The Salmon of Doubt Uncertain Future Spread

Here's a spread for exploring projected developments in a future situation or condition that is expected to occur, but that is completely up-in-the air as to any visible hints of potential success or failure. It makes extensive use of the quintessence calculation, which you can do any way you choose. Reversals may also be used as you see fit.

I pinched the title from Douglas Adams' unfinished novel because 1) the layout looks like a fish (I tried to put "feet" positions on it like the Darwin bumper sticker but that didn't work ), and 2) the very idea of an "unfinished novel" seems like the epitome of an "uncertain future."

This is *super* cute. I will have to use it in a reading for my partner, a huge Douglas Adams fan, once I get the feel of it.

To help me along that route, are there any good threads here, or resources elsewhere, to read about quintessence cards?

Thanks so much!

TK_Finch said:

This is *super* cute. I will have to use it in a reading for my partner, a huge Douglas Adams fan, once I get the feel of it.

To help me along that route, are there any good threads here, or resources elsewhere, to read about quintessence cards?

Thanks so much!

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Thanks! The quintessence is usually a single Major Arcana card calculated to summarize all of the cards in a spread, but I get creative with it by using what I call "sub-quints." There are a few ways to calculate it, and there have been previous discussions in numerous threads. I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere in the tarot literature, but I'm sure it must be there somewhere. I'll take a look in the past threads to see what I can find.

Here's an old thread that is as good a place to start as any, and if you google "quintessence" you'll find a few more. It echoes what I heard previously about the German author Hajo Banzhaf being the only one to mention it in books. I have two of his books but don't recall seeing anything there, although he may have other untranslated publications.

http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=56813

Thank you!

On Page 28-30 of his book Keywords for the Crowley Tarot, Banzhaf has two paragraphs on the quintessence, but I think you may find the forum discussions more enlightening.

Barleywine said:

Here's an old thread that is as good a place to start as any, and if you google "quintessence" you'll find a few more. It echoes what I heard previously about the German author Hajo Banzhaf being the only one to mention it in books. I have two of his books but don't recall seeing anything there, although he may have other untranslated publications.

http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=56813

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That's correct, I have a book from Hajo Banzhaf (a translation in Hungarian) where he talks about "quintessence".

ETA Thank you for this spread, I'll try it out, I love your spreads. Can't wait to buy the book (I read somewhere that you are going to publish a book with your spreads)

rylla said:

That's correct, I have a book from Hajo Banzhaf (a translation in Hungarian) where he talks about "quintessence".

ETA Thank you for this spread, I'll try it out, I love your spreads. Can't wait to buy the book (I read somewhere that you are going to publish a book with your spreads)

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I keep setting myself back! I had a workbook of 24 advanced spreads all set to go, but now I have more than twice that many, so I'm back to Square One. I've started publishing some of them in the American Tarot Association's free monthly newsletter, and have also approached Cartomancer magazine about publishing some of my stuff. I really need to set up a blog so I can offer a PDF version of the expanded workbook via PayPal. Double-sided, spiral-bound hardcopy production is way too much work to do at home.