Hebrew letter on wand of Magician

Abrac

I was looking at the Magician card a little while ago and something jumped out at me I've never noticed before. On the Wand on the table it looks like a Hebrew Tzaddi or Ayin. Does anyone else see it? Here's an image from Kenji's Pam A. http://s32.postimg.org/um5pato4l/Untitled_1.jpg. I did a search but couldn't find anything and I don't remember it coming up. If it is a Hebrew letter, anyone have any thoughts on what it means?
 

ncharge

I think it is Yod, which is all about creation. It is the spark of the Divine. I have seen it as a term for the "finger of God". Thank you for pointing that out! I have noticed it before, but never thought about it.
 

Abrac

It looks a little more like Tzaddi to me. But it seems like an odd place for a Hebrew letter, if it even is one. Maybe it's just a leaf stem that coincidentally looks like a Hebrew letter.
 

Barleywine

I looked at it as well as I could with a magnifier, and also in a larger size on my tablet. It looks more "organic" and not like a Hebrew letter at all. In fact, on my Radiant RWS magician card it's missing entirely and there is a knob of wood sticking out of the staff at that location. I looked at some medieval quarterstaff images to see if I could find something that might have served as a model, with no luck. The Albano Waite shows it with a green center but - unless it's supposed to be a (rather malformed) leaf like on all of the minor and court Wands - I'm thinking that was just a printing anomaly. Hmm. maybe it's a Mercury sigil that somebody stepped on . . . ;)

ETA: Maybe a spur? Something to keep the Will aligned and going in the right direction?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spur#/media/File:Ep_gdgalle.jpg
 

Abrac

I think you're right about the printing anomaly. It looks like it was intended to have a green leaf on the end but someone dropped the ball. There's another place toward the end of the wand that looks like it maybe should've had some color too. :)