Your favorite decks that nobody likes

[Teemu]

Hi,

 

that "Rancid Vibes" deck makes me cringe. I am German, and that one has too much 3rd Reich vibes to be political correct nowadays.

 

The Fri-Ho-Di is better, I find it funny that Fri-ho-di is a margarine. I have never heard of it. Just found the deck on Ebay and bought it 😉 

OT: The company still exists and sells mainly salads and fish delicatessen nowadays. AND I of course know their "Homa Gold" margerine that is still available.

 

Of course there are several ways to say something in German, be it easy and straightforward, or indirect, or lyrical, or whatever. Lawyers tend to have their own dialect (you should try to understand our tax forms).

Edited May 25, 2024 by Teemu

[akiva]

17 minutes ago, Teemu said:

that "Rancid Vibes" deck makes me cringe. I am German, and that one has too much 3rd Reich vibes to be political correct nowadays.

Woah that didn't even cross my mind! Could that be why it's not searchable? 

 

18 minutes ago, Teemu said:

The Fri-Ho-Di is better, I find it funny that Fri-ho-di is a margarine. I have never heard of it. Just found the deck on Ebay and bought it 😉 

It is a charming deck, but so expensive! There seems to be a couple of verions of it. Never knew they were margarine company 😂

[Teemu]

4 minutes ago, akiva said:

Woah that didn't even cross my mind! Could that be why it's not searchable? 

 

It is a charming deck, but so expensive! There seems to be a couple of verions of it. Never knew they were margarine company 😂

Perhaps that is the reason, yes

 

And expensive, hmmm, depends. I just paid 29 bucks, I think it is ok for a rare 32 card deck that old. But probably it is much more expensive outside of Germany.

[akiva]

8 minutes ago, Teemu said:

And expensive, hmmm, depends. I just paid 29 bucks, I think it is ok for a rare 32 card deck that old. But probably it is much more expensive outside of Germany.

29!? I can only find it for €80 from Italy! It'll turn up more affordable when the time is right 😊

[Woland]

@Teemu Yeah I much prefer the look of the Fri-Ho-Di deck! It's weird that the two decks were probably made at about the same time, potentially even by the same printer, but have such a different "feel". It's much more expensive on UK ebay XD

[Teemu]

35 minutes ago, Woland said:

@Teemu Yeah I much prefer the look of the Fri-Ho-Di deck! It's weird that the two decks were probably made at about the same time, potentially even by the same printer, but have such a different "feel". It's much more expensive on UK ebay XD

I think not. The Homann deck seems to come from 1924 or so, well before the Nazis took charge. The rancid deck is clearly later, middle to late 30ies I guess

[Woland]

@akiva you might be right- the person I got it from was Danish, and his friend who he got it from got it in a house clearance lot. I don't know if any of the military uniforms in it fall foul of the German laws on symbols of the third reich, but I could also imagine people just throwing them out just to be safe. Plus, the original cards are really poor quality, they could well have mostly disintegrated...

 

@Teemu did the Fri-Ho-Di deck come as some kind of promotional thing with margarine? I wish there was more information on it in English! It is so bright and warm, and I am so glad to know it exists now.

 

I love decks that were freebies or that needed to be collected- My two actual all-time favourites are the Carreras Lenormand, which were cigarette cards released in the 1920s and then rereleased in the 30s, and the Thomson Leng which came free with a women’s magazine XD 

[akiva]

26 minutes ago, Woland said:

you might be right- the person I got it from was Danish, and his friend who he got it from got it in a house clearance lot. I don't know if any of the military uniforms in it fall foul of the German laws on symbols of the third reich, but I could also imagine people just throwing them out just to be safe. Plus, the original cards are really poor quality, they could well have mostly disintegrated...

I'm not totally clued up on their symbolism, but it fits the era they were in so we have to assume it's related. It's a shame because I love obscure cartomancy decks! The rancid vibes were correct about this one. It would make sense they were trying to get rid of it too

 

Thinking about it... I could just write the keywords on a deck of playing cards and use that, they're very similar to other german systems 🤔

 

27 minutes ago, Woland said:

Carreras Lenormand, which were cigarette cards released in the 1920s and then rereleased in the 30s, and the Thomson Leng which came free with a women’s magazine XD 

I have both of these 😁 my Thomson-Leng tarot is a reprint though, I'd love an original but they don't come up as often as they used to on ebay.

[Woland]

@akiva yeah, the reason I own it in the first place was because my friend reckoned that if anyone had a right to own it, a Romani guy who has had run-ins with police about both the PCSC act and laws against telling fortunes, was a safe bet. I wasn't kidding when I said this deck has the absolute worst vibes and everyone hates it (and my relationship with it is... Weird. Spoiler tag for potentially very upsetting history-

Spoiler

Like I say, knowing that well-off white Germans were playing fortune-teller with cards like these, while my cousins were being arrested and sent to the camps and killed in the Devouring at least partially because of libels about us "tricking people with superstitions", it is a lot to carry - But it also feels like an absolute proof that we survived, collectively, and our practises survive too.)

