Mary El Tarot - The Emperor

Bat Chicken

This Emperor is by far the most elegant, empathetic and this is by far my favourite from any deck.

http://www.mary-el.com/04.html

There is the wisdom of the old warrior in this deck. At first I wondered about the dragonfly on his head with a tail that looked like paintings of Egyptian live papyrus. The watery fields of papyrus would have been the home of the dragonfly which the ancient Egyptian warrior admired for its speed and agility.

The typical Aries red is present in this card with a bit of colour in every part, including the eyes of the fish decorating the sword. If this a reference to AC's Thoth interpretation of the Emperor having the letter Tzaddi (fish hook)? Or is it because his path is the path between the king and the prince, Chokmah and Tiphareth and it is a sideways reference to Christ?

The gold of the Sun/Son is in the Emperor's jewelry, sword and the crown on his forehead. I am going to assume the three stones on his ring are alchemical, perhaps representing salt sulpher and mercury? Perhaps someone else could elaborate on that?

This Emperor makes me think of Father Time and I accidentally looked up the Titan Cronus (Saturn) instead.This interesting tidbit came up in Wikipedia:

Wikipedia said:
El, the Phoenician Cronus
When Hellenes encountered Phoenicians and, later, Hebrews, they identified the Semitic El, by interpretatio graeca, with Cronus. The association was recorded ca. AD 100 by Philo of Byblos' Phoenician history, as reported in Eusebius' Præparatio Evangelica I.10.16.[15] Philo's account, ascribed by Eusebius to the semi-legendary pre-Trojan War Phoenician historian Sanchuniathon, indicates that Cronus was originally a Canaanite ruler who founded Byblos and was subsequently deified. This version gives his alternate name as Elus or Ilus, and states that in the 32nd year of his reign, he emasculated, slew and deified his father Epigeius or Autochthon "whom they afterwards called Uranus". It further states that after ships were invented, Cronus, visiting the 'inhabitable world', bequeathed Attica to his own daughter Athena, and Egypt to Thoth the son of Misor and inventor of writing.[16]

I am under the impression that this was Marie's first and most important card, and like me, her soul card. So perhaps this "El" is significant?

On the far right of the card, the clouds and birds seem to make another face, a ghostly mirror image. Because the Emperor of the Qabalistic Tarot is Intellect, I am inclined to think that the water of previous cards is transformed into mist by the heat of Aries and Mars' fire into the Air of Intellect.

I am uncertain, but it seems there is a mountain behind him as well.

Well that gets things started anyway!
 

Debra

Dragonflies are predators, and very territorial.
 

Debra

I am a thread killer :(
 

BrightEye

No, you're not.

Dragonflies are beautiful though, an almost threatening kind of beauty that I also associate with the Emperor energy (personal thing). They are also good navigators and always elegant, just like I think of the Emperor. I do like this one particularly!
 

Bat Chicken

I thought I was the thread killer! :laugh: I guess you just kinda summed it up... :)

I like that - a 'threatening kind of beauty'.
 

Laura Borealis

I like this Emperor. There is less of the stern authoritarian and more of the wise and serene. I like what Bat Chicken said about the wisdom of the old warrior. The information about El/Chronus is very interesting. I didn't even see the mirror image face in the clouds until BC mentioned it... intriguing!
 

Laura Borealis

I meant to ask, does anyone know what the glyph on his finger might be?
 

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Requiella

I am going to assume the three stones on his ring are alchemical, perhaps representing salt sulpher and mercury? Perhaps someone else could elaborate on that?

Alchemical--maybe so, especially given who the artist is. :) I cannot comment on the alchemical meanings, but I'll offer a tangential observation. Two of the three stones appear to be red and green to me, which could represent the marriage of Emperor and Empress (marriage of society and nature). Also, the green eyes of the Emperor give another connection to the Empress.
 

Debra

She wrote somewhere about green eyes representing something-or-other :laugh:
I wonder about symbolic stews vs intuition with cards like this.
 

Bat Chicken

Well that was informative! :laugh:

But that is a good question. I think, for me, I wait until I hit symbol overload and then my intuition takes over....