I have had the Pagan Tarot Deck with me since a few years now, and every time I look at the cards, I find myself amazed and intrigued by their images. In this deck, we see the ups and downs of the everyday and spiritual life of a modern day witch, a young woman.

The deck features art work by Luca Raimondo and coloring by Cristinao Spadoni. The book that accompanies the deck (if you buy the kit), is written by Gina M. Pace. This deck is published by Lo Scarabeo.

The Cards

The cards in the Pagan Tarot Deck are 7.25 inches in length and 4 inches in width. They handle pretty well while shuffling. However, the back of the cards is not reversible – in that, it shows the image of the ‘World’ card from the deck, and thus one can easily make out a reversed card while one pulls them out for a reading.

The essential pattern of the Pagan Tarot Deck does match a lot with the Rider-Waite-Smith system, with the Strength card being Trump 8 and Justice being Trump 11.

Also, in the tradition and style of Lo Scarabeo decks, the Pagan Tarot deck also has the translations of the names of the cards featured at the bottom of the image.

The Book

If you look for the Pagan Tarot Deck on Amazon.Com, you will likely end up with an option to buy the ‘kit’ or to buy the ‘mini’ version. I would genuinely recommend getting the ‘kit’ because with it, you’ll end up getting the very nice book written by Gina M. Pace.

The book has all your standard sections: a bit about the history of Tarot, and then a few tips about preparing for and conducting the readings, and also a bit about reading reversed cards. After that, we delve into the images and meanings of the Majors, Minors and the Courts.

The book is really well written, and can truly help you to understand the hidden depths of the images. Normally, if one saw the pictures of this deck, one would easily be able to interpret them. But there are some aspects of the Wiccan / Pagan traditions which are present within these images, and the book can easily guide you to understanding them better.

The Majors

The Major Arcana cards of the Pagan Tarot Deck show the major milestones in the journey of our young witch, as she goes through the different stages of her spiritual journey.

Check out the Fool Card from the Pagan Tarot Deck! I mean, here’s the young witch, venturing out into the unknown, in the dark, with only her cat to guide her!

One can very easily connect these images with those of the Rider-Waite-Smith deck, and understand the deeper significance of the meanings of the images. Again, the book is pretty helpful in understanding the specific Wiccan / Pagan symbolism present in the images.

The Minors

The Minor Arcana card images of the Pagan Tarot Deck show us the everyday aspects of the life of our young witch. There are 4 Suits: Wands, Swords, Chalices (for Cups) and Pentacles, which depict the different aspects of this journey.

I mean, how can one not truly grasp the meaning of the 3 of Cups after looking at this image, eh?

The Minors truly do speak to you right away!

The Courts

Now, here’s where I get a little stuck though! As is typical, the Court cards depict people. Over here, we have Elementals for each Element of the Suits, and then we have three other people: Novices, Initiates and Elders for each of the Suits.

One could connect the Elementals with the Pages, Novices with the Knights and so forth… but in my experience, this doesn’t work in a reading. I have always found myself getting baffled by the Court Cards while using the Pagan Tarot Deck in my readings. Maybe, I genuinely need to change my perspective, and they might start making some sense to me!

Reading With The Pagan Tarot Deck

Apart from the Court Card confusion, the Pagan Tarot Deck lends itself very easily to readings. If you use reversed cards in your readings, then you also need to stop wondering about the reversed card (because of the back of the card) when you pick it up for your spread. But if you cross all these hurdles, then I have experienced some really goosebumps-giving, ‘OMG this is so true’ moments while reading with this deck.

Since the images of the deck are from everyday life, they speak volumes in terms of what’s going on. And if you really want to delve deep, then it takes but a moment to do so. The images are very, very real… and I have had some truly, astonishingly accurate readings with this deck! So, yes, I would recommend this deck in a flash! 🙂

The Cards I Liked

Here are some of the cards from this deck that I truly, truly liked.

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The  Lovers card from the Pagan Tarot Deck shows such a clear picture of the ‘choices’ that the young witch has to make: one one side are her family, and on the other is her group of friends with whom she is studying! Any modern woman faces similar choices in her life, where she has to often prioritize one over the other at different points of time in her life.

And then, we see her meditating in the Moon card! With your traditional symbols (water, mountains, crayfish and of course, the large, yellow Moon), this card also shows us a different aspect of the Moon’s energy – one of calm, peaceful contemplation, one of knowledge gathering, one of gaining access to one’s own subconscious!

Here are some of the other cards which I have also found fascinating, in terms of their imagery and also for providing a very different take on the traditional interpretation of the card.

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Your Turn…

So, do you also have this deck? What have been your experiences of this deck?

Did you also face the ‘Court Card’ issue as I did? How did you manage to tackle it?

Are you thinking of getting this deck? What made you want to buy it?

Do share your thoughts in the comments section below.