The King's court

BoPeep

I posted this in the RWS study group too ...

I started putting the kings and queens next to one another and noticed that if you put the kings to the left of the queens - the pentacles are looking at each other as are the cups. Wands are both looking ahead, and the swords are looking away from each other.

Does anyone know if the kings traditionally sat on the right of the queens? It just seems interesting...

BoPeep.

Fulgour

When I've made posters of the Zodiac positions for the
Court Cards using The Pamela Colman Smith Tarot of 1909,
what has worked best is to reverse some of the more
off-into-space postures.

I think Pam wanted to emphasize that the Kings, Queens,
Knights, and Pages all hold their appropriate symbols in
their right hands. (They do look odd reversed, but only
up close ~ the posters are great, you should try one.)

PS: The Pages are the 4 Phases of the Moon

Pentacles = New
Wands = Waxing
Cups = Full
Swords = Waning

You can really see this when you arrange them
each under a Moon Phase drawing in the above order.

Ross G Caldwell

BoPeep said:
Does anyone know if the kings traditionally sat on the right of the queens? It just seems interesting...

BoPeep.

I believe so. Queen is on King's left (hence he is at her right), as in Chess.

Ross

Fulgour

lefty righty

Ross G Caldwell said:
I believe so. Queen is on King's left (hence he is at her right), as in Chess. Ross

You'd better check your chess board, Ross. Queens begin next to the Kings, but on their own colour. Depending on where you're sitting, they're opposite.

Ross G Caldwell

Re: lefty righty

Fulgour said:
You'd better check your chess board, Ross. Queens begin next to the Kings, but on their own colour. Depending on where you're sitting, they're opposite.

Half true, I guess. If I play white, Queen is on King's left. If I play black, Queen is on King's right.

Fulgour

Very true, and vice versa.

Ross G Caldwell

I'm trying to find pictures of Kings enthroned beside their Queens. In a relatively quick search, I haven't found any, but in the Chapel of Saint Denis, where the Valois line is entombed, all of the Queens' effigies are to the left of the Kings'.

I think the symbolism would have been deliberate. The left side is the female, passive side. I'm willing to hazard a guess that when I find some pictures of *living* King-Queen pairs, she will be to his left.

We might wax mystical and suppose that in Chess, since black is the female side, that the Queen, female, is ruler in this realm, and therefore has the stronger position.

Fulgour

Gift of books to Ferdinand and Isabella

http://www.humanities-interactive.org/newworld/fact_fict/ex036_03b.htm

She is to His right, on Our left...

BoPeep

I was away all weekend so wasn't able to catch up on this thread.
I didn't think of the chessboard, and had a tough time finding pics of 'throne rooms' etc.

If one puts the kings and queens together with the Queen on the left does a pattern arise? Something that might tell us about the suit characteristics? Something about how the kings and queens relate to one another, how they 'rule' together? Can it be taken further wiith the remaining court cards?

BoPeep.

Ross G Caldwell

Fulgour said:
Gift of books to Ferdinand and Isabella

http://www.humanities-interactive.org/newworld/fact_fict/ex036_03b.htm

She is to His right, on Our left...

While we're playing tit for tat, here's one "Illustration of a Coronation from the Liber Regalis, a 14th century manuscript. It may depict Richard II and his wife, Anne of Bohemia, who was crowned in January 1382"

http://www.royal.gov.uk/output/Page58.asp (click on the small print to the left of the picture)

She is on his left, and lower.

Here's another - scroll down to "Mary I"
http://www.westminster-abbey.org/coronation_tour/interesting.htm