Those wonderful old fashioned Thomson Leng spreads

[katrinka]

Hi all, I'm currently immersing myself in the Thomson Leng, and I want to share the spreads ITT. It's my hope that some of you try them out here - use any deck you like.
And bear in mind that I'm no expert with this deck yet, I just got it yesterday and it's very different from what I'm used to in some ways. But they're good ways.

It occurs to me that, since the deck was published in 1935 in the UK, people would have had it in the house during the Blitz. I think some people would have consulted it to see if their homes would be safe, and if their men would return alive. When we're worried and we have no way of knowing something, we turn to cards. So it's an important deck historically. Probably a lifeline for some.

The average person using these cards would have been following the instruction booklet. And yes, there's some BS in there, like the Egypt story. But it's solid old school card reading and I think that some people got to be very good readers with just the instructions and plenty of practice. They probably had no other Tarot literature in the house. So I'm going to outline the spreads included. As mentioned, feel free to post yours here.

And, as with anything else, a big grain-o-salt may be needed. So just have fun with it. 😉

The Royal Road of Life
For the Royal Road of Life method, divide the pack into two lots - the Major cards and the Suit cards. The Questioner begins by drawing one Major card and laying it face up at the top. She then draws ten from the Suit cards and places them, as she draws them, underneath the Major card, and along the foot, as shown in the diagram.You now draw another Major card and place it above the last card (No. 10). The diagram makes this quite clear.
Now read your fortune from the top of the road down, and to the end. Take special heed of the card at the turn of the road.

 

M

1

2

3

4

5           M

6 7 8 9 10

Here's mine:

 

 

It makes sense. I was an only child, so, the Hermit. As a young adult, I was always broke. No career focus, lol. That stuff still makes my eyes glaze over. I'm supposed to get excited over that? As the old saw goes, "Working for The Man sucks!" LOL.  And there's the 7 of Cups, that spiel people used to give me: "The world is your oyster", "You can do anything you want if you put your mind to it", "I wish I was your age and knew what I know now", etc. It was BS - youth is no guarantee of wealth. I didn't really even want a career - my generation grew up thinking we'd be housewives like our moms and grandmas. I didn't aspire to anything else, but that got taken off the table. I guess Uncle Sam wanted more tax dollars. So I had to get out there and grub for a living, and I did. It was poverty wage for a long time, then things eventually got better. I'm still technically low income, but I'm comfortable.

The King of Rods puzzles me. I'm supposed to pay special attention to it, but there was no Rods man who altered the course of my life. The instructions say "This card shows that you will succeed in any undertaking, and announces some pleasant and quite unexpected news. It also proclaims you to be a person of honesty." I'm not sure what it refers to. Maybe I should start playing the numbers? IDK.

The stuff at the end looks like work gets overwhelming. 10 of Wands is normally a big burden. Like work gets to be too much, so I file for social security (if we can stop Trump) and live on air, essentially. (A fixed income is tough, but it's much better than the streets!) But the instructions say "...you will shortly visit a strange town and you may find yourself called upon to face difficulties through no fault of your own." That sounds like something that happened 14 years ago! Is most of this stuff behind me? I'm OK with that.
 

Yet to come is 4 Pence, which I take to mean pinching pennies. But the LWB says, "A chance you take will be successful." Remind me to start buying those lottery tickets!

Finally, we have 6 Pence + Great Priest. The normal Tarot interpretation in this position would be practicing acts of charity and kindness in preparation for death. Getting religion in the foxhole. But for the 6 Pence, the LWB advises caution, and warns of financial disputes. As for the Great Priest, it promises an alliance: "a big change indicated, as a result of opportunity accepted." OK, that hasn't happened yet. I still have a few more good years in me, lol.

 

All in all, a mixed result. I need to spend a LOT of time with this deck, lol.


 

Edited August 26, 2020 by katrinka

[TheFeeLion]

What an interesting spread! I might have to give this a go soon. I'm curious to see what comes up... 

[Decan]

I read your review with interest regarding this deck. I like its style (even with this yellow!), and its Knapp-Hall side is interesting (actually I considered myself to order the Knapp-Hall at some point, but finally I didn't because I found it too complex when I looked at the resources for it).

