On 10/26/2021 at 9:26 AM, katrinka said:

 

That's EXACTLY what makes a good deck, AFAIC.

I agree.

I was exploring this older (I can't say vintage since it was published in 1982) Freudian, classical and avant-garde oracle. Actually difficult to label it!

Classical because it is a cartomantic deck, and avant-garde because it was pretty unusual to create a deck like that in 1982 I guess (you have 3 cards for the querent, the 3rd one is for a querent of the "3rd type") and you have 5 cards for sexual partners (depending whether there are straight or gay, even if there are several, it's the card of libertinism, we likely could say debauchery, lol), and all this with these gentle houses and landscapes on the cards 😁

It will be distracting to study it!

You have 67 cards, the size is fine, not too small, not big.

No title, but numbers only. The cards which share a same subject have the same image on it (either the same house or scene, often, generally not people). I have to check that though since not everything is explained in the LWB, but there are obvious things you have to think about and to deduce by yourself.

For example the symbols at the top or at the foot aren't explained, but when these are genitals, well... you see. The square is probably for what is material (health too), the Heart for love; the yellow spirals could refer to energy but I'm still unsure for now and there are a few more (hands of several colors, clouds).

 

The cards are read upright and reversed, but there are cards with the same meaning when they are reversed.

10 cards in the decks are also said a major importance, so they likely dominate when pulled.

And you have 12 figures (Jack/Queen/King) of Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs, Spades. The figures of the same suit share the same main image and it broadly has a connection with the suit. For the figures the meanings don't look that different than the playing cards.

 

In the LWB you have each of the cards shortly explained: one sentence for the meaning upright, one for the meaning when reversed. You have to compare that with the words written directly on the card.

And there is also another part with combinations of cards for each of the cards (about 4 or 5 combinations for each); so here it's interesting but it's something to think about and to compare.

A third part in the LWB explains spreads.

 

It's what I can say for now. So you have to take your time with this one, and to think!

Oddly you find Buddha on the card 20 (the card refers to felicity and is one of the card considered as more important). The card showing a portal (beside the one depicting Buddha on my pic below) is the Death card (13): "change" when upright, "decease" when reversed.

Here for the combo 20 + 13 I guess an interprétation would be a state of emotional contentment that will lead to an important change.

Very unusual deck but interesting!

 

Edited October 28, 20214 yr by Decan

Thanks, @Decan!
I was never attracted to it - there's something a bit drab about the art - but the system sounds fascinating and certainly not drab! I'll keep an eye out for a copy. 🙂
 

5 minutes ago, katrinka said:

Thanks, @Decan!
I was never attracted to it - there's something a bit drab about the art - but the system sounds fascinating and certainly not drab! I'll keep an eye out for a copy. 🙂
 

Lol, yes, it looks a bit an old-fashioned grandmother's deck, but has something "avant-garde".

Maybe not for all querents, but particularly for those who have a very complicated love life! Anyway it could be distracting to study that deck 😁

Edited October 28, 20214 yr by Decan

Hey Decan 🙂  So I googled this deck and one of the first hits was this 2010 review by one of our active members here @marinaoracles.

https://marinaoracles.blogspot.com/2010/11/saturnatic-review-oracle-alma-bose-by.html

Thanks @bastetly, I knew that Marinaoracles owned this deck (because of a post of her elsewhere) but wasn’t aware of this review, which fits my first impressions!

Its art won’t provoke an earthquake, but it has a kind of old charm though.

Edited October 30, 20214 yr by Decan

13 hours ago, Decan said:

Thanks @bastetly, I knew that Marinaoracles owned this deck (because of a post of her elsewhere) but wasn’t aware of this review, which fits my first impressions!

Its art won’t provoke an earthquake, but it has a kind of old charm though.

Yes, your similarities are noted!  You both brought up the strange emphasis of sexuality of cards that otherwise have mostly docile postcard scenery.  I think the "bag of d*cks" imagery would throw me off every time though lol.   Although sex is a major theme in life certainly.  Not for me anymore, sadly and yet THANKFULLY.  The DRAMA burned me out!  So a most strange, and very different oracle.  Glad you posted about this!  

3 minutes ago, bastetly said:

Not for me anymore, sadly and yet THANKFULLY. 

