Which book? pro and contra

Teheuti

DownUnderNZer said:
And as I see it if the Lenormand branched off of Playing Cards, am sure I read somewhere Madam Lenormands deck was Playing Cards with symbols drawn all over them

The images first appear as a complete set in Nuremberg Germany 1798 as the "Game of Hope." The cards were laid out as a game board and the instructions describe a game of the "Snakes & Ladders" type (related to the Game of Goose). In the corners were playing cards - German-suited on the upper left and the related French-suited on the upper right. The instructions mention that the cards may also be used for fortune-telling (with no further instruction). The playing card designations would allow one to also use the deck for many of the extremely popular games that used only 32 or 36 cards. I would call this deck a multi-purpose one - designed to be used in many different ways.

About two years ago I discovered at the British Museum an earlier game of Viennese Coffee-Cards (first published in Vienna around 1794 and soon republished in an English-language edition). These are a set of cards based on standard coffee-ground divination images as described in earlier books. The accompanying book gives divinatory meanings for each card that are almost identical to the meanings given in the original Lenormand instruction sheet (that was published, practically unchanged, with almost every Lenormand deck until the late 20th century).

The card images have no correspondence with the English and French playing card meanings of the card inserts! They do match very closely with 18th-19th century German playing card meanings for the suits of Bells, Acorns, Hearts and Leaves, as recent research has amply shown.

Teheuti

DownUnderNZer said:
Playing cards, from what I have just read, came off of Tarot.

Playing card history is surprisingly well-documented considering that as soon as a deck was missing a card it was usually thrown away. The earliest European playing card references are from around 1375, with cards probably arriving in Europe around mid-century. The earliest mention of Il Trionfos (the earliest name for Tarot cards) are from around 1440 - with experiments in devising a permanent set of trump cards from around 20 years earlier. Trump card games like Karnoffel (a forerunner of Bridge and Whist) had already developed in Germany.

My understanding of the Lenormand is that the purpose of it being developed was to find a more simpler and direct way of reading cards for everyday matters.

The earliest listing of a related set of images is for coffee-ground divination. However, similar sets of images (often with 36 pictures) are found in Biribissi board games (originating around the 14th-15th century). Biribissi, a gambling game, developed into modern lotto and also roulette. Also, emblem books (dating back to the early 16th century), while containing many more images (sometimes hundreds of them), include many of the same symbols with similar meanings ascribed. These books sometimes include a dial in the back for determining an image containing personal "advice" (usually of a moral nature). The introductions to such books go out of their way to draw distinctions between this and fortune-telling.

If you look at its "cousin" the Mystical Kipper it has more people cards in it and was created over 100 years ago.

Kipper cards came later as did quite a few other pictorial divination decks. Etteilla came out with a picture deck in the late 18th century. In England divination cards and related "conversation cards" started appearing in the mid-to-late 17th century. Each deck seems to have its own unique emphasis, making them better for certain kinds of readings - like finding a husband or determining one's future profession.

The Lenormand and Playing Cards came off of the Tarot and are possibly not unique in that way.

As I mention in my prior post, playing cards existed before Tarot and long before Lenormand.

One person pointed out something about the "insets" in that the Germans viewed Clubs being worse than Spades. And just maybe it was confused and mixed up when it crossed over the border.

The German "Green Leaves" were associated with the nobility and were the best suit. Because of their shape they were later associated with Spades (see the Game of Hope where both German and French playing cards are inset on each Lenormand-style image). Clubs were associated with Acorns - the suit of the peasant, representing suffering, disease and disaster.

Who really knows?

Quite a bit is known and available both on the internet and in recent Lenormand books - including the book by Anthony Louis.

ThtDancerGuy

daphne said:
I am not decided which book to buy for Lenormand study, Rana George's or Caitlin Matthews?
What are your experiences with these?
If you have to choose, which would be the first pick?

Hi daphne,

I have read both of those and I can honestly say that I would never read a better Lenormand book than Rana George's book. I've even read Tali Goodwin's and Marcus Katz's book, so I've read all the "popular" ones on the market today, for comparison's sake. Rana George is an exceptional teacher as much as she is an amazing, thorough Lenormand reader. She makes it fun and understandable, with loads of actual personal history behind the cards and her meanings and experiences with them – something both the other authors' books did not have. Please, do yourself a favor and buy Rana's book instead. (;

DownUnderNZer

Just read something more about "Madam Lenormand" and a book she wrote. Also, that the only thing she predicted "wrong" really was the age that she would die!.

