Tarot Thrones | The Court Card Blog

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  • AnnaK Tarot | Deck Review

    Oh this is loooooovely!

    Originally self-published in 2009, the
    AnnaK tarot has now been taken up by Llewellyn – thank goodness,
    because it’s a charming little deck that deserves to be widely
    seen.

    It arrives in a nice presentation box
    along with a chunky little accompanying book of 230 pages. Not every page of the 230 is filled with writing – some are blank (well, they are lined for you to write on)  and 78 of them are the card illustrations themselves. Each
    card is illustrated in B&W with the
    interpretations on the facing page, sometimes including a little tip from Anna. 
    The deck measures 7cm x 11.5cm (3″ x 4.5″ in
    old money!) and is of thin – but beautifully slippy – card stock
    which ensures the deck shuffles like a dream from the start. 
    With an her World tree motif on the
    back (see scan below), the cards can easily be used for reversals.
    Anna K touches on reversed meanings in her accompanying book, but they are not integral to her
    use of the deck.
    Having the cards bordered in black
    really makes the colours of the deck really pop – golds contrast
    magnificently and dark cards are, erm, darker. 

    As far as card names go, no great
    changes here – suits are Swords, Rods, Pentacles and Cups with the
    Majors as you would expect (note: Strength is XI and Justice is
    VIII)
    The book also contains hints on how to read, as well as some of Anna’s own insights into using Tarot – and some spreads for you to play with too, of course!

    *rubs hands together*  Let’s dive in!
    The deck is based on the Rider Waite
    Smith and if you can read with the RWS, then you can read with the
    Anna K. It’s not a simple clone though, there ARE cards that Anna
    has depicted in a different way to the RWS – the 2 of Swords for
    example (see above).

    Despite this rooting in The Golden Dawn, Anna has
    pared back the occult symbolism. For example, there is no mention
    made of any astrological associations for the cards. However, the suits ARE
    accorded elemental associations (eg Rods are related to Fire) and the
    ranks of the courts are Page, Knight, Queen and King.  

    Each Page is depicted as a very
    young person involved in recreational activity that one might
    associate with the suit.  For example, the Page of Swords is
    practising with his Sword (literally, striking at a straw man!)
    and the Page of Wands gazes longingly over the restraining wall of his compound.
    Anna says that the Pages are ‘invitations to cultivate certain
    attitudes’.
    The Knights are interesting because
    they are not on horses (or creatures of any kind!) Anna does
    provide sufficient symbolism that you can quite easily read what the
    Courts are about. Our Knight of Rods for example, is running (just
    as he would be on his horse) with a cloudy sky behind (perfectly
    fitting the Knight’s blustery ‘rush-in’ attitude) with a banner in
    hand – a banner that obscures the perilous path that he is running
    along!
    The Queens, like the Kings, are not
    depicted on thrones. Intriguingly, the Queens are all depicted
    outside, in nature – representing ‘values or habits’. Conversely,
    the Kings are all depicted indoors (with the active King of Wands
    striding towards the outdoors!) and show outer life or actions.
    ‘Well, this is all GREAT’ you might be thinking, ‘but whaddya REALLY think of
    the deck?’
    Truthfully, I really like it. It’s perfect for a
    beginner, freeing you from the confines of Golden Dawn inspired ‘bolt ons’ such as astrological associations and complex
    alchemical/hermetical symbolism which are often not needed in a Tarot
    reading.
    Anna works from her imagination, the
    figures are not taken from life and while most of the illustrations
    are attractive (especially Death – he’s totally smokin’ hot btw!)
    her emphasis is on the card’s character’s emotion and expression, so
    if you like all your figures to be pretty and serene, this lively
    little collection might not be for you.
    To find out more about the deck, visit Anna K’s site:  This is the English language version site (Anna K is Austrian) 

  • Tarot Radio Show | 25 March 2013

    I’ve been a bit remiss at posting the links to the Tarot Radio shows, but here’s a link to the podcast culled from the 2 hour show of 29 April 2013.  Relax – it’s not a 2hour podcast, it’s about 35 minutes.  You can download it, even if it’s only for the soporific effect of a Glaswegian voice!

    https://soundcloud.com/alison-cross/radio-bute-tarot-talk-podcast

  • Tarot Blog Hop | Beltane

    You say Tomato, I say Tomato
    You spell it Judgment, I spell it Judgement
    Does it matter?! 🙂

    Welcome, welcome, welcome!