It's nice getting our brains back after having them hijacked by hormones for 40+ years, I think. 🤣

3 hours ago, katrinka said:

It's nice getting our brains back after having them hijacked by hormones for 40+ years, I think. 🤣

So true 😂   It makes the aging process worth it  👺   🤣🤣🤣

11 hours ago, bastetly said:

Yes, your similarities are noted!  You both brought up the strange emphasis of sexuality of cards that otherwise have mostly docile postcard scenery.  I think the "bag of d*cks" imagery would throw me off every time though lol.   Although sex is a major theme in life certainly.  Not for me anymore, sadly and yet THANKFULLY.  The DRAMA burned me out!  So a most strange, and very different oracle.  Glad you posted about this!  

LOL, the infamous debauchery card is numbered 15, it's probably intentional since the Death card in this oracle (the Portal, see my pic) is numbered 13.

Its "particular vibe" doesn't fit my life, but it fits the world we are living in now, with hypersexualization.

Anyway, all the deck isn't about this, but the topic of sexuality won't be avoided with this oracle deck. The mysterious Alma Bose (we know almost nothing about her) "saw" the world we are living in now about 40 years before!

Edited October 31, 20214 yr by Decan

In the Petit Oracle des Dames, Card No. 1 is the 8 of Diamonds, but it also recycles the art from The World in the Grand Etteilla. But it gets worse. Card No. 12 uses the art from The Wheel of Fortune in the Grand Etteilla for its reversed position, and has no playing card association. As if to make up for that, Card No. 25 is the 6 of Clubs upright, and the 5 of Diamonds reversed. Decks that seem to derive from an Ancient Tradition tend to be the best liked, and this deck is lacking there.

1 hour ago, Quadibloc said:

In the Petit Oracle des Dames, Card No. 1 is the 8 of Diamonds, but it also recycles the art from The World in the Grand Etteilla. But it gets worse. Card No. 12 uses the art from The Wheel of Fortune in the Grand Etteilla for its reversed position, and has no playing card association. As if to make up for that, Card No. 25 is the 6 of Clubs upright, and the 5 of Diamonds reversed. Decks that seem to derive from an Ancient Tradition tend to be the best liked, and this deck is lacking there.

When they created the Petit Oracle des Dames, it's possible that the Grand Etteilla was popular in esoteric clubs since Etteilla was well-known, so I guess it's for that.

Now the Grand Etteilla isn't really popular or used.

I have a copy but never really used it.

One of the problems could be the method, I remember that Etteilla wrote to read the cards from the right to the left and he had a few other personal ideas but I'm not an expert about his way to deal with cards. There is this famous idea that all the mysteries came from ancient Egypt, well, it could be a French idea since I read this many times!

Edited February 20, 20224 yr by Decan

5 hours ago, Decan said:

When they created the Petit Oracle des Dames, it's possible that the Grand Etteilla was popular in esoteric clubs since Etteilla was well-known, so I guess it's for that.

Now the Grand Etteilla isn't really popular or used.

I have a copy but never really used it.

 

I use mine. It borrows images from Etteilla Tarot, but it doesn't really seem to be based on it. It seems closer to the parlor decks, like the Sybille des Salons and the Livre du Destin. Not exactly the same, but created in the same spirit. It might be interesting to compare it to Petit Etteilla, but I wouldn't really expect it to line up with that, either. It's a bit of an outlier - but an easy deck to read with.
 

5 hours ago, Decan said:

One of the problems could be the method, I remember that Etteilla wrote to read the cards from the right to the left and he had a few other personal ideas but I'm not an expert about his way to deal with cards. There is this famous idea that all the mysteries came from ancient Egypt, well, it could be a French idea since I read this many times!

 

Yes. Antoine Court de Gébelin started that, if I'm not mistaken.

I recognize that I have gaps regarding the history of the Tarot so I trust you!

What we read is more or less the same with ancient Egypt ; I guess Egyptology was fascinating at that time.

When I said that I never really use my copy, I meant my Grand Etteilla Tarot.

Yes, the Petit Oracle des Dames is different, and his author wasn’t Etteilla, I remember there is a confusion about that (an old thread on a forum somewhere).

11 minutes ago, Decan said:

I recognize that I have gaps regarding the history of the Tarot so I trust you!

What we read is more or less the same with ancient Egypt ; I guess Egyptology was fascinating at that time.

