Prophetical, Educational and Playing Cards

by Mrs. John King Van Rensselaer

In the “Catalogue of Playing and Other Cards in the British Museum,” by William Hughes Willshire, M. D. (1876, page 52), he shows a picture of Addha-Nari, saying, “she is the Isis of the Hindus, a pantheistic emblem typifying Nature, Truth and Religion.” In this Hindu emblematic figure the four symbols of the ancient Tarots (now the suit marks of the numeral playing cards of the Tarots and of Italy and Spain) are placed in the four hands of the figure that has the crescent or emblem of prophetic power on her head—namely, the Cup, the Circle (or Money), the Sword and the Magician’s Rod. “These are recognised,” says Mr. Willshire (page 62), “as being the symbols of the four chief castes into which men were divided on the banks of the Ganges and of the Nile. Accordingly, the Cup denotes the sacerdotal rank or priesthood; the Sword implies the king, a soldier or military type; the Circle or ring of eternity (that in the hands of the protector of commerce became Money) typifies the world or commercial community, and the Staff is emblematic of agriculture or the tiller of the soil.” This connection between these symbols with those on the Tarots has been copied slavishly by many authors as the only explanation for the adoption of these devices. That there were in early days these principal caste divisions is unquestionable, and men of the different professions selected their heraldic emblems when consulting the oracle to worship or consult Mercury as Chthoneus, Argiphontes, Cyllenius or Caduceator.

The bridge connecting the great goddess of India with Mercury has not yet been built, although the foundations have been laid and will soon be given to the world. It is sufficient to say at present that the mythologies of Babylonia and Egypt have mingled mysteriously, and that the mother of Thoth is connected with the Indian deity so that symbols and rites common to one country are often found in the sister continent.

Before the era of printing men crystalised their ideas by making pictures to portray the thing or person that it was desired to represent. Thus the heraldry of to-day is simply this crude idea scientifically treated and classified, and a coat-of-arms is the name of a family pictorially represented. The totem of the North American Indian displays his family cognomen in this way, as do the various symbols of uneducated people all over the world who are unable to express their ideas in written characters.

Signs over the doors of tradesmen carry out the same plan, as the barber’s basin or pole (the latter being really the caduceus of Mercury, that was inherited from the doctors who studied at the Temple of Thoth). The bunch of grapes or bush of a wine dealer shows an inn, and a well-known saying of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu recalls this, for she remarked, “How should we know where the wine was sold if we did not see the bush?”

Thus, also, at a cross-road where directions from the god Terminus (Mercury) were required, his pointing finger

(which was also the Yod found on the Tarots) was a pictured sign that all could comprehend. It is the same with all the other emblems connected with this ubiquitous deity, and the ancients understood these devices far more easily than we of to-day, as the lapse of time has caused the intention of many of them to be forgotten, and none more so than those of Mercury on the pip cards of the Tarots. That their meaning is forgotten is not the fault of those who credited transmitted knowledge through pictures instead of written words, as the devices remain as a simple key to the origin of cards that originally were intended only as a means of communicating with occult powers. (See Numbers xvii.)

In order to come closely to the meanings attributed to the devices as well as to the figures on the Atout part of the Tarots, each one must be studied separately, and close attention must be given to the other connections with the cult of Mercury that have not been dropped from the cards in the course of ages, but which remain to enlighten us.

Thus, the girdle or cestus that Mercury stole from Venus encircles the deuce of Money, and all the oldest cards retain this symbol as well as those manufactured now. This card plays an important part in the soothsayer’s pack. Under some conditions it signifies thieving, which probably refers to the theft of the girdle. A pig is always displayed on the two of bells of the German pack that was evidently derived from the Tarots, since it was sacred to Nebo. Pigs and tongues (representing speech) were always part of the sacrifice to Hermes at his annual festival, and both were sacred to Proserpene, whose descent to hell was celebrated on the day she was dragged from her mother, Ceres, and conducted by Mercury Chthoneus, to the arms of Pluto.

A gazelle under a palm tree is placed on the knave of Money, which recalls the worship of Osiris, in which Thoth plays such an important part. According to a legend, the gazelle gives notice of the rising of the waters of the river Nile by fleeing from its wonted feeding grounds on the banks to the recesses of the desert, long before the first signs of the coming flood are noticed by mankind. The gazelle acts in this way as a lieutenant to Hermes, or as a messenger from the gods to humans, and it is sacred to Thoth, who was afterwards, by the Romans, merged into Mercury. Thoth is also represented on the Fool or Joker.