Tarot of
Atlantis by Bepi Vigna, Illustrated by Massimino RotundoReviewed by Joan Cole
Tarot of
Atlantis by Bepi Vigna, Illustrated by Massimino Rotundo
If you would like to purchase this deck, click here.
"But afterwards there occurred violent
earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune all your
warlike men in a body sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like
manner disappeared in the depths of the sea.”
Plato, Timaeus
I was getting
ready to review this deck around Christmas last year…and then the South Asian
Tsunami happened. In the wake of that event, I was unable to even open the
deck. The impact of cities wiped away by the sea was far too real to want
to look at a legendary treatment of the same. Months later, I finally
opened the deck and decided to work on this review. On August 13, my
process of studying the deck and writing this review was completed.
Then on August 29, the Gulf Coast of the
U.S. received its own reminder of the power of the sea. My deepest
sympathies to all who have been impacted by these events.
Tarot of Atlantis is clearly meant to be a "fun" deck. Although there are
some tragic images, most of the scenes depicted on this deck are of Atlanteans
enjoying their lives before the final catastrophe depicted on the Tower card.
This deck is not a solemn treatment of an esoteric symbol system; nor even a
solemn comment on the Tarot tradition in general. People who want to think
about Atlantis in terms of theories of advanced civilizations that existed tens
of thousands of years ago with technologies superior to anything we can conceive
of will not recognize that Atlantis here. The visual culture of Atlantis
of this deck is a combination of historical civilizations well within the
archeological record, civilizations such as Sardinia, Minoa, and Santorini.
Archeological artifacts are incorporated into the drawings, like the Sardinian
horned helmet (on multiple cards, including the King of Wands) and the garb of
the Minoan "Snake Goddess" on the Four of Pentacles. In the links at the
end of this review, are several websites showing frescoes that supplied imagery
for other cards. So the authenticity of the deck depends on which myth of
Atlantis you prefer.
Whatever the truth of Atlantis as an
actual historical culture may have been, all we have of Atlantis is its use as a
legend to promote various political or philosophical agendas. Plato was the
first teller of the Atlantis myth (that we still have access to today). His
concern was not pure history, but political philosophy:
“Although the Republic, the
Statesman, the Laws and a few shorter dialogues are considered to be
the only strictly political dialogues of Plato, it can be argued that political
philosophy was the area of his greatest concern. … For Plato, making decisions
about the right political order are, along with the choice between peace and
war, the most important choices one can make in politics. Such decisions cannot
be left solely to public opinion, he believes, which in many cases does not have
enough foresight and gets its lessons only post factum from disasters
recorded in history.”
The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (http://www.iep.utm.edu/p/platopol.htm)
Plato tells the story of Atlantis as an
object lesson of what happens when the gods
are angered by a people’s
debasement, their intoxication by luxury. It is entirely possible that Plato
was disguising a historical event known to his students, but giving it a more
grandiose age and size for literary effect. This is part of the thinking behind
putting forward the volcano-demolished island of Santorini (Thera) as the
historical Atlantis, a theory with many followers since Spyridon Marinatos’
archeological excavations at Akrotiri in the 1960s. (Santorini is not beyond
the Pillars of Hercules, it not larger than Libya and Asia combined, and the
eruption that buried it occurred circa 1650BC, not 9000 years before Plato.)
Another more recent theory, which Vigna
references in the LWB, is the possibility that the Atlantis myth is
remembering
Sardinia (though it did not sink beneath the sea):
“Sardinia, which for the Greeks might
once have been beyond those Pillars of Hercules that divided the eastern
Mediterranean from the western Mediterranean, is a large island that rises to
the west of Egypt and Greece: A land with a mild climate and lush vegetation,
rich in precious metals, which in ancient times must have seemed like a far-away
Eden.”
At any rate, speculation as to the
possible historical location of Atlantis, if it even existed, is a vast
literature. I’ve included a number of links to explore at the end of this
review if this sort of speculation interests you. At this point, however, it is
time to talk about this Tarot deck. Many of Lo Scarabeo’s decks share three
characteristics:
· Comic art or fine art (Besides Tarot, Lo Scarabeo publishes books of comic art, illustrations and art criticism)
· Iconoclasm with respect to Rider-Waite-Smith (RWS) symbolism
· A strong sense of landscape and story in the illustrations
This deck is no exception. Massimo
Rotundo is a well known comic artist, especially of erotic comics (a connection
that is evident in the four Chalice suit cards that depict explicit couplings or
orgies). The Minor
Arcana, while shown with complete scenes, only occasionally
come close to a RWS depiction; quite frequently even the meanings are not RWS-compatible. For instance, the
meaning given for the Five of Chalices in the little white booklet (LWB):
“Secret practices, unjustified fears,
[reversed:] dangerous acquaintances, withdrawal”
What I personally find attractive in so
many Lo Scarabeo decks, however, is the third characteristic. I’m very taken by
landscape and story in decks; in fact, “Landscape and Story” is one of my
collecting niches. (Other examples: Hallowquest Tarot, Legend: Arthurian
Tarot, Secrets Tarot, Tarot of the
Origins, Merlin Tarot) A landscape and story deck has a consistent story it
tells throughout the deck, and the place in which the story is occurring is
also a character in the story. It is not simply a theme deck, as theme decks do
not always attend to the sense of place. I want to feel as though I could lay
all the cards out and draw a map locating all the backgrounds together into a
consistent geography. For instance, if a tarot deck were set in a castle, I’d want
to feel as though I could figure out from looking at the cards which rooms were
involved, where the secret passages are, the dark forest, the rocky seashore,
the castle’s relationship to the town – whatever elements are depicted should
fit together coherently and the relationships between landscape elements should
remain consistent. Perhaps I might see a statue from different viewpoints in
the background of different cards. When the place is made real, it makes the
deck better for meditative use. Landscape and story decks are ideal for
entering the card and walking around.
