Liani's Tarot Folio

emo is a great example of a concept that has been ...

2009-11-12T20:49:49.532-08:00

emo is a great example of a concept that has been reversed. before this whole hipster irony thing took over and made it impossible for anything to be cool or embraced enthusiastically, emo was a term for a specific genre of punk music. there was not the same pejorative aura (although like "math rock" the term came from a sarcastic joke about the style) and it wasn't about depressed kids wearing the current "emo" style at all. the bands (nobody who uses the term nowadays ever heard of any of them) were excellent examples of artists who genuinely cared about the music they made, and there was nothing fake or conformist about the emphasis on emotion.

I love this perspective of the page of cups revers...

2009-10-08T22:58:04.126-07:00

I love this perspective of the page of cups reversed. Funny! Keeping it real...

Wow. While I've often related to the Pages (a...

2009-09-12T13:51:46.540-07:00

Wow. While I've often related to the Pages (and one Page in particular), I've never thought of myself as the Nine of Pentacles lady. I am terribly flattered, Ydorj, terribly flattered indeed :)

You, my friend, are the Lady of the Card. This blo...

2009-09-11T06:15:15.700-07:00

You, my friend, are the Lady of the Card. This blog is your garden. The falcon is your post. Great back story. I always love reading your work and, as always, look forward to your next hunt.

I love that you think of her as the Queen of Penta...

2009-09-10T16:15:49.867-07:00

I love that you think of her as the Queen of Pentacles. It's fun to think of the whole deck as a magical, unified landscape. A land of dreams...

Why thank you, Jaya. You know, I DID once have the...

2009-09-10T16:12:30.764-07:00

Why thank you, Jaya. You know, I DID once have the Strength card come up in a reading where the meaning was very much 'domination'. The other cards around it and the way the question was phrased all pointed to that! So, I guess it goes both ways, depending on context.

To my other blog readers, Jaya has a beautiful, beautiful site at www.sacredelephants.net and I hope you all check it out :)

I'm really enjoying your interpretations. One ...

2009-09-10T10:01:34.908-07:00

I'm really enjoying your interpretations. One of my teachers explained that the Strength card is one for "female domination." It's a tough word, "domination." I rather prefer your more fluid interpretation of softness overcoming hardness. Good food for thought!

I like to think of the Lady as the Queen of Pents ...

2009-09-09T15:03:24.684-07:00

I like to think of the Lady as the Queen of Pents strolling in her garden.

I used to think of the bird as a Peregrine Falcon, but now that you've mentioned Merlin (and the magical name), I seem to be forming a second opinion.... :D

It should come with a warning, though. In my case...

2009-09-07T12:37:41.832-07:00

It should come with a warning, though. In my case, excessive consumption led to some pretty embarrassing lounge-room dancing... and then some loud singing.

That sounds delicious! YUM! Thank you for sharing!...

2009-09-07T12:17:37.795-07:00

That sounds delicious! YUM! Thank you for sharing!

Very true... but this isn't something I'd ...

2009-09-03T15:06:01.496-07:00

Very true... but this isn't something I'd necessarily share with my clients during a paid reading! I just feel that a lot of analysis went into the original Rider-Waite deck, and so I'm trying to respect some of those 'missed' details here, in this blog for tarot people... but I wouldn't bombard a client with this stuff!

Hi Liani Having folks focusaed on mundane issues ...

2009-09-03T12:12:08.210-07:00

Hi Liani

Having folks focusaed on mundane issues does sometimes feel at odds with the depth behind the cards. It used to really bug me. Now i just try and point at the beautiful mystery and show how it relates to their question, or not. If they have the eyes to see its a great thing.

A

Liani BTW, I found in Carlyle A. Pushong's &q...

2009-09-02T11:01:30.492-07:00

Liani

BTW, I found in Carlyle A. Pushong's "Tarot of the Magi" (1969) that he describes "A scarlet Ibis, the Egyptian bird sacred to the great Hermes is in some Tarot packs ..." He goes on to describe this card as symbolising meditation, which is an interesting take on the usual "hope" and "vision" readings.

Marcus.

Dear Helen, Those are great points. While I'...

2009-08-31T10:15:42.693-07:00

Dear Helen,

Those are great points. While I'm having a lot of fun writing about individual cards, of course we never know what the nuance is until we see them laid out with their brothers and sisters in a spread, or can use intuition to relate to the querent :)

Thanks for posting! Keep 'em coming...

Liani.

I often see the different shoes that he is wearing...

2009-08-30T23:14:42.732-07:00

I often see the different shoes that he is wearing in the 7 of Wands as a sign that he is flexible but on the other hand it could also symbolise that his footing is unsure. In other words, he is not absolutely sure what it is that he is defending or standing up for here.

Either way this is often a card that represents challenges in one form or another. You know standing up for what you beleive in or maybe being too defensive.

Hi Andrew, Thanks for commenting. Yes, it makes ...

2009-08-30T11:06:30.261-07:00

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for commenting. Yes, it makes perfect sense and underlines the fact that these Major Arcana cards deal with massive themes.

I sometimes lament the fact that the average punter seems more interested in 'Is he gonna call me?' than in the wisdom shown by these cards, and particularly by the Star, which is a personal favourite.

All the best,
Liani.

Thank you, Marcus, for such a comprehensive respon...

2009-08-30T10:53:49.948-07:00

Thank you, Marcus, for such a comprehensive response! It's of great use.

I agree with you about Thoth not gelling perfectly with the Star card, to my mind anyway.

