This article and several others are out of place in this blog, due to my not noticing them on the site where Franco posts his articles, naibi.net - they are in the "articles first published in journals" section, at the top of the contents page, and I had been focusing on the "first published at naibi.net" section, at the bottom of the contents page. Well, better late than never.
This one, the first article in a series of articles in The Playing-Card on 18th century books on the subject of the rules of minchiate, is a translation of "Il Capitolo delle Minchiate," on naibi.net at https://www.naibi.net/A/80-CARDS.pdf, originally in The Playing-Card
47, No. 2 (Oct.-Dec. 2018), pp. 103-113. The page numbers, which in
this post are the numbers standing by themselves in the left margin, are
those of the version on naibi.net, as opposed to those in the journal itself. Footnotes appear at the bottom of the corresponding page. Comments in brackets are
mine, for clarification purposes, after consulting with Franco.
The link in Note 2 of this article no longer brings up anything
relevant; it just shows something pertaining to a different
organization. We would appreciate it if anyone could find the correct
link.
The Capitolo delle Minchiate
Franco Pratesi
English Summary
The Capitolo delle Minchiate [Chapter of
Minchiate] is an important poem on the Minchiate game, which also
provides useful information on its rules. Four subsequent editions have
been identified, all very rare: the Leghorn edition of 1752, an edition
without date (now recognized as identical for the three copies
preserved); and the two editions printed in Florence in 1777 and 1827.
The game described is compatible with what we know both about the
evolution of the rules, and on the atmosphere that surrounded it in the
middle of the 18th century. The author was the Marquis Abbot Pio Enea
degli Obizzi, from Ferrara; some information on his activity is
reported. The “Lombard” town in which the text was written should thus
be Ferrara, the same town in which we find the only copy of the Capitolo recorded in the OPAC catalog for all the Italian libraries.
Introduction
The complete text of the Capitolo under consideration can be read at the end of a preliminary version of this study [note 1] and on the IPCS web pages. [note 2] This investigation originated from a Domanda [Question], one of many published in Florence at the end of the nineteenth century in the Giornale di erudizione
[Journal of Erudition]. At the time, and in the first decades of the
following century, Florence played a notable role in the artistic and
literary fields, remaining one of the main cultural centers at a
national level; this also occurred in the publishing sector, with the
publication of books and periodicals that became famous.
The Giornale di erudizione was published
in Florence two or three times a month and was aimed at scholars and
bibliophiles throughout the Kingdom of Italy. The Questions constituted a fundamental element of the Journal:
a reader had encountered an insoluble problem in a bibliographic,
literary, or scientific investigation and turned to the entire Italian
cultural elite for assistance. The question was published with a title
that clearly indicated its topic; as a rule, in subsequent issues of the
magazine the relevant "answers" appeared from scholars capable of
providing useful information. The Question of interest to us is the
following.
_________________
1. http://trionfi.com/evx-minchiate-poem-17th-century
2. https://www.ipcs.org/misc/CapMin.pdf. TO BE FOUND.
2
As you can see, rather than one question, it is several connected questions: who was the author, how many editions were printed, what other similar writings are known. Unusually, this question went unanswered; no one from any city came forward to solve the case; evidently, it was a very difficult question, because among the readers there were experts in every sector, and of a high level. Let's try again now, after more than a century, taking advantage of the fact that bibliographic research has become much easier today.Game of Minchiate. – Who is the author of a chapter relating to the game of minchiate that begins: "Since I learned the game of minchiate"; and how many editions were done? Could we then have information on other writings of a similar kind? A.L. [note 3]
The Capitolo
The text of the Capitolo is made up of a long poetic composition in rhyming tercets, and in the undated edition, which will be better described later, it is printed on twenty pages, numbered from 3 to 22. Each page contains six alternately rhyming tercets, except the first and last which have two fewer tercets; there are 349 hendecasyllables in total. The entire work describes the card game of Minchiate, the Florentine variant of the tarot that used the characteristic deck of 97 cards.
