WolfyJames
This study group is exciting!
Dark Angel has already written a text about the High Priestess in the thread "Comparative Study - The High Priestess" here: http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=17686 . I prefer letting Dark Angel rewrite her text here and maybe add other things of her own, so I won't copy-paste it, but I'm giving the link because I think she wrote interesting stuffs.
cjtarot has also written interesting stuffs on this card, and other cards as well, in a thread on The Gothic Tarot and he/she accepted graciously to be quoted here.
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The card is monochromatic here, and there's a door again, this time it is egyptian style. The priestess is an egyptian priestess, wearing a long skirt, and wear the pharaoh mask-crown with the serpent (she could be the pharaoh's wife), and an hathor crescent moon on top of the crown. She has tattos of snakes and many jewels, including an ankh on her breast. She stands between two black pillars with hieroglypghs, an ankh at the top. Anubis is engraved at her right while Khousou, Ra's son, is at her left. Her knees look weird.
As we know, Anubis was bringing the soul of the dead in the underworld. For Khousou, he was Ra's son; Ra was the sun while Khousou was the moon, bearing the crescent moon on his head. Ankh means immortality and can also mean the key that opens mysteries and visions, but these must be kept secret and only offered to the initiated.
Vargo's cards were based on previous works, you can see some on his website. It's possible that this card was based on the novel "Queen of the damned" by Anne Rice, explaining the origin of vampirism going back to the pharaoh couple vampirised by a demon.
I like Dark Angel's idea that this High Priestess hunts down for knowledge.
Dark Angel has already written a text about the High Priestess in the thread "Comparative Study - The High Priestess" here: http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=17686 . I prefer letting Dark Angel rewrite her text here and maybe add other things of her own, so I won't copy-paste it, but I'm giving the link because I think she wrote interesting stuffs.
cjtarot has also written interesting stuffs on this card, and other cards as well, in a thread on The Gothic Tarot and he/she accepted graciously to be quoted here.
cjtarot said:I want to respond to the quote about the Lovers, the High Priest and the Empress standing in the same arch...
The Empress, guards her home...the relm of beond. (note the Emperor is inside with all the babe's doing NOTHING)
The Hight PRiest guards the knowledge in the Relm of beond
The Lovers..It is your choice (or is it) to enter into the Relm..note the lovers almost look farther into the arch..
Also look at the High Priestess and the 9 of cups...
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The HP..guarding the unknow of our sub consious - or the door to the afterlife.
The 9 of cups.. Cups are emotion, our life flow if you will..the 9 is showing the final preperation before we are fufilled, before the final journey into the ultimate unknow..(Note the 10 of cups is within that arch..the claiming or the dark angel leading you away)
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The card is monochromatic here, and there's a door again, this time it is egyptian style. The priestess is an egyptian priestess, wearing a long skirt, and wear the pharaoh mask-crown with the serpent (she could be the pharaoh's wife), and an hathor crescent moon on top of the crown. She has tattos of snakes and many jewels, including an ankh on her breast. She stands between two black pillars with hieroglypghs, an ankh at the top. Anubis is engraved at her right while Khousou, Ra's son, is at her left. Her knees look weird.
As we know, Anubis was bringing the soul of the dead in the underworld. For Khousou, he was Ra's son; Ra was the sun while Khousou was the moon, bearing the crescent moon on his head. Ankh means immortality and can also mean the key that opens mysteries and visions, but these must be kept secret and only offered to the initiated.
Vargo's cards were based on previous works, you can see some on his website. It's possible that this card was based on the novel "Queen of the damned" by Anne Rice, explaining the origin of vampirism going back to the pharaoh couple vampirised by a demon.
I like Dark Angel's idea that this High Priestess hunts down for knowledge.