If You Were Able To Travel In Time, On a Tarot Related Quest, What Era Would You Visit And What Would Be The Nature of Your Quest?

[Nordica De Spell]

Three trips to choose from 🙂 

 

1. First, I’d gather in my mind a great list of 78 people that I would like to draw me (or if they can’t draw, to dictate to an artist nearby them for me,) a card of my choice. So, it would be many stops in time before I had THE BEST DECK EVER!! I’d imagine having Poe draw up and explain in text Death (from a tarot perspective, as I’d quickly explain.) Of course, I’d be there to witness his process! Maybe Katarina the Greats for The Empress, or do something crazy like having Michelangelo draw The Hermit, instead of Dostoevsky. But Bulgakov would get The Devil, FOR SURE. Unless... it could be interesting to give that job to Hitler, just to have an idea of what HE would perceive as the devil... except no, I probably couldn’t use the deck if Hitlers was in it... maybe for an alternative card? Yay, I get to keep Bulgakovs!! The Star would probably be Michael Jacksons, and High Priestess could be Elisabeth Taylors, or why not the actual Cleopatras. For The Sun card, I’d have to search the thrones in Ancient Egypt anyway, yay!! One of The Ramses? For The Tower, The French Revolution Era, or another time of upheaval, maybe? 

 

For all of the minors, I’d love to make the bulk of the deck from those people throughout history, women, children, men, whom lived their lives without fame; on the fields, on the streets, in the villages, as slaves, as wifes, old spinsters, etc. Just normal people in all sorts of communities, circumstances and countries.

 

I’ll let you all know when I get back! But you can’t have my deck(s). Yes, the (s) at the end is probably a significant indicator of something, here. 🤣 

 

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2. Same sort of journey, except I wouldn’t meet with people to ask for their input, I’d simply observe a cavalcade of chosen world history event, maybe even a fastforward of life creation, and draw my conclusions from that, and just commission an artist (or more) to draw a deck according to my experiences of the way it actually was. 

 

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3. Yeah, don’t judge me, but I’m a greedy little collector, I am...

 

So maybe just, go back in time for a few stops in the last two decades, and buy things like The Greenwood etc. before they went OOP? And the Kickstarter and Indiegogo’s I missed by a hair’s width? 

 

(Why can’t I have them, whyyyy...)

 

AND, here’s the Marty McFly part: I’d buy supermany copies of every one; then when I got back I would gift some, and sell the rest of the extra’s at a (reasonable) profit, and put ALL THAT MONEY in a bank account:

 

And with them; just buy the new decks that I want, that are launched or selling now and in the future... which is something that I cannot currently afford. 

 

(Why can’t I have them, whyyyy...)

 

Edited July 6, 2019 by Nordica De Spell

[McFaire]

8 hours ago, gregory said:

 Well, Milano for my SECOND trip. But the first - I don't know. That's the POINT. Not only the Very First Tarot (including probably ones we know nothing about !), but also I want to be there for the Very First Time it was used for divination. That could be 19th century - or it could be 12th century, and we had no idea. We actually have no concrete proof. That's what I want to get !

Ah, I see!

[McFaire]

On 7/2/2019 at 2:20 AM, Raggydoll said:

Ooh, this is such an intimidating question because I feel like I lack the historical knowledge to give a really good and proper answer. But I will put those insecurities aside and just have fun with it. So, yes. I would travel back in time to the wonderful but short era when Pamela Colman Smith (along with several of my other tarot heroes) was a member of the Golden Dawn. And I would try to be approved as a member and get to know all these iconic people first hand. I would have loved to participate in their rituals and to learn from their methods. And I would have wanted to purchase one of those very first RWS decks that was ever published, to use alongside the one I would have made myself (according to GD traditions). And I would have wanted to try and find out if and how Pamela ever used that deck herself ☺️

I would love to see her original paintings with the original colors!

[McFaire]

8 hours ago, gregory said:

 Well, Milano for my SECOND trip. But the first - I don't know. That's the POINT. Not only the Very First Tarot (including probably ones we know nothing about !), but also I want to be there for the Very First Time it was used for divination. That could be 19th century - or it could be 12th century, and we had no idea. We actually have no concrete proof. That's what I want to get !