The beginning of the text is very clear and important: after the author learned to play minchiate, he no longer liked any of the games he played previously, and therefore he assiduously and constantly tried to make it appreciated also in his region, where the game was still not widespread: "And yet few people do it in Lombardy"; then under the name of Lombardy, one could understand all or almost all of northern Italy.
The Capitolo in question is aimed at people who do not yet know the elements of the game. The complexity of minchiate derives not only from the high number of cards, but even more from the scoring, which is based on the declaration of particular combinations of cards, or verzigole (counted both on the basis of the distribution of the cards at the beginning of the game, and by choosing them at the end from the cards won), and on the difference in score between the two opposing pairs at the end of the game. In short, the capture of some points derives directly from a lucky distribution of the cards, but to have a high score it is essential to play in the best way, to capture the valuable cards and count their combinations again at the end of the game.
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3. Giornale di erudizione, Vol. I No. 9-10 (1888), 131.
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It is known that the first compilations handed down on the rules of minchiate date back to the seventeenth century, with Malatesti's riddles [note 4], and above all with Paolo Minucci's notes to the Malmantile racquistato, [note 5] which describe the form of the game most used in Florence, the cradle of the game. It was an everyone-for-themselves game, so popular that in 1693 a ban was published prohibiting it in barber shops and public baths, but only after the evening bell ringing. [note 6] The Capitolo instead describes that game between two pairs, which in the eighteenth century also spread to other European countries, limited to the most prestigious courts, academies, and clubs.
The first impression is that the game rules set out in the Capitolo are not substantially different from what we know from the printed and manuscript treatises of the eighteenth century; starting from the precious manuscript of Regole [Rules] compiled by Niccolò Onesti in 1716, probably in Rome, found by Andrea Vitali and transcribed in full and extensively commented on by Girolamo Zorli. [note 7]
A comment on the game rules set out in the Capitolo could be that, as happens with many game regulations, there are some peculiarities here, too, that would require further agreements among the players to avoid arguments during the game. The first agreement, simple but indispensable, concerns the stakes; in fact, all the complex management of the score can ultimately be associated with small sums or entire estates, depending on what preliminary agreement establishes the correspondence between points and money.
However, upon first reading, the main experts on the game did not find any points of disagreement or notable originality in the Capitolo compared to the rules described in eighteenth-century sources. A peculiarity reported to me by Andrea Ricci is the following: "a custom that I cannot find described elsewhere, that is, the one that allows the card dealer to be able to give the cards under the cut directly to his partner, as long as they are less than nine.” [For the usual procedure of the “cut,” see any account of the rules of minchiate.] Nazario Renzoni has observed that in the Capitolo the distribution of the fola is substantially that present in the texts of the late eighteenth century [note 8] and could go back to the allusions to a "modern" custom already present in the Regole in the manuscript by Niccolò Onesti of
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4. La Sfinge enimmi del Sig. Antonio Malatesti. In questa nuova impressione aggiuntaci la terza parte con le Minchiate. Florence 1683.
5. Malmantile racquistato. Poema di Perlone Zipoli con le note di Puccio Lamoni. Florence 1688.
6. ASFI, Consulta poi Regia Consulta, prima serie, 30. Bando No. 49.
7. http://www.tretre.it/menu/accademia-del ... ti-e-saggi [now https://web.archive.org/web/20170213034 ... esti-1716/: Regole del nobile e dilettevole gioco delle Minchiate. For a summary in English, see A. Vitali at http://www.letarot.it/page.aspx?id=257&lng=ENG.]
8. Regole Generali del Nobilissimo Giuoco delle Minchiate, Rome 1773, and Regeln des Minchiatta-Spiels, Dresden 1798.
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1716, mentioned above. Of originality [to this author], there can be noted only a few strategic observations during the game and reports to the companion, which the author himself indicates as devices he in fact used personally, not taken from any previous texts.
It is not easy to understand how widespread our Capitolo was. Judging by the copies preserved in public libraries, one would say that it remained completely unknown, or almost so; however, the type of publication must be considered, a small, thin booklet, which would easily have been lost; add to this the subject of the verses, which could not have been among the most appreciated by librarians, both public and private. The two Florentine editions, printed half a century apart, nevertheless demonstrate that the Capitolo had a certain success, at least in the homeland of minchiate.
