by Philippe Camoin and Alexandre Jodorowsky
In 1998, movie director Alexandre Jodorowsky and Master Cardmaker Philippe Camoin accomplished the task of restoring the Tarot de Marseille. Their research led to discoveries, secrets seemingly hidden for centuries. Legendary film director, master of Tarot, scriptwriter for comic strips and novelist Alexandre Jodorowsky has studied the Tarot for over 40 years. For over 20 years, the Tarot de Marseille has been the only Tarot which he refers to in his studies. Alexandre Jodorowsky decided to restore the Original Tarot with Philippe Camoin: "Knowing secret facts regarding its history, manufacturing, tradition, symbolism and having the original templates meant we were the only ones who could properly restore the Original Tarot de Marseille." Philippe Camoin has studied symbolism since the age of 14: "I grew up with the Tarot. In my bedroom, as a child, the only pictures on the bedroom walls were the 78 arcana of Nicolas Conver’s Tarot de Marseille, who founded what later became the Camoin House."
In 1998, thanks to Philippe Camoin and Alexandre Jodorowsky, the Tarot de Marseille recovered a symbolic structure which had been lost over time. The Tarot de Marseille of Camoin and Jodorowsky contains all the symbolism already known and more than a dozen additional symbols which experts and amateurs will no longer be able to do without. What is radically different from other Tarot de Marseille decks is the colours: certain decks only contain red, yellow and blue - without sky blue or other colours. These non-initiatory primary colours—red, yellow and blue—were copied from an 1880 Camoin deck at the time of the industrial era and the appearance of machines for mass production. These machines were only able to print in four colours. From 1860 to 1880, Philippe Camoin’s ancestor, the last and only Master Cardmaker in Marseille at the time, felt constrained to come up with these new colours for the transition to automation. Thus was born a particular edition created for mass production. It is these primary and non-initiatory colours from 1880 which were used, fifty years later, by other printers.
Since 1930, for over 70 years now, people have wrongly thought that these colours had an esoteric significance. Now since 1998, the new colours of the Tarot de Marseille of Camoin and Jodorowsky reflect the authentic alchemical tradition.
This restoration of the Tarot de Marseille is a major event in the history of the Tarot. Many generations of researchers have studied the last existing Tarots in the search of initiatory secrets. It seems that Philippe Camoin and Alexandre Jodorowsky have now discovered them.
Philippe Camoin and Alexandre Jodorowsky are two Masters of the Tarot and both teach on this subject. Alexandre Jodorowsky has given lessons on the Tarot of Marseille for many years. He is a legendary film director and has directed several initiatory full-length films; he is a scriptwriter for comic strips and has been passionate about the Tarot for over 40 years. As for Philippe Camoin, he teaches his own method following his major new discoveries concerning the structure of the Tarot.
A few months ago, Philippe Camoin revealed to Tarot experts of the world the date of the oldest existing deck of Tarot de Marseille manufactured in Marseilles. It belongs to François Chosson going back to 1672, and no one jad been aware of its existence. An American expert, Doctor Robert O’Neill, in contact with Philippe Camoin, was able to move back the date of TdMs printed in Marseilles to as far as 1608. This is far from the date of 1760 which the historians have claimed until now.
Philippe Camoin has also just revealed new historical data, which may upset the accepted theories of the appearance of the Tarot in the West. According to him, it was the monk John Cassian, founder of the abbey of St. Victor in Marseilles, in year 400 C.E. who came from Egypt and who contributed to inroducing to Western Europe secret teachings that were strongly influenced by Origen. It is clear that during the early part of the second millennium the Order of St. Victor reigned over all the territory where later the oldest Tarots and the oldest references to the Tarot were found. This territory is now Northern Italy, Northern Spain, and the south of France, territory in which the Cathars and Templars flourished.
Philippe Camoin is the last heir to the Master Card Makers of Marseilles. The Camoin House goes back to Nicolas Conver, who in 1760 engraved his Tarot de Marseille, continuing the tradition of masters going way back to the much older masters of which François Chosson (1672) is an example. In the 19th century, the Camoin House inherited the tradition of all the Master Card Makers of Marseilles and became the last one remaining in Marseilles.
The reconstruction of the Tarot de Marseille by Camoin and Jodorowsky will launch the revival of a Tradition which goes beyond a simple deck of cards, and which has been dormant for several centuries.
This reconstruction was a complex process of comparing the symbols present on many European decks, all conducted according to the authentic tradition of the Tarot de Marseille. This work required an extremely precise initiatory approach. It is not just a question of copying or restoration from an older deck of cards. The term "Restoration of the Original Tarot" applies in the sense of restoration of a complex philosophical system. The Tarot is actually considered a type of initiatory learning, a metaphysical mechanism for which the cards are only a support. Together, Philippe Camoin and Alexandre Jodorowsky have restored the symbolism of the Tarot de Marseille to how it must have been at the beginning, the original deck having disappeared from the world. They have also added specific elements of their own which they keep secret, just as Master Card Makers have always done in the past.
The original symbols had been lost over generations of Master Card Makers. The rediscovery of the egg situated at the bottom of the eagle in the card The Emperor was a decisive moment, confirming that a number of forgotten symbols were hidden therein, waiting to be revealed. The other discoveries allow understanding of the system upon which the Tarot was originally built. Among the other easy-to-understand symbols that were restored are the two snakes intertwined at the foot of Temperance and the four elements in the Ace of Cups.
From all these new restored symbols in the Tarot de Marseille flow new teachings adapted to the 21st century and introduced by Philippe Camoin and Alexandre Jodorowsky.
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