I imagine that the artists knew what they were doing. That's why I'd like to watch them work and here what they had to say. But you're right, that might only provide clues, not answers!

[McFaire]

11 hours ago, Flaxen said:

I think I’d like to see how some of the alternative older decks evolved - Vandenborre Bacchus, Viéville, Rosenwald. How did the makers decide on the images? The woman spinning under a cabbage moon is one of my favourites. 

 

 

I love it! Which deck is that?

[McFaire]

On 7/3/2019 at 4:49 AM, Ruby Jewel said:

Yes, it would be so interesting to have met and talked to Arthur Waite and Pamela Smith. They must have been fascinating people....and also the era of the Golden Dawn group would have been tremendously enlightening for tarot lovers. I recently read "Women of the Golden Dawn" by Mary Greer and it was a great description of those times. I might recommend that as a good read if you would like to travel back to that era.

Interesting book! I didn't know about that one. Must. Read.

[Flaxen]

32 minutes ago, McFaire said:

I love it! Which deck is that?

It’s the Vandenborre Bacchus aka The Flemish Tarot. I love the different images for the Trumps in this. If you like historical decks, it’s worth getting a copy. 

[DanielJUK]

I want to travel back to when Pamela Colman Smith was around to find out the truth about her. I must get Stuart Kaplan's book on her sometime. I know Mary Greer has a wonderful post on her blog about some of the internet tales about her are totally romanticised, we just don't know, it's not recorded in history! The reality is that there are many aspects of her we don't know the truth about. I want to know the real her! Also I would tell her to make sure she got her share or ask for a percentage of the copyright 🤣 That would be changing the course if history though!

[NathanAdler]

On 7/2/2019 at 3:11 AM, stephanelli said:

I would love to travel back to the times when old fashioned Gypsy travelers went about Britain in their lovely carts.  Among them, there would be the fortune teller and I would love to study with her - the cards, palmistry, anything she wished to teach me.  Possibly a fantasy, but I think it's an awesome idea nevertheless!

I love that idea!

 

I'll take the opposite track, though. I'd like to go forward and see where Tarot is going.

[Ariana]

I agree with the upper poster, Renaissance most likely,but only to find out things about my own self or to create the setting to help myself somehow in the near or distant future.You souldgo on quests perhaps,but only to help yourself and venture in various endavors,

[zedekiel]

Like many, it seems, I would head to the age of Pamela Smith! But I'm going on a mission as someone from the future to convince the large socialite public at the time of her talents, as so much of what we love about the Rider-Waite deck came from her and was not as recognized in the time. I'd like to confirm for them her talents and then use that as a jumping point to change the view of female artists from then on and ever after. Maybe by now the gender wage gap would be non existent after all that 😄

[Netzach]

On 7/2/2019 at 10:41 AM, gregory said:

I would travel back to the day the FIRST tarot was used for divination.

 

Then I would know FOR SURE when that was and everyone else could shut up about it !

 

(After that I'd go and visit the Viscontis way back when and see the originals of all those missing cards. Shallow of me - but there you go !)

You took the words right out of my mouth.

[Starlight63]

I would go to the Middle Ages to know firsthand they way they lived.  I've always felt fascination

[pinkvelvetz]

I would love to go back to the medieval times. I’ve always dreamed of seeing how the people lived back in that time.

[Raggydoll]

People! It says ‘On a tarot-related quest”! We’re not just doing random time travel here 😉

[Cookie]

I'd like to go as a time-travelling troubadour to the Royal Houses of Europe just before the downfall (the Hapsburgs, Louis the 16th, the Romanovs, Charles the 1st) and over tea & a  Battenberg, I'd offer them a tarot reading.  I'd look at the cards and say: 'mmmm...there may be trouble ahead...' 

[AV86]

For me, quests have to have a beginning, middle, and an ending, but the journey is not spoiled on me. I would quest for love, to find my twin flame, and given how I often find my luck in love, I think I would be at war (largely with myself) for much of it, holding onto any kind of hope (STAR) until I finally achieved my goal (ACE OF CUPS) and I could rest (WORLD).