    If you’re here because you have hopped upon the Tarot Blog Hop and alighted here from either Stella or Cher’s place – I’m really pleased to see you!  If you are a regular reader and are wondering about this Tarot Blog Hop thing,  here’s the facebook details so that YOU can take part in the next one! And, of course, I’m really pleased to see YOU here again too!

    The question set to us by the Beltane Tarot blog wrangler, Arwen Lynch, is:  What traditions are important to you in how you read Tarot?

    Initially, I just stared at the question blankly:  I didn’t have any traditions, did I?  But, of course, I DO have traditions

    Here are some of mine:

    1  Rider Waite Smith tradition – yes, I like to use decks based on the iconography of the RWS.  I much prefer my Strength to be Major VIII and my Justice to be up there as Major XI.

    2  Golden Dawn attributes – everything from astrological associations, right through to the Opening Of The Key Spread, this is a whole smorgasbord of traditions that I adore dipping into with the same delight as I might  raid your jewellery box.  Or your biscuit barrel.

    3  Tarot bags and reading cloths – I like to keep my decks in bags and I like to use a reading cloth.  There’s maybe a bit of the gypsy fortune-teller in me after all – or maybe even a novice Golden Dawner – they liked a bit of shwbiz with their Tarot.  Well, what do you expect from a group comprising of theatre designers, poets and playwrights?!

    4  Getting in the Zone – I do this lots of different ways.  Maybe with a scented candle or incense.  Maybe with some unobtrusive music playing gently in the background…..ritual washing, ritual clothing. I even have ritual SOAP!  I don’t do this ALL the time, you understand, but whenever I need to bring my head away from Facebook and Syria and Bombings and Budget Cuts, I like to go through some of these little routines to get into the Zone for reading.

    And they don’t do any harm, do they?

    Or do they?

    Maybe they encourage me to become set in my ways?

    I have now pulled out some decks where Strength is in her original setting of Major XI and Justice sits at VIII and I promise *gives girl guide salute* to use these until I am comfortable with either card in either position.

    Do I really need to stick to the Golden Dawn’s impositions on the Tarot? Will the world fall down if I start to use an older deck, one that doesn’t easily fit the constraints of the GD’s systems?

    What happens if I start thinking of Wands as Air, not Fire?

    Or Knights as Fire and not Air?!

    *looks around – the world still spins on its axis!*

    Let’s challenge ourselves and our beliefs – welcome the new and embrace it if it is a truth to YOU.    There is no one ‘right’ way to work with the Tarot – so you use it for fortune-telling, someone else uses it as a writer’s prompt, yet another uses it as a tool for self-development, someone else uses it to build fabulous card towers!

    Tarot is a mongrel puppy – hailing from Europe and North Africa. At every turn it has been modified and changed – let’s not ruin that fluidity of growth by letting our traditions solidify into dogma.

    Of course, the whole shebang needs to end with a spot of theatre……. altogether now! ‘Traaaaaadition!!!!!!’

    Now, shoulder-shimmmy your way to the next blog and, if you’ve a mind to do a bit of work with the Court Cards, come back and see us here!

    Previous blog – Stella  at US Games Ltd 
    Next blog – Cher at Tarot by Cher

    Broken links?  Here’s the master list

  • Protecting Artists’ Work – can WE help?

    When I’m creating a blog post here at Thrones Towers, I like to illustrate it with one or two card images.

    Sometimes it’s the image that’s important, rather than the card.  For example, if I am blogging about masks, I might search for a Tarot card that shows a mask: I’m not concerned whether it’s the 10 of Swords or The Magician.

    Other times, I might be talking about a specific card or even a specific card in a specific deck: Would any Page of Wands card would do? Let’s pick some nice ones!  Or maybe I need the Page of Wands from Alexander Daniloff’s Tarot specifically. So, let’s go get him!

    What do I do?

    I would like to tell you that I go to every artist and ask for their permission to use their cards in my blog posts, but I don’t.

    That’s not because I don’t respect the artists that have created this work, but if I asked for permission for everything, I stand the risk of being refused or (worse?!) ignored and then unsure about whether I ought to proceed or not.  Should I ask EVERY time I want to use a card from that artist’s deck? Sheesh, Alexander Daniloff is going to get really sick of seeing my name pop up in his inbox!

