Tarot Thrones | The Court Card Blog

Tag: tarot court cards

  • Tarot of Delphi | J D Hildegard Hinkel | Review

    Another beautiful Tarot birth, midwifed through the process by the astute backing of many Kickstarter supporters!  The tag line for this project was ‘Know Thyself’ which is inscribed in the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, but it could just as easily be ‘Know thy Neo-classical artworks’!

    This is a 79-card deck (with an additional card permitting a choice between two Empress card styles) based on the sensuous and sumptuous classical visions of Victorian and Edwardian artists.  The card-stock (and lift-top box!) is of excellent sturdy quality and the glossy cards slip over each other beautifully.  The deck measures 3.07″w x 5.04″h and comes with a small accompanying book 66 pages long.

    Looking first at the 22 Major Arcana cards, we mostly have the traditionally titles with five exceptions:

    X (Wheel of Fortune) is renamed Threads of Fate
    XII (Hanged Man) is now The One Torn Asunder
    XV (The Devil) becomes The Siren
    XVI (Tower) transforms into Shipwreck
    XXI (The World) is renamed Garden

    Keywords for these renamed cards are familiar to those who work with RWS decks.  So, no hardship there!

    The Minor Arcana suits are as expected: Wands, Cups, Swords, Coins and the cards are fully illustrated throughout.

    The Court Cards are completely restyled as Devotee, Artisan, Hero and Enchantress.  These titles perfectly lend themselves to the style of artwork used but don’t translate directly across to traditional ranks (Page, Knight, Queen, King).

    Let’s look at the Courts in their ranks:

    The Devotees

    These characters are the courts ‘most devoted to what the suit represents’.
    Each of the card descriptions comes with details of the painting/artist and Hinkel’s observations about the card, rounded off with some useful key words.

    As an example, the keywords for the Devotee of Wands (The Priestess – J W Godward) are: “a guardian, protector, privacy…. gestation of creative ideas…. secretive”.

    The Artisans


    The Artisans are those characters ‘most able to use their suit’s qualities in productive ways’.

    Looking at the Artisan of Cups (The Roman Wine Tasters by Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema) the keywords are include ‘appraising, discernment, cultivated, objectivity’ etc which can easily be linked to the qualities in the painting used, but again, like the other ranks of the Tarot of Delphi, doesn’t obviously translate to any particular traditional rank.

    The Heroes 



    These characters are ‘the energetic, living expressions of the suit’.  What would these be – Knights or Kings? Kings are those who walk the talk, but the Knights are more energetic about their business, so again, a very individual take on a court card rank, not a straightforward rank exchange.

    Let’s look at the Hero of Coins (Hercules wrestling with Death for the body of Alcestis – Lord Frederick Leighton).  The keywords here include ‘bold, adventurous, vigour and vitality’ which can be easily applied to the character in this image and won’t be a chore to commit to memory.

    The Enchantresses


    Meet the ‘conscious application of the suit for desired ends’.  This level of mastery sounds almost Kingly, but I would be doing Hinkel a disservice if I said that the Enchantresses equated to Kings.  They are, in fact, very much their own women and our final look at the Delphi courts dips into the keywords for the Enchantress of Swords.

    This is Sybil by Lord Frederick Leighton and in the accompanying book, Hinkel explains the Sybil’s role and importance in the ancient world. Keywords here include: Sagacious, Piercing, Erudite, Prescient.

    So, what do I think of the deck?

    I think that the paintings chosen are beautiful and the eye devours each card greedily.

    The accompanying book illustrates the suitability of the painting and it is easy to see the connection between the RWS interpretations and those offered by Hinkel. It also contains a couple of spreads and many pages of image credits.

    I do, however, find the courts slightly tricky because of their unique structure. This is an issue that will lessen over time as one become more familiar with the Devotees and their compatriots.  Beautiful deck for readers experienced with the RWS, tricky (in the courts) for a beginner.

    Do you have this deck, what do you think of it? I’d love to hear your opinions.

