covenrochester

It is very likely that LeNormand, the famous french cartomante, read from cards similar to those now known as Le Grand Jeu -- the Great Game. You can buy all sorts of oracle decks these days, but Le Grand Jeu is the Grand-Mere of them all. Many of the scenes are taken from the Quest of the Golden Fleece, or the War at Troy, the art of Alchemy, and other Greek and Roman myths, and they incorporate such things as constellations, playing cards, and flowers.

If you are very knowledgeable in classical mythology and the magical language, you can read these very, very easily. They should be read, not as a Tarot or a deck of oracles cards, but as if you had seen a series of symbolic images in a crystal ball.

This is a deck for realists, though. If you are a person of delicate mind or constitution, stay away from these, and maybe get an Angel Oracle Deck. Madame LeNormand was practicing her arts in a time of great turmoil and danger in France, and she did not mince words.

In the above reading of three cards, I asked about the Fate of a woman barely known to me, whom I've met with only a single glance and handshake. Some of the great images here: The inconclusive fight between Paris and Menelaus, Zeus instructing Dionysus to drink water from a spring, Helen receiving news from Iris, Odysseus and Diomedes stealing the statue of Athena from the Palladium of Troy, Achilles receiving the weapons of Haphaestus from his mother, Thetis.

Let us pretend that a woman has come to us as a modern Pythia, and she wishes to know the trajectory of her life. What might one say?

You will be chosen among others to be raised up to preferment. It is no contest, really, for you have a powerful woman on your side. You will be unfitted, however, for the tasks that will be assigned to you. You will require leadership and counsel in even the most basic functions, and even after that, you will require the constant support of others to keep yourself afloat. In time, you will be raised even higher. Does this astonish you, as it does me? You will initially consider this further advancement a great boon, but beware what you have agreed to. The Circlet of Leadership is too heavy for your small head. You cannot lift the Sword of Justice unaided. Brazen Greaves will render you unable to walk. You will not have been given a gift, but the instruments of your self-destruction. You were fated for a quieter life, but you will foolishly succumb to others telling you what you should want and what your ambitions should be. I pity your lack of self-knowledge. Now rise, foolish woman, and get out of my house!

Well, maybe I would temper the language a bit . . .