This deck looks a better Knapp-Hall regarding practical fortune telling. That they changed the elements with the Swords/Cups/Rods/Pence is possibly what I could be uncomfortable with though. Well, an interesting little deck for sure, and an interesting spread here!!

I don't know the meanings of these cards in this particular deck but it seems that things end in a much better way than it begins (the 2 first cards and the 2 last cards). Could the Great Priest be a teacher in this deck, or a man with religious values?

[katrinka]

39 minutes ago, Decan said:

I read your review with interest regarding this deck. I like its style (even with this yellow!), and its Knapp-Hall side is interesting (actually I considered myself to order the Knapp-Hall at some point, but finally I didn't because I found it too complex when I looked at the resources for it).

There's a few other decks with Eudes Picard style Minors. I can't stomach the art, especially what they did to Wirth's Majors, but for people who like this kind of thing, these are options:
 

39 minutes ago, Decan said:

This deck looks a better Knapp-Hall regarding practical fortune telling. That they changed the elements with the Swords/Cups/Rods/Pence is possibly what I could be uncomfortable with though. Well, an interesting little deck for sure, and an interesting spread here!!

Yes, if you rely heavily on elements in your readings, it could get sticky.
It doesn't really bother me. I tend to glance at the spread, note if there's a majority of a certain suit (EX: "Oh, sh--! You've got a lot of Swords here!) and move on to other things.

39 minutes ago, Decan said:

I don't know the meanings of these cards in this particular deck but it seems that things end in a much better way than it begins (the 2 first cards and the 2 last cards). Could the Great Priest be a teacher in this deck, or a man with religious values?

Possibly. Good call!

 

 

[ballerina]

Spoiler

 

I love The Royal Road of Life spread.  Thanks for sharing katrinka.

 

Edited August 31, 2020 by ballerina
There are no hidden contents but don't know how to get rid of the line.

[Decan]

At first I thought that they sell the Thomson Leng Tarot to the US only, because the seller is living there, but I realized that they live in the UK (Northen Ireland) and I'm not sure if they ship the deck within the UK too, it's a bit odd.

I sent a little email to let them know that in France we receive the packages from abroad! But?...

Edited September 19, 2020 by Decan

[katrinka]

Did you hear back from them?

[Decan]

4 hours ago, katrinka said:

Did you hear back from them?

No, they didn’t answer. I think they just want to send their deck to the US.

[katrinka]

@Decan - Found it! "Free delivery worldwide": https://www.tarotcollectibles.com/store-policies-page.html

[Decan]

31 minutes ago, katrinka said:

@Decan - Found it! "Free delivery worldwide": https://www.tarotcollectibles.com/store-policies-page.html

Thanks! Informations are conflicting. On this page there is no restriction regarding countries (apart Russia and Ukraine), but on the Thomson Leng page "US only" means they just ship to the US. For another deck I saw "US and Canada only". 

There is something I don't understand completely; I asked them though, but no answer.

Edited September 22, 2020 by Decan

[katrinka]

That's weird. Maybe the printer they use for that one only ships inside the US? But mine took a good while to arrive. I wish I'd looked at the packaging more closely.
Write them again. The squeaky wheel gets the oil!

[Decan]

I'll let pass the week if they are overworked currently; possible I don't know even if people generally answer pretty quickly to emails, or never.

Or I'll invoke the Great Spirit, another option 😄

[katrinka]

I'd offer to order it and ship it to you, but the combined cost of the deck + shipping is pricey. Shipping looks a little tricky, too, there's apparently a customs form that has to be filled out. And that's without any customs you might have to pay.

If you really want it, we can do that, but it could easily run over $100 USD. Better to get the seller's attention!

 

 

 

Edited September 22, 2020 by katrinka

[Decan]

Thanks for the intention, it's much appreciated! I also think that it would be better that I get the seller's attention, indeed!

"Tax at customs" resonates like something horrific one Halloween day 🥶, and from the UK (at least until december 2020) there is no tax, after that we'll have to pay (Brexit).

[ballerina]

I just got a reply from them about the shipping - at least to Canada.  It seems it is all going to Canada at the moment but during early covid-19 days shipping to Canada was iffy so they stopped shipping to Canada as did many other online retailers.  Now, however they are shipping to us again but don't want to bother changing the website just yet in case it all goes south again.