    There has been some discussion on other platforms about what constitutes ‘fair use’ and I regard my blog as ‘fair use’:  I am not selling the images.  I am not passing them off as my own work.  I am commenting on the artwork or I am (I hope!) using the artworks to help with understanding the Court Cards – so they are a sort of learning tool.

    On the other hand, if I wanted to create, for example, an e-book, I wouldn’t DREAM of using an artist’s work without their permission and would expect to pay them (and possibly also the publisher) for the privilege of being associated with their artwork.

    Yet artists are finding their work popping up in unexpected places.  It can be entire copies of their hard-crafted decks, such as happens with sad regularity to the creative powers at +Baba Studios.  Will Worthington’s work, for example, has been found on giant-sized poster artworks.

    Taking someone’s work, their livelihood and making money from it without paying the genius behind the paintbrush?  That’s not on.

    There are grey areas though – what about when you sell a reading to someone and want to include a scan of the cards used in the layout?  What about if you want to use an artist’s work in the header of your blog?  *cough* Or your avatar on facebook?  Or pin an image in Pinterest?

    I think that both artist and admirer have a role to play in protecting the artist’s work.  Artists could create FAQ pages on their websites or blogs which outline what uses of their work they deem acceptable for free use (eg blog headers, avatars, newsletter header images etc)  and that for all other uses, admirers should expect to pay a fee (on business cards, in training materials etc)  And those FAQ pages would grow as more innovative uses for their artworks are put forward to them (would it be free to use a card’s image as the basis for your new tattoo, for example?!)

    We, as admirers of an artist’s work, can play a part in protecting our artists by watermarking every image that we use.  And when I say ‘watermark’ I mean any marking directly to the card image with the artist’s name, source and website. Take a look at Nimue, illustrating this blog post.  She’s gorgeous, isn’t she? She’s by Will Worthington and anyone using this image will see that.

    Marking artworks in this way will:

    1  Prevent unauthorised use of YOUR scanned card image by an unscrupulous downloader.
    2  Act as an advert for the artist if the image IS used (eg pinned on Pinterest) or shared on another blog
        because any viewer will immediately know who the artist is, where the card comes from and the url
        for the artist’s site.

    Adding a caption beneath the image on your blog is not enough, it’s not protecting that piece of art.  It doesn’t travel WITH the artwork to any another site.

    We LOVE these artists, let’s do what we can to protect their work 🙂

  • Boston

    So, there I was last night, plinky-plonking away on the ipad’s tiny keyboard with my eyes smarting from squinting in the darkness when I noticed that the TV seemed to be showing rather a lot of footage of people from Boston.  I was working with the sound turned down.  Why I didn’t just turn the damned telly off, I don’t know. I like the company.  Even if it is Jeremy Paxman.  I turned the sound up and the full horror seeped through the screen and into my living room.

    How strange to be working away diligently on a blog post about the history of Tarot cards when some person (I use that term very loosely) was blowing up a whole crowd of cheering, happy people who were simply raising funds for charity.

    Who would do such a thing?  The media speculation begins.  So I decided to speculate myself.  I reached for my RWS deck, shuffled and drew a card: 8 Cups.

    This is my take:  Whomever is behind the bombing seems to be someone who is disenchanted with how life is for them – those cups are artfully arranged to look like there is one missing.  But, of course, there ISN’T one missing (otherwise it would be the 9 of Cups!).

    Lots of people would be happy with 8 golden Cups, but not this person.  They have turned their back on their (comfortable? happy-looking?) life and headed off to seek for truth.  But what truth are they finding?  There’s no objective truth in an ideology – whatever ideology it might be.  Heck, sometimes it’s hard to find a definitive truth about ANYTHING – the sky isn’t blue, mountains aren’t solid, there are sounds and colours that are beyond our capacity to experience, Justin Bieber isn’t that good a singer.

    Does the red cloak have any significance here, for this question? Matadors have red cloaks.  Men who goad bulls to anger and violence? Little Red Riding Hood had a red cloak. She outwitted a big bad wolf.

    Maybe the only difference between a terrorist (a matador) and a freedom fighter (Little Red Riding Hood) is where you find yourself when he acts out his ideology?

    My second question was direct – Foreign or Domestic?

    The card drawn is the Queen of Pentacles.  She sits in a lush setting and is well-dressed – someone who is not short of a dollar or two.

    The Queen is not a character that you would associate with any kind of violence.  But Pentacles IS the suit of home and hearth.  Does this signify a home-grown terrorist?  Or does it just mean that the bomber is someone who feels that their hearth and home needs defended against ‘American Imperialism’?

    Or is it simply to do with money? She’s totally focussed on that Pentacle….

    How would you interpret these two cards for my questions? And have you drawn cards about this horrific act to see what the cards have to say?

    All thoughts are with the people of Boston.

  • Tarot Challenge | Day 9

    She’s the gal for me!

    Question: What card do I pull the most often? Why do I think that is the case?

    I had a look back through the Tarot cards that I have pulled when I was selecting a Court Card’s energies to guide me from a) the dark moon to the full moon or b) the full moon to the dark moon.  The card most drawn is the Queen of Wands.

    I’m quite pleased about this as I am working towards being a bit more Queen of Wandsy.

    Naturally, I think I tend to live in my interior landscape, mainly inside my head, as per the suit of Swords.  I admit that I am more comfortable relying on my thought processes than, say, on my emotions.  I find my emotions unreliable and easily influenced by things like music, art and hormones. 

    I went to an art exhibition in Glasgow a couple of years ago that featured the work of the Glasgow Boys. I got all weepy over a painting of poppies, their gorgeous petals scattered around their vase. I burst into tears.  Which was quite unexpected.  And hugely embarrassing.  I put it down to being Hormonal.  So, emotions are, for me, fickle things that can be influenced by a poorly-timed listen to a Leonard Cohen CD.


    That said, I am quite happy to change my thoughts about things if the facts call for it!

    The Queen of Wands is a Goal character for me, so maybe that’s why she appears so often?

    Have you ever played the game ‘What would Jesus/Madonna/Amanda Palmer do?’  Well, I play that game with the Tarot Court.  So when I find myself sinking into a Knight of Swords moaning session, I often try the ‘What would The Queen of Wands do?’ approach and, even if I really don’t feel like it (hey, those unreliable emotions again!) I can still take the action that SHE would advocate…..  when I can bring a bit of her can-do attitude to my day, I mostly feel myself climbing up out of the Slough of Despond.  Not that I think the fine town of Slough is a place of Despond, you understand; it’s from Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress.   *waits for the Slough fans to boycott the blog*

    So, I’d love to know – what card tends to crop up in your Tarot work, for yourself?  What does its repeated appearance mean, for you?

     

  • Tarot Challenge | Day 8

    Tarot Thrones: Thoth Tarot Death US GAmes Inc
    So beautiful, so misunderstood –
    A bit like Justin Bieber 😉

    Question:  What Tarot card do you dread pulling the most?

    I’ve given this a lot of thought and can honestly say that I don’t dread any particular Tarot card in a reading, generally.

    What I DO dread is a Tarot card coming up in a positional value in the spread that clearly means the exact opposite of what the Querant hopes to hear.  That’s tricky: giving the information in a way that supports the client, but, at the same time, remains honest to the interpretation of the card.

    Many years ago, I did a reading for a friend (that was probably my first mistake lol!) straight after her husband left her for a woman that he’d known for 6 weeks.  SIX WEEKS!!! What an INSULT!

    The majority of the cards that came out were upside down and the only card that was rightsides-up was the Queen of Swords.  THAT was a difficult reading to do!

    I think that if you use pre-selected positional values within your spreads, then this really does test your metal as a Tarotist.  There’s a big difference between having a card like, say, Death, as your incoming influences than your outgoing influences!

    That’s not to say that I never work without positional values – when you do the Opening of The Key Spread, for example, it’s a complex wee beast that would be really hideous if you had to start allocating values to each of the cards!

    ….and of course I can say, hand on heart, that the appearance of Court Cards no longer leaves me quaking in my boots!

    So, over to you now – which card do you dread pulling the most? Or, if you’re ok with all the cards, what situations in a Tarot reading leave you hyperventilating into a brown paper bag with fear?!

  • Inner Ring of Hell: imac hard drive failure

    Oh dear reader, it has  not been a good couple of weeks technology-wise.

    We had a power cut two weeks ago and the imac refused to boot up afterwards.  I accidentally reloaded Snow Leopard (the Apple OS) onto the imac when all I really wanted it to do was boot up.  But, unfazed, I attempted a ‘restore’ from the Time Machine facility.

    It meant that I would lose files back to 1 February, but that’s not the end of the world, right?

    How wrong can you be?!

    Woe! Woe! and Thrice Woe!

