The things I missed in this deck - after 28 years of looking!!

lucky star

Hierophant

I'm sure I can make out "FEB" on the Heiophant's red gown?
 

poivre

I never noticed the river in The Chariot card,
until today.
 

Rabbit

You know what cracks me up?

4 of cups...the hand coming out of the cloud with a cup. lol

lol the two men in the Hierophant are balding.
 

Orlando

A Gift...

Yes...and that 'hand in the cloud' is similar to the Ace of Cups imagery, i.e. another gift available to us.
 

rosesred

One significant symbol I missed until a couple of years ago is that the towers of the Moon are actually in the background of 'Death', and the light is not above them, but low between them.

Love this thread, invites a closer study of the cards.
 

MercyMe

The bridge across the water in the 5 of cups escaped my notice until recently. So, there's a lot more the sorrowful figure could notice when they get around to looking up and around. Like a bridge across the emotional waters.

I'm going to be looking a lot closer at these cards from now on. I can't believe I missed that very large detail.
 

Elnor

Something I recently found out that I thought was amazing...

the letter on the Ace of Cups seems to be a 'W'...but it isn't, it's an upsidedown 'M', and I could never understand what this was supposed to represent.

Then this past summer I read 'The DaVinci Code'- and do you remember that bit where it says that the Holy Grail is actually symbolic of Mary Magdelene?!

Somehow, I think that this is what Pamela Coleman-Smith is hinting at- since she was a member of the Golden Dawn she would have been aware of this, I suppose? (I know next to nothing about the Golden Dawn- I might be wrong here), but it does give a different slant to this card! Anyway, it gives me a satisfactory explaination for that 'M'.

Elnor
 

Rosanne

Elnor said:
Somehow, I think that this is what Pamela Coleman-Smith is hinting at- since she was a member of the Golden Dawn she would have been aware of this, I suppose? (I know next to nothing about the Golden Dawn- I might be wrong here), but it does give a different slant to this card! Anyway, it gives me a satisfactory explaination for that 'M'.

The author Robert Place would agree with you Elnor. He says in his book That this Cup seems to represent the Holy Grail. The intial M on the cup identifies it with Mary. It is upside down to show that it is receiving the Host delivered by the Dove.... It seems he thinks the chalice is Mary the vessel for the body and blood of Christ.
Although I do not dispute this, I prefer to think it was the W of the sign Scorpio or even the top half of the alchemical sign for distillation. For all I know it could be Pamela's poke of fun at Arthur Waite- because when she knew him he acted as a pseudo Catholic Priest- celebrating Mass and giving Communion. Pamela became a Catholic and as far as I can tell, she no longer had contact with Waite after her conversion. As a Catholic she would have viewed him as a Heretic and very wrong for pretending Priesthood.

Have you noticed on the King of Cups, in the water at his right hand there is a blue fish rising out of the water? Maybe it is the fish from the cup of the Page of Cups off to tell tales in the ear of the King? ~Rosanne
 

Flavio

7 of Cups - Skull

The version of the RWS deck I use is the "Universal Waite" in that one, the light colours didn't allowed me to see the skull in the cup with the laurel crown in the 7 of Cups until someone in my class asked the teacher about the meaning that skull, in summary the laurel crown might represent glory even after death.
 

Fulgour

M'Lady Pamela

"The Magician" is pointing straight down at the PCS
signature, which is strangely thick and scrunched...
almost like it is growing there among the flowers! :joke: