Colouring the Pips

Hello everybody,

I'm from Germany so please excuse my bad English...

Sometimes when I think of drawing my own deck or colouring Dawson's "Hermetic Tarot" I wonder how to do it according to the Golden Dawn tradition. In Liber T there are no explicit informations and using the different scales (tree of life, zodiac, planet), one ends up with a lot of possibilities.

One could use the colour of the Sephirah in the special element or qabbalistic world (for example: amber = Netzach in Fire/Atziluth = Seven of Wands) as backround. Or one could use the colour of the sign (example: Seven of Wands = Leo = Yellow). If using the sign's colour, would you use the "general" colour (rose cross) or the special colour of that sign in the element or qabbalistic world the card is assigned to? What about the planet of the Decan - general colour or elemental scale?

According to Lon Milo DuQuette in his book on the Thoth Tarot, Frieda Harris tried to mix them ALL. By doing so you get 9 colours for each of the pips (plus the complementary ones if you like).

I think I'm a bit confused whether to put the emphasis on the Decan of each card (sign and planet) or more on the Sephirah on the Tree of Life?

So, what's my point? I would like to know if there is any information I might have missed somewhere out there, where there is a clear(er) instruction from the Golden Dawn (or later sources) on this subject?

I appreciate all of your information, thoughts or inspirations!

Tzadkiel

I don't know about emphasis, but Harris used elements from all over, and at when it came to coloring had a very free hand is choosing and emphasizing certain colors above others. I have begun a study group in the Thoth forum, the purpose of which is to actually find and identify all the colors used in each card. You're more than welcome to join, I've only just begun with the Fool.

Attached are the fives from each suit in the Golden Dawn Tarot, which was prepared by Robert Wang under the direction of Israel Regardie. The other pips are colored the same way.
Wands: red (more precisely, scarlet or scarlet-orange)
Cups: blue
Swords: yellow
Discs: black, red, green, yellow (see ETA) concentric circles with a red cross on white background in the center

ETA. The GD colors for Earth are citrine, olive, russet, black. This is the Queen Scale for Sephirah 10 and also the King Scale for Path 31 bis. They are the official GD colors for the Pentacle/Disc (Elemental Weapon).

The colors for Wands, Cups, and Swords are those for the corresponding Elements / Mother Letters (King Scale), except that I believe the color for Mem/Water is dark blue, whereas a lighter blue is used for Cups. The information is scattered around in Regardie's Golden Dawn book, but it's all in there somewhere.

Here is a scan of the Golden Dawn Aces. The colors show up better.

Coloring the Pips

Were my posts of any help, Tzadkiel?

Perhaps also check out the Cicero's Magikal Golden Dawn Tarot. They used the queen scale colors as background, and other colors in the design.

Thank you all very much! Especially for the scans and the invitation

I already knew Wang's Golden Dawn Deck and the one from the Ciceros. When it comes to Wang's deck I always wondered why he did not use any of the possible colours? I think because they are not mentioned in Liber T. But having so many colours to choose from, leaving the backround of the pips blanc just doesn't feel right to me and leaves me in a way dissatisfied..

If you look at the Thoth Deck you get the impression that Crowley focused more on the decans or astrological attributions. (Not much "amber" in the Seven of Wands... or the green of Venus and the red of aries in the Four of Wands.) I'm pretty sure that Crowley would have rejected the cards if he didn't agree with Harris' inspiration.

Paul Foster Case specifies that the background of the pips should be blank. In the instructions for coloring the Ace of Wands, he writes: "UNCOLORED - Do not paint the background or outer border. (This will be true of all Aces and numbered keys of all suits.)"

So it must have symbolic significance. It could refer to Kether for the Aces, but I'm not sure how this applies to the other pips.

Thank you for the information LRichard.

I've read somewhere that the clouds, where the angelic hands (that hold the wands or swords etc.) are appearing from, should be shimmering in the colour of the specific sephirah. That would indicate that the backround itself should be blanc. (On the other hand: if the hands are connected to the 72 angels of the shemhamphorash, the clouds could appear in the colour of the zodiac sign too.)

Maybe the focus of my question is shifting from the colouring of the cards to the significance the Golden Dawn gave to the pips and if there is a greater emphasis on their sephirotic equivalence or their astrological (decans) analogy.

Case specifies light grey or white for the clouds.