Legend: Four of Shields, King Mark

Sophie-David

Anna-Marie seems to have had a bit of fun with some of Legend's Suit of Shields, and this Four is a good example. With his right hand King Mark points to his increasingly ambitious plans for a large banquet hall, while his left arm sweeps to the heights of his grandiose visions. His clerk (it could just as easily be his wife) sits with mounting frustration and tedium as he listens to his King's tall and impractical tales. To suggest King Mark's silliness, Anna-Marie has indulged in giving him some subtle horse's ears. This is a card of well founded manifestation and expansion, but can also suggest either ostentatious display or miserliness.

As the husband of Isolt who drank the love potion with Tristram in the beautiful Two of Cups, there is certainly a suggestion that King Mark has little relational maturity and thinks of women as possessions. Rather than court or at least arrange the marriage to Isolt in person, he sent Tristram instead to take care of the details, with tragic consequences for the three of them. He may have horse's ears but it would seem that King Mark has a shortage of horse sense.
 

Leo62

David - all these cards!!! Are you having a brainstorm? ;)

This card does make me laugh. I love the expression on the adviser's/wife's face. You can just imagine what she is thinking - "I wish the pompous old g**t would just shut up!"

To me, this is a card of non-communication. As you say, King Mark lacks "relational maturity." He is so carried away by his plans/his ranting/his own opinion that he does not notice the body language of the other person. These two people are "communicating" but not talking. They don't look at each other - their body language communicates a lot to us, but they are not listening to each other.

They might think that they are talking or discussing something, but they are both stuck in their own mire. The adviser or wife is powerless to stop King Mark and KM is just...completely oblivious to anything but himself.
 

WalesWoman

I'm glad someone else noticed the humor in this card as well.

To me it is pretty much what has been described so far... King Mark full of ideas and plans, full steam ahead and damn the cost. While the advisor looks as if he's heard so many things like this before, but of course, no matter what he says to the contrary this King is not going to listen.

In a way the King's attitude and wide vision, and single mindedness sort of reminds me of having a King Spears attitude... he is the guy who wants things to go in the way he sees them even when reality says otherwise. And the advisor definately represents reality and caution.

So it is like a 4, successful foundations to build on... in the reality phase sort of. The commitment to a dream or ideal and wanting to make it become solid and earthbound, rather than ideas and plans but finding ways to make it happen. I guess it's all a matter of how it can be accomplished, what has been saved or accumulated, what will it cost, how will it be paid for, what resources can you draw on to make things manifest?

It reminds me of how I spent yesterday, watching the trucks bring in loads of rock and spread around by a bulldozer to become the driveway of some freinds future home. The couple is very much like this card, the husband waving his arms around as he describes the place they will build, while she is holding this little piece of paper with the costs that mount with each hour of how much they need to pay these guys to do the job and will the bank account keep stretching until the job is finished. LOL

I know I had deeper thoughts on this card before, but they must be really deep since I can't seem to get them to surface.