HP Lovecraft Tarot

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 05 Apr 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

Kiama	05 Apr 2003
Hi All, I just received the HP Lovecraft Tarot deck as a gift from a very good friend this morning, and must say it is one of the darkest, most chaotic decks I have seen... Its GREAT! Exactly in keeping with the Cthulu mythos and Lovecraft's writings. I have a question however... Which suit corresponds to which? There is the suit of Men, Artifacts, Tomes, and Sites. I have a feeling the suit of Men may be Swords, but the rest I am confuse don, mainly because the meanings given in the book seem to be very mixed and contradictory... Help? Kiama

Umbrae	05 Apr 2003
Perhaps in keeping with the Lovecraft mythos...there is no correlation...he he he...

Rose	05 Apr 2003
My best guess from the LBW pg. 50-"Four Suits of the Minor Arcana" Man - personality traits, relationships (Cups) Sites - locale, environment (Pentacles) Artifacts - objects, possibilities, objectives (Wands) Tomes - knowledge, mentality, intellectual states (Swords) I'm not familiar enough with Lovecraft's work to make this a workable deck for me, but the images are great and it did spur me to read some of his works. I'm not sure how much this deck actually correlates with any other tarot decks. Enjoy the deck. Rose

rota	05 Apr 2003
Much as I love Lovecraft, and believe me, I have a shelf-ful of his works [sidenote: in fact, chaosium house puts out the most amazing compilations of lovecraft-y stuff. find them on the net if you're a fan. i've got most of them.], I haven't been able to use this Tarot. Or even have it in the house. It's beautifully done -- I appreciate the craft, but I don't relate to it as a deck somehow. It's a theme deck that I don't vibe with, I guess... I would guess that Men = Wands, since human spirit may be a cognate for Fire, Tomes may equal Cups, as repositories for knowledge and spells for calling up extracosmic eldritch horrors, Sites might equal Pentacles, since a site is a physical place, which means Artifacts have to equal Swords.

galadrial	07 Apr 2003
I got this deck for Christmas, and I don't think the suits are meant to correspond to the traditional ones. But then, I didn't try to make the correlations because the break with tradition is one of the things I really like about this deck. In the Buckland Romani tarot book, Mr. Buckland suggests using a variety of decks to keep your perspective fresh. This is my favorite deck for going off the beaten path without getting lost.

Aerin	08 Apr 2003
I used to devour Lovecraft books when young. I may need this deck. I found some pictures here http://www.weirdco.com/lovecrafttarot.htm Aerin

ahpookus	08 Apr 2003
If you like the HP Lovecraft tarot you should check out the H R Geiger tarot. (Not for the faint of heart or easily offended.) http://www.baphomet.com/us/cards/fr-cards.htm

The HP Lovecraft Tarot thread was originally posted on 05 Apr 2003 in the Tarot Decks board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Tarot Decks, or read more archived threads.