Alchemical Tarot and Books

With the release of Place's Alchemical Tarot I'm wondering if people know of any good books on Alchemy that would be a good introduction to the deck and further studies.

Thanks in advance!

Alchemical tarot - Robert Place.

Sorry, I don't know of any books, but would very much like to own the Art Edition deck. The images are calling to me...

Hope you get a good response - I'll be checking this thread!

Bee

PS: Your pic. looks like a bind-rune, are you into the Runes (Elder Furthark - no blank rune!) ?

There are a lot of good books on Alchemy that would enhance your understanding of the Alchemical Tarot but none that can really compare to Place's companion book. He has taken information from a lot of sources and put it in one volume. You would have to do a lot of reading to get the same information. Not only that, the books you read on Alchemy rarely, if ever, have anything about the Tarot. The Alchemical Tarot is a fusion of Alchemy and Tarot and Place explains how they work together in his book. Unfortunately it can be hard to find by itself, but from what I've been hearing there is an updated version in the works that will be available sometime in the near (hopefully) future.

Abrac:

Thanks for your reply. I have some books on both alchemy and the tarot, but as you say, Robert's deck and book appear to be a succesfull fusion of both.

Looking forward to the reprint

Bee

Abrac said:

Unfortunately it can be hard to find by itself, but from what I've been hearing there is an updated version in the works that will be available sometime in the near (hopefully) future.

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I hope that rumor is true!

That rumor is true

There will be an updated edition of the Alchemical Tarot book. I believe it will be called Alchemical Tarot: Revisited. I'm anticipating it will be done in the Fall/Winter of this year.

I've heard my deck has now been shipped.

Kenny said:

With the release of Place's Alchemical Tarot I'm wondering if people know of any good books on Alchemy that would be a good introduction to the deck and further studies.

Thanks in advance!

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The classic work is Titus Burckhardt's Alchemy: Science of the Cosmos, Science of the Soul, which clearly explains the spiritual nature of the alchemical quest. For a pictorial review of the imagery of Alchemy get Alchemy & Mysticism: The Hermetic Museum, by Alexander Roob. Everything by C G Jung and his student Marie Louise Von Franz on Alchemy and its imagery is invaluable.

fyreflye said:

The classic work is Titus Burckhardt's Alchemy: Science of the Cosmos, Science of the Soul, which clearly explains the spiritual nature of the alchemical quest. For a pictorial review of the imagery of Alchemy get Alchemy & Mysticism: The Hermetic Museum, by Alexander Roob. Everything by C G Jung and his student Marie Louise Von Franz on Alchemy and its imagery is invaluable.

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I have all these and more! Guess I'm set until the Fall when the book comes out!

The tricky thing is that the subject is contradictory and mutates so drastically over its development. Place isn't really using Hellenistic or Arabic Alchemy, but focusses on later iterations. A couple books that are user-friendly and solid and won't drown your enthusiasm in minutiae:

Cotnoir's Weiser Concise Guide to Alchemy
Abraham's Dictionary of Alchemical Imagery
our very own Adam McLean's Alchemical Mandala (a must read!)

Then when you've gotten your Alchemical sea-legs, you should check out Joscelyn Godwin's translations of The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz and Splendor Solis... both of which will give you lots of paradox to mull. Paired with the Place deck they can both lead to some amazing flashes.