Playthings in Early Modernity: Party Games, Word Games, Mind Games

354 Pages·2017·66.401 MB·English

by  Allison Levy (editor)

Playthings in
Early Modernity
Party Games, Word Games, Mind Games
Edited by
Allison Levy
LUDIC CULTURES, 1100–1700
Playthings in Early Modernity
Ludic Cultures, 1100–1700
SERIES EDITORS:
Bret Rothstein (Chair)
Indiana University
Alessandro Arcangeli
University of Verona
Christina Normore
Northwestern University
See our website for further information on this series and its publications.
Medieval Institute Publications is a program of
The Medieval Institute, College of Arts and Sciences
Playthings in Early Modernity
Party Games, Word Games, Mind Games
Edited by
Allison Levy
Ludic Cultures, 1100–1700
MEDIEVAL INSTITUTE PUBLICATIONS
Western Michigan University
Kalamazoo
Copyright © 2017 by the Board of Trustees of Western Michigan University

Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
are available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-580442-60-2
e-ISBN 978-1-580442-61-9
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright
reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored
in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any
form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both
the copyright owner and the author of the book.
Contents
List of Illustrations vii
Acknowledgements xv
Introduction: Playing the Field 1
Allison Levy
Performing Pictures: Parlor Games and Visual Engagement in
Ascanio de’ Mori’s Giuoco piacevole 9
Kelli Wood
“Mixt” and Matched: Dance Games in Late Sixteenth- and Early
Seventeenth-Century Europe 29
Emily F. Winerock
Ludic Intermingling/Ludic Discrimination: Women’s Card Playing
and Visual Proscriptions in Early Modern Europe 49
Antonella Fenech Kroke
Leonardo da Vinci, Parody, and Pictorial Magic 73
Chriscinda Henry
Letter Games: Machiavelli and Guicciardini in Carnivalesque Correspondence 97
Sergius Kodera
The Rules of Passion and Pastime: The Game of Lurch in a Late
Renaissance Poem 117
Manfred Zollinger
“Sportes and Pastimes, done by Number”: Mathematical Games in
Early Modern England 131
Jessica Marie Otis
vi CoNtENtS
Predictive Play: Wheels of Fortune in the Early Modern Lottery Book 145
Jessen Kelly
Virtuous Vices: Giuseppe Maria Mitelli’s Gambling Prints and the
Social Mapping of Leisure and Gender in Post-tridentine Bologna 167
Patricia Rocco
trading and trick taking in the Dutch Republic: Pasquin’s Wind
Cards and the South Sea Bubble 191
Joyce Goggin
The Problem of Excessive Play: Renaissance Strategies of
Ludic Governmentality 205
Andreas Hermann Fischer
Imaginary Cartographies and Commercial Commodities:
Geography and Playing Cards in Early Modern England 219
Serina Patterson
Land of Elusion: Portuguese Perceptions and the Matter of Play
and Gaming in Vijayanagara 239
Elke Rogersdotter
Visual Frames and Breaking the Rules of the Reconquista: Chess and
Alfonso X, el Sabio’s Libro de ajedrez, dados y tablas 261
Nhora Lucía Serrano
The Prisoners’ Dilemma: Strategies and Ruses in the Inquisitorial
Jails of Early Modern Cuenca 277
Patrick J. O’Banion
Bibliography 291
Notes on Contributors 321
Index 325
List of Illustrations
Kelli Wood
Figure 1.1. Antonio Tempesta, January, from a series of etchings of the
months, published by Giovanni Antonio de Paoli in Rome, 1599,
Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi, Florence. 10
Figure 1.2. Antonio Tempesta, January, detail, from a series of etchings
of the months, published by Giovanni Antonio de Paoli in Rome, 1599,
Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi, Florence. 11
Figure 1.3. Detail from Il Piacevole gioco dell’oca, woodcut, seventeenth
century, British Museum, London. 14
Figure 1.4. Elevation of the Arch of Trajan, Ancona from Sebastiano
Serlio, Libro d’architettura. Il terzo libro (Venice: Gio. Battista et
Marchio Sessa, 1559–62). Photo: author. 17
Figure 1.5. Ignazio Danti, View of Ancona, fresco, 1581–82. Galleria
delle Carte Geografiche, Vatican City. Scala/Art Resource, NY. 18
Figure 1.6. Giuseppe Maria Mitelli, Il giuoco del blasone, etching,
1714–18, British Museum, London. 21
Emily F. Winerock
Figure 2.1. Pieter Aertsen, The Egg Dance, 84 × 172 cm, oil on panel,
1552, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. 33
