Illustration of 10 Swords in Thoth

[Barleywine]

Thats the spirit .... research! But now the sun is up and I have to go water the garden , heatwave expected. keep us posted on results.

OK, here's what I came up with; it's a bit rough but gets the idea across.

I set out to see if I could match the rather irregular figures in the backround of the 10 of Swords (and also behind the throne in the Queen of Swords) to the magic square of Saturn to go along with Snuffin's observations about the sword hilts in the 10 of Swords.

The first thing I noticed was that most of the figures are sort of "squashed" 8-pointed stars, or maybe Maltese crosses. (I toyed with the idea they might be transformed versions of Crowley's Unicursal Hexigram, but that only has six points.) Using the two larger figures at the top of the 10 of Swords as a guide, I "normalized" the figures into regular polygons.

Next I noticed that the figures contain somewhat distorted images of interlocking "arrowheads" or stylized capital Greek deltas (think of the delta used as the logo for Delta Airlines). I decided to use contrasting colors and lines to bring these into sharp focus.

I then "pinned" this figure to the square of Saturn in a way that seemed to make sense (no rotation required). The results are attached.

I disn't realize until I was done that the central, green 4-pointed star loosely resembles the background figures in the 2 of Swords and, much more closely, the 7 of Swords, as well as (again loosely) the wings on the Knight of Swords and the Princess of Swords. It also mimics the hilts on the Netzach and Hod swords in the 10 of Swords. Interesting coincidence.

ETA: Here's the preliminary drawing for it. It's also interesting to note that 2 of Swords is Moon in Libra, the sign in which Saturn is exalted, and 7 of Swords is Moon in Aquarius, the sign of Saturn's traditional rulership. Seems to be a lot going on behind the scenes here.

 

[Barleywine]

10 of Swords and Square of saturn

I chased this a little further. I was poking around in Agrippa's Three Books of Occult Philosophy and came across a diagram of the Seal of Saturn in the Square of Saturn. What I seem to have done, by pure coincidence, is come up with almost a "doubling" of Agrippa's diagram, which I was led to by the Harris 10 of Swords illustrations. Not all the terminations match, of course, but there is a similar emphasis on Agrippa's 2, 4, 6 and 8 "stations." My geometric "normalizing" departed from that model somewhat, but the inkling of commonality I find interesting (and maybe revealing?).

ETA: For those coming late to this, our discussion centered on the sword hilts in the 10 of Swords and the fact that Snuffin made much of their association with Saturn. We were looking for a rationale for the geometic "doodles" that Harris put into the background of the card, and I thought I would try linking them to the Snuffin observations via the Square of Saturn.

 

[ravenest]

Yes, these are similar to my results.

I am not sure what you mean by 'geometric normalising' though ?

I found I could not get an exact fit .... is geometric normalising changing the form so it does fit ?

One possibility, being swords is that they were 'planetary intelligences' , their names converted to number and then drawn on the square ... but no match there.

Then again, they could be variant expressions of mathematical formulas


http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/68271.html

Note this bit : " There are seven other solutions. A 3x3 magic square contains eight
possible solutions total; four rotations and four reflections. "


also ;

n the 19th century, Édouard Lucas devised the general formula for order 3 magic squares. Consider the following table made up of positive integers a, b and c:

c - b c + a + b c - a
c - a + b c c + a - b
c + a c - a - b c + b

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_square

( Sorry I am not that into this, eve though I bought it up ... but I flogged it before - results are in that old thread ... wherever that is ? )

 

[ravenest]

I did a more thorough search ;


http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=66469&highlight=magic+squares

 

[Barleywine]

Yes, these are similar to my results.

I am not sure what you mean by 'geometric normalising' though ?

I found I could not get an exact fit .... is geometric normalising changing the form so it does fit ?

One possibility, being swords is that they were 'planetary intelligences' , their names converted to number and then drawn on the square ... but no match there.

Then again, they could be variant expressions of mathematical formulas


http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/68271.html

Note this bit : " There are seven other solutions. A 3x3 magic square contains eight
possible solutions total; four rotations and four reflections. "


also ;

n the 19th century, Édouard Lucas devised the general formula for order 3 magic squares. Consider the following table made up of positive integers a, b and c:

c - b c + a + b c - a
c - a + b c c + a - b
c + a c - a - b c + b

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_square

( Sorry I am not that into this, eve though I bought it up ... but I flogged it before - results are in that old thread ... wherever that is ? )

Geometric normalizing just means I took the "doodly" and somewhat disjointed squiggles and literally "squared them up" into regular polygons so I could work with them in a more organized way. I did that conceptually before I consciously tried to "pin" them to the Square of Saturn; that notion came later.