 

[ballerina]

I don't think my edit is going to go thru so I'll just say here they emailed me back immediately so maybe send again to get current shipping info to your country.

[katrinka]

Double post. Mods please delete.

Edited September 22, 2020 by katrinka

[katrinka]

2 hours ago, ballerina said:

I just got a reply from them about the shipping - at least to Canada.  It seems it is all going to Canada at the moment but during early covid-19 days shipping to Canada was iffy so they stopped shipping to Canada as did many other online retailers.  Now, however they are shipping to us again but don't want to bother changing the website just yet in case it all goes south again.

 

Ah, it may be the same with France. Do mail them again!

[katrinka]

In the meantime, I'd totally forgotten this thread and neglected it half to death. So here's another spread, a leisurely one that involves separating the Minors and counting cards:
 

T H E   M Y S T I C   S E V E N S
 

(I love the atmospheric names of these. They're BS, but they have a wonderful old-fashioned ambience that reminds me of 1920's - 1930's fortunetelling guys in turbans. 💖)

"Here you have another and very interesting way of laying out the cards. In this method you only use the Suit Cards. The Major cards are taken out of the pack.

 

First, take from the Suit Cards the four sevens - Seven of Rods, Seven of Cups, Seven of Swords, Seven of Pence, and lay them on the table to form a square, but not touching each other. (See the shaded cards in the diagram on the opposite page.)

The one whose fortune is being told shuffles the remainder, draws out any three cards and discards them.

Now, holding in your left hand the forty-nine cards you have left, count these out, taking every seventh card.

 

The first seventh card which stands for the head is placed on the centre top (No. 1 in diagram). The second seventh card which stands for your left eye is placed in No. 2 position and the other seventh cards in the numbered order indicated. The third card laid down stands for your right eye, the fourth for your left hand, fifth for right hand, sixth for left foot, and seventh for right foot.

See that these seven cards you have just drawn touch the four already on the table.

Read your fortune in the numbered order."

(I love the way that's written - the hyphenated "forty-nine" reminds me of old books! The kind with words like "to-morrow". 🥰)

 

 

OK, here's mine, a general:

 

Next post will be the interpretation.

Edited September 23, 2020 by katrinka
One of the photos posted twice. Ack.

[katrinka]

Damnit, I was on the LAST CARDS, parked my cursor in the wrong spot, went to another page and everything disappeared! I used to be able to just click the reply box and everything would come back - what gives?

(I hate Microsoft with the fire of 1000 suns.  If I want to navigate to another page, I'll CLICK, damnit.)



Anyway, short version (lest I lose all my text again 😣)

Left side is receiving. Right side is giving.
Eyes take things in. Hands work. Feet take us places.
Every card touches at least one 7, so I read the combos.

I do my own thing. You do you, just leave me alone - that's indicated by the 9P touching the 7R and 7C. There will be business propositions coming up, I need to be careful as not everything is on the level. The left side of the spread touching the 7 of Swords is especially problematic. Still, this is fairly auspicious altogether. There's definitely opportunities in the works, I just need to exercise caution.
 

[Decan]

Interesting old fashioned spread, indeed.

Counting cards seems to be a very popular way to deal with spreads in the past. Otherwise this deck has something of the Albano regarding its very intense colors.

(otherwise I sent them another message with messenger on facebook -they have a page-, I will let pass a few days but if they don't answer I won't insist though, because I'm the customer so I won't beg for buying a deck, lol 😄 )

[ballerina]

Just to let you know - I used the chat box on the contact page on their website.  Maybe they check some places more than others.  🤔

[Decan]

58 minutes ago, ballerina said:

Just to let you know - I used the chat box on the contact page on their website.  Maybe they check some places more than others.  🤔

Thanks @ballerina I copy-pasted my message of yesterday there, and  then I sent it, but I got the following message in red "unable to send, please try again".

Lol, it's must be a joke 🤪

I never faced this sort of situation for a deck of cards, really weird, I shouldn't insist anymore for now.

ETA: situation unblocked! 🙂

Edited September 23, 2020 by Decan

[ballerina]

Wow! So sorry! Maybe you should look at getting another deck!  😉

[Decan]

4 minutes ago, ballerina said:

Wow! So sorry! Maybe you should look at getting another deck!  😉

I edited my last post @ballerina, the situation is unblocked and just ordered the Thompson! Ha ha!