 

...So the version of these cards that I actually use in public are a set of normal French suited playing cards that I've drawn on, which have much less intense (rancid) vibes, for doing parlour readings about people's love lives.

 

Oh man the Thomson Leng is the best! I wish it had more of an influence on later decks - The mix of Eudes Picard pips and RWS and Golden Dawn symbolism will always get me. The Knight of Swords swimming in the swamp, and the King of Rods with her lion are perfect ❤️ I'm convinced that the dancer on the 2 of Pence is copied from a Sunlight soap or Puck matches advert (or maybe, drawn by the same person?) But I've never had much luck finding the artists' or designers' names.

 

And aaaah! Which version of the Carreras do you have? I inherited mine so it's a mix of the pips version and the portrait version, which is both super annoying but also I suppose kind of charming XD

 

Since we seem to have similar taste in decks... Got any favourites to recommend? XD

 

 

[akiva]

6 hours ago, Woland said:

yeah, the reason I own it in the first place was because my friend reckoned that if anyone had a right to own it, a Romani guy who has had run-ins with police about both the PCSC act and laws against telling fortunes, was a safe bet. I wasn't kidding when I said this deck has the absolute worst vibes and everyone hates it (and my relationship with it is... Weird. Spoiler tag for potentially very upsetting history-

It's really eye opening to see the impact fortune telling had on the Romani people during that era. I don't think it's a weird relationship, it's like you're reclaiming what was taken all those years ago! 

 

6 hours ago, Woland said:

Oh man the Thomson Leng is the best! I wish it had more of an influence on later decks - The mix of Eudes Picard pips and RWS and Golden Dawn symbolism will always get me. The Knight of Swords swimming in the swamp, and the King of Rods with her lion are perfect ❤️ 

I just wish more people knew about it. Picard was done dirty by the Tarot world and the more people know about him, the better imo 😉

 

6 hours ago, Woland said:

I'm convinced that the dancer on the 2 of Pence is copied from a Sunlight soap or Puck matches advert (or maybe, drawn by the same person?) But I've never had much luck finding the artists' or designers' names.

I'm going to have to Google this and see. One thing I did find out is Thomson-Leng also published the Beano (a children's comic which still gets made today), which means they definitely weren't short of artists!

 

6 hours ago, Woland said:

And aaaah! Which version of the Carreras do you have? I inherited mine so it's a mix of the pips version and the portrait version, which is both super annoying but also I suppose kind of charming XD

Mine are the thin ones, and I bought a set with the playing card inserts and the correct court cards. I have another set which is all court cards but some of them are sooo paper thin and damaged it's unusable! Is yours the thin or wide ones?

 

6 hours ago, Woland said:

Since we seem to have similar taste in decks... Got any favourites to recommend? XD

Have you seen Hermes Playing Card Oracle? I got mine off abebooks, it has the Lenormand 36, plus extra to make it a 52 card deck.

That deck probably fits in this thread too as you never see anyone using it 😅

 

Cartes La Voyante which is another that could be in this thread, it's in french though which is probably why. A 32 card piquet deck with all the meanings written on them, easy to translate though! It's a fun system to try out every now and then

 

Horoscope Belline it has artwork you either love or hate, and I'm not sure I've seen it used in the English speaking world. I find it very charming, and it doesn't pull its punches 😅

 

There's this deck on Gallica which I'm planning to get printed once I've cropped all the cards 

 

And the Petit Sorcier I'm also planning on getting printed 

 

I mostly just read piquet though, which is a standard 32 deck like yours. I use Sepherials method, but accompanied with Minetta and Cicely Kent's books, as they all expanded on Sepherials text. But I've dabbled in German, Russian, Polish (24 card) and French methods. All of them are kind of obscure in the English speaking world. I wish piquet was more popular so more systems could be made, I'm running out 🤣

[Teemu]

10 hours ago, Woland said:

@akiva you might be right- the person I got it from was Danish, and his friend who he got it from got it in a house clearance lot. I don't know if any of the military uniforms in it fall foul of the German laws on symbols of the third reich, but I could also imagine people just throwing them out just to be safe. Plus, the original cards are really poor quality, they could well have mostly disintegrated...

 

@Teemu did the Fri-Ho-Di deck come as some kind of promotional thing with margarine? I wish there was more information on it in English! It is so bright and warm, and I am so glad to know it exists now.

 

I love decks that were freebies or that needed to be collected- My two actual all-time favourites are the Carreras Lenormand, which were cigarette cards released in the 1920s and then rereleased in the 30s, and the Thomson Leng which came free with a women’s magazine XD 

Well, I am no lawyer. Questionable are the "Offizier" with the Iron Cross on his breast and the "Grosser Herr" with the double-S. But all images come from that period, making me uneasy.

 

As for the margarine deck, I do not know. Perhaps I can tell more when it  arrives. It is neither mentioned on the german wikipedia site nor on the Fritz Homann site.

