c. 1650 · Rouen-Brussels / Belgian line (Paris, c. 1650)
Jacques Viéville Tarot — Paris, c. 1650 (BnF)
At a glance
One of the three oldest surviving named Tarots de Marseille-family decks, printed in Paris around 1650 by the maître-cartier Jacques Viéville — a near-contemporary of Jean Noblet (whose deck this library also holds). The single known copy is at the Bibliothèque nationale de France and is on Gallica (ark:/12148/btv1b10510963k). The woodcut is public domain; the BnF scan is free to reuse non-commercially with credit, and commercial reuse needs a BnF licence. Its 78 woodcut cards are shown here from the BnF scan, at high resolution.
Why it matters — the road not taken
Viéville's pack is the great outlier of the early Parisian tarots. Where Noblet sits squarely in the C-order (Marseille) line that became standard, Viéville's trump imagery leans toward the Eastern/Belgian branch: its figures face the other way, several trumps (the Popess, the Sun, the World, the Star) carry markedly different designs, and the pack is a key witness to the family that later surfaces in the Vandenborre / 'Tarot Flamand' decks rather than the Marseille mainstream. It shows that c. 1650 Paris held two competing tarot patterns at once.
What you're looking at
- 22 atouts (trumps): 21 carry printed Roman numerals (read directly from the scans here) plus the unnumbered Mat (Fool).
- 56 suit cards: four Italian suits — Épées (Swords), Deniers (Coins), Bâtons (Batons), Coupes (Cups) — each with King, Queen, Cavalier, Valet and ten pips.
- The even-numbered canvases of the BnF scan are the cards' patterned backs; only the faces are shown.
Honesty notes
The trumps are identified by their printed numerals AND their scenes — and the two together reveal a key feature: the Viéville follows the older Eastern trump order, not the later Marseille standard. Here Justice is VII, the Chariot VIII, Strength VIIII, and the Hermit XI — exactly the cards the Marseille (Conver) sequence reorders. This non-standard order is itself the evidence for the deck's Eastern/Belgian-leaning lineage. Suit cards are shown in BnF folio order; courts are identified by figure, and pip ranks are assigned by position and may warrant correction — corrections welcome, as everywhere in this library.
Game, not divination
Like Noblet, this is a playing-and-trick-taking pack from a century before tarot was attached to fortune-telling; no cartomantic meaning is native to it.
Sources
BnF / Gallica (ark:/12148/btv1b10510963k), Source gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France; Thierry Depaulis on the early Parisian cartiers; Dummett, The Game of Tarot.
Where the pictures come from: who holds this deck's pictures, how sharp they are and what their rights allow: Sources: Jacques Viéville.
The cards (78)
78 of 78 card images are not shown on this page (scan from the BnF (Gallica), free for non-commercial reuse only). Each card links to where its holder shows it; the card viewer and recursive.eco still open the deck.
- see it at the holderI · Le Bateleur
- see it at the holderII · La Papesse
- see it at the holderIII · L'Impératrice
- see it at the holderIIII · L'Empereur
- see it at the holderV · Le Pape
- see it at the holderVI · L'Amoureux
- see it at the holderVII · La Justice
- see it at the holderVIII · Le Chariot
- see it at the holderVIIII · La Force
- see it at the holderX · La Roue de Fortune
- see it at the holderXI · L'Hermite
- see it at the holderXII · Le Pendu
- see it at the holderXIII · La Mort
- see it at the holderXIIII · Tempérance
- see it at the holderXV · Le Diable
- see it at the holderXVI · La Maison-Dieu
- see it at the holderXVII · L'Étoile
- see it at the holderXVIII · La Lune
- see it at the holderXVIIII · Le Soleil
- see it at the holderXX · Le Jugement
- see it at the holderXXI · Le Monde
- see it at the holderRoi de Épées
- see it at the holderReine de Épées
- see it at the holderCavalier de Épées
- see it at the holderValet de Épées
- see it at the holderDix de Épées
- see it at the holderNeuf de Épées
- see it at the holderHuit de Épées
- see it at the holderSept de Épées
- see it at the holderSix de Épées
- see it at the holderCinq de Épées
- see it at the holderQuatre de Épées
- see it at the holderTrois de Épées
- see it at the holderDeux de Épées
- see it at the holderAs de Épées
- see it at the holderRoi de Deniers
- see it at the holderReine de Deniers
- see it at the holderCavalier de Deniers
- see it at the holderValet de Deniers
- see it at the holderDix de Deniers
- see it at the holderNeuf de Deniers
- see it at the holderHuit de Deniers
- see it at the holderSept de Deniers
- see it at the holderSix de Deniers
- see it at the holderCinq de Deniers
- see it at the holderQuatre de Deniers
- see it at the holderTrois de Deniers
- see it at the holderDeux de Deniers
- see it at the holderAs de Deniers
- see it at the holderRoi de Bâtons
- see it at the holderReine de Bâtons
- see it at the holderCavalier de Bâtons
- see it at the holderValet de Bâtons
- see it at the holderDix de Bâtons
- see it at the holderNeuf de Bâtons
- see it at the holderHuit de Bâtons
- see it at the holderSept de Bâtons
- see it at the holderSix de Bâtons
- see it at the holderCinq de Bâtons
- see it at the holderQuatre de Bâtons
- see it at the holderTrois de Bâtons
- see it at the holderDeux de Bâtons
- see it at the holderAs de Bâtons
- see it at the holderRoi de Coupes
- see it at the holderReine de Coupes
- see it at the holderCavalier de Coupes
- see it at the holderValet de Coupes
- see it at the holderDix de Coupes
- see it at the holderNeuf de Coupes
- see it at the holderHuit de Coupes
- see it at the holderSept de Coupes
- see it at the holderSix de Coupes
- see it at the holderCinq de Coupes
- see it at the holderQuatre de Coupes
- see it at the holderTrois de Coupes
- see it at the holderDeux de Coupes
- see it at the holderAs de Coupes
- see it at the holderLe Mat (The Fool)
Sources and credits
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris (Jacques Viéville, c. 1650)
- Jacques Viéville (c. 1650): Maître-cartier, Paris; the earliest surviving witness of the non-Marseille pattern that descends to the Belgian line
- Bibliothèque nationale de France (holding institution): Holds the single known copy; digitised on Gallica as ark:/12148/btv1b10510963k. Credit: 'Source gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France'. The scans are reused under Gallica's conditions of use: non-commercial reuse is free with this credit; commercial reuse needs a BnF licence (https://gallica.bnf.fr/accueil/fr/html/conditions-dutilisation-de-gallica)
- PlayfulProcess (2026): Grammar architecture and summaries
Research dossier: research/decks/vieville-tarot.md. Data: tarot/vieville-tarot/grammar.json, CC-BY-SA-4.0. Images keep their own licences (hover a card for its credit).