Sibylle des Salons/Parlour Sibyl Question

Does anyone else use this deck, and has anyone else noticed how totally trippy it is?

E.g., some of the cards follow traditional playing card meanings on the word on the card face. Some. But but but...take a look in the booklet that comes with it, and you'll be hit by something completely different to the picture and the keyword combined.

One that really stood out for me today was the Ace of Spades. Keyword: Delay. Picture: Mythological, though I don't see instantly which two goddesses are involved here.

Card meaning per book: Success in business endeavours and for a young woman, marriage is on the horizon. Reversed card meaning: Unforeseen change. With 7 Hearts: Pregnancy.

Or my other card for the day, Hindrance, which is the 8 of Spades, showing a man on horseback and a blocked road.

Book meaning: A picnic in pleasant company. Reversed: family arguments, severance of affection. With any hearts: Pleasure in meeting somebody.

I love these cards, they're incredibly trippy, and JJ Grandville is one of my favourite artists (it was he who designed the deck in 1819? I think). And it may be the deck that La Lenormande (or would that be LaNormande?) used in her readings.

But, pray tell, how does one read it? I don't think I want to go down the strictly intuitive route, because there's far too much difference betwixt the text and the pictures (and the text does describe the pictures, so we can be reasonably certain that they do indeed go together).

Does anybody else work with this one, and if so - how? Cos it's occurring to me that picture, keyword, playing card meaning, book meaning, and combinations might all be getting used in this one. Which would give it quite a lot of depth, reading on several levels at once, maybe? Clueless here.

Thanks

Yes, it was Grandville that designed the deck. You might like The Fantastic Menagerie Tarot by Baba Press, and be sure to get the companion book which has a lot of information about Grandville.

So you don't know how to read the Sibylle des Salons either?

Ah well.

And yes, I quite like the FM and the companion book.

I wonder if this is the same one I have been eyeing up at Tarot Garden. It looks very readable from the scans and the correspondences match the way I learned to read... which I am discovering is quite different from how most people read PCs.

There are some scans here - maybe you can check if it's the same one?

What's been confounding me is the symbol being one thing, the picture often something else, the keywords something else again, and the meanings in the book being completely different to all of them.

It does incorporate reversals, and most of the cards mean different things depending on if you're reading for a man or a woman, as do the combinations.

If that sounds familiar, please help me out here. I dearly love the deck, but I can't read it without a book - either I haven't cracked the system, or my memory just isn't good enough.

Yeah, that's the one I was looking at.

From what you posted from the lwb, it sounds like it matches the way I learned to read and yes, the meanings change for men and women. Mostly the changes involve a domestic versus career bias regarding traditional roles, although I can think of a couple of exceptions to that. Having the right spread helps, I learned on a set position 15 carder. For example, take the Ace of Spades: in the lower right wing it means delay or a difficult situation, in the center it can represent either law or medicine or it can represent personality traits like narrow-mindedness and inflexibility(rev). With a number of diamonds, business; with hearts, trouble in love; clubs, partnerships. Those are traditional male interps.
For women, marriage in the center probably an existing union, in the upper right with a court a future union. Upper left, maybe a nursing career. With the 7 of hearts... that would point to a pregnancy out of wedlock, not a happy situation. Much better to appear with the 4 of hearts which denotes a happy home/family. Definitely gender biased, so you will have to decide on how you will adapt that in use.

Combinations are used but they are card and location specific.

I'm probably not helping any, am I.

Yes you are. You're actually making sense. I knew there was a system in there somewhere, it was too elegant, I just couldn't figure out what it was.

Post an example, if you're so inclined!

Oh, gosh.

This one seems a very interesting oracle. But I have to refrain myself, I still have a few decks waiting in the unexplored-decks box. I would be thrown away from home if I buy another deck.

Yes, the system seems pretty elaborate.

Gavriela said:

Yes you are. You're actually making sense. I knew there was a system in there somewhere, it was too elegant, I just couldn't figure out what it was.

Post an example, if you're so inclined!

Click to expand...

An example of combinations? A sample reading? What would you like?

A sample reading - to see how it works. Not for me, just so that I can get a better idea of the system.

I think MatPoint is interested too - and the deck is only €10, if that helps