When I said that I never really use my copy, I meant my Grand Etteilla Tarot.

 

Ah. I can't recall the last time I used mine either. I should dig it out and see whether I want to hang on to it or pass it on.
Sometimes I put a deck away and forget it's there. Other times, it's just not that good.
Etteilla Tarots are something I don't really see people using often. Of course, that in itself means nothing. A lot of great decks aren't popular, and a lot of popular decks are stinkers.
 

11 minutes ago, Decan said:

Yes, the Petit Oracle des Dames is different, and his author wasn’t Etteilla, I remember there is a confusion about that (an old thread on a forum somewhere).

 

It's Etteilla in looks only, lol.

Comments on a few mentioned decks:

 

The Grail Tarot is one of my favorites for meditation, though I've never tried actual readings with it. I too love the panorama produced by the majors, and by each suit of the minors. And I love the Templar symbolism; I still have a lot to learn.

 

The Medieval Scapini: it depends on which printing you get. They weren't all printed in the same country; the older decks (with the cut-out on the box) are much clearer. When I got mine I had a choice, luckily; obviously I have the good one. 😍

 

As for not enough love, I always think of the Arcus Arcanum; it's a brilliant deck, but when we were doing the deck study over on AT (and I think we only got halfway through the majors), we only had about 3 people posting. Another deck that NOBODY talks about is the Prairie; my copy is in hiding somewhere, but I always want to use it in the summer. It translates RWS imagery into 19th-century Americana and does so brilliantly. 

57 minutes ago, Morwenna said:

Another deck that NOBODY talks about is the Prairie; my copy is in hiding somewhere, but I always want to use it in the summer. It translates RWS imagery into 19th-century Americana and does so brilliantly. 

 

The Prairie is great! Beautiful art and a really good reader for me, but I never see anyone talking about it. It has one of my favorite Temperance cards ever.

 

Edited April 14, 20242 yr by Laura Borealis

I agree; this card illustrates the concept brilliantly!

I like the Gothic Tarot of Vampires a lot, but very few share my enthusiasm for it. 

This is my absolute favourite deck, which has been christened the "Rancid Vibes Deck" by my friends because, well, its vibes are rancid. I agree with them, but also love it though, because it is so simple to work with, and I've never seen another one like it. It's a 32 card deck, numbered like a French suited Skat deck (7,8,9,10,B,D,K), and I usually read it as a Große Tafel like you would with Zigeunerwahrsagekarten or German Kipper, which I suspect it's related to: 

 

 

(I would also love to know more about it, who published it and what for, etc! The person I bought it from got it from a guy who picked it up secondhand in the 1980s, who thought it was made in the 1940s - The "1927" on one of the cards makes me wonder if they were actually made in 1927, but other than that they have no box, no name, no instructions or anything. So I am really hoping that in sharing them, I'll find an answer!)

 

But yeah, it is a deck that it's very easy to hate - As a Romany person, I have a bit of a morbid interest in how fortune telling both often saved us and condemned us, and a fashionable, modern, forward-looking fortune telling deck based on our Zigeunerwahrsagekarten, made in the Weimar Republic, feels like an important nodule in that history.

1 hour ago, Woland said:

... (I would also love to know more about it, who published it and what for, etc! The person I bought it from got it from a guy who picked it up secondhand in the 1980s, who thought it was made in the 1940s - The "1927" on one of the cards makes me wonder ...

Wow! It's sooo strange. There are a couple ppl on here who know more about these old skool fortune telling cards. I know nothing about the 32 card decks. @akiva knows more about them. 

 

Yours is interesting b/c we moderns are used to photo collage decks in the Age of Photoshop. But if this was a "photocollage" deck from 1927 or even 1940s. How common was that? Maybe pretty rare? idk. Did they have color photos in 1927?

@Woland I don't see any rancid vibes there 😁, it's such a cool looking deck! Antique decks seem to read the best too. 

Do you base your interpretation of the card off of the image and keyword? 

 

6 hours ago, Woland said:

I would also love to know more about it, who published it and what for, etc! The person I bought it from got it from a guy who picked it up secondhand in the 1980s, who thought it was made in the 1940s - The "1927" on one of the cards makes me wonder if they were actually made in 1927, but other than that they have no box, no name, no instructions or anything. So I am really hoping that in sharing them, I'll find an answer!

