Baroque Bohemian Cats Tarot: 4 of Pentacles

Okay, I know this is only the second card discussed, but I have a personal block with the Magician card. No one else started a thread, so I just flipped through the deck until I found one of my favorites, so here he is.

I love this card. As a cat lover, facial expressions mean a lot to me, and this cat has the perfect attitude for the 4 of Pents! The medallions under his throne, the one grasped in his paws, and his overall body language just shouts out, "Mine! Mine! Get your own, these are MINE!"

Love his coat, again red used as a color of wealth (purple as well). His throne is beautiful and goes along with the theme, even down to the colors. It's too big for him, really, but he's firmly seated there and not budging! The room is gorgeous, the artwork lovely, but if feels somehow empty, as if the room is echoingly empty apart from this miserly cat on his golden chair. He's surrounded himself with costly things that belong to him, and has obviously been wise with his money, but what does he have apart from material goods? He certainly doesn't look happy!

On a purely aesthetic note, I love the parquet floor.

You know, there's a saying: A big fish in a small pond. Take that big fish & put him in a bigger pond & he's now a small fish compared to others. I wonder if this kitty is suffering from that in a way--achieving the wealth he's still got his 'small pond' thinking going though I'm sure others in the large pond aren't reacting the same way.

The card also means 'frugal' but he doesn't seem to be indicating this with his posture at all. That glare, the grump, you can hear the growl. His chair's too big. (On a side note, the one pentacle slid under the chair reminds me of a chamberpot I'd seen in some oldstyle pictures, it'd be hidden under the chair to avoid being hit by feet & overturning). I know I should think 'toy under the chair' in regards to cats, but a chamberpot came to mind. That's so strange!

Did you see the little angel on the left of him whispering in his ear? (His right ear that is, our left). I wonder what it's saying? Is this a Scrooge moment? You know, where the Ghost of Christmas Present starts whispering?

And somebody bumped the chandelier, the candles are crooked.

Yes, this guy is NOT happy, even though he is wealthy. I wonder if he can ever bring himself to actually spend any of it on anything other than "investments"? I think he is a collector of "things" (that Japanese tapestry, that oh-so-expensive chandelier with the candles that have never been lit - waste of money to burn wax), but what if you asked him to donate to charity? I think he'd become very Scrooge-like if it came to giving anything away.

The pity of it is, that he's just tense, worried about hanging on to what he's got and unable to enjoy it. I'll be honest and say that I had one of my (now deceased) relatives in mind when we designed this card. She died with vast amounts of money in the bank, but largely alone and unhappy. She would spend a lot on anything that she thought was a good investment, and yet she would go to secondhand shops if she had to buy a present for someone else. Yet tragically she was a nice woman in other ways - just totally trapped by her obsession with building up a fortune then hanging on to her money - not a bit of which she could really enjoy.
That explains a little how I see this Four of Pentacles. This Persian cat COULD be happy, if only he was not so constantly worried about losing even one little bit of his vast collection of gold. By the way, notice also that he is quite thin - especially for a Persian (don't worry, in reality he wasn't, we just made him look this way). He is probably being very frugal in some aspects of his life. You just wish he could learn a bit from the cat on the Nine of Cups!

One final note - the parquet floor was not in this room in fact, we added it. The original room has a fantastic tiled floor that represents aspects of Hermeticism - it seemed much too spiritual in meaning for this card, so we changed the floor. I agree that this wooden one is beautiful, it's also old of course.

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Okay, final, final thing I just wanted to say! I know that this card is arguably a particularly negative aspect of the Four of Pentacles - of course it can mean good things such as saving, being rightly careful with money and simply hanging on to things that you need. However, I think the "lighter" side of this Four is there in one particular way - there is a lot of intentional humour. Yes, we wanted to show miserliness, but we also wanted to show how funny and silly it can be to let money take over your life - in a way we wanted to say "Don't be so daft, get out there, be generous, make friends, there's more to life than possessions".

The humour in this deck and its storytelling abilities are very much part of the way it works. Many cats do of course have a huge sense of humour - though maybe not this particular Persian! ;_)

The face of the cat remind me of my uncle : very serious most of the time. But the similarity end there.

I have not anything more to add to the meaning of the card. This cat is a little bit too materialistic. And he is neglecting friendship. He most feel a void and think that more money and a lot of wealth will fill it in time. But it is making the void bigger and hungrier for more. A sad little rich cat...

annik said:

A sad little rich cat...

Click to expand...

I think that's a good phrase for him - thanks I'll remember that!

Not much to add here, except to say that money can't buy happiness, because it is free and priceless, and that is a truth this poor little rich cat has yet to discover.

This card does make me feel a little sad because I feel sorry for him. This is something that doesn't come across for me in the RWS. I feel indifferent to the guy/woman in that card. There is a real desperation here; a need to protect what he has at all costs. As much as I understand the traditional meaning for the card, and also Karen and Alex's take, it also brings someone else to mind - someone that was not miserly, but protective over her posessions. I used to work with a young woman who had profound disabilities and in her early life, she had lived in an institution. Even though, as she lived through her 30's, she was in a house (with four other housemates with similar needs) that was safe and with a great staff team, the memories of those days did not leave her. She would sleep with her handbag under her pillow every night. I would always remind her before she went to sleep that everything in her room was hers and that she need not fear that anybody would take her posessions, but after I would say goodnight and close the door behind me, I would see her hand slide out of the duvet and reach for the bag that was left on the floor. In the past and in other shared houses, I think people would help themselves to her gifts and things that were hers and since she was viusually impaired, she would have no control over this. Unfortunately, we lost this very kind-spirited and lovely woman last year, a few years before she was due to reach forty.

I think I will keep this memory in mind when I look at this card because it makes me feel a little more connected with this cat. It still helps me to remember that even though her possessions were very important to her (in a way, they were her 'rights' and part of her makeup), there were times when she was able to forget about them and just enjoy being herself. In that way, the card, to me suggests a release and a time to appreciate what you have that is important - your life, support from friends - that possessions and material things can be seductive but cannot replace your memories or a true gift, such as sight and laughter.

LB

Not much I can add to all that's already been said. My only extra thought is about that disk underneath his chair. It's almost as if he's got so much that he doesn't even notice that one of his coins has gone missing. It's right there in front of (beneath) him, but amongst all his stuff he doesn't even notice it.

I love this card. He seems a grumpy guss, but as baba-prague has said, these cats bring a humor, a lightheartedness, to the scene, that draws me in and makes me want to understand instead of walk away. I kind of want to pinch his little toes and chuck him under the chin ... cheer up little guy ...