, many modern, small print playing card runs don't find that audience either.  And a lot of people (me! ) can't afford to bankroll a 500 deck print run and then be stuck with 300 decks that end up getting dumped on retailers who insist on wholesale prices that are less than what the cards cost to get produced.  We can discuss the Darwinian action of the marketplace but, ultimately, these cards will be available to the small group of people that care about them.  I'll grant you Jeannette is charging more than I would, but her game store is her livelihood and I'm just a guy who likes old cards and sells a few in his spare time.  I know that my decks run $12-$15 each I make between $2-$3 per deck sold which is, so I'm told, peanuts.

That's fascinating.  There is a 17th Century (16th?) German deck held in the Louvre that uses Latin suits AND has an additional 5th suit: Shields bearing an eagle.  I'm working with an artist on a 15th Century French deck and it has a complete set of figures for an extra court.  Unfortunately we don't know what the suits would have been because none of those survived.

Wow.  The internet available version suddenly feels less like a treasure trove. 

 

Some of you might be interested in the work being done by this lady: http://ladyheatherhall.com/

She's doing some fantastic work re-creating early decks of cards.  I don't know if she's selling her cards yet, but I've been trying to convince her to do so for a couple of months.

This deck is optimized for the 'as close as possible' crowd right now.  In fact, the printer just agreed to do these with square corners rather than the standard rounded corners.

I plan to re-size the cards and include corner indices so as to offer a modern version of this deck.  I don't think it will sell all that well but it'll only take about 8 hours and I've been wrong before.  And, of course, I have the benefit of being able to upload the design and pretty much forget about it so why not make it available even if it's only a few folks who want it?

The faux aging is inappropriate in this case (natural or off-white would be better choices for the card backing) because it doesn't reflect what the cards would have really looked like.  Try telling that to my customers, however.  I am certain this deck would get a better reception, and more purchases, among my target audience with the current sepia tone than it will with the more accurate, lighter color background.

So far as names go this one will probably by Lyonnaise Number 1.  If I knew the name of the artist who originally drew the courts I'd name the deck after him.  Unfortunately his name is lost to history.

Readability is less of a concern for me.  This is, of course, horrible design from a modern stand-point, but I'm not (with this deck) concerned with making a modern deck.  These courts are among the earliest surviving images of playing cards and the pip cards are arranged as those early cards would have been.  When I use decks like these I typically play an early game like Karnoeffel and imagine what it was like when the design was first introduced.