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Posts tagged ‘Tarot de Marseilles’

Apr 5

New Tarot de Marseilles Decks

A Tarot de Marseilles revival is in the air. After more than 350 years of continuous use for divination and game playing, the TdM is being rejuvenated with new editions that remain faithful to the 17th century prototypes. A handful of devoted scholars and artists from around the globe are sprucing up the standard Covers-based TdM with fresh colors and crisp lines, and issuing beautifully crafted limited editions.

The first stop on our tour of new productions is Japan and the Institute of Study on Initiation and Symbolism (ISIS).  Examples of founder Tadahiro Onuma’s deck are scattered throughout his class descriptions. There’s a link on the Home page to a shopping cart for purchasing either a majors only or a 78-card deck.         

Next, we’ll go half way around the globe to Israel where Yoav Ben-Dov has revitalized the 1760 Convers deck with a faithful-to-the-original update known as the CBD TdM.

Naturellement, France, the home of the TdM, offers the largest selection of decks. Read more

Jan 8

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Reading Techniques in Action

On New Year’s Day I picked up my free readings for the week over at EnchantedSpirit.com (more about them below). One of my favorite features, “Tarot Treats”, delivers a card for the week on Sunday that I like to work with throughout the week.

My New Year’s Day card was the Ace of Swords – the perfect talisman for someone who has just resolved to do more writing and blogging in 2012. So far this week I’ve used two of my favorite techniques with this card.

I shuffled just the minor arcana of the Soprafino deck while asking for a message about how I can support Ace of Swords energy in my life during the week. When the deck felt well-shuffled, I went through it card by card until I found the Ace of Swords, and pulled it out along with the cards on either side of it. This gave me a spread where the cards work together synergistically rather than being compartmentalized into separate spread positions. Then I took the sum of the three cards (10) and found the corresponding trump card (Wheel of Fortune) to give me the theme of the reading. Read more

Oct 26

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The Soprafino Deck of Carlo Dellarocca

A new Tarot deck style was born in 1835 when the Milanese printer Ferdinand Gumppenberg commissioned a deck from the artist/engraver Carlo Dellarocca. As the most elegant and refined Italian deck of its time, it quickly became known as i tarocchi sopraffini, the super-fine tarot. Many of its unique design elements were adopted by 19th century card printers. In the 1990s it experienced a revival when two publishers reprinted Dellarocca-inspired decks. Read more

Sep 8

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The Worst-Ever Booklet for a Tarot de Marseilles

The other day, I was looking at a 19th century Tarot de Marseilles, the 1JJ, that was published in Switzerland with an accompanying booklet written in French. The booklet has a Rider Waite Smith image on the cover! What were they thinking? Read more

Aug 21

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Graphic Structure and Card Meaning

I’ve just discovered a technique that helps me see the cards in a new light. It’s from a book written in 1973 by Fred Gettings that I just reviewed for the American Tarot Association’s Quarterly Journal. Gettings was way ahead of his time in his approach to tarot history and the Tarot de Marseilles, and is one of the first English-speaking authors to focus on this deck. I couldn’t find any biographical information on Gettings online. If anyone knows about him or if he’s even alive today, I’d love to hear about it.

Gettings’ method is all about analyzing the underlying structure of each card. When you reduce an image to its basic geometric shapes you can see how the parts relate to the whole and read astrological or alchemical symbols into the image, adding layers of meaning. Read more

Aug 11

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Selecting an Historic Deck for Readings

Do you want to start reading with the Tarot de Marseilles (TdM) or some other historic deck, but you aren’t sure how to pick the right one for you? In the Cartomancy section I gave a run-down of decks by category and style, but I didn’t talk much about the actual selection process. Here’s how I go about evaluating a deck as a possible reading companion. Read more

Aug 8

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Comparative Tarot and the Tarot de Marseilles

A comparative tarot reading starts as a short spread using two to five cards from a deck you’re familiar with. Once the spread is laid out, you add the same cards from one or more different decks to get an alternate view of the reading. Read more

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