    You can buy the deck here:  www.tarotofdelphi.com 

    *** Due to copyright restrictions, this deck is not for sale in the UK ***

    *whispers* but you COULD get it delivered to a lovely US friend who will then post it to you ;-D

  • The Kings of Shoes

    Let it not be said that I stooped to sexist lows and only gave you the shoes that the Tarot Queens might wear.  Let’s take a look at the shoes that the Kings might wear.  This blog post has the potential to save you from many insufferable dates….*

    Since all the Kings are Active in the world – walking their talk – I felt that they would all wear fairly stand-out shoes. Stand-out shoes do exactly that – make you stand out and so people will NOTICE the Kings and that’s what ALL the Kings (yeah, even the sympathetic and helpful King of Cups wants to be spotted in a crowd)

    The King of Swords

    This guy is a sharp dresser, so I picked these.  Brogues are trustworthy and sensible shoes and so are Swords.  However, the pointed toe adds an additional little Swordsy frisson, yes?  And the monochrome colour-scheme? What other suit likes to see things in black and white?

    King of Swords – sharp and sees things in black and white!

    The King of Wands

    If anyone wants to stand out from the crowd it’s the blazing King of Wands with his expansive, passionate approach to life.

    Gucci, darling

    Appearance is important to the King of Wands – after all, when he bursts into a room he’s pretty magnetic.  So I figured that he would want everyone to SEE that he is the top dog and thus picked Gucci shoes with the iconic Gucci colour bar that will make him instantly stand out from the rest of the room.

    It’s got the look of a driving shoe with that pebble sole, automatically making me think that he’s got a red Italian soft-top taking pride of place out front of the hotel!  Exactly what the King of Wands would want you to see 🙂

    And it’s a slip on shoe – something that he can kick off or pull on quickly, if his passionate nature results in a hurried rendez-vous in a cupboard somewhere (Boris Becker, I’m looking at you).

    Ladies – if you meet a man wearing these shoes, be wary – you’ll never be as important to him as he is.  And if he’s not wearing socks  either just….. RUN!

    The King of Cups

    Watery and empathetic, the King of Cups needs something that shoes he’s connected to his emotions, but knows how to manage them – what better than a deck shoe?!  Worn on all the finest yachts, dontcha know?  Need to control your craft on the water – get deck shoes!

    I would have picked a flipper, but thought that it was toooooo obvious!  I thought that this was a ‘friendly’ looking shoe.  THIS one can be worn without socks without you needing to be worried – he’ll need to be out and in the surf with these and you don’t want a water-logged white M&S sports sock to ruin the image, do you?

    The King of Pentacles

    Mr Practical is also Mr Money and I was torn as to whether we would see him in a Birkenstock or a power shoe….. and went with the Birkenstock as you can see.

    comfy and right on, man

    These are comfortable, practical shoes – but also VERY identifiable too – and fairly ‘spensive.  So you should get a fair idea of this guy’s earthy connections and also perhaps that he likes his comfort and has got the cash to spare for the best footwear.

    Of course, he would wear a welly – but the BOOTS of the courts are for another blog post.

    What sort of shoes would you have the Kings wearing?

    *a guy wearing a slip on shoe without a sock is to be avoided at all costs. Unless he’s got a yacht.  Avoid any man not wearing a sock with his shoes.  Just take my word for it.

    But a man that can handle a lace-up can handle putting up shelves.  This is my ‘suitable boy’ advice to you. You are welcome 🙂

  • Full Moon | Gemini | Knight of Swords

    The sun has swung into Sagittarius, so the silverly light of December’s full moon falls on the glinting armoured outline of the Knight of Swords, Gemini.

    I haz serious hat envy for this Knight of Swords.

    That’s peacock feathers by my reckoning and just the thing to be seen in around town this Christmas.  Also, you won’t need an umbrella with a hat brim that wide.

    One high wind, however, and you will end up in the next county…

    This golden-haired beauty is actually the Knight of Swords from the Visconti Tarot (Lo Scarabeo).

    I see that our Knight is breaking the first rule of superherodom – no capes.

    I would humbly suggest that the first rule of Knighthood should be ‘no peacock feathered picture hats’. It’s not a look that will strike fear into the heart of your opponent, bro.  Unless your opponent is wearing a fascinator.

    Would he look better in this?

    But other than the suggestion of a fancy hat and a cape for Christmas attire, what IS the Knight of Swords bringing to the table this fine full moon?

