2012: Tarot of Ascension [Cards]

Created by Pierluca Zizzi and illustrated by Michele Penco, this tarot deck attempts to portrait the new age concept of ascension based at the end of the Mayan Calendar in 2012. The scenes are painted with muted colors, almost wood-cut like, highlighting the medieval aspect of this deck. As such, this may not be a tarot for everyone.

These cards are bordered dark brown, almost leathery, and like many other cards from Lo Scarabeo, these are labeled on four languages at the top (English, Italian, Spanish, and French) and two at the bottom (German and Dutch).

The Major Arcana are numbered with roman numerals at the top, starting at 0 with the Fool. Justice and Strength are numbered VIII and XI respectively, following the Marseilles tradition. Death is the only card devoid of labels, called Nameless Arcane in the little white book (LWB), but still numbered XIII. These are sub labeled in the LWB as follow:

0. The Fool, Energy
I. The Magician, the Creator of Reality
II. The High Priestess, Accumulation
III. The Empress, Creativity
IV. The Emperor, Power over Oneself or Self-domination
V. The Hierophant, the Truth
VI. The Lovers, Love
VII. The Chariot, Action
VIII. Justice, the Ideal
IX. The Hermit, Wisdom
X. The Wheel, Karma
XI. Strength, Awareness
XII. The Hanged Man, Meditation
XIII. Nameless Arcane, the Ascension
XIV. Temperance, Harmonious Equilibrium
XV. The Devil, the Subconscious
XVI. The Tower, the Explosion
XVII. The Star, the Galaxy
XVIII. The Moon, the two Moons
XIX. The Sun, the two Suns
XX. Judgment, the Day of the Ascension
XXI. The World, the New World

Some of these are illustrated on the Marseilles tradition, for example: The Lovers shows a man choosing between two lovers all of them clothed. The Chariot shows a chariot pulled by two horses.

However, other Major Arcana seems to be a reinterpretation of the Marseilles, for example: The Wheel shows three human figures around a wheel, a naked angel-like being lying on top and pointing to the wheel, a half man-half faun climbing up on the right, and a half faun-half man climbing down on the left.

The Minor Arcana are made of four suits: swords, wands, pentacles and cups. The Court Cards follow the usual set: Knave, Knight, Queen, and King. The pips in these cards are numbered at the top, but unlike the Marseilles Tarot, these are fully illustrated, incorporating the suit icon symmetrically arranged on the scene.

The back of these cards are non-reversible, illustrating a bright star high in a dark sky at dusk. This scene is presented inside an elaborated frame.

This deck includes a little white book (LWB) which provides brief descriptions of each card.

This is a very unique deck. It has very muted colouring all round and the illustrations are semi medieval tone. The backs are not reversable. Most of the images are pretty strigtforward and are easy to recognize and interpret in your reading, however certain cards are especially different ie. the 8 of cups ( depicting 2 men on a stage like scene facing a lage crowd, behind one man is an arch and on his clothing is a red heart, definitely not from your tradion raider-waite style, another unique card is the 4 of swords ( showing a man in the middle of a battle scene whereby he's looking stright at you, perhaps indicating he wants out of this mess and needs to recuparate). There are a couple of cards that are definitely unique, but well worth the study in its unique illustration. MY only wish for this deck, is that it comes with its own companion book , hence giving clearer understanding of this deck.