What card am I: XVI The Tower

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 13 Jun 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

jmd	13 Jun 2003
The image as abject says it all! Though as an alchemist, I may have seen this more as the Athanor! Oh miserly pressured release... but it must be for the transformations to occur. (more clues forthsoming if need be :))

firemaiden	13 Jun 2003
Okay jmd, that's a challenge! here's to beginning the treasure hunt. I haven't a clue! --- off to surf for answers...

firemaiden	13 Jun 2003
Hmmm. okay, -- image as abject? none is more abject than the lady in the 8 of swords. Or - the gentleman in the 10 of swords. But when we get to talking of pressure, release, and transformations, the Tower comes to mind. But miserly? The 6 of pentacles shows miserly release, measured gifts, and abject beggars... will there be an alchemical transformation too?

jmd	13 Jun 2003
Correct... By Jove you've got it! The Tower, by the way :)

firemaiden	14 Jun 2003
hahahah! It was a beautiful clue, jmd! Now just for the record, (did you think we were going to let you get off so easy?), could you please explain to us (us means...uh...in this case, me, I guess) what is the Athenor? I've gotten as far as finding it refers to the ovens used for alchemy. (or will you be buried alive for revealing secrets?) Was it considered to be the gate to hell?

jmd	14 Jun 2003
I had to try and find an image of the one I had in mind before posting. The image as abject says it all! Firstly, I was probably reflecting on Inna Semetsky's paper 'Symbolism of the Tower as Abjection'. This is not the place for a critique of it, but I do intend to bring some of my thoughts on her work in the Iconographic and Historic section. 'Abject', etymologically, and in the sense used in the paper, refers to the 'casting off', in this case, of its occupants. Though as an alchemist, I may have seen this more as the Athanor! The Athanor is both, in Alchemical literature, the furnace of transmutation, and in Rosicrucian thinking, the Mountain of the Adepts, also at times depicted as the College maintaining its sacred vessel from the eyes of the insiduous. As such, the wheeled depiction at times called 'the Invisible college of the Rosicrucians' from Theophilus Schweighardt's Speculum sophicum rhodo-stauroticum of 1618 came to mind (I've attached a copy of the image). Here then, both the alembic pressured vessel - with its release in the next 'clue' - and the image, is reminiscent of the Tower - at least to me! Oh miserly pressured release... but it must be for the transformations to occur Given what I've written above, this last clue now makes more sense :)

The What card am I: XVI The Tower thread was originally posted on 13 Jun 2003 in the Tarot Games & Fun board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Tarot Games & Fun, or read more archived threads.