Falconnier-Wegener Egyptian Tarot

This is a majors only deck, containing the 22 tarot trumps plus two information cards.

The idea that the tarot originated in ancient Egypt originated with French scholar and occultist Antoine Court de Gébelin in 1781. Soon after, Etteilla called his deck, the first deck made specifically for cartomancy, the Book of Thoth. It was published as the Egyptian Gypsies tarot, an the false assumption that Gypsies (Romany) came from Egypt.

This tarot is a facsimile of the illustrations drawn by Otto Wegener and published in Les XXII Lames Hermétiques du Tarot Divinatoire by R. Falconier in 1896. These cards are based on descriptions in a novel by another French occultist, Jean-Baptiste Pitois, writing as Paul Christian in 1863.

The Falconnier-Wegener deck, a century after Etteilla, was the first occult tarot deck with imagery based on ancient Egyptian themes. Its 22 trumps have since been copied or adadpted for a number of other Egyptian tarot decks, starting with Comte C. de Saint-Germain in 1901 (see related games at right).

While this deck has typical Magus, Heirophant, Strength, Justice, Death, and Star cards, Falconnier has taken liberties with other card names, even swapping some around. Trump XIV, which we would recognize as Temperance, is named The Sun (Le Soleil). XVIII, which looks like a Sun card, is titled Love (L'Amour), and VI, clearly a Lover card, is The Test (L'Epruve). The Moon card is moved to the end (XXII), and titled Night (La Nuit); the Fool is renamed The Atheist (L'Athee). My experience with the deck is that that images are familiar enough to work with, and the renamings introduce a different point of view on those cards. Your milage may vary; you have been warned.

As all I have to go on at present is Falconnier's text (in French) and vague memories of having studied the language in high school, there is no Little White Book at this time.

Also, it doesn't come with box. A template to make a one-piece folding box from cardstock is a free download here on the shop page; it's shown in the action shots below.