Neat to read especially as a few years back it was a bit more limited.

Found this also:

DND said:
In all the tapestry of history, the thread that leads to the origin of both playing cards and Tarot is tangled, intertwined with the weave of nations with each other. The farthest the thread can be traced back though this tapestry of time is to Italy in the late thirteenth century. In a manuscript by Pipozzo di Sandro, dated by Tiraboschi as being from the year 1299, the earliest written mention of cards can be found. This manuscript 'not only proves the very early knowledge the Italians had of cards, but that they were also known by the appellation of carte , as well as that of naibi (Singer, 21).

And I love the cards shown in the write up. Italy has some amazing decks.

DND said:
Although the origin of cards in indeterminable, it seems most likely that the early Tarot was an antecedent to the simpler decks of playing cards. Considering the rapidity with which the popularity of playing cards grew, decks could not afford to be so 'costly' and 'cumbrous' as Benham describes them to be; cards were in demand by both the rich nobility and the poor working class. As the cards were known throughout Europe, people made changes particular to their own values and lifestyles. For example, the Spanish would not let a female figure on the cards, and replaced the Queens of the suits with caballeros . The Germans substituted acorns and hearts for a couple of the Italian suit-signs. Fearing this new way to succumb to the vice of gambling, clergyman and Kings outlawed the production, importation, or use of playing cards. Some areas had regulations relating to the importation of foreign cards to protect the businesses that produced cards in their cities or countries.

It is kind of like the "chicken" and "egg"riddle. Which came first?

All I will say is that after the "Tarot" or "Playing Cards" came other forms of cards/oracles etc including the Lenormand.

Teheuti said:
Playing card history is surprisingly well-documented considering that as soon as a deck was missing a card it was usually thrown away. The earliest European playing card references are from around 1375, with cards probably arriving in Europe around mid-century. The earliest mention of Il Trionfos (the earliest name for Tarot cards) are from around 1440 - with experiments in devising a permanent set of trump cards from around 20 years earlier. Trump card games like Karnoffel (a forerunner of Bridge and Whist) had already developed in Germany.

The earliest listing of a related set of images is for coffee-ground divination. However, similar sets of images (often with 36 pictures) are found in Biribissi board games (originating around the 14th-15th century). Biribissi, a gambling game, developed into modern lotto and also roulette. Also, emblem books (dating back to the early 16th century), while containing many more images (sometimes hundreds of them), include many of the same symbols with similar meanings ascribed. These books sometimes include a dial in the back for determining an image containing personal "advice" (usually of a moral nature). The introductions to such books go out of their way to draw distinctions between this and fortune-telling.

Kipper cards came later as did quite a few other pictorial divination decks. Etteilla came out with a picture deck in the late 18th century. In England divination cards and related "conversation cards" started appearing in the mid-to-late 17th century. Each deck seems to have its own unique emphasis, making them better for certain kinds of readings - like finding a husband or determining one's future profession.

As I mention in my prior post, playing cards existed before Tarot and long before Lenormand.

The German "Green Leaves" were associated with the nobility and were the best suit. Because of their shape they were later associated with Spades (see the Game of Hope where both German and French playing cards are inset on each Lenormand-style image). Clubs were associated with Acorns - the suit of the peasant, representing suffering, disease and disaster.

Quite a bit is known and available both on the internet and in recent Lenormand books - including the book by Anthony Louis.

Teheuti

It would help to know who DND is and what qualifications this person has as a historian of playing cards. The book by Singer (published in 1816) is quite out of date. There has been a tremendous amount of excellent research since then. I suggest books by Kaplan, Dummett, Depaulis, the trionfi.com website, and summaries of the research in Huson and Place. I also recommend the Tarot History & Research section of this forum.

Here's some research on the history of divination with cards:
https://marygreer.wordpress.com/2008/04/01/origins-of-divination-with-playing-cards/

And here's some on Mlle. Lenormand based on first person accounts by those who knew her:
https://marygreer.wordpress.com/200...mand-the-most-famous-card-reader-of-all-time/

Which book? pro and contra

Teheuti

Teheuti

ThtDancerGuy

DownUnderNZer

Teheuti