The other thing I like to bear in mind is that the early limitations of print runs (choice of maybe four colours, etc...) did affect the way some things are portrayed in earlier decks.

Cheers,
Liani.

My first thought when I read your discussion on th...

2009-08-30T10:50:13.668-07:00

My first thought when I read your discussion on the colour of the bird was of the transition of the eagle in the Thoth deck from white to red.You can see it on the Temperence card. That it was symbol of the union of opposites so often talked about in magick and alchemy.

I often see in Star a communication between opposites that brings about elevation of consciousness. Between above and below and between inside and outside. The bird being a symbol of the psychopomp or spiritual messanger it makes sense that it would appear on this card that talks about what is outside of the universe and its relation to what is inside the universe. The stars give us a view of the divine plan, the waters in the card connect our mundane self with our higher self and with the universal source.

Does that makes sense?
Andrew

The Bird of the Star Hi Liani, excellent post, go...

2009-08-30T01:39:36.604-07:00

The Bird of the Star

Hi Liani, excellent post, got me to try and trace where the bird was first identified as an Ibis. I think it's in Papus, possibly earlier in Court de Gebelin, making that old "Ancient Egypt" connection!

As we e-mailed, I've made some brief notes. To illustrate this text, please refer to many versions of the Star card shown on:

http://www.albideuter.de/html/stern.html

The bird in the PCS deck was never a permanent fixture of the Star card, appearing variously in many guises in the early origins of the Tarot. It was perhaps first identified as an “Ibis” by Papus, writing in the context of the ‘Egyptian connection’ of the Tarot. Papus (1892, Tarot of the Bohemians, p.172) gives it as an Ibis or butterfly, saying both are symbols of the soul.

The early Sola Busca deck (often cited as an influence on PCS) actually has a “winged head” whilst the earlier Marseilles deck has an unidentified bird in various colours, black, red or blue depending on the printing. Later decks use the butterfly, or the owl as the winged symbol. The Visconti deck doesn’t have a bird, nor trees, just two hills and the Star. Wirth uses the butterfly.

By the time of the Golden Dawn, Mathers describes the background images of the Star as “trees and plants grow beneath her magic influence (and on one the butterfly of Psyche alights)”. The Cipher manuscripts of the Golden Dawn draw the bird on the floor, near a pool or possibly a nest, but do not identify it. In a rarely published piece, Mathers equates the card with Juno, and hence the Peacock (The Golden Dawn Source Book, Kuntz).

Waite gives “whereon a bird alights” in Pictorial Key (1910), and Pamela Colman-Smith certainly used the Marseilles image as inspiration for this card but again it isn’t identified. As it was Waite who translated Papus, they would have probably taken it for an Ibis.

Kaplan (1972, Classical Tarot) refers to the Ibis, illustrated by the Marseilles deck.

Pollack (1980/3, 78 Degrees of Wisdom, p.123) gives the bird as an Ibis, according to “tradition” as she later writes in Tarot Wisdom (2008), sacred to Thoth, and comments on the role of Thoth as artistic creativity.

Dictionaries of Tarot symbols then state it definitely, for example, the Ibis is given in Thomson (2003, Pictures from the Heart, p. 200).

So you'll see from those brief notes the bird is a generic symbol of the soul, became identified as the Ibis during the "Egyptian Craze" and has now become set (pardon the Egyptian God pun)as the Ibis. I prefer to avoid the alchemical connection due to the colouring not being an instrinsic part of the symbol, and the Ibis identification as that corresponds to Thoth, who is better suited to the Magician card or the Moon card.

Hope that's of some use for research routes!

Marcus Katz

I've seen stuff everywhere about those tarot p...

2009-08-27T10:11:04.555-07:00

I've seen stuff everywhere about those tarot perfumes too, but am also clueless about how they smell! If anyone knows, please comment.

Haha... please let me know which decks have the mi...

2009-08-27T08:25:42.808-07:00

Haha... please let me know which decks have the mismatched shoes... not all do :)

Well, guess who will be running home and looking a...

2009-08-27T07:13:06.189-07:00

Well, guess who will be running home and looking at the feet of the person in each of her Seven of Wands cards? *grin* I'll let you know if mine fit the profile.

If you are going to act wierd, you better be able ...

2009-08-27T04:13:48.876-07:00

If you are going to act wierd, you better be able to defend yourself.
The bravest have an opinion they are willing to defend or can defend their own opinion...

Hi Liani, What a great post and a terrific insi...

2009-08-27T02:39:47.864-07:00

Hi Liani,

What a great post and a terrific insight into the Seven of Wands!

I always feel this guy is ready for anything, but you have illustrated that he is literally - even if he's just feel out of bed, mentally he's already there - sometimes it's all we need to fight another day (or an unseen adversary!)

Strangely, when we were much younger, my best friend and I used to share trainers, well, Ellesse pumps. She had red and I had blue - we wore one of each colour so we were both wearing one red and one blue. It seems silly now, but in an effort to be different (even weird?) we actually made a carbon copy of each other - and went everywhere together like it too! Not very 'individual' after all!

I especially like Polyvor - what a cool find, how creative and inspiring :)

The perfume launch did the rounds everywhere Tarot enthusiasts gather, but I haven't read any reports about how they actually smell. Have you had the chance to do that yet? Makes me want to pop into the Trafford Centre in Manchester for a little sweet smelling Tarot exercise ;)

Thanks for posting this :)

Blessings,

Catherine

Wondeful post! Thanks again!

2009-08-26T21:56:30.397-07:00

Wondeful post! Thanks again!