The Deck, to Start.

Happy New Moon, Friends.

I wanted to spend today talking a little bit about this deck, where it comes from, and what the stories can represent for us.

We don’t have any record of what Marie Anne Lenormand’s personal cards looked like. They were hand painted and hand made - specific to her personal reading style. They had obscure imagery, featured various skill sets, and were said to be larger than traditional cartomancy decks.

We currently have two decks that bear the Lenormand name, however with Petit Lenormand coming from a game and divination style called The Game of Hope - the Petit deck doesn’t quite reflect the style Mme. Lenormand herself used. Grand Jeu Lenormand traces to another person, supposedly close to Mme. Lenormand herself.

The main cossover of these decks is using Playing Cards as part of the layout. Playing card cartomancy is an art unto itself - and can be implemented alongside these reading styles. These card images are featured on both Petit Lenormand (36 cards) and Grand Jeu Lenormand (54 cards.)

That’s where the similarties end. Grand Jeu draws extensively from Greek Mythology, using many recognizable characters like Jason, Hercules, Zeus, Pandora and more. The imagery also draws on the Alchemist and Alchemy, using the Philosopher’s Lamp, to inspire images of creation, gaining of knowledge, and overall success. The smaller imges do refer to commonplace happenings in French life in the 1800s - recognition by the mayor, positions in society, and more.

Next, I’ll begin to address how these card decks are broken down, and how those breakdowns affect readings!

Sophie