Re: Exploring The Wheel of Fortune

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jmd wrote:Just so as to give due credit where due credit it due... it was not I, but OP who said:
OnePotato wrote:[...]In Europe the sphinx is a symbol for wisdom.
If you want that at the top of your wheel of fortune, I guess you can ignore what I said above.
My apologies, have edited post to correct.
jmd wrote:The sphinx indeed has also been linked to understanding and prudence (hence 'wisdom') when considered in connection with its riddle, but I would not link it to Wisdom even if it was a sphinx intended on the Tarot de Marseille-II.
Depending upon when and by whom (do you have any period appropriate examples?) I would guess an association of the sphinx with wisdom and understanding would be more cognate with the appearance of the sphinx on the Pope card, unless such represents alternatively the triumph of Christianity over pagan ignorance and folly. Any association with wisdom is irrelevant to its placement atop the wheel of fortune, whereupon her association with folly and ignorance, or as the bitch presiding o'er days of ill fortune about to be toppled and overthrown, or as a general symbols of reversals in fortune, are the more cognate (and I think probably the more common for the time). She also came to represent hieroglyphs and their decipherment, in the tradition of Chaeremon and as popularised by Kircher (via the patronage of a series of Popes among many others - Kircher being a master of the patronage game).

SteveM

“Egyptian wisdom is to say all things symbolically, to conceal the images of the gods in littles boxes and to hang from walls only the Sphinx.”
Chaeremon of Alexandra, 1st century AD
Last edited by SteveM on 17 May 2009, 12:42, edited 1 time in total.

Re: Exploring The Wheel of Fortune

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Ross said:

It's anachronistic to use the chimeras of Notre Dame to prove anything. These are 19th century carvings, begun in 1845 for the massive and famous restauration of the Cathedral by Eugène Viollet-le-Duc
http://ndparis.free.fr/notredamedeparis ... illes.html

* Hello Ross.

-I know the restorations did by Le Duc.

Here you have the example of the Church of San Miguel de Estella in Spain.
GRIFO-AMIGO.jpg GRIFO-AMIGO.jpg Viewed 7464 times 13.44 KiB
The Universe is like a Mamushka.

Re: Exploring The Wheel of Fortune

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So, I'm sitting here with two sides of a riddle.

Just to clarify what I have learned here:

On one side, the Sphinx is Ignorance, (and not the wisdom of the ages, unless it's on the Pope's throne,
[double-unless the Pope is sitting on ignorance to conquor it,])
and it belongs on the top of the wheel of Fortune.
(BTW, can someone show me a timely example of an ignorant sphinx with a crown and a sword?)

On the other hand, the figure on the top of the wheel of fortune should be a king with a cape, but was accidentally copied wrong, and mistakenly turned into a sphinx? (BUT, on an earlier occasion the other two beings were intentionally and correctly turned into beasts after beginning as people on Visconte Sforza.)

Have I got this right?
I am not a cannibal.

Re: Exploring The Wheel of Fortune

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hmm, I thought the thing on top looked like GW Bush...and sort of fits with that idea of "leader degrading into monkey".
"...he wanted to illustrate with his figures many Moral teachings, and under some difficulty, to bite into bad and dangerous customs, & show how today many Actions are done without goodness and honesty, and are accomplished in ways that are contrary to duty and rightfulness."
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Re: Exploring The Wheel of Fortune

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OnePotato wrote:[...]On the other hand, the figure on the top of the wheel of fortune should be a king with a cape, but was accidentally copied wrong, and mistakenly turned into a sphinx? (BUT, on an earlier occasion the other two beings were intentionally and correctly turned into beasts after beginning as people on Visconte Sforza.)

Have I got this right?
I suppose that what I wrote indeed makes it sound such... so how about a mildly different description for the same sequence of transformations:

Even on the Visconti-Sforza, we see the ascending (aspiring) person represented with monkey-features, consistent with the then 'common' view of false aspiration symbolically ascribed to monkeys (in other words, persons seeking a station above their call or ability may be called 'simianus' or 'simpleton' or 'backwards'); whereas the descending (falling) person metaphorically also 'falling from grace' and confounding, therefore, 'true religion' with that upon which Christ sat: the Ass (hence also the representation in various reformation protestant depictions of the Pope as Ass-like).

So these two are quite straightforwardly, in that context, animals standing for or representing two types of human condition. The top person is there, however, but by 'the grace of God' (or, in the context, Fortunæ under the guidance of God). If he or she thinks falsely about their current position, then the ears upon the Visconti-Sorza deck shows the stupidity or foolhardiness of the person in the position, and again an 'animal-like' indication is implied - though no specific one, rather just with elongated ears.

I personally suspect that it is simply this combined with the rather more symbolic representation of the Monkey and Ass that eventually allowed for the central top figure to also acquire animalistic traits not found in Tarot de Marseille type-I decks. Still, by the way, I accept that by the Tarot de Marseille type-II style, the perception is sphinx-like, and may even be considered as 'Man' in answer to its own riddle, implying thereby that people in general rise, climax and decline.
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association.tarotstudies.org

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Crowned sphinxes are common (a google image search on “crowned sphinx” should find you plenty). Egyptian crowned sphinxes can be found holding sceptres or incense pots. Sphinxes holding swords are rarer but not unknown; Hungarian denars from the reign of King Stephen V (1270-1272) for example have a cross with rosettes between its arms on one side and a Sphinx facing right with sword and shield on the other.
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