A question about symbolism

[Moon-Hermit]

I was reading "Symbolism; a treatise on the soul of things" by Milton Alberto Pottenger the other day and came across the following pages which peaked my interest (btw, the book is available on Internet Archive for free, so I suppose including its pages in this post would be ok):

 

 

 

 

The thing that confuses- and baffles me at the same time- is the association of the suit of spades with the acorn... which, I'll be honest, makes sense. It reminds me of the suits depicted on the petit Lenormand cards, and how one might read them according to the German tradition as stated in books like Andy Boroveshengra's and Caitlin Matthews'. Is the association by Milton nonsense, a new way to look at the subject, or straight out of another tradition?- I'm not sure based on which tradition the associations above are made (not that they're easy to trace when it comes to playing cards anyway) and I have no idea how you'd read the German cards (Skat, for instance... saw it in Hexe Claire's videos) aside from what I've read in my Lenormand references, hence why I'm asking here. 🥲

 

If Spades are not leaves but acorns, and Clubs are not acorns but leaves... wouldn't that make the symbolism similar to how one goes about it in French and English traditions? Money (Diamonds) is corruption, leaves give you life and the energy to gain experience and wisdom, acorns are just.. rough and painful if you hit your knuckles with one of them, and what a heart does is quite obvious to all of us. But according to the German way we should take spades as honorable and clubs as an equivalent to acorns = hardship and misery, so what is stated in the Symbolism book is being the complete opposite. I'd be super grateful if anyone could tell me which is which in this case. Is one of the associations wrong- I hate to say the word "wrong" because the ways in which one can interpret symbols and emblems in cartomancy is limitless, as long as it's well thought out at least- or can we justify them both? 

Edited November 28, 2025 by Moon-Hermit

[DanielJUK]

The book was originally published in 1905 apparently, so it's pretty public domain by now and safe 🙂 

[JoyousGirl]

8 hours ago, Moon-Hermit said:

I'd be super grateful if anyone could tell me which is which in this case. Is one of the associations wrong- I hate to say the word "wrong" because the ways in which one can interpret symbols and emblems in cartomancy is limitless, as long as it's well thought out at least- or can we justify them both? 

 

You can justify both - it's what you apply or how you make sense of it - and then it's what comes to mind when reading. Take what clicks and leave the rest because if you're ever stuck that little click will help you to move forward.  This is why I've avoided reading many books on card systems "he said this, she said that, they said this" and you'll never be done with it. Maybe there was confusion in the initial transmission of information between languages, a "heading typo" in effect, and that's been carried through? Maybe someone swapped them on purpose so their French/English opponent with a set of cards wouldn't know what's going on? 

 

Journal a comparison of the suits in question and at the end you should have a definite system of understanding of your own. "The way of the acorn is _____, and that way of being is ______".  Then it doesn't matter what deck you're using your system phrase or keyword will start ball rolling.

 

  

[Moon-Hermit]

12 hours ago, JoyousGirl said:

You can justify both - it's what you apply or how you make sense of it - and then it's what comes to mind when reading. Take what clicks and leave the rest because if you're ever stuck that little click will help you to move forward.  This is why I've avoided reading many books on card systems "he said this, she said that, they said this" and you'll never be done with it. Maybe there was confusion in the initial transmission of information between languages, a "heading typo" in effect, and that's been carried through? Maybe someone swapped them on purpose so their French/English opponent with a set of cards wouldn't know what's going on? 

 

Journal a comparison of the suits in question and at the end you should have a definite system of understanding of your own. "The way of the acorn is _____, and that way of being is ______".  Then it doesn't matter what deck you're using your system phrase or keyword will start ball rolling.

Thank you so much for your help and suggestions. 

I can say I'm not in the primitive phase of learning anymore (I say primitive because learning never stops), and I've been practicing more with playing cards. I just read many books about the subject here and there in my spare time, since I like cartomancy in general... lol. But I can see where you're coming from with not wanting to read many books on the topic, since sometimes the clashes between ideas can be wild and have the ability to either confuse or overwhelm the reader. In my opinion, it can be more productive when you stick to a reasonable number of recommended resources when you're just starting out, and then when you're more comfortable expand that and look through more stuff if you still wish to. But then again, I've seen many seasoned cartomancers that nail their readings without even needing an exhaustive amount of resources. I guess it depends on how that person operates.

The idea of the associations being swapped seems plausible. When I saw the above information in the book, I was baffled mainly because of what I had learned about Lenormand insets (clubs are bad, spades are good, it fits the images and all that). I honestly tried for a while to read them the German way, but I couldn't go as detailed as I could have with English/French associations. One big reason might be because I'm not versed in German and don't know their tradition apart from some basic stuff, the other one could be because the insets don't look German at all and since I read with normal playing cards too I could never make the transition. My readings felt rigid and I just decided to be comfortable and do it my own way, in spite of some practitioners potentially judging me for it. 

Thanks for the idea about journaling too! I admit that I don't journal the fancy way, that is I just jot down all my stuff on a very normal looking notebook with the average kind of pen that makes your knuckles throb when you write for too long, lol. I've been thinking about making comparison/contrast charts for a while now; perhaps this is my prompt to go and get it done!

Edited November 29, 2025 by Moon-Hermit