Information about the author
In none of the known editions is the author's name printed. However, we read in various sources that the author was the Marquis degli Obizzi. The best-known writer of the family is the Paduan marquis Pio Enea degli Obizzi (1592-1674), who is usually referred to as Pio Enea II to distinguish him from his grandfather, who had built the prestigious family residence, the Castello of Catajo, a dozen kilometers south of Padua.
We must then exhume the "canonical" text in the copy preserved in Ferrara, cited among Ferrara writers, and ultimately look for an author who had that famous name, but without being either so well-known or so ancient. Decisive help comes to us from a group of manuscripts from the Obizzi family library, now preserved in Vienna in the Austrian National Library. The Obizzi family died out at the beginning of the nineteenth century and the properties came into the possession of the imperial Habsburg family. The Viennese documents were studied by Alfred Noe [note 9], who on that basis also provides us with an extensive genealogical tree of the family, limited to the male line, reproduced in Fig. 1.
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9. In: S. Loewe, A. Martino, A. Noe (eds.), Literatur ohne Grenzen, Frankfurt am M. 1993, pp. 282-310.
5
Another piece of information is also of interest to us, again communicated by Alfred Noe. In one of the manuscripts of the group studied, Ser. N. 2106, a Memoir is inserted, in which the abbot Pio Enea, son of Tommaso, reported that in 1739 in Rome, in Santa Maria Aventina, he had found a tomb with the family's coat of arms. Furthermore, Mirna Bonazza, responsible for manuscripts and rare books at the Ariostea Municipal Library [note 10], has found in that library a letter sent by him, again from Rome, in 1742. [note 11] At this point, it becomes legitimate for us to imagine that this abbot had also discovered in Rome the game of minchiate, we know was then held in high esteem.
It is not easy to find precise information on this personage, but some mentions of his name can be identified with reference to the ducal court
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10. M. Bonazza, Email communication 07.23.18.
11. Ferrara, Ariostea Library, Cittadella Autographic Collection n. 2089. Lettera autografa di Pio Enea Obizzi. Rome, 23 June 1742, to the Marquis Giraldi Sacrati, Ferrara.
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of Modena. The oldest of these notices sees him still as a boarder of the Collegio dei Nobili, engaged in three performances in the Teatro Ducale of Modena in 1737 to celebrate the birthday of Prince Rinaldo I. Of that event, there remains a booklet of about fifty pages printed in the same year as the performance [note 12]; here our personage appears as the last in a list of no less than 42 boarders of the College of Nobles who took part in the cantatas as dancers. In a similar event the following year we meet our Pio Enea again, but now he is actually one of the three authors of the recited text. The theatrical performances that were performed in Modena were studied by Alessandro Gandini, who compiled a three-volume Chronistoria [Chronological History] on them;[note 13] on p. 37 of the first volume, a play composed by three authors is cited that was performed in the Teatro Ducale di Piazza in 1738. [note 14]
We also have other kinds of information, which confirm not only the cultural level of this author, but also his commitment to the literary competition of the time. In 1746 we find our marquis abbot in his city, Ferrara. The testimony is not among the most direct: in a 48-page book printed in Padua in 1746 we find the text of an "academic speech Giovannandrea Barrotti recited in the Accademia del'Intrepidi of Ferrara on the evening of February 16th." The title is Of Alcina's blonde hair and black eyelashes. In the preface, Abbot Pio Enea degli Obizzi appears as editor of the publication. A copy of that academic speech is preserved in a collection of Barotti's letters in the Archiginnasio Library in Bologna (B200) and we find it indicated that that performance in the Accademia degli Intrepidi took place "under the Principality of the Marquis Pio Enea degli Obizzi." [note 15]
Evidently our author had been elected in those years to the top of the local academic consortium. In fact, Mirna Bonazza was recently able to find
_________________
12. Alessandro signor d’Albania, azione accademica da rappresentarsi nel Ducale Teatro Grande il felicissimo giorno natalizio del serenissimo signor principe di Modena, composta recitata e dedicata all’altezza serenissima di Rinaldo 1. Duca di Modena, Reggio, Mirandola ec. da’ signori Convittori del Collegio de’ Nobili. Bartolomeo Soliani, Modena 1737.
