Le Tarot des Imagiers du Moyen Age. [With: Plate Volume]
Paris: Le Symbolisme, 1926-27. 1st Edition. 2 vols., quarto: publisher's stiff printed wraps, unopened; publisher's printed marbled paper portfolio with 11 loose sheets printed in color and gilt; original paperboard slipcase.
First edition of Swiss occultist Oswald Wirth's landmark work on the Tarot, dedicated to his mentor and collaborator in the project, French poet and mystic Stanislas de Guaita. Wirth originally created his Major Arcana-only deck in the late 1880s, around the time he joined Guaita's Ordre Kabbalistique de la Rose-Croix, a Rosicrucian brotherhood that studied Jewish and Christian Kabbalah, among other "hidden sciences." His designs synthesize the imagery and symbolism of alchemy, Freemasonry, Rosicrucianism, and Kabbalah with ancient Egyptian and Chaldean iconography. Wirth revised some of the images in his deck in preparation for this work, particularly La Papesse, but retained the striking gilt backgrounds and the Hebrew lettering. Illustrated with in-text line drawings and diagrams, and with the rare separate folder of plates, which features lithographs of the twenty-two Major Arcana on eleven sheets, each printed in color and gilt. Text in French. Light creasing to spine of text volume; minor edgewear to portfolio of plate volume; light rubbing and edgewear to slipcase. Very nearly fine overall. One of the most influential, visually striking, and symbolically rich decks of the modern tarot. Item #7354
$1,800.00