    As someone who is dominated by the element of Air, the Knight of Swords is very much a head-dweller and values the intellect over everything else.  Whatever story his head is telling him will be his truth – even if that’s at odds with his actual experiences. Neither is he entirely comfortable trusting his emotions either, preferring to go with his head over his heart any day.

    A Knight of Swords person has a lot of wind about them.  And I don’t mean ‘too many beans’ either.  They will be blustery, blowy and capricious.  Possessed of a rapier wit, he loves the ol’ verbal spar and parry.

    He (or she – the sex of the knight is neither here nor there)  makes a marvellous student – especially of mentally taxing subjects.  I can imagine him leading the university debating team and thinking deeply about such weighty issues as Ethics and Morality; working out what he believes, trying to scale his own mental Everest and work out what he stands for.

    A chat with a Knight of Swords will be fast and intelligent. You will need to be mentally agile to keep up with her train of thought, because it rattles along like an intercity express!

    On the downside, the Knight’s mercurial nature means that his point of view changes (depending on what else he has learned) and therefore isn’t the most reliable of opinions to lean on.

    But he’s fabulous if you need picture hats and capes….

    So, while the Full Moon is in the Knight of Swords:

    * Be prepared to challenge what you believe in.
    * Forgive people for changing their minds!
    * Get a cape and a hat for the coming season 🙂

  • The Wicked Queen | Snow White | Villains in the Court

    ‘Bring me back a Crunchie and a 99 cone’

    In Walt Disney’s 1937 classic ‘Snow White’ the wicked Queen is the young princess’s step-mother.  Beautiful – in a glacial Hollywood Bitch sort of way – the Queen erupts into a jealous rage when her magic mirror tells her that she is no longer the fairest in the land.

    Raven-haired step-daughter Snow White has become the most beautiful in the land! Which can only be bad news for Snowy.

    The Wicked Queen charges her hapless huntsman with the job of taking Snow White into the woods and murdering her.  To prove that the job has been done, the Queen gives him an appropriately decorated box in which to bring back her heart!

    Of course, her evil plan is thwarted and the Queen has to do the job her self.  Using her totally EBIL magic powers she transforms herself into an cackling hag and uses the same skills to poison an apple.

    Using deception and preying on Snow White’s good nature, the Wicked Queen persuades the princess to bite the apple….

    The dwarves who have allowed the house-work-mad princess to live with them rush home from their work in the mines to discover their lovely Snow White ‘dead’ on the floor.  Incensed they chase after the Wicked Queen who eventually plummets to her death, thanks to a judicious bolt of lightning.

    -o0o-

    But here’s the thing! Which Court Card would you choose to represent The Wicked Queen?  I initially decided on the Queen of Cups reversed.

    This is because, according to my Ready Reckoner Guide to Villainy in the Courts, this crime would be committed by a member of the Cups family: After all, it is perpetrated on a family member (well, step-daughter) and caused by jealousy.

    However, there is a cold and calculating side to this Queen – cruel plans (is there any other kind? lol!), a contract killing, a demand for proof, deception (transforming into hag, poisoning the apple) which makes me think that the Queen of Swords reversed is perhaps closer to the truth.

    Add to this the skeletal remains in her dungeon and we see that she’s a heartless ruler.  And there is no sign of Snow White’s father either – so, for me, it’s looking weighted in favour of the Queen of Swords.

    What do you think?

  • Tarot in Art | Besancon Tarot

    Again I have been dusting in the vaults and stumbled upon this jewel lurking in a darkened corridor, the Besancon Tarot.  Reader, there should be a cedilla underneath that ‘c’, but my keyboard won’t let me insert one *ashamed of uncouth keyboard face*

    This French Tarot by Guillaume Mann has some interesting omissions – from this image we can see that the King of Cups and Queen of Swords have had their titles removed and also their crowns, thus ensuring that this is a politically astute deck for Revolutionary France!  Better their crowns and titles swiped than their heads 😀

    Interesting to see that Major Arcana V is named  Jupiter and not The Pope.  This change wasn’t so much brought about by the Revolutionary attitude towards cutting links with the church as much as it was the church itself having been quite keen on getting rid of the figures of the Popess (Juno) and the Pope (Jupiter) from the deck – it’s not terribly dignified having the Pope as a trump in a card game that was no doubt played in inns and brothels all over Europe and goodness knows what the blessed cardinals thought of the mythical Pope Joan as the Popess!

