[Chrystella]

Oooh, yah, I love the idea of drawing a court card to help identify if it's the maternal or paternal side.

I'm loving the evolution of this. Here's where we're at now.

• Draw from the courts to represent the ancestor.
• Draw from the courts to identify if it's the maternal (Pages and Queens) or paternal line (Knights and Kings).
• Draw from the majors to get a deeper sense of the ancestor's life or personality.
• Tell me about a memorable day in your life.
• How do you affect or influence me?
• What is your message for me?
• How can I honour you?

conurelover, I'd love to know more about how you use Lenormand for this. I don't work with Lenormand, but I understand you can get more pragmatic answers from it.

[conurelover]

Originally Posted by Chrystella

Oooh, yah, I love the idea of drawing a court card to help identify if it's the maternal or paternal side.

I'm loving the evolution of this. Here's where we're at now.

• Draw from the courts to represent the ancestor.
• Draw from the courts to identify if it's the maternal (Pages and Queens) or paternal line (Knights and Kings).
• Draw from the majors to get a deeper sense of the ancestor's life or personality.
• Tell me about a memorable day in your life.
• How do you affect or influence me?
• What is your message for me?
• How can I honour you?

conurelover, I'd love to know more about how you use Lenormand for this. I don't work with Lenormand, but I understand you can get more pragmatic answers from it.

Hi Chrystella! Like a few others in this thread I am heavy into my genealogy. My maternal side has a line that was full of boisterous stories that we are finding out were not true and have come down right mysterious because the stories were used to hide the reality of the situation. So I use Lenormand to ask "Did so and so come from this village?" Or something simple....Then I draw three Lenormand cards and depending on the ratio of positive to negative cards you get a yes or no.

If anyone has an idea on how to use tarot to break down a genealogy roadblock I would love to hear it, but it kind of breaks off a little from ancestor communication.

Okay, I am off to try the new layout of questions above with the Tarot of Delphi.

[celticnoodle]

Originally Posted by RiverRunsDeep

I'd like to give this a try, using the spread Chrystella shared. (Thank you, Chrystella!). I'll draw from the majors and the courts as an indication of the ancestor, but I have another idea as well. I think I'm going to draw from the courts twice; the second time, I will ask: Are you from the paternal or the maternal side of my family? I was considering using the Pages/Queens as maternal and the Knights/Kings as paternal. What do you guys think?

what a great idea! I'm going to add that in as well.

I'm going to use the Ghost Tarot.

Oh, I wish I had thought of this too! Very appropriate, eh?

[celticnoodle]

Okay, so I am pulling from the court cards to see if this ancestor is from my maternal or paternal side.

The King of Wands rx.

So, my paternal side! Which would leave the auntie out that I was leaning towards.

Day 2: Tell me about a memorable day in your life.
knight of wands.

So someone who was moving forward with a specific goal in mind to tackle. It appears in the card that he has a lot of skill and determination with this endeavor. He is on his horse, who is bucking and ready to move! In an area with some hills--sandy--perhaps the desert? The horses' mane and tale are yellow like fire, which gives more feeling of this being a action of great importance to my ancestor here, I think.

any other thoughts?

[Tanga]

Originally Posted by Chrystella

...I'm loving the evolution of this. Here's where we're at now.

• Draw from the courts to represent the ancestor.
• Draw from the courts to identify if it's the maternal (Pages and Queens) or paternal line (Knights and Kings).
• Draw from the majors to get a deeper sense of the ancestor's life or personality.
• Tell me about a memorable day in your life.
• How do you affect or influence me?
• What is your message for me?
• How can I honour you?

You guys are slowly drawing me into experimenting with this...
With a recent resurrected interest in my Thoth and Liber T decks - looks like I may be trying this out using these.

Ghost Tarot would be fab huh?

Originally Posted by celticnoodle

...
Day 2: Tell me about a memorable day in your life.
knight of wands.