Anyway, mission accomplished to my satisfaction. Considering my observations on the 2 and 7 of Swords, I'm satisifed there is something more here that supports Snuffin's suppositions. But, as you say, it will ultimately remain a mystery.

 

[ravenest]

Oh dear ! .... back then ... how times have changed ... I had to bump a post from there to here ;

I forgot I had actually found the solution by ' remote viewing the Akashic record ' !


Frieda enters drawing room laden down with bags of shopping.
F; "Good Lord! It's hell out there!"

Aleister sitting at table with books, drawing paper and drawing instruments; "Mmmmmm..."

F; 'I got the scotch sausage, anchovies, kippers, oysters and cigars but not the caviar, it was too expensive."

A; "Mmmmmm ..."

F; "It's out of season, you know?"

A; " Mmmmm ..."

F; "Yes, apparently its all due to the invasion, they pulled the plug on Norway and it sank right to the bottom of the sea, scared all the Russian sturgeon and now they wont lay."

A; "Mmmmmm ..."

F; (Shouting) "You haven't heard a word I said have you?"

A; Looks up, "Eh, What?"

F; "You look like a little schoolboy, sitting there with your paper and pencils and compass and protractor. What's that book?"

A; Holds up book, " 'Letters and Papers on Philospohical Subjects by Benjamin Franklin. LL.D.,F.R.S.' Look at these squares ... brilliant, absolutly brilliant! And if you draw a line through each consecutive number you get these very interesting patterns, look ..." A. fumbles some loose sheets of scribbles and patterns " ...see this star like mandala? That's actually a visual representation of 1+2+3+...etc, that is, to n; the last number in the series, over n equals n over 2 times n squared plus one! and this one shows Pi to 37 places, but reversed and when you only link the odd consecutive numbers in reverse ..."

F; "Yes, fascinating - I'm sure - can I have the money for the shopping now please?"

A; Looks at watch "Good Lord! Is that the time? I have to run!"

F; "But you were supposed to help with the sword suit backgrounds today, you cant just run off!"

A; Stuffs the sheets in Frieda's hand, "Just use these, change them how you want, you know, artistic license and all that, I'm sure you'll do a wonderfull job." He rushes towards the door.

F; "The shopping money, when do I get it back."

A; "The publisher has promised me a check next week." He goes out.

F; "Dho !"

 

[ravenest]

and from Lily;

" The reference to the geometric shapes on the swords is in the Wassserman LWB that came with the old USG decks.

(it might have been with othrs, it might still be in use, I don't know)

It is in the last section, the 'catalogue', and I believe it was written by Lady Frieda Harris.
In the tiny section for the 4 of swords it says, after the little discription of the card, 'The surrounding crystals, as in all these sword cards, contain the hidden names of their guardian angels worked out in numbers on squared paper. It was thought that air was formed of crystals according to Pythagoras.' "

 

[ravenest]

From Aeon418

All of the minor arcana have two angels from the Shem ha Memphorash assigned to them. For example the 3 of Swords has the angels Hariel and Hakamiah. I'm guessing that Crowley constructed the correct sigils of the angel names using the appropriate planetary Kameas of the minor cards in question. In the case of the 3 of Swords he would have used the Kamea of Saturn. Crowley could have given these sigils to Harris and asked her to incorporate artistic, stylised versions of the sigils in her renditions of the cards.

.... DuQuette's minor cards carry the names of the angels but not the sigils. The actual sigils on the cards relate the 72 demons of the Goetia.

 

[ravenest]

from ravenest

In any case (and to finaly shut up about this, to your relief) I do have an answer to my original question of what are the geometric designs in the sword suit backgrounds.

They are crystal geometric shapes symbolising the element air, drawn by gematricising on a grid Shemhamphorash Angelic entities and/or Planetary Intellegences that are attributed to each card.

 

[Barleywine]

I did a more thorough search ;


http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=66469&highlight=magic+squares

I waded through part of that thread; it did go pretty deep. I think whether they're actually wings or not is kind of irrelevant (although I do agree the minor cards hold the root of the idea and the court cards extrapolate from that). They (the putative "wings") mostly seem to be built on the number 4, and do remind me strongly of the "whirling deltas" image that emerged from my reconstitution of the Harris "doodles" Especially since it seems to hold strong echoes of Agrippa's Seal of Saturn in the Square of Saturn, I will probably stick with the Saturn association.

Thanks for starting this, it was fun and let me unleash some of my old graphic design training.

ETA: Oops, posted before I saw your last reply. Looks like I'm going to have to retrench . .