    Created in 1795 in the town of Colmar in Alsace, this particular 78-card deck sold for £2,375.00 in November 2013.  The Besancon Tarot was a fore-runner for the IJJ Swiss

  • Meet the Family | Dame Fortune’s Tarot Wheel

    A while back I was enthusing about this Dame Fortune deck because it had a ready-made significator which absolves you of appropriating another Tarot card to use as the significator for your client.  At the time, I said that the Courts of the deck were worth a post on their own, so here they are.

    A year later.

    What can I say? I’m in a Pentacle-type sloooooooow state of mind 🙂

    I’ve written a post on the names associated with these Tarot cards, which you can read here.

    Dame Fortune’s Tarot Wheel was created by Paul Huson, the author of the excellent Tarot books, The Mystical Origins of The Tarot and The Devil’s Picturebook.


    Huson favours the tarot as it was, prior to the meddlings of those pesky kids from The Golden Dawn and draws his inspiration directly from Etteilla’s Tarot of the 1700s.

    Who was this Etteilla person and why are we interested in him?  well, that will be the subject of another post!

    Anyhoo, let’s meet the courts who have been waiting patiently for a year! Here’s my take on Dame Fortune’s courts 😀

    The suit of Coins family are depicted in a verdant green with contrasts of red, which make them a most visually striking suit.  Like The Fool, the Knave has a playful dog at his heels as he focuses on his Coin (and not in the direction of where he walks!), his axe in hand.   He’s named Lancelot.
    The Knight’s tabard is decorated with a trefoil (associated with the suit of Clubs) and he rides slowly through a lush woodland setting.
    Hopefully you will have noticed that all the Courts bear a name.  These names derive from the Paris pattern (learn more about that here).  I would love to know whether you feel the stories of the various characters influence your thoughts about them as Court personalities.
    You’ll note that none of the Knights have a name.  This is because the fashion for naming the Court cards spilled over from playing cards.  And playing cards only have Kings, Queens and Knaves 🙂
    The Queen’s robes also sport the trefoil and this Queen is named Argine. I have searched all the dusty corners of the internet for a woman of importance called Argine, but nothing has turned up.  If you can tell me who Argine was – please let me know!  It may just be a bastardisation of Regina.  I know that ‘argine ‘ is also Italian for ’embankment’ or ‘dam’. 
    Alexander is the King of Pentacles. The King’s Coin has become his shield.  He carries no weapons.  I love his horns.  The King of Pentacles is associated with Taurus and I like to think of these as his bull’s horns.

    The Swords family are largely in orange with a contrast of bright blue. They all sport spades on their regalia in some way or another, linking to their playing card suit.

    The Knave, Ogier, stands attentive while the nameless Knight’s white horse rears up – terribly chivalrous-looking, isn’t he?

    The Queen is clearly Pallas Athene – the Greek goddess of wisdom. I love the blood-like slashes of red inside her cloak – reminding us that this is a woman not to be messed with!  She looks directly towards the Knight – and he to her.  Looks quite an interesting relationship there…..

    I did read in Stuart Kaplan’s Tarot Encyclopedia that this name ‘Athene’ might actually refer to the martial Joan of Arc.

    Our elderly King of Swords is the Biblical hero, King David.  I love the Star of David on the throne and the inclusion of the harp, to remind us of the Psalms he wrote.  You can see the spade insignia on his armour and over his heart.

    The Cups are all in a deep watery blue, coupled with green and red.  The characters in this suit have no weapons nor armour (other than the Queen, Judith) Hearts are the playing card associations for this crowd and you can see this in all of the cards – La Hire’s leggings, the Knight’s jacket, in the robes of the King and the drapes that surround the Queen, as well as inscribed on each of their Cups.

    The Knave stands before a huge display of white lilies and his green scarf flows like water from his shoulder to his open Cup.  The nameless Knight is the least warlike of the four Knights – bare headed and weaponless; very much a character from a romantic tale.  Queen Judith’s cup has a lid on it – perhaps she keeps something of herself under wraps? It’s marvellous that she’s depicted with a sword (she decapitated the General, Holofernes, in the Bible tale).

