Tarot of the Origins by Lo Scarabeo at House of Tarot

Product not found!

Reviews ...

Submitted By: Nancy on 04/22/2006
Over the years I\'ve turned to two decks when exploring issues more serious than the norm: the Inner Child deck, and the Major Arcana deck of the Tarot of the Origins. It\'s been my experience that these two decks can more easily break through the barriers of my preconceived notions and modern-day thoughts. So of course I jumped at the chance to review the full 78-card Tarot of the Origins with artwork by Sergio Toppi.

The images are prehistoric, primal, and rarely evoke the same thoughts or feelings as a traditionally-designed Tarot.

The suits are:

Blood (Swords) is the suit of aggressiveness, instinct, action. Cards are red.
Jewel (Pentacles) represents daytime energy, and the material world. Cards are yellow.
Nature (Wands) is the suit of harmony and life. Cards are green.
Soul (Cups) is the suit of night, dreams, meditation. Cards are blue.

Many of the cards depict natural stone structures, weapons created from bone or stone, and people wearing hammered bits of metal jewelry. The people are mostly neolithic in appearance (no gentle faces here!) - - and pictured in scenes that clearly show the difficulties of survival, the joy of simple pleasures like fire, and absolute belief in the power of natural magic.

For me, the images evoke answers that come straight from an ancient deposit of wisdom--wisdom older than any civilization.

While some of the Major Arcana are similar to traditional decks, most are not, and even those that are more like modern decks have a prehistoric twist; for example, the Mother (Empress) is a nude woman holding a statue that appears much like like the Goddess of Willendorf. The Father (Emperor) is depicted with beads twined in his hair, and a carved bone in place of a scepter. The Star (one of my favorites) shows sparks flying into space, caused by hands crashing together two stones.

If you read Tarot based strictly on traditional decks (a la Rider Waite) you may find this deck difficult to read, as there are few correspondences. However, if you\'re open to the feelings evoked by these primal pictures of a primal time, I think you\'ll get much from your readings.

4 of 5 Stars!

Average Customer Rating:

Displaying 1 of 1 product reviews