Le Fanu said:
I particularly like Spanish playing cards for divination because the suits are the same as the Minor Arcana and you also have knights, which other decks have lost.
I sometimes read with Spanish playing cards as if they were Minors, alongside a Majors only tarot deck. It´s one of my favourite methods!
I did not know that the Spanish playing card decks included all four courts. Thank you for that, Fanu. All these years I have just been living with readings with the king, queen, and knight. Also, thank you, Sinduction, for the link to The Art of Cartomancy Forum.
I have recently been researching as old of books that I can find that contain divination of cards, tarot or regular. I have tired of the new books, I want to read older books on the subject. Here is a little piece, that mentions double-headed playing cards (I think that most regular playing are all double-headed), that I found interesting that I'd like to pass on as food for thought. It is taken from
Foster's Encyclopedia of Games by Robert Frederick Foster (1897):
"According to Eittella, the father of all fortune telling, only 32 cards should be used, and it is essential that they should be single heads, because a court card standing firmly on its feet is a very different thing from one standing on its head. If single-head cards are not at hand, the lower part of the double-head cards must be canceled in some manner." I wasn't sure, upon reading this, if the author meant "canceling" or adjusting in one's mind or physically altering cards?
Just something I thought of while reading this thread.
Regards ~