    The King of Cups, Charlemagne, seems to be standing (the only King to be depicted thus) and is not depicted in armour – so he looks more like a priest than a King, don’t you think?

    The suit of Wands is depicted in blue and diamonds are their playing card symbol.

    The valiant Trojan Hector in his armour stands as Knave of Batons – his pose reminiscent of the RWS Page of Wands, I feel.  What does his baton remind you of? For me it is something quite playful, like a tent pole, rather than a weapon.

    The Knight rides forth down a cobbled path on his white horse looking much calmer than we would associate with a Golden Dawn Knight of Wands.

    The Queen is patient Rachel who waited 14 long years for Jacob to be able to wed her, her robe decorated with diamonds and clutching a spray of oak leaves and acorns (strength? endurance?). Her baton is a shepherd’s crook.  For when Jacob encounters her for the first time in their Bible story, Rachel is tending sheep. Caesar represents the King of Batons and has diamonds on his throne and carries the ‘fasces’ bundle that symbolises the power of the Roman senate.

    So what do you think of these courts? Do you like the names?  Do you like these characters – do their historical/mythical characters feed into your understanding of the cards as contemporary courts?

  • Full Moon | Taurus

    As we creep towards Yule, the nights here in Scotland are definitely chillier. I’ve unearthed my bed socks for another season and the central heating has been turned on*.  For us at Tarot Thrones, November heralds the full moon in Taurus.

    In Tarot, Taurus is represented by the King of Pentacles, so for 6 November, here’s how he will be influencing us all!

    In the Druidcraft Tarot, we see an older man who sits in his great hall in front of a roaring fire upon which a boar is roasting. I love how the carved points of the pentacle behind him look like horns!  Perched in the window is a little red-breasted robin.  The sky is darkening.  As the Stark family in that OTHER Game of Thrones might say… ‘Winter is coming!’

    Pentacles is the suit governed by the element of Earth and this, coupled with his Fiery Kingly energy tells us that the Full Moon in Taurus is a very productive time (think of how fire and elements from the earth come together to make pottery, ceramics, glass etc).

    This is a very sensuous character – he’s all about the experiencing (Pentacles/Earth) through the doing (Fire).

    He is very much at home with the finer things in life (just look at his fine robes and surroundings!) and while we may not all have the wealth that the King of Pentacles clearly enjoys, we can make the most of all the wonderful things that we DO have in our lives. Yeah, this is where I get all mushy and point out that even the dog lying snoring gently by your desk brings wealth of a sort to your life.

    Maybe not his in-sleep farting though.

    The King of Pentacles enjoys great wealth, but he is no risk-taking gambler.  His approach is steady and responsible and if you are in business, his influence shows sustainable progress.

    This full moon, he tells us:

    Be productive!
    Slow and steady wins the race!
    Enjoy life!
    Be generous!

    * How do you turn on your central heating system? Simple. You just say ‘hey baby, you are the sexiest heating system that I’ve ever seen.’  Old jokes.  Golden 😀

  • Heroes | Warriors |Worthies

    A long time ago,  I promised to show you the Court Cards from the Dame Fortune’s Tarot Wheel deck (by Paul Huson) because they are REALLY interesting: They are all named after well-known characters from classical literature and the Bible.

    I know.  CLASSICAL LITERATURE!!  THE BIBLE!!! Here on m’blog!!!!

    Before we meet those Court families, I thought that it made good sense to take a look at just why these cards bear the names that they do.

    *does the wobbly hands time thing*

    Back in the 1400s in France, it was the custom to pop names onto the face cards of the standard
    deck of playing cards. Two groups of names were common; one that
    became known as the Paris pattern and the other, the Rouen pattern.  These patterns, or lists of names,  have quite a bit of overlap and it is the Paris pattern that we are interested in today because this is the design that influenced early Tarot decks, such as Etteilla’s Tarot in the 1700s. And it is Etteilla’s deck that forms the basis for The Dame Fortune’s Tarot Wheel.
    The Paris Pattern

                       Hearts         Spades            Diamonds          Clubs
    Kings          Charles       David              Caesar                Alexander
    Queens       Judith         Pallas              Rachel                Argine
    Knaves       La Hire      Ogier               Hector          Judas
    Maccabeus *
                                                                                       Judah Maccabee

    Although we’re not talking about them today, here are the famous stars of the Rouen Pattern.