Besides the well-realized landscape,
another thing I was struck by in this deck is the presence of people. 
Compared
to Atlantis, RWS is a very lonely deck. If I enter a RWS landscape, it often
feels as though I am walking around a depopulated world. The characters in RWS
are individuals isolated out of the larger community. We might see a city, but
rarely see the populace depicted. Atlantis, on the other hand, is full of
people. I did a count of the people on each card on both decks just to see if
this was a valid impression. In the RWS deck, only seven cards show four or more
people. In the Atlantis deck, by comparison, 27 of the cards show four or more
people. This depiction of community rather than individuals (even on the
quintessentially solitary Hermit) seems appropriate for a deck inspired by a
myth told by a political philosopher who wanted to instruct his fellow Greeks on
structuring a just and prosperous society.
Although Atlantis may never have existed, its legend is as relevant today as it ever was. While Tarot of Atlantis may simply have been intended to be a fun theme deck, not a “serious” deck focused on issues of community, it does have some relevance to these kinds of questions. Whether Plato’s political philosophy, Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis, or the very charming modern retelling and extension of the Atlantis story, Robert Sullivan’s Atlantis Rising: The True Story of a Submerged Land Yesterday and Today, with its strong environmentalist message, the story of Atlantis continues to be used to draw our attention to how we live together, and our relationship to the land itself.
“There is magic in names and the
mightiest among these words of magic is Atlantis. It is as if this vision of a
lost culture touched the most hidden thought of our soul.”
- H. G. Wells
The Major Arcana use the ordering that preceded the RWS (Justice is eight, Strength 11), and the court cards are named in classical fashion: Knave, Knight, Queen, King. The suits are Wands, Chalices, Swords and Pentacles.
The Tarot of Atlantis (ISBN 0-7387-0607-8) was published by Lo Scarabeo in 2004.
Bepi Vigna was also involved in the creation of Lo Scarabeo’s Tarot of Druids and Tarot of the Thousand and One Nights. Massimo Rotundo was also involved in the creation of Lo Scarabeo’s oracle deck, the Native American Cards.
Links about Vigna or Rotundo:
Lambiek.Net page about Rotundo:
Links about Atlantis:
Various Source Texts, including Plato’s Critias, Donnelly’s Atlantis: The Antediluvian World, the 19th
century sci-fi book A Dweller on Two Planets (source material for the "I AM"
movement, the Lemurian Fellowship, and Elizabeth Claire Prophet) and more.
Greek Mythology link page about Atlantis
Cerulean’s notes about the Major Arcana of
this deck at Aeclectic.Net
Myths of Crete & Pre-Hellenic Europe By
Donald A. MacKenzie [1917]
chapter 14 including information on Minoans and Shardana
Wikipedia article about Atlantis, complete
with timeline and various location theories
Sardinia Theory
”My hypothesis is that Atlantis was a powerful state that was based on the
island of Sardinia in the Western Mediterranean Sea. This powerful state was
most fully developed in the pre Bronze Age and the early Bronze Age, say about
2000 BC to 1400 BC. … It is my hypothesis that the Nuraghi culture, the "Keftiu"
and the Atlantis of Plato are all one and the same. And that the archaeological
remains that exist on Sardinia are in fact the remains of the Atlantis
civilization.”
Sardinia
”By the Late Bronze Age, there is extensive evidence for contact with the Aegean
(oxhide ingots and Mycenaean ceramics in Sardinia; Nuragic ceramics in Crete),
and it is possible that the Sherden tribe of the Sea Peoples mentioned in
Egyptian documents is related to Sardinia.”
Egyptian History: the invasions of the Sea
Peoples into Egypt 12th Century BCE
The Shardana by Megaera Lorenz
The Sea Peoples by Dale E. Landon
National Geographic Article: Atlantis
“Evidence” Found in Spain and Ireland
"According to Rainer Kühne, a German physicist, satellite photos of southern
Spain suggest that the "island" of Atlantis was in fact a region of the southern
Spanish coast that was destroyed by a flood between 800 B.C. and 500 B.C. … But
Ulf Erlingsson, a Swedish geographer, believes Plato combined elements from
different times and places in the background description for his utopia. The
geographic description of the island Atlantis, he suggests, is based on an
island that is still standing today—Ireland. … The island that sank was not
Ireland, he suggested, but nearby Dogger Bank, which was struck by a flood wave
in 6,100 B.C.”
Santorini and the Legend of Atlantis
Theories about the Lost Continent of
Atlantis
Legendary History: The Minoan Glories of
Crete and Santorini
Greek and Minoan Art
(Some of the source images used for developing the garb, hairstyles, and
material objects depicted in this deck)
Rand Flem-Ath’s Antarctica theory
If you would like to purchase this deck, click here.
Read another review of this deck here.
Joan Cole is a stay-at-home mom and former geek. She has been studying Tarot off and on since the early 1980's. You can see her deck collection and other Tarot writings here."
