Prophetical, Educational and Playing Cards

by Mrs. John King Van Rensselaer

XV. IL DIAVOLO (The Devil)

Set, or Sutech, the principle of evil, who is connected with the myth of Osiris, needs but little explanation. Even moderns can comprehend at a glance all that it typifies. Mgr. Antonio Dragoni is one of the earliest persons to identify this card with Set or Typho, the son of Seb, who was the brother of Osiris, and one of the geniuses of evil. Any one who has attempted to read the myth of Osiris will appreciate the difficulties of unravelling it. The Hyksos, or shepherd kings, selected Set as their sole deity, and Seti I assumed his name, thus placing himself under the protection of the evil one. Afterwards the worship of Set ceased entirely and he was abhorred. The long ears retained on the figure of the fifteenth Atout mark the connection with Set, for that was one of his distinguishing attributes. The Hebrew letter that represents this card is Zain, which means arrow, or any weapon of destruction. The intention of this Atout is destiny, chance, fatality, superstition, illness, temptation; it represents a spirit of evil, hatred, jealousy, and suspicion.

XVI. LA TORRE (The Tower)

In this leaf, a building struck by lightning is portrayed, through a thunderbolt shot by Jupiter, and conveyed by the “Messenger,” Mercury. The “lightning god” was one of Nebo’s titles, and the mark is retained on the Japanese cards, although probably accidentally, since there is no connection between their playing cards and the original Atouts. Some writers call this tower the “castle of Plutus” (the Roman god of wealth), deeming it a warning to misers, for it recalls the legend relating to an incident in the life of Rameses II, recorded in Herodotus. The Pharaoh ordered a tower to be built for his treasures, and he alone had its key, but daily he discovered that his valuables were disappearing, although there was only one egress. A watch was set, and it was found that two of the sons of the architect could enter by displacing a stone, that had been left for the purpose of thieving, and when the men were entrapped inside, they threw themselves headlong from the tower. This picture shows a connection with Egyptian legend that must not be disregarded in seeking to trace the Tarots to the mysteries of Thoth. Besides, some persons believe that the card represents the destruction of the temples of Babylon, and due weight must be given to the significance awarded by that people to lightning, when consulting the gods through divination, particularly as it was the weapon of Jove (Merodach), who was connected with the Baal of the Bible, and sometimes worshipped as Enlil, who was frequently implored not to destroy his people by lightning. But there are other legends connected with the destruction of ancient temples that are even older than that of Egypt, and we are lucky to have access to one that has lately been translated from the Sumerian language, written in cuneiform characters on one of the tablets discovered by Prof. Herman V. Hilprecht in the Temple Library of Nippur. Above two hundred of them were of a religious or historical character, which he set apart for the well-known scholar, Doctor Radau, to translate. These related chiefly to the worship of the gods of the second dynasty of Ur, or about two thousand five hundred years before Christ. “Although the beginning of the Babylonian religion, as portrayed in these tablets,” says Doctor Radau, in “Miscellaneous Sumerian Texts from the Temple Library of Nippur” (page 389), “has to be sought somewhere at about 5700 B. C., when the religions of Babylon were systematized.” One tablet relates how a king of that period conquered his enemies with the help of the chief god, who at that time was named Enlil, “the Governor of the gods,” “the god who destines fate.” It was his son, Nebo, who was his confidential messenger, his “lightning-rod,” and who wrote on the “tablets of Fate” the decrees of the supreme being at the birth of each mortal. It may be noted that Nebo is given a different father at different times, but so it is in the mythologies as now interpreted; the oldest accounts name the chief gods, whose qualities and symbols later became merged in more modern ones, and they were given different names at various times, which is most confusing. The great temple consecrated to Enlil is called E-Kur, and is at Nippur. This name for this particular tabernacle became the common name for temple in general (page 411). No king of Babylon ventured to do anything or take any step without “kissing the hand” of Enlil, to obtain his consent and approval. According to Doctor Radau, Enlil was afterwards succeeded or displaced by Marduk (the Merodach of the Bible, and the Jupiter of the Romans), although the supremacy of Enlil lasted some three thousand five hundred years, quite long enough to leave an impression on the “Book of Fate.” One of the tablets translated from the Sumerian language has been given almost literally, and is an invocation to Enlil, bewailing the destruction and begging for the restoration of the principal cities of Babylonia, together with the temples that had been destroyed, which were, in fact, the homes of the priests, who always dwelt in the sanctuaries. Doctor Radau (page 444) calls the song, “The Lamentation of the Goddess Nin, of the City of Mar, who was called Nin-Mar.” He gives a literal translation of the cuneiform text of the tablet that has a well-defined metre, and is divided into sections. The first three verses are an invocation to Enlil, the supreme god, by this goddess, Nin-Mar, who declares that she is “Mistress of Mar,” who, through the power granted to her by Enlil, was once able to destroy the enemies of her country and lay waste their lands, but the power has left her, as her “Master” sleeps. Nin-Mar gets a sympathetic god, named Nin-ib, to sing a hymn with her, in which the destroyed temples are recounted. Nin-ib was the solar deity of Nippur, also a war god, but inclined to be beneficent to mankind. One of his titles was “the warrior,” and he is identified as the planet Saturn. His symbol was a man with a lion’s head.

TO ENLIL.

Oh, Enlil, who placed on the waters
A shelter for men and for all,
Great God, who creates and then slaughters,
Come, hark to the children’s call.
Nin-Mar, the smiter of mountains, I sigh, I sigh;
Enlil, to thee I cry, cry, cry.
Shall the Mistress of Mar and his daughters,
His doves and the broods on their nests,
Shall their homes be cast out on the waters,
While their Master is lying at rest?
Nin-Mar, who was the destroyer of lands, I sigh, I sigh;
Enlil, to thee I cry, cry, cry.

Exalted one! Listen to pleadings,
For my Nippur now covers its face;
My E-Kur, my Ki-Ur have vanished,
May all be restored to their place.
It is Mar, the smiter of mountains, I sigh, I sigh;
Enlil, to thee I cry, cry, cry.

THE HYMN.

Great Nippur, and E-Kur and Ki-Ur with Girsu have perished in flame,
Then harken, oh, powerful Enlil, and restore them to greatness and fame.
Oh, then shall thy cities exalt thee, thy harems, thy children, thy lands,
The doves which fly over the towers, the temples that rise from the sands.
We pray that thy days may be lengthened, thy cities, like mountains, arise;
Then open thy ears, mighty Enlil, to thy children’s most sorrowful cries.
Listen to Nin-Mar, its Mistress, I sigh, I sigh;
Enlil, to thee I cry, cry, cry.

The Atout of the Tower typifies the money pip of the cards, with all of its mundane significances, so its meaning is easily translated as intending sorrow, destruction, vice, descent, perverseness, wickedness, degeneration. Ayin is the letter of la maison de dieu, or le feu de ciel, as the card is variously called, and both its design and its complementary letter express all that is crooked, bad, and false.

XVII. LE STELLE (The Stars)