The concept here is somewhat different from traditional tarots, as well it should be, representing the Ancient Mayan culture.  This must have posed quite a challenge for Mr. Balin.  The Minor Arcana have retained a lot of the sense of traditional pip cards, it is in the Major Arcana that we see the most departure from the norm.

All 22 of the Major Arcana cards are numbered sequentially only with the ancient Mayan numbering system, down at the bottom of the card.  If you don't pay careful attention, you will miss the little coded symbol.  There are no titles or text of any kind to mar the pictures, and they are borderless, full scenes as well.

The idea here is, you can take all 22 cards and lay them together, much like you would a puzzle, and they will form one large picture.  The artwork runs straight off one card and down onto the next, etc.  The artwork itself is primitive but appropriately so.  The concept of having to put the cards together into a puzzle annoyed me to no end, forcing me to sit and put the darned thing together just out of spite really.

Yet, when I was done, it was really cool.  The picture really looks like something that would have been unearthed in ancient Mayan ruins, depicting scenes from a lifetime which died out many hundreds of years ago.  In a way, they are reminiscent of the way ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs depict life in Egypt thousands of years ago.  The artwork style is different, as it would be from culture to culture, yet there is a similarity as well.

The cards are a standard size and shuffle easily.  The cardstock they are printed on breaks in more easily than usual.  I suspect with much wear, the colors on this deck might fade a lot or even show those funny little white wear marks.  The suits are Swords, Staffs (which is incorrect, it should be Staves), Cups and Jades, which correlate to Pentacles.  The court cards are Lord, Lady, Warrior and Servant.

I highly recommend this deck for someone wanting to make a study of more primordial native American peoples.  It is a refreshing change from all the redundant Native American decks, as well as the takeoff from the traditional tarot.

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Review Copyright 1998 by Gina M. Pace