Figure 2.2. After Maerten de Vos, published by Johannes Baptista Vrints,
The Egg Dance, 23.2 × 29.7 cm, engraving, late sixteenth century,
Elisha Whittelsey Collection, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. 34
Figure 2.3. Attributed to Daniel Vinckenboom, detail from The Thames
at Richmond, with the Old Royal Palace, 152.1 × 304.2 cm, oil on
canvas, ca. 1620. © Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. 35
viii LIST oF ILLUSTRATIoNS
Figure 2.4. Emblem IV, Johannis de Brunes, Emblemata of Zinne-werck
(Amsterdam, 1624), p. 23. 44
Antonella Fenech Kroke
Figure 3.1. Unknown artist, Allegory of the Plague, Biccherna book
cover, 1437. © Kunstgewerbemuseum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. 50
Figure 3.2. Hans Holbein the Younger (after), Wenceslaus Hollar
(primer), Death and the Devil Strike a Player (Antwerp, ca. 1680),
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. 51
Figure 3.3. Monogrammist SH, Giovanni da Capistrano Preaching
against Games, frontispiece of the Vita Iohannis Capistrani. Sermones
eiusdem (Augsburg, 1519). 52
Figure 3.4. Woodcut illustration from chapter 77, “on Gamblers,”
from Sebastian Brant, Das Narrenschiff (Basel, 1494). 54
Figure 3.5. Niklas Stör (or Erhard Schön), Couple Playing Cards,
from H. Sachs, Welcher ein schon weyb pulen zvil. Der musz auch
von yhr leyden vil. Das lie der untrew mit im spil (Nuremberg,
ca. 1530), Schlossmuseum, Gotha. http://www.zeno.org –
Contumax GmbH & Co. KG. 56
Figure 3.6. Master of the Amsterdam Cabinet, Card Players, end
of the fifteenth century, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. 58
Figure 3.7. After Lucas van Leyden, The Card Players, oil on panel,
probably ca. 1550/1599, Samuel H. Kress Collection, National
Gallery of Art, Washington. Courtesy National Gallery of Art,
Washington. 59
Figure 3.8. Quentin Massys, The Ill-Matched Lovers, oil on panel,
ca. 1520–25, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, National Gallery of Art,
Washington. Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington. 60
Figure 3.9. Jacob Matham, A Man and Woman Playing Backgammon,
engraving from the series The Consequences of Alcoholism, ca. 1600,
British Museum, London. Courtesy © Trustees of the British Museum. 61
LIST oF ILLUSTRATIoNS ix
Figure 3.10. Jacob Matham, Two Men Argue and Fight over a Game of
Cards, engraving from the series The Consequences of Alcoholism, ca. 1600,
British Museum, London. Courtesy © Trustees of the British Museum. 62
Figure 3.11. Girolamo Romanino, Tarot Card Players, detached fresco,
mid sixteenth century, originally part of the decoration of the Sala
del Capitano in the Broletto, Brescia. Private collection. 64
Figure 3.12. Niccolò dell’Abate, Tarot Card Players, fresco, 1548–50,
Museo di Palazzo Poggi, Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna. 65
Figure 3.13. Giovanni Antonio Fasolo, Card Players, fresco, ca. 1570,
Villa Caldogno, Vicenza. De Agostini Picture Library/Bridgeman Images. 66
Chriscinda Henry
Figure 4.1. Leonardo da Vinci, Phyllis (or Campaspe) Riding Aristotle
(recto), 9.6 × 13.5 cm, pen and ink over metalpoint on paper,
ca. 1475–80, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg. 74
Figure 4.2. Leonardo da Vinci, A Satire on Aged Lovers (Grotesque
Couple), 26.2 × 12.3 cm, pen and ink over black chalk on paper,
ca. 1489–90, Royal Library, Windsor Castle. Royal Collection
Trust/© Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2016. 75
Figure 4.3. Leonardo da Vinci, A Man Tricked by Gypsies (Five
Grotesque Heads) (recto), 26.0 × 20.5 cm, pen and brown ink
on paper, ca. 1493, Royal Library, Windsor Castle. Royal
Collection Trust/© Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2016. 76
Figure 4.4. Florentine (circle of Baccio Baldini?), Phyllis and
Aristotle, Surrounded by a Young Man and Woman with Eros,
and a Reclining Nude Woman with Two Children, 16 cm diameter,
engraving (otto print), ca. 1465–80, private collection.
Photo © Christie’s Images/Bridgeman Images. 79
Figure 4.5. Baccio Baldini (or workshop), Death and the Lovers
(Allegory of Love and Death), 25.4 × 20.4 cm, engraving, ca. 1465–70,
British Museum, London. Courtesy © Trustees of the British Museum. 82