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Posts tagged ‘Benedetti’

Oct 21

Mitelli and Barattini: Two Generations of Tarocchino Bolognese

Bolognese Hanged Man

About 1660, Count Filippo Bentivoglio of Bologna commissioned a luxurious tarocchino deck from artist and copper engraver Giuseppe Mitelli. Over 140 years later, in 1803, his descendent, Count Luigi Bentivoglio, hired engraver Francesco Barattini to create a faithful copy of his ancestor’s deck in wood block. This is unique in tarot history: two generations of the same family commissioning two versions of the same tarot deck. We are privileged to have reproductions of both the Mitelli and Barattini decks by the same card maker, Marco Benedetti of Rome. Let’s take a close look at Barattini’s deck and how it differs from the original Mitelli.

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Apr 29

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Loving Pierre Madenié

Hundreds of decks have passed through my hands during my fifty years with tarot; and I’ve been reading with a few that I really love for decades. But I never became instantly infatuated with a deck until I unboxed the 1709 Pierre Madenié in 2013. This was the first deck I ever purchased from Yves Reynaud, and I was thrilled to own such a faithful reproduction of an historic deck. Adding to the magic, when I opened the package from France, something tiny zipped through the air in front of my face and brushed my cheek. I was sure a tarot fairy had been set free from the package. I knew instantly that this was no ordinary deck!

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