PKT PDF with Images

Abrac

When I first made this document I was under the impression that the de Laurence version was an "exact facsimile" of the PKT as it says on Wikipedia, so I used its text. But after looking more carefully I discovered there are some major differences, maybe to get around copyright law, I'm not sure. So I went through and compared line by line to see exactly what all the differences are; some of what I discovered is listed below.

I did a complete revision; this time I compared the de Laurence to the "1911" version at Sacred Texts. For the most part I stuck to the Sacred Text version, correcting some errors it contains. Here's one example:

"Chatto's Facts and Speculations concerning the History of Playing Cards", should be "Chatto's Facts and Speculations on the Origin and History of Playing Cards."​

In a few places I used the de Laurence because it's actually better. For example, it corrects a couple of Latin typos, and in one place it italicizes a book title that's not italicized in the PKT:

"I commend this suggestion to the lineal descendants in the spirit of Gabriele Rossetti and Eugène Aroux, to Mr. Harold Bayley as another New Light on the Renaissance."​

The reference is to Bayley's book but without the italics it's not immediately obvious what Waite means.

But the de Laurence has some very critical mistakes:

1. Some key phrases have been completely rewritten. For example in the PKT Preface:

"After the same manner, it happens more often than might seem likely that those who have seen the King of Heaven through the most clearest veils of the sacraments are those who assume thereafter the humblest offices of all about the House of God."

and De Laurence,

"After the same manner, it happens more often than might seem likely that those who have seen the Occult Powers of Nature through the most clearest veils of the sacraments are those who assume thereafter the humblest offices of all about the House of Wisdom."​

2. Words that aren't italicized in the PKT are italicized in the de Laurence for no apparent rhyme or reason, and it's not consistent throughout, as if the book had more than one editor.

3. Several words have been stripped of their British form and changed to American: "favour" and "honour" for example.

4. Waite's use of the archaic "shew" has been changed to "show" in the de Laurence.

5. de Laurence has a strange way of capitalizing the first letter of each word in book titles such as "Tarot Of The Bohemians" rather than "of the."

6. The description of the King of Pentacles is messed up in both versions. The de Laurence completely omits a couple of important sentences, one of which is Waite's explanation for his use of the Pentacle.

7. One paragraph in the Lesser Arcana section is at the beginning when it should be at the end.

Overall the new PDF is a huge improvement over the last one. It should be a reliable and easy to read version of the PKT. I didn't use internal hyperlinks this time except for the endnotes, they're more trouble than they're worth; but it still has bookmarks. Download link above has been updated.
 

Abrac

Updated version of PKT is available (download link in first post).

Found what I think may be a misprint in Waite's correspondences of the tarot suits to those of playing cards. I inserted a note with explanation (see last paragraph, page 6).

Fixed bug in links that can change zoom level when they're clicked. Now it stays at whatever zoom it's set to.

Corrected a few typos.

Fixed a couple of bookmarks that weren't working right.
 

Denever

Bless you for doing this, Abrac. I'm very happy to have it.
 

Abrac

I think I may be wrong about the misprint. Here's what Waite says in the PKT:

"There remain the four suits, being Wands or Scepters—ex hypothesi, in the archæology of the subject, the antecedents of Diamonds in modern cards: Cups, corresponding to Hearts; Swords, which answer to Clubs, as the weapon of chivalry is in relation to the peasant’s quarter-staff or the Alsatian bludgeon; and, finally, Pentacles—called also Deniers and Money—which are the prototypes of Spades."​

After considering this carefully, he seems to be making a comparison of the Sword (a weapon) with the quarter-staff and bludgeon, both types of "clubs" and both weapons. This seems deliberate. Probably not a misprint, but a departure from Waite's usual correspondences, and an enduring mystery. :)
 

Abrac

I uploaded an update. I took out my speculation about a misprint and just noted that this version of Waite's correspondences is different from that which he usually held.
 

parsival

I take my hat off to your industry and your generosity in sharing the fruits of your work.
Thank you !

I see you caught the blooper about the value of the letter Shin which I only recently noticed was given as 200 in my 1911 copy of the PKT.
 

Abrac

Thanks a lot parsival. This book was badly in need of an edit. It must've gone to press with no (or very little) editing, otherwise many of the mistakes would've been caught. A lot of Waite's books appear to be very well edited and don't contain typos and obvious mistakes. But judging from his FRC rituals and the PKT he had a habit of writing the wrong words in places.
 

Abrac

I found another de Laurence edit in the Preface. The expression "Mr. Smith" used by Waite was edited and changed in the de Laurence version. The change actually isn't that bad and makes Waite's meaning a little clearer, but unfortunately they didn't change the punctuation to match their new wording and that just confuses things. So for the sake of accuracy I changed it back to Waite's original.

I originally used de Laurence's version as my pattern, thinking it might be truer to the original, but boy was I wrong. de Laurence made massive changes to the original, some good and some very bad! Anyway, I uploaded the latest version of the PDF if anyone wants it.