I tried reverse image searching but it came up with nothing. I'll keep trying as I love a good cartomancy mystery 🔎

@akiva Mostly, yep! A lot of the cards match either the ZWK, Kipperkarte or Lenormands in name or vague theme, so I often find myself using a mix of those interpretations, plus just general feelings I get from the card - It has a Lover and Beloved that I usually treat as the Querent and their partner (or, the querent and someone significant to them) and then a few other people-cards (Blonde Woman, Officer, Old Woman, Judge, Child, Widow, Great Man) that I sometimes take literally as people, but sometimes treat as metaphors or as equivalent to tarot cards with a similar theme (eg, The Judge as Justice, the Great Man as a King of Swords or Emperor kind of feeling, the Officer as a sense that the cards in his row are going to be enforced upon you by a higher power, the Blonde Woman as the alternative path-not-taken). If the querent immediately says "Oh, the Child is definitely my new apprentice!" I'm not going to insist that it has to be read as The Sun XD

 

And yeah I've tried the image search game too - Now i often just get my own blog, where I put up a load of pictures of it and asked the internet if anyone had seen it before... XD Thank you so much for going looking for it! I don't even know the name for the exact type of deck, but the way that the numbers on it match with a Skat deck makes me wonder if it is like the Lenormands and the Thomson-Leng Romany Fortune Telling Cards, and is based on a traditional way of telling fortunes with the local playing card deck?

1 hour ago, Woland said:

Mostly, yep! A lot of the cards match either the ZWK, Kipperkarte or Lenormands in name or vague theme, so I often find myself using a mix of those interpretations

I've seen a lot of German decks that tend to be mixes of systems. Even the Italian Sibilla deck is a mix of Kipper and ZWK

 

1 hour ago, Woland said:

And yeah I've tried the image search game too - Now i often just get my own blog, where I put up a load of pictures of it and asked the internet if anyone had seen it before... XD Thank you so much for going looking for it!

Well, I did find something but it's not an exact match. There's a deck called Fri-Ho-Di Wahrsage-spiel which is quite old. It has a card titled Geschenk, I wonder if your deck is related to this one? 

There's also this deck which is a precursor for the ZWK, that might have similar titles? 

 

They all share similar people cards, like a judge, widow, officer, etc. There's definitely a link somewhere!

 

1 hour ago, Woland said:

but the way that the numbers on it match with a Skat deck makes me wonder if it is like the Lenormands and the Thomson-Leng Romany Fortune Telling Cards, and is based on a traditional way of telling fortunes with the local playing card deck?

It's possible that they've taken a card system similar to ZWK or Kipper and put them onto playing cards? A bit like Lenormand with its playing card inserts.

 

I wish I could find your deck, I want a copy 🤣

@akiva oooooh that Fri-Ho-Di is closer to it than anything else I have ever seen! Not exactly the same names, but the same kind of "feel" somehow - I could imagine the Rancid Vibes being a modernised version, the equivalent of those Kipperkarte with very 1990s illustrations on them and a few of the cards renamed to be more "now"... The Hoher Beamter and the Grosser Herr seem very closely related!

 

If you like, I have put scans of all the card faces on this Google drive (the original cards were massively fragile, so I made a single copy on MPC so that I could play with it without further damage to the original) so you could make yourself a copy if you fancy XD https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1_zO9OoXVIFqN76SAhHCiLgtnma6u4r1x

Edited May 25, 20242 yr by Woland
Added a thought!

13 minutes ago, Woland said:

oooooh that Fri-Ho-Di is closer to it than anything else I have ever seen! Not exactly the same names, but the same kind of "feel" somehow - I could imagine the Rancid Vibes being a modernised version, the equivalent of those Kipperkarte with very 1990s illustrations on them and a few of the cards renamed to be more "now"... The Hoher Beamter and the Grosser Herr seem very closely related!

German has a high language and a more common one too? Maybe they've used a more accessible version of the language? Plus language changes so much over the years 🤣

 

16 minutes ago, Woland said:

If you like, I have put scans of all the card faces on this Google drive (the original cards were massively fragile, so I made a single copy on MPC so that I could play with it without further damage to the original) so you could make yourself a copy if you fancy XD https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1_zO9OoXVIFqN76SAhHCiLgtnma6u4r1x

Omg thank you so much! This means a lot 🤗