Divination with playing cards

psychiclayla

I have recently added fortune-telling with playing cards to my psychic CV. Does anyone else around here do this? It's a very traditional type of divination apparently, and a lot to do with the Romany people/gypsies.

A few of my clients have told me that their Grandmothers/Great Aunts/Great Grandmothers used to practise this type of divination. I would be really interested to know of any superstitions or nuggets of knowledge about reading playing cards.

Also there are many conflicting 'true gypsy methods' of this type of divination. I can only assume that each clan had it's own way of interpreting the cards. I would love to hear of any traditional methods or meanings to the cards.
 

poivre

I think one way of doing this you can match the regular playing deck to the minor & court cards of the tarot. The only thing missing is the majors & the pages. Put the joker in for the fool & there you go.
This is just one idea. I know there are some different meanings also.
 

WolfyJames

My mother used to do cartomancy. I have proudly followed in her footsteps, even though I'm not as good as her.

My mother was given a cartomancy book by her bestfriend and my mother used that book to read cards. I'm the one today who has that book and I follow the meanings that are in it.

This book by Delpha is called: Le nouvel art de tirer les cartes, toutes les méthodes connues: Eteilla, Lenormand, Le grand jeu, les réussites, les patiences et les tours de cartes

My bestfriend does cartomancy too and the meanings of the cards as well as the way of picking them up are completely different from me, along with the spreads. Cartomancy is not like tarot where the meanings are well defined and the same for all the decks. Everyone in cartomancy has its own meanings and methods.
 

psychiclayla

Wow, I love this site! Everyone is so knowledgeable and happy to help.

Ros, I never thought of it that way before. I am sure that method would make for a much simpler reading (closer to traditional fortune-telling). Sometimes simple is just what's needed, much as I love the Tarot, it does ramble on a bit sometimes!

WolfyJames, sounds like an interesting book but it sounds a bit...French! Is it available in English? What you said about people having their own methods is very interesting. Maybe I'll come up with my own meanings and my own way of interpreting the cards now.

skytwig, thanks so much for the links. They were both very helpful. I've printed them out for future reference.

Cheers!
psychiclayla
 

Rusty Neon

WolfyJames said:
This book by Delpha is called: Le nouvel art de tirer les cartes, toutes les méthodes connues: Eteilla, Lenormand, Le grand jeu, les réussites, les patiences et les tours de cartes

That's interesting about the Delpha covering Patience (i.e., Solitaire) as well. I haven't seen any French-language cartomancy books that touch on Patience. In fact, the only reference to Patience in the context of cartomancy that I've seen was in a 2001 Russian-language cartomancy book. As most Russian language books on cartomancy and tarot are derivative, it's not surprising to hear now of this French source.
 

WolfyJames

Yes indeed, patience are included in the book, it also says that a patience can serve for a yes/no question. If you succeed the patience, the answer is yes. I've never tried that. The book is out of print, I think, and nearly impossible to find. And I don't know anything about the author Delpha.

psychiclayla said:
Maybe I'll come up with my own meanings and my own way of interpreting the cards now.

Creating your own method, and cards, could be fun, think about it (I've thought about it). You could inspire yourself from Sibilla Oracle Cards, beautiful 52 cards with images on the cards that show the meaning of the cards (the Rider-Waite version of cartomancy with illustrated pips), with the meanings that you come up with. I've seen template on the web to create your own deck of cards, here: http://www.marticia.com/tarot/items.html

Have fun!
 

Rusty Neon

WolfyJames said:
Yes indeed, patience are included in the book, it also says that a patience can serve for a yes/no question. If you succeed the patience, the answer is yes. I've never tried that. The book is out of print, I think, and nearly impossible to find. And I don't know anything about the author Delpha.

In the Delpha book, is a Patience used to answer other types of questions, or just yes/no questions?
 

skytwig

this thread really opened up alot for me, psychiclayla.... Thanks :)

And the threads you included are very helpful and informative, wolfy.... thanks..... I had several sibilla decks and was fascinated by them..... I didn't know what they were, but, loving playing cards, I took special care of them for years.

Now, after several moves and the kids having gotten to them, i'm not sure i still have them.... darn! but i shall look through storage boxes.....

I like the ideam however, of creating oracle cards, containing whatever 'theme' I want, rather than standard Tarot themes..... hmmmmmmm.......

I LOVE BEING INSPIRED :D
 

Logiatrix

ros said:
I think one way of doing this you can match the regular playing deck to the minor & court cards of the tarot. The only thing missing is the majors & the pages. Put the joker in for the fool & there you go.
This is just one idea. I know there are some different meanings also.
That's how I read my own fortunetelling deck.
I'd looked into just about every fortunetelling book and/or deck set on the market, because it is indeed a fascinating study and I've been using playing cards since forever.
Ultimately, I've come to use a regular poker deck, with my own keywords or phrases written on each card with a Sharpee.
I use card meanings simillar to tarot.
I use numerological associations to apply the Major Arcana into the readings, and I do not use the Joker.
While I do have the tarot associations, I still find these readings to be different than tarot readings.
The readings are more detailed somehow, but I don't exactly know why--except that I may rely more on my intuition and less on the cards.
I often prefer the simplistic symbolism and abundantant white space on playing cards, as opposed to a lot of color and images.
I also find that many of my querents are more comfortable with playing cards, and find it fascinating to see a familliar object (the poker deck) become magical.
On the practical side, my little poker deck is much smaller and more flexible for me to handle and shuffle.
:)