    The Rouen Pattern



                       Hearts          Spades    Diamonds    Clubs
    Kings         Alexander     David        Caesar          Charles
    Queens      Rachel           Pallas        Argine          Judith
    Knaves      La Hire          Hector      Ogier            Judah Maccabee **
                                                                                 Judas Maccabeus
                                                 

    Info from the International Playing Card Society website                                                                
    You will have noted, because I know that you are a clever and discriminating personage, that there is a Tarot rank missing – the Knights are not included in either the Paris or Rouen Patterns.  There’s nothing sinister about this, just that in ordinary playing card decks (where these patterns come from) there were only the three ranks of King, Queen and Knave.   We’ll be talking about this again when we get on to the Sola Busca Tarot in a week or so, because it’s contrary!  I know, it’s almost like I’ve PLANNED these posts.

    13th century ‘Nine Good Heroes’
    (City Hall, Cologne)

    It was also suggested to me that the Nine Worthies (Neuf Preux) play a role in the names selected for the Paris and Rouen patterns.

    These Worthies were famed rulers of the Christian, Jewish and Pagan worlds and were first mentioned in a chanson de geste (a type of epic poem), ‘Voeux du Paon’  (‘The Vows of the Peacock’) by Jaques de Longuyon around 1312 – all about chivalry.

    It seems likely that similar chivalric tales (which were all the rage) influenced the naming of the cards in both the Paris and Rouen patterns.  

    The Nine Worthies 

    Pagan         Hector, Alexander and Caesar
    Jewish        Joshua, David, Judas Maccabeus
    Christian    King Arthur, Godfrey of Bouillon,  Charlemagne
    I’ve highlighted the overlapping names in the Paris Pattern with the Worthies in red.

    * Edit:  Paul Huson very kindly commented on this blog post and provided the following correction:  “Judas Maccabeus was one of the Nine Worthies but his name was never attached to the Knave of Clubs. From 1490 the Knave in both Rouen and Paris patterns bore the name “Lancelot” (of Camelot fame) although the name “Roland,” another name from French legend, was briefly tried but didn’t last”. 

    In the late 1300s,  Lists of 9 Lady Worthies were created, but only Judith seems to be an overlapping name. However, the Lady Worthies seem to change depending on who is creating the list!
    So while the Worthies must have influenced the naming of many of the male characters in the Paris system for playing cards,  the sources of the Lady Worthies just seem to be sourced from the Bible (Judith and Rachel), Argine isn’t a name that I’ve managed to find as a heroine anywhere (but it means ‘dam’ or ‘bank’ in Italian) and Pallas will be referring to the Greek goddess, Pallas Athene.
    King Arthur and Lancelot need no introductions from me but some of the others might need a Big Up:  La Hire was a French military commander during the 100 Years War and comrade of Joan of Arc and although Ogier (The Dane) was one of Charlemagne’s Knights, he became more widely known as a subject of European literature.
    Anyway, now that we’ve cleared all that up, I hope that you’re all geared up to meet Dame Fortune’s Families……in Monday’s post!

  • Courts in Court | Crime Families | Corleones & Krays

    He’s going to make you an offer
    you can’t refuse……

    My good friend Viv had another stroke of genius the other day (to see previous strokes, and stitches, visit her blog!) and suggested that m’blog would be a great place to discuss the Courts and chat about their various criminal inclinations.

    And it’s an INSPIRED idea!

    So who do you think are our Corleones? our Sopranos? our Luccheses? our Krays?

    And let’s not forget those dastardly Partridges (for crimes against music, of course).

    Let’s set the mood…..

    Historically, of course, our cards HAVE been associated with various Italian families – none of whom were squeaky clean – the Sforzas, the Viscontis, the Estes to name but three.

    And let’s not forget that Mafia gangs are referred to as families!  In later posts (if you like the idea!) we will look at the individual capofamiglia (family head), the soto capo (underboss) the consigliere and the foot soldiers!

    From a contemporary point of view, being aware of our Court Families’ darker sides can only help us flesh out these characters – either to help us choose significators or to help deconstruct a personality type that arises in a reading.

