This is a deck of fortune telling tarot cards based upon the work and deck of Etteilla, which was produced and printed by Editions Dussere in Paris.  I could tell that it was an old deck as soon as I laid eyes on it, the graphics on the box are reminiscent of old posters I've seen for the original Barnum and Bailey Circus, and other events of that era, so just the box looked old.  However, I wasn't sure how to tell how old it was, because it predates copyrights, and the only date on the deck that I could find was a notice on the side which said, "Reproduction d'un jeu de 78 cartes edite vers 1870 dont l'original est conserve a la bibliotheque nationale de Paris."  I sure wasn't gonna believe this deck was made in 1870!  Basically it sounds like it is saying, the original deck design upon which this deck is modeled is housed in the national library in Paris, and that deck was made in 1870.  So this is a reproduction.

I searched through Stuart Kaplan's Encyclopedia of Tarot and found this deck after a lot of digging.  According to what I read there, this deck was actually produced in two different time periods, by two different companies.  The one I have is by the earlier company.  The encyclopedia said that the way to verify the date this deck was printed was to look on the Two of Swords card and there is a tax stamp there which shows the date the deck was printed, for purposes of paying tax on it.  I looked, and sure enough, there was the tax stamp.  And then my jaw hit the floor when I read that the date on this deck was April 17, 1890.

This deck is an Etteilla-based tarot deck, which means the cards are numbered 1 through 78 with lesser emphasis given to the Minor Arcana than a standard deck.  Etteilla is considered to be the father of fortunetelling; he is basically the first man to take the tarot decks of older times, and redesign them in accordance with his new system of fortunetelling.  Previously, tarot was used mainly as a game, with some students of its esoteric nature emerging more recently.  Etteilla took this and created a fortunetelling deck, which he used to predict the deaths of many French nobles at the guillotine during the French Revolution.  Etteilla is also the inventor of the concept of reversed meanings of the cards.  Another practice which began with Etteilla is the use of significators; two of the cards in this deck are designated for use to represent the questioner; one for the questioner if male, one if female.  And, of course, Etteilla is the first to have represented the court cards as being persons of certain color hair and complexion.  Many other tarotists to this day follow these conventions.

These cards, following the Etteilla style of fortunetelling cards, have many changes in them from the classic tarot, including most of the titles, and the numbering system.  Each card has a double white border, in the inside border the titles appear around the image.  If you are looking at the card in its upright position, the numbers are in the corners, alongside them in tiny fine print are the words "Droit" (to signify that they are upright) and a keyword meaning of the card is in French in the center.  This meaning only applies to the card when it is upright.  Titles appear sideways in both of the borders down the side of the image, so that they could be read from the card regardless of whether it was upright or reversed.  On the other end of the card, the numbers appear in the corners, with the word "Renverse" (which means reverse) and the keyword meaning for the card when it is reversed is in the center.

As is standard with most Etteilla-style decks, this deck begins with number 1 and moves through 78, the 78th card being the Fool.  None of the numbered Majors correspond directly with the classic tarot, titles are as follows:

1 -- Chaos (Le Chaos)
2 -- The Sun (La Lumiere)
3 -- The Plants (Les Plantes)
4 -- The Sky (Le Ciel)
5 -- Man and Animals (L'Homme et les Quadrupedes)
 6 -- The Zodiac (Les Astres)
7 -- Birds and Fishes (Les Oiseaux et les Poissons)
8 -- Repose (Repos)
9 -- Justice (La Justice)
10 --Temperance (La Temperance)
11 -- Force (La Force)
12 -- Prudence (La Prudence)
13 -- The High Priest (Le Grand Pretre)
14 -- The Devil (Le Diable)
15 -- The Magician or the Juggler (Le Magicien ou le Bateleur)
16 -- Final Judgment (Le Jugement dernier)
17 -- Death (La Mort)
18 -- The Monk or Hermit (Le Capucin)
19 -- The Ill-Fated Temple (Le Temple Foudroye)
20 -- Wheel of Fortune (La Roue de Fortune)
21 -- The African Despot (Le Despote Africain)

As you can see, there is very little relevance of these cards to classic tarot.  While it is considered a tarot deck, Etteilla-style tarot decks must be measured on their own merits and not compared to classic decks; they are definitely apples and oranges.  I have done my best to translate the French titles for the cards above, but if you have a better knowledge of how they should translate, suggestions and corrections are welcome.

The very next card, number 22, jumps right into the court cards for the Minor Arcana, so you can see there is less division than usual here.  King, Queen, Knight and Page are the classic courts, and they are used here.  Of course, the court cards, and the numbered pip cards, do still carry the system of upright and reversed keywords as the Majors, and the numbers continue to go up throughout the deck as described.  In this deck, the suits are the classic Wands, Cups, Swords and Coins.  And, as previously mentioned, the Fool then rounds out the deck as card number 78, coming at the end.

The cards are slightly smaller and narrower than standard, and seem to be coated on one side only.  The back design is a bland red and white rosette pattern.  The cards handle and shuffle very well, but due to the age of the deck, I don't think I will be shuffling them very much!  The printing quality is weak, and I can guess that this isn't due to the wear on the deck so much as the technology available for printing at the time.  The typeset is very tiny on these cards, and you could go blind trying to read them.  At least I have difficulty reading them.  Plus everything is written entirely in French.  The little white booklet looks like it is actually a decent one; hard to tell unless you're fluent in French.  However, the images are attractive in a historical sort of way.

Since this deck is so old, stating it's out of print is probably obvious, yet I shall emphasize that they are no longer available on the primary market.  However, I have seen them surfacing a lot lately on ebay (www.ebay.com) and so I do think a review is prudent.  Those who are interested in historical or Etteilla-style tarot decks will want to keep a keen eye out for these.  They're definitely worth catching!

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Review Copyright 1999 by Gina M. Pace

Tarot Egyptien -- Grand Jeu de Oracle des Dames by Julia Orsini, 1890
published by Editions Dussere, Paris, France