    Whatever it was that I did, the system backed up – but not to the hard drive as it should – but to a blummin’ FILE in the darkest, deepest recesses of the hard drive.  Not only could I not access anything from the end of February, but I could not find nor access any of the photos that I’d taken from 2008.

    Mostly of my son.  And a very ancient pain au chocolate called Kevin who lives in my bread bin.  Long story.  But you can read about him here.

    I was devastated.  Honestly, I cried more last Monday morning when I thought that I’d lost all my son’s photographs than when my dad died.

    BUT to the rescue came the most wonderful man in the world, Uth. Not his real name.  Top bloke.  Clever, good at communicating with Homer Simpson luddites like m’self, patient and kind.

    Today he spent an hour and a half on the telephone guiding me through the intricacies of getting my files back to where they should be.

    I was completely out of my depth, working in Terminal (for fellow pc fans – that’s the equivalent of out at the c prompt!) typing commands that were entirely alien to me.  Sweaty-palmed and churny of stomach, that was me.

    But he has managed to restore my files to me!!!!  And if he wasn’t married, I would be down on one knee to procure him for myself.

    Sadly, all the 2-hour Tarot shows are gone as is a lot of music…… but I might be able to get the shows (and the music) back from Radio Bute in mp3 form.  Keep your fingers crossed.

    So, here’s my question to you today – which Tarot Court card best exemplifies Ian (and me!) in our exchange today?

    Uth and me, hamming it up for the camera
    Glastonbury – many years ago!
    Jeez, my roots REALLY needed doing….

  • Tarot Blog Hop | Ostara 2013 | Snowdrop Spread

    Welcome to the Ostara Tarot Blog Hop! You may have arrived here by hopping forward from Joanne’s blog or hopping backwards from Joanna’s – or maybe you’ve just alighted on the page by chance! 

    Whichever mossy path you have taken to reach me here at Tarot Thrones, you are most welcome *pulls out a chair and proffers a plate of chocolate biscuits. Really nice ‘spensive biscuits – nothing but the best*

    If you’ve never been here before, let me explain a little about life here at Tarot Thrones – this blog exists primarily to help people with their Court Card work.  I know.  Tricky! And that maybe makes it sound a bit boooooooring here, but I hope that it’s not 🙂

    This spread was inspired by the snowdrop.  By looking at the plant’s structure, I arrived at this 8-card spread.   Take your cards and begin to shuffle, all the while thinking of the snowdrop……

    THE SNOWDROP SPREAD


    The Snowdrop

    Card 1:  The bulb that sits patiently in the darkness of the earth asks:  what nourishes me?  Because the bulb is in the ground, this may turn out to be something that you don’t initially recognise as being nourishing.  It might be a shadow energy.  Can it nourish you?

    Card 2:  The green fuse (as Dylan Thomas most memorably wrote!) that emerges from the earth, spiking its way inexorably skywards asks:  what motivates me?


    Cards 3, 4 and 5 – These three cards represent the three outer petals and together ask: what flowers within me.  The cards may be read individually or as a trio.

    Cards 6, 7 and 8 – These are the three tiny inner petals that are difficult to see (unless you look!)  and together ask:  what hidden gifts do I have?  Again, these cards may be read individually or as a trio.

    Record your reading in your journal and refer to it whenever your energies flag or you could just do with a boost to renew yourself.

    There may be cards that arise within this spread that you don’t feel fit the questions – cards that you actively dislike or feel ambivalent about.  This is the perfect time of year, the Spring Equinox, to deal with any ambivalence that you might feel regarding the cards – see whether you can bring those energies from the dark and into the light 🙂

    Should any card be unclear, pull another card to clarify the meaning.  The spread works equally well with an Oracle or Tarot deck, I find.  Because my blog is about Court Cards, you can try this variation – For Card 1, you may prefer to take 16 Court Cards from a different deck to your main deck and select a Court to see whose energies nourish you?

    I hope that you find a little time to try the spread, but now I appreciate that you must be off – forwards or backwards – to my lovely neighbours on this blog hop *waves white hankie fondly at the departing reader*  Come back and visit us again, won’t you?

  • Tarot Podcast | 18 February

    Starting off with US and ending with Mumford & Sons – an eclectic musical mix again this week!  This time we look at Julie’s reading and how she might cope with her new situation after her husband has walked out on her and their children.

    Can you imagine what I REALLY wanted to say?!