So someone who was moving forward with a specific goal in mind to tackle. It appears in the card that he has a lot of skill and determination with this endeavor. He is on his horse, who is bucking and ready to move! In an area with some hills--sandy--perhaps the desert? The horses' mane and tale are yellow like fire, which gives more feeling of this being a action of great importance to my ancestor here, I think.

any other thoughts?

My brain immediately jumped to "initiation ceremony". ...on my paternal side - any ancestor before my grandmother and grandfather (maybe even them) - would probably have undergone some form of one in the tribe... And hence when my brother was born (1st born) - my father kept a cheetah skin for him when he "came of age" (originally - you went out and hunted such animals down as proof of manhood).

Or should that be the domain of the Page?...

[celticnoodle]

Originally Posted by Tanga

My brain immediately jumped to "initiation ceremony". ...on my paternal side - any ancestor before my grandmother and grandfather (maybe even them) - would probably have undergone some form of one in the tribe... And hence when my brother was born (1st born) - my father kept a cheetah skin for him when he "came of age" (originally - you went out and hunted such animals down as proof of manhood).

Or should that be the domain of the Page?...

oh, an initiation ceremony, eh? Well, my paternal gf was the only son of his parents. He had an older sister and a younger sister who was adopted into their family. I know he was well thought of by both parents and spoiled a bit, I believe.

My paternal great gf was a middle son from a large family--older and younger brothers and sisters. I've no idea what kind of initiation would've been done for either of them--if it is one of these two men...

but gives me something to think about. thanks for your response. do join in with your own reading too!

[RiverRunsDeep]

Originally Posted by celticnoodle

Okay, so I am pulling from the court cards to see if this ancestor is from my maternal or paternal side.

The King of Wands rx.

So, my paternal side! Which would leave the auntie out that I was leaning towards.

Day 2: Tell me about a memorable day in your life.
knight of wands.

So someone who was moving forward with a specific goal in mind to tackle. It appears in the card that he has a lot of skill and determination with this endeavor. He is on his horse, who is bucking and ready to move! In an area with some hills--sandy--perhaps the desert? The horses' mane and tale are yellow like fire, which gives more feeling of this being a action of great importance to my ancestor here, I think.

any other thoughts?

Gee, I hope I've done that quote bit correctly!

celticnoodle,
With the Knights, I also like to consider the aspects of movement/journeys/traveling.
Could your ancestor have been a traveler, maybe in regards to his work? Or maybe he had the opportunity for one particular trip that he felt was especially adventurous, or maybe to a desert area??

[celticnoodle]

Originally Posted by RiverRunsDeep

Gee, I hope I've done that quote bit correctly!

celticnoodle,
With the Knights, I also like to consider the aspects of movement/journeys/traveling.
Could your ancestor have been a traveler, maybe in regards to his work? Or maybe he had the opportunity for one particular trip that he felt was especially adventurous, or maybe to a desert area??

yes, good point. I do see the knights as travelers too and yes, my great grandfather on my dads side did travel. Not really extensively, I think the furthest he traveled was PA to Ohio. but back in his day that was far, I guess.

It'll be interesting to see what the rest of the cards have to say.

[RiverRunsDeep]

I'm glad you like the paternal/maternal idea.

So here is the beginning of my ancestor spread:

First court card: Knight of Pentacles.
I immediately thought of my uncle, who passed around five years ago. He was very family-oriented, with a slow, quiet, methodical way of doing things.

Second court card: Knight of Pentacles
The paternal side of my family, which is correct for the uncle I'm thinking of.

Major: The Lovers
Ok, so.....hmmm. This one has me a bit stuck. The phrase that eventually came to mind was "related by marriage". This would be true for my uncle, as we are related by marriage, not blood. But then, does this mean he is not truly my ancestor? He does visit my dreams more often than any of my blood kin!

I will have to think on this for a bit. I don't want to force meanings to fit just because I think this may be my uncle. Off to ponder.....

[conurelover]

Well I was not a fan of the Tarot of Delphi with this spread. Back to Mary-El today.