After a considerable amount of handling card decks experience has shown when working with clients who want to know about what is coming down the pike, a decan style deck is the most effective tool. The term decan is from Egyptian astronomy but when used here simply refers to the number of cards in a fortune telling deck which is 36. Lenormand, Kipperkarten, Zigeuner are Wahrsagekarten or fortune telling cards. It is their purpose.
The 36 card decks seem to have an affinity with the interplay of the earth plane and the energies that affect it from the skies above the so-called “36 faces of heaven.” The number 36 is a number which relates to spirits & Daimons.* The astute reader will see the 72 spirits attributed to Solomonic Magic is simply the doubling of the number 36.
In fortune telling, two of the cards are the Querent and their significant other. Some decks show other persons or characters as well, the rest are symbols as in Lenormand, or scenarios as in the Kipperkarten and Zigeuner decks. Lenormand with its symbols does not have the same amount of predictive power because it depends upon a reader’s ability to interpret the symbols as if they were seen in a dream without real context. This of course will vary from reader to reader leaving a lot of room for “guessing”.
The Zigeuner or Gypsy deck combines symbols with scenes. It is not a deck of choice for me. It has an atmosphere or a vibration of the Old World which does not trigger any connection to the images. This is key to the use of any card deck -that there be personal affinity. However, the Kipper cards which depend on scenarios and not symbology do spark a link for me. They are in the what you see is what it is camp. The reader does not have to use mental gymnastics to tease out a meaning and they are not read by rote keywords but by placement and direction.
The German language puts many off but the scenes and the signs are in the universal language of imagery. If you want to tell what events are coming for clients, do investigate a 36 card fortune telling deck. You won’t be sorry.
*(See: Austin Coppock, 36 Faces, Three Hands Press, 2014)