    In this first post, I thought we could look at what sort of crimes would apply to the families generally:

    Wands are assertive, active and passionate 

    For me, this means that any crime involving violence would fall within the remit of a Wands crime – murder, attempted murder, assault, rape, mugging, physical abuse, torture, kidnapping……

    Swords are logical, communicative and largely brain-powered

    This makes them eminently suitable for fraud, deception, scams, cyber-crime, trolling, identity theft, counterfeiting, extortion, blackmail, revenge porn.  Although breaches of contract etc are not crimes, but civil matters, I’d have the Swords represent this sort of nastiness too.

    Cups are to do with love and relationship 

    The darker side of the Cups would mean that any crime against a family member or someone that you have a relationship with would bring in Cups energies.

    So crimes such as fratricide, matricide, patricide,  stalking (even if it’s a relationship in your head lol!) would count as Cups crimes.   I would count the ‘assisting’ part of assisted suicide as a Cups crime, although suicide isn’t treated as a crime any more (although up until 50 years ago in the UK it was)

    Pentacles is associated with home, wealth and health

    Any property crimes – vandalism, burglary, bank heists, fly tipping, etc would be Pentacles crimes. Also anything to do with getting cash – bank robberies, shop-lifting etc

    Of course, they will overlap and blend, but even if you can pin down a type of behaviour to two suits, it will help you talk about their darker sides:

    For example:

    – The violent burglary of a family member would tick the Wands, Pentacles and Cups boxes.

    When crimes are blended, which aspect would you prefer to focus on – the violence involved? the fact that it was from family? or the theft itself?

    Obviously, I lead a very sheltered life and the lists of crimes here don’t cover everything.  And your associations for the suits might be quite different – if you regard Wands as blustery and airy, then the attributes of the Swords families crimes would better suit your Wands famiglia 🙂

    Which crimes do I need to which family? Make your suggestions in the comments and I’ll add them in!

  • Full Moon in Aries | Queen of Wands | October 2014

    *claps hands* bring this woman a thermal vest!

    In October the silver light of the full moon falls on Aries, or as we know her Royal Highness here at Tarot Thrones, the Queen of Wands.

    Since this is also a lunar eclipse, that silver light will turn a dark and earthy red as the shadow from our own little rock falls across the face of the moon.

    Technically, the moon is full at a whisper off midday on the 8th of October, so celebrate it when you can!  If you live in Western North America, you lucky things get to see the full lunar eclipse Here in the UK, we’ll see nothing! PAH!

    Not only will this be a lunar eclipse, it will also be a SELENELION.  Which is NOTHING to do with sealions and everything to do with fancy-pants atmospheric conditions.

    You can read about it here.

    Anyhoo, to mark the lunar eclipse and the marvellousness of the Selenelion we witness the appearance of the Queen of Wands energy in our inner lives.  Here’s the Enchantress of Wands from the Tarot of Delphi, resplendent in her diaphanous red robe.  I think it may be time to send a Page down to the boiler room to instruct the ceremonial turning on of the central heating here at Thrones or she’s going to catch pneumonia…..

    So what is the Queen of Wands saying to us this Full Moon?


    The combination of Water (Queenly energy) and Fire (Wands energy) gives the Queen of Wands a tricky balancing act to cope with:  On one hand, the passion, fire and action that her Wands behaviour requires must not be drowned into ineffectuality and paralysis by her emotional nature.  On the other, she must make sure that her loving and caring watery side is not steam-rollered over by her enthusiastically assertive (and some might say aggressive) traits either.

    How does she do this?

    The Enchantress tells us that this is a fantastic time for getting active and fired-up about something that makes you feel quite emotional.  It’s time to take a stand!

    This might take the form of:

    volunteering to help at a local charity shop
    running a 10k in memory of someone that you love
    signing on-line petitions against animal cruelty
    March against social injustice

    Today is a good day to let your playful, sexy side have a bit more free reign – you can catch many more flies with sugar than you can with vinegar ;-D  And The Queen of Wands is an utterly irresistible charmer when she puts her mind to it!

    Considering the glyph for Aries, it maybe time to pluck those eyebrows?!  Unbutton one more blouse button? Sit with your knees apart and raise some, erm, eyebrows!

    *pssst* – put your hands up if you prefer the Queen of Wands to represent Leo?