[Woland]

@akiva oh man, now I want to try them all! That deck on Gallicia really reminds me of the Grand Lenormand style, which I don't have (yet!), the multiple images per card seems like a very French thing to do XD And my curiosity has been piqued about piquet! I am really drawn to the other old cartomancies that used common decks, or modified common decks, so both that and the 24-card decks sound like they're right up my alley.

 

I love the wide Carreras ones but mine are the narrow ones too - I've  never worked out exactly how many variations are out there! This is them - https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1dJLK1F1ZPaidP0-EN6HrpQKZ_PUln-Eo - they're all on fairly thick card, thankfully, but I still am really careful with them because they're so smudgy and they pick up oil from my skin too easily. Maybe ironically, my "valuable" old Thomson Leng still looks as good as the day it was printed, other than that the box has fallen to pieces and got badly nicotine stained from being carried around for decades by my aunt. Does your version have the red Wheel, or the one with the sort of blue clouds in the background?

 

I love the idea that the artists who worked on the Thomson Leng might also have been painting Minnie The Minx and the Bash Street Kids on their next shift XD

[akiva]

1 hour ago, Woland said:

oh man, now I want to try them all! That deck on Gallicia really reminds me of the Grand Lenormand style, which I don't have (yet!)

You should definitely get the Grand Jeu Lenormand if you like odd decks (I have a vintage one from the 70s). It's another that earns a place in this thread, because people get put off by how complex the cards look! It's a lot easier to read in practice though, it just seems complicated.

 

There are some good books on it in French and German. I have Corinne Morels book "Comprendre et Interpréter Le Grand Jeu Lenormand". It's very good! If you want to print your own deck there are images available of it on Gallica too.

 

1 hour ago, Woland said:

And my curiosity has been piqued about piquet! I am really drawn to the other old cartomancies that used common decks, or modified common decks, so both that and the 24-card decks sound like they're right up my alley.

I'll PM you some links to books and websites later if you want? I can't share the 24 card method on here because it's from another forum. 

 

1 hour ago, Woland said:

I love the wide Carreras ones but mine are the narrow ones too - I've  never worked out exactly how many variations are out there! This is them - https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1dJLK1F1ZPaidP0-EN6HrpQKZ_PUln-Eo

I have those, and the ones with the pip card inserts too. Afaik there's only 3 versions (wide, narrow with all court cards and narrow with normal Lenormand inserts).

I wish Carreras did more fortune telling decks, the size is perfect. Imagine a Carreras sized TdM on that lovely card stock, with those beautiful card backs 😍

 

1 hour ago, Woland said:

Does your version have the red Wheel, or the one with the sort of blue clouds in the background?

Mine has a yellow wheel with clouds behind it? I didn't even know there were multiple versions 😯

Edited May 26, 2024 by akiva

[Woland]

@akiva ah i shall get a photo tonight - There are two canonical versions of the wheel: Both have the same picture, with the monkey and dog riding the yellow knifegrinder's wheel, but one of them has a sort of blue and pink speckly cloudy background, and the other has a red background and looks way more sinister - The red one was originally glued to the outside of the box and couldn't be used, but some replica decks add it as an extra card XD

 

- I caved immediately and bought a Grand Lenormand, which should arrive this afternoon along with a reprint of Tchalaï Unger's Tarot Tzigane, which i have been coveting for years but had always been unobtainium-levels of expensive and hard to find. I had no idea, but apparently it was reprinted some time last year, so am glad to have got that before it's gone again!

 

Oh man yes, especially since Carreras Black Cat were always marketed with lucky, mystical themes, it would have made so much sense to make a series of Tarot cards in the same format! They could even have kept the pip card insets, so the picture part of the card could be less complex to fit in the small space... Maybe I'll design one, it won't be as refined as theirs but it'll fill a niche that I really like.

 

And yes please, DM me XD

[akiva]

On 5/28/2024 at 11:18 AM, Woland said:

The red one was originally glued to the outside of the box and couldn't be used, but some replica decks add it as an extra card XD

Ohh yes I think I know what you mean now. Mine didn't come with that 😯

 

On 5/28/2024 at 11:18 AM, Woland said:

I caved immediately and bought a Grand Lenormand, which should arrive this afternoon along with a reprint of Tchalaï Unger's Tarot Tzigane, which i have been coveting for years but had always been unobtainium-levels of expensive and hard to find. I had no idea, but apparently it was reprinted some time last year, so am glad to have got that before it's gone again!

It's a great deck, I think you'll like it. The guidebook it comes with is good enough for a start with the deck too. I hadn't heard of Tchalaï's book but it looks great, love the bold colours on the cards too!

 

On 5/28/2024 at 11:18 AM, Woland said:

Oh man yes, especially since Carreras Black Cat were always marketed with lucky, mystical themes, it would have made so much sense to make a series of Tarot cards in the same format! They could even have kept the pip card insets, so the picture part of the card could be less complex to fit in the small space... Maybe I'll design one, it won't be as refined as theirs but it'll fill a niche that I really like.

They really did miss out on an opportunity! If you do make one do share what it turns out like 😁