Category Archives: Tarot

The Sword

Posted on by
Reply
This viking sword was forged in the 9th-10th century and used in Northern, Western, and Central Europe.

This viking sword was forged in the 9th-10th century and used in Northern, Western, and Central Europe.

Swords go hand-in-hand with “knights in shining armor” or Vikings as well as gladiators and Greco-Roman soldiers. Swords are also one of the four suits (with Wands, Cups, and Pentacles) of the Tarot’s Minor Arcana. In tarot readings, swords correspond to the element of Air, and therefore signify freedom but also quick change. The Swords suit also traditionally represented the military, which implies strength, power and authority, but also responsibility, violence and suffering. Most readers today, however, interpret Swords in terms of thought and mind, ways of thinking or organizing the world even though certain of the cards retain interpretations of sorrow and anguish.

One of the four traditional tools of the occult practitioner, the sword or athame often — for practical reasons — becomes a small dagger or knife. It is used to cut and loose in a variety of circumstances or demarcate boundaries, as in tracing the outline of a magic circle or other geometric shapes (ex. pentagrams). It was also used to kill in ritual settings, such as offering a sacrifice (an animal) or in cases of alleged ritual murder.

The constellation Orion, easily identified by the 3 stars that form his “belt,” is said to depict the great warrior wielding a sword in the heavens as he prepares to strike a scorpion (which had been sent by a goddess to torment Orion); this battle between the Hunter and the hunted scorpion is said to be the reason that Orion and Scorpius (a sign of the zodiac) never appear in the night sky together. (Hungarian folklore identifies Orion with Nimrod, the great hunter in Genesis 10. In Scandinavian tradition, “Orion’s belt” was known as Frigg’s Distaff (friggerock) or Freyja’s distaff but the Finns call the Orion’s belt and the stars below it as Väinämöisen viikate (Väinämöinen’s scythe), keeping the association with the magical sword.)

In modern playing cards, the tarot suits have developed from Swords into Spades, Wands into Clubs, Cups into Hearts, and Pentacles into Diamonds.

Fortune Teller in Prague Killed by Nazis

Posted on by
4
© Kriti Bajaj | Prague Golden Lane, House 14, Madame de Thebes

© Kriti Bajaj | Prague Golden Lane, House 14, Madame de Thebes

Madame de Thebes

Madame de Thebes

Along the Golden Lane in the Prague castle complex is house number 14, the residence of the famous psychic Madame de Thebes (Matylda Průšová), who lost her son in the First World War. She was extremely sought after for her predictions, which later resulted in her being arrested and tortured to death by the Gestapo for predicting the downfall of the Third Reich. The cozy house has objects like tarot cards, a skull, and a bookshelf of books on horoscopes and astrology.

Following the 2011 reconstruction of Golden Lane, president Václav Klaus had his palm read in the home of Madame de Thebes, which was reconstructed with the help of the  recollections of one Prague woman who had her fortune told there many years  ago.

Madame de Thebes’ ghost plays a significant role in Come Hell or High Water, Part 1: Wellspring as she tries to warn Magdalena–using tarot cards–against trusting the ghost of Fen’ka.

Aquarius (January 20 — February 18)

Posted on by
Reply
Aquarius is associated with the tarot card The Star, often interpreted in terms of generosity, hope, inspiration, and serenity.

Aquarius is associated with the tarot card The Star, often interpreted in terms of generosity, hope, inspiration, and serenity.

Aquarius was known to the Babylonian astrologers who associated the constellation with the god Ea, who is commonly depicted holding an overflowing vase. Aquarius was also associated with the destructive floods that the Babylonians regularly experienced, and thus was negatively connoted. In Ancient Egypt, Aquarius was associated with the annual flood of the Nile; the banks were said to flood when Aquarius put his jar into the river, beginning spring.

In the Greek tradition, the constellation became represented as simply a single vase from which a stream poured down to Piscis Austrinus.

In Greek mythology, Aquarius is sometimes associated with Deucalion, the son of Prometheus who built a ship with his wife Pyrrha to survive an imminent flood. They sailed for nine days before washing ashore on Mount Parnassus. Aquarius is also sometimes identified with beautiful Ganymede, a youth in Greek mythology and the son of Trojan king Tros, who was taken to Mount Olympus by Zeus to act as cup-carrier to the gods. Neighboring Aquila represents the eagle, under Zeus’ command, that snatched the young boy; some versions of the myth indicate that the eagle was in fact Zeus transformed. An alternative version of the tale recounts Ganymede’s kidnapping by the goddess of the dawn, Eos, motivated by her affection for young men; Zeus then stole him from Eos and employed him as cup-bearer. Yet another figure associated with the water bearer is Cecrops I, a king of Athens who sacrificed water instead of wine to the gods.