Tarot Decks as Antiques: Identifying Pre-War Decks

The oldest tarot deck I have handled personally was a Marseille-pattern deck printed in Belgium around 1875, in a small cardboard box that had lost its lid, sitting on a table at an estate sale in Antwerp. It was priced at 30 euros. I paid the 30, took it home, catalogued it properly, and later sold it to a specialist for 780. That is what happens to pre-war tarot decks when they turn up in general sales rather than specialist ones.

I want to be clear from the start about the frame here. I write about tarot decks as printed collectibles, the same way I would write about pre-war playing cards or trade catalogues. What the cards mean to a reader, and whether they mean anything at all, is not the question here. The question is what makes a deck a genuine antique, how to date one, and what to look for when buying.

The three families of antique tarot

Almost every pre-war tarot deck you will encounter falls into one of three design families. Knowing which family a deck belongs to is the first step in dating and valuing it.

The Marseille pattern, or Tarot de Marseille, is the oldest continuously produced design. It originated in seventeenth-century France and continued in production, with almost no significant change, until the mid-twentieth century. Woodblock-printed originally, then lithographed. The design is instantly recognisable: bold outlines, flat colour, four suits of cups, coins, swords, and batons.

The Etteilla and Grand Etteilla decks are late eighteenth-century French designs that added esoteric imagery to the Marseille framework. The original Etteilla was produced from around 1789 onwards, and variants continued through the nineteenth century. Rarer than Marseille decks and generally more valuable.

The Rider-Waite-Smith deck, first published in London in 1909, is the ancestor of almost every modern tarot design. First-edition copies are the great trophy of the pre-war tarot market, and they command four-figure prices. Later printings from the same pre-war period are more affordable but still valuable.

There are other designs, and there are many regional variants of the Marseille pattern in particular, but if you can identify which of these three families a deck belongs to, you have your starting point for research.

How to date a Marseille deck

Marseille decks were produced by many different printers in France, Belgium, and Switzerland, often with only minor variations in design. Dating them requires attention to three things: the maker's mark, the printing technique, and the paper stock.

Maker's marks are usually on the two of coins, sometimes on the ace of the same suit. Look for a printer's name or initials, often in the design of the coin itself. The names to know are Grimaud (Paris, 1848 to present, but early Grimaud is scarce), Camoin (Marseille, various dates), Conver (whose earliest cards date to the eighteenth century and whose later cards were reissued into the twentieth), and Dellarocca (Italian, various).

Printing technique dates a deck within roughly a fifty-year window. Woodblock printing on rag paper indicates pre-1830. Early lithography with a distinctive slightly blurred outline indicates 1830 to 1870. Sharper lithography with cleaner colour separation indicates 1870 to 1920. Photolithography, with its uniform dot pattern under a loupe, indicates post-1920.

Paper stock is the final clue. Rag paper, thick and slightly fibrous, was standard until around 1870. Wood-pulp paper, smoother and more prone to yellowing at the edges, took over from 1870 onwards. A rag-paper Marseille deck is almost certainly nineteenth century or earlier.

What condition means in this market

Condition standards in tarot collecting are stricter than in most card categories, because complete decks in fine condition are extremely rare. Every deck has almost certainly been used, and most have missing or damaged cards. What matters is the extent.

A complete deck of 78 cards with no missing cards, no torn corners, no writing, and reasonable colour retention is considered excellent condition regardless of the age of the deck. A deck with one or two missing cards, or with light corner wear, is considered good and typically fetches half to two-thirds of the excellent price. A deck with more than five missing cards, or with heavy wear, is essentially broken and worth only reference value.

The original box, when it survives, adds substantially to the value. A pre-war Marseille deck in its original printed box is worth roughly double the same deck without the box, because the boxes were routinely thrown away and few survive.

Where the reproductions hide

The reproduction problem in this market is less acute than in casino chips or motorcycle memorabilia, but it exists and it is often subtle. The main hazards are twentieth-century reprints of older designs being sold as originals. A 1970s reprint of a nineteenth-century Marseille deck can look, at first glance, remarkably like the original, especially if the reprinter went to the trouble of ageing the paper.

The tells are usually in the printing. Modern reprints use offset or digital printing with characteristic dot patterns that are not present on genuine lithography. Even the best modern paper has a different feel under the thumb than genuine rag or early wood-pulp paper: modern paper is slick, old paper has a dry, absorbent quality.

Sellers in the modern reading world, like specialist retailers such as Psychic Mrs Martin, are generally clear about which of their decks are new productions and which are vintage, and this transparency is now the norm in the reputable end of the trade. It is the general antique market where deception, deliberate or accidental, is more likely.

What to actually buy if you are starting

My advice for a new collector is to start with a single reasonably priced Marseille deck from a named maker between 1870 and 1920. This is the middle of the market, and there are enough examples around that you can compare and learn without paying trophy prices. Expect to pay 200 to 500 pounds for a good example. Do not start with a Rider-Waite-Smith deck, because the first-edition variants have their own set of subtle distinguishing features and you need to know what you are doing to buy well.

Do not buy incomplete decks, even at very low prices, unless the missing cards are documented and you have a specific plan for them. An incomplete deck stays incomplete forever, and the market is unforgiving.

For related pieces on printed collectibles, see the Victorian bookbindings article, condition grades in prints, and casino chips and cards. Category archive: Prints, Maps and Books.