Thoth deck

The Thoth Deck is a tarot deck designed by Aleister Crowley, and painted by Frieda Harris.

General description

The imagery is believed to be dramatic, although arguably less detailed than the Rider Waite deck. The Minor Arcana are pips, but the color and arrangement of suit symbols are highly suggestive of meaning.

Differences to other decks

The order of the major arcana is that of marseilles style decks, with Justice 8 and Strength (called Lust) 11, but he maintains the Golden Dawn attributions to the Hebrew letters for them. He changes the attributions for The Emperor and The Star. See Tarot correspondences (Kabalah) for more on that. The pip style minor arcana are another reminiscence of the marseilles deck.

The astrological attributions also differ from those of the Golden Dawn, as detailed in Crowley's other works.

Some of the major arcarna have different names.

The court cards are Knight, Queen, Prince, Princess.

Availability

The deck is widely available in many languages and editions. In German, it is availiable from two different publishers, both offer it in several different sizes, alone or in set with some book.

Criticism

Some people consider that this deck is "negative" and will produce harmful results if used, but such people often judge without sufficent understanding. In most cases, this oppinion is based on these people's dislike for Aleister Crowley, Thelema (his magickal system) or both. In a way, it may be wise not to use the deck if one has such prejudices.