13. A. Gandini, Cronistoria dei teatri di Modena dal 1539 al 1871. Modena 1873.
14. Avvenimento al trono di Alessandro il Grande. Academic Action for Christmas Day HHS [His Highness Signore] Francesco III, Duke of Modena, composed by the Marquis Abbate Pio Enea degli Obizzi, Ferrarese, the aforementioned Count Magnani [from Modena] and Signore Paolino Ottolini, Lucchese patrician. [Azione Accademica pel giorno natalizio di S.A.S. Francesco III. Duca di Modena composta dal Marchese Abbate Pio Enea degli Obizzi Ferrarese, dal suddetto Conte Magnani {modenese} e dal signor Paolino Ottolini patrizio Lucchese.]
15. G. Mazzatinti, Inventario dei manoscritti. Vol. 69. Florence 1939, p. 10-11.
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some confirmation in a manuscript with the list of the "princes" of the academy [note 16], where he is indicated as Pius Aeneas III, precisely for 1746, as shown in the reproduction of Fig. 2.
(Ferrara, Biblioteca Comunale Ariostea, Coll. Antonelli 248, p. 28)
That Abbot Pio Enea was interested in Roman antiquities becomes even
more plausible considering that a letter was sent to him with
information on the first discoveries in the excavations of Herculaneum:
there are conflicting opinions on the attribution of that letter to
Papaudi, but if the sender is uncertain, the recipient is certain. [note 17]
That letter was republished several times in various periodicals and
collections of the time, so great was the interest in those antiquities
that had come to light.
_______________________
16. Antonelli Collection 248, Ristretto
istorico della fondazione e progresso dell’Accademia degl’Intrepidi di
Ferrara, ed ordine cronologico dei principi d’Este dall’anno 1600
all’anno 1761.
17. Raccolta di opuscoli scientifici e filologici, 38. Venice 1748, pp. 349-354
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Other traces of this author's cultural interests can be noted. Thus, in a
long list of Associates, printed at the end of the famous Universal Dictionary, we find the name of the Marquis Abbot Pio Enea degli Obizzi, precisely for Ferrara.[note 18]
Further traces could be indicated, particularly in the musical field,
which would testify to the continuation of the personage's cultural
interests; considering that our interest is limited to the game of
minchiate, we can stop at the 1752 date of the Livorno edition and not
ask ourselves whether what can be found for years approaching the end of
the century still refers, as would seem probable, to the same author of
the Capitolo or to another member of that noble family.
The various editions of the Capitolo
Very few copies of various editions of the Capitolo
have been preserved, including some without dates, and the task of
verifying whether the latter are the same or different is quite
relevant.
1. Il giuoco delle minchiate. Capitolo.
[The game of minchiate. Chapter.] Livorno, Gio. Paolo Fantechi, 1752. In
16°, 22 pp. This is indicated in No. 47 of Lensi's Bibliografia, which
then comments: «Chapter in tercet rhyme by an unknown author, contains
the rules of the game of minchiate, it begins: "Since I learned the game
of minchiate." [note 19]
Unfortunately, Lensi does not write where he found an example of this
work, nor even where he had obtained the printer and the date, which
appear plausible considering the multifaceted activity of Giovanni Paolo
Fantechi in Livorno; in those years, the printing house was indicated
as Gio. Paolo Fantechi e Compagni, while a few years later it was
indicated only by its name "in the name of Truth in Via Grande." Most of
his editions were in the theatrical or religious field, but
publications on various subjects also appeared.
It was possible to find an example of this dated edition in the
Braidense National Library in Milan. The discovery occurred only thanks
to the paper catalogs, because the copy does not yet appear in the
digital ones. The title page is reproduced in Fig. 3.
__________________
18. E. Chambers, Dizionario universale delle arti e delle scienze. [Vol.] VIII. Venice 1748
19. A. Lensi, Bibliografia italiana dei giuochi di carte. Florence 1892.
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Figure 3 – Title page of the Livorno edition. (Milan, Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense, 3.3.C.25.5)
2A) Il gioco delle minchiate capitolo. [The game of minchiate chapter.] 22 p.; in 12°.
A copy of this edition is preserved in Oxford in the Bodleian Libraries, with signature 013983413 Association copies – Jessel. In the Bodleian catalog the typographical data "Livorno, Gio. Paolo Fantechi, 1752" is indicated in brackets, as if it was actually absent in the work and only taken from some other source. Thanks to the courtesy of the Oxford librarians (and in particular Francesca Galligan), it was possible to obtain more precise information. The book arrived in the Bodleian with the gift of the rich Jessel collection. Frederick Henry Jessel (1859–1934) was an expert collector who compiled a famous bibliography on playing cards in 1905; probably in his hand is the annotation that this book was printed in Livorno in 1752. Another annotation cites Lensi's bibliography, which is plausibly at the origin of what is indicated in the catalog. There are no other possible supporting sources. This book was already cited by Michael Dummett [note 20], who, unusually, seems to have used this text available in "his" Bodleian Library solely for a comment on the Genoese variant of ganellini, citing the term Ganellino attributed here to number One of the tarocchi. In reality, however, this edition, indicated [also by him] as printed in Livorno in 1752, appears actually
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20. M. Dummett, The Game of Tarot, London 1980, p. 339.
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to have been published without editorial notes. Let's look at other editions, which were similarly published without date and place of printing.
2B) Il gioco delle minchiate capitolo. [The game of minchiate chapter.] 22 p.; in 12°.
Present in the Ariostea Municipal Library of Ferrara with signature A 12. This edition is the only one to appear in the SBN OPAC catalog, updated for all Italian libraries. Even if we search for specimens in the online catalog of the main European libraries we find (as of mid-2018) only this specimen. [note 21] In this copy, there is a handwritten note "From Canon Pio Enea degli Obizzi." In the bibliographical indications of the catalog of the Ariostea Municipal Library, again accompanying the Ferrara specimen, a quotation from a manuscript work preserved in that library is reported: “The author Pio Enea degli Obizzi is taken from G. Antonelli, Indicem operum ferrariensium scriptorum, 1834.”
2C) Another copy without typographical notes, to be checked if different, is preserved in the Humanistic Library of the University of Florence with signature: Misc.A.300.1. Like the Ambrosiana edition, this example also does not appear in the SBN OPAC catalog, as it has not yet been included in the electronic cataloging. A membership stamp indicates the Royal Institute of Florence and dates back to the end of the 19th century or the beginning of the 20th century. From the inventory of the time it seems that it belonged to a group of books donated by the University's botanical Cabinet, where it would have arrived as an inheritance from a donor whose name has not been preserved. Written in pencil on the last page we read: -.3.6. This is probably the price of the booklet in the traditional L.s.d system, i.e., three and a half soldi; perhaps useful information, but insufficient for a certain dating.
Thanks to the checks carried out on the copies, it was ascertained that this edition is identical to the one preserved in Ferrara. The question was whether these two editions without typographical data could be the same as the edition preserved in Oxford, and the comparison confirmed that in fact in the three cases it is the same print. It seems unlikely that this edition was printed before the Livorno one; in fact, the hypothesis that it was instead an illegal copy, printed using that as a source, is more convincing. Two other editions, dated and different from this one, were published in Florence at a later time.
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21. http://www.theeuropeanlibrary.org/tel4/ ... iate%29%29
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3) Delle regole delle minchiate capitolo in terza rima: publicato per uso de’ dilettanti di detto gioco. [Of the rules of minchiate chapter in tercet rhyme: published for the use of enthusiasts of said game.] In Giuseppe Allegrini's printing house, Florence 1777. 20 pages.
With a bibliographic search on the Internet, only one example can be found, present abroad in the Houghton Library of Harvard University, with signature: IC7.Al525.777d. In particular, the librarian responsible, James Capobianco, confirmed that this book was donated to the library in November 1927 by the children of Charles Eliot Norton (1827-1908). Another copy (if not found to be precisely that same example) was present in the mid-nineteenth century in the library of the Marquis Costabili of Ferrara; in the relevant catalog, compiled on the occasion of the sale, it appears at No. 3494, with the attribution to Pio Enea degli Obizzi [note 22] printed next to the title.
That this attribution also appears in this document is not surprising, given the information that comes from other sources, but in this case the publisher inserts a preliminary comment on the matter that is of interest. This Notice does not indicate anything more about the author of the Capitolo: “whom I believe Lombard, is not known to me” [che credo Lombardo, non mi è noto]; but it offers us confirmation of the atmosphere that surrounded the game of minchiate, intelligent entertainment in the conversation rooms.
_________________Printer's Notice (From the 1777 edition)
Among the games that have been invented since they began three centuries ago [in reality there would have been four. FP] to play with cards, there is perhaps none more industrious, that is, one that gives scope to the art and subtlety of the player, than that of Minchiate, also called Tarocchi and Germini by the good writers of our Italian language. For this reason, it has been observed that the wittiest people from beyond the Alps, when they cross the Alps to stay for some time in Italy, demonstrate a great genius for learning it, and some of them even engage in it to the point of contending with the most experienced and expert. I am reminded of a person of great birth, having to settle in these districts for reasons of ministry, who found so much pleasure in having learned it, that he even went so far as to say that he found it the only remedy for passing the winter vigils without tedium. Time advances even for the most burdened by occupation and study; nor can one always sustain company for many hours with only dialog and the daily newspaper. What more innocent entertainment than testing one's industry and fortune with Minchiate in hand among four friends? This is why I was led to publish these verses, which contain all the rules and almost all the subtleties of such a noble and entertaining game. The Author of this Chapter, whom I believe Lombard, is not known to me; but I know very well that even without this information, anyone will admire the ease and
22. Catalogue de la première partie de la bibliothèque de M. le Marquis Costabili de Ferrare. Bologna 1858.
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4) Capitolo relativo al giuoco delle minchiate. [Chapter relating to the game of minchiate.] Florence, in the Grand Ducal Printing House, 1827. 22 p. 18cm.accuracy of the Poet Legislator, and this composition can be regarded as the Code of Minchiate.
This edition is also present in the aforementioned Alfredo Lensi Bibliografia. It is listed as no. 23, with data: in -8, pp. 22, and the comment that refers to the other: “For the description of this pamphlet see the 1752 edition at n. 47.” An example is present in the Vatican Apostolic Library, with signature Stamp Ferr.V.7286 (int.15). Of this edition it is possible to point out a copy recently put up for sale by an antiquarian bookshop in Padua [note 23]; in the catalog description we read: “First edition. (. . .) No clear examples registered in ICCU. Lensi n. 23.”
It is surprising that no copy of these two Florentine editions can be found in Tuscan public libraries.
Conclusion
The Question about the game of minchiate, published in 1888 in a journal for bibliophiles and left unanswered at the time, has found an answer, accompanied by further information on the subject. In particular, a compilation of the text towards the middle of the seventeenth century, considered possible in an initial phase of this study, is not at all plausible. The date of composition of the Capitolo is close to that of the first printing known to us, Livorno 1752; we are in the middle of the eighteenth century, when the type of game described is better in conformity with what we know in general both about the evolution of the game’s rules and the atmosphere that surrounded it.
The author was Marquis Abbot Pio Enea degli Obizzi, from Ferrara, about whose activity some information has been provided here; the "Lombard" city in which the text was written is therefore Ferrara, the same city in which the only copy of the Capitolo registered in the OPAC for all Italian libraries is still found. The various editions identified are reduced to four, all very rare: the Livorno edition of 1752, an undated edition (now recognized as identical for the three copies found); and the two editions printed in Florence half a century apart, in 1777 and 1827.
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23. Edizioni Pregiate. Libri Stampe e Disegni dal XVI al XX Secolo. Bado and Mart, Padua, circa 2009. (Reported by Sergio A. Bonanni.)
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