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The Tarot of Pagan Cats
Talisman and I have both been professional readers for a (very!) long time now and as such we get through a lot of tarot decks during the course of our work.
Usually, that means several decks a year for each of us as the cards simply get to the stage where they are no longer easy to shuffle and deal.
Once that happens it interferes with an attempt to do a reading simply because with the cards sticking it can mean you are no longer getting the right cards.
As a result, we not only replace a lot of our decks with a new version, but we are also always on the lookout for completely new decks. Anyway, the Tarot of Pagan Cats is the latest one I had to replace.
A Review of the Tarot of Pagan Cats
The Tarot of Pagan Cats is a deck that has been published by Lo Scarabeo which is a company that will be well known to many of you as it has so many tarot decks in its portfolio.
According to the box and its accompanying booklet, Magdelina Messina is the author and Lola Airaghi the artist.
Artwork
As you can imagine the graphical element of these cards resolves around cats as you can see if you look at the accompanying gallery. Graphically the cards are a mixture of conceptual Rider-Waite imagery with (as you might expect from the title!) a pagan flavor.
Having said that, the cards are not so easy to understand from the imagery as a traditional Rider-Waite deck. Some are obvious, but many are not.
Now, this deck has changed considerably in one way since I first bought it. Originally, the name of each card was printed in six different languages actually on the card: Top left: English and Spanish, top right: Italian and French, bottom left: German, and bottom right: Dutch.
Lo Scarabeo is fond of doing this, but I have to be honest, it’s not a convention I love. Although I can see its usefulness from their point of view.
However, and this is a BIG however, the cards are now borderless and the major arcana names have disappeared and only have numbers. For the minor arcana the suit names have gone with only the numbers for two to ten and symbols for the ace and face cards.
I don’t consider that an improvement as it will seriously slow most non-professional readers down. Imagery should help beginners and not hinder them.
Dimensions
The cards themselves are 4.625 by 2.5 inches or 118mm by 65mm in size. This makes them somewhat taller and a little wider than standard playing card size.
Production Quality
The production quality is what I would expect from Lo Scarabeo. Print quality is good with no color bleeding evident. Lettering was crisp and clear. The cards were not quite as thick as I would like but the cardstock is not so thin that it causes a problem.
Durability
If you are someone reading for yourself these cards will last well. The cardstock could be thicker but you shouldn’t find that an issue.
If you are reading professionally and this is your only deck, then six months or so is about average depending on your workload. If it is one of several decks you use (like me) then you should get a year out of the cards.
The Tarot of Pagan Cats in Use
This deck does have a booklet with explanatory meanings which many beginners will turn to (especially if it’s the first deck they’ve ever purchased) so how good it is (or isn’t) will need to form part of this review.
Of course, how useful a particular tarot deck will be does depend to a very great deal on how accurate it is in use. But there are other considerations such as how easy shuffling and dealing are.
Enclosed Interpretation Booklet
The enclosed booklet only has very brief meanings for each of the cards. The major arcana have slightly more context than the minors but still only has a couple of sentences for upright interpretation and most times a single sentence for reversals.
When it comes to the minors it is a single short sentence for uprights and reversals. Very often it is no more than two or three words for a card’s meaning.
Overall it does nothing more than give a slight flavor to a card’s meaning. Perhaps the saving grace is that it may point someone in the right direction rather than giving them nothing at all.
The meanings are in English, Italian, Spanish, French, and German. To Lo Scarabeo’s credit this is something that very few tarot card makers do.
Shuffling and Dealing
The cards are not much bigger than standard playing card size and as such are relatively straightforward to both shuffle and deal.
If you have very small hands, you might find it a little more difficult but it’s not something that should ever be a deal breaker.
Accuracy
I did review this deck a good while back for our newsletter, but I have revisited my methodology and conducted the comparison again for this review.
To review the Tarot of Pagan Cats deck, I decided to compare it with one of my other usual decks on three different completed tarot readings. The readings were about work, relationships, and past life issues.
The Pagan Cats deck gave me clear and helpful guidance on the work and relationship readings, but it was less clear on the past life reading.
I was surprised by this, because I expected the deck to have a strong spiritual connection, since cats themselves are very mystical animals and this deck has a lot of feline energy.
I don’t think the deck is bad for spiritual readings, but it was harder to interpret its messages. It will perhaps need you to think outside the box a little to see what the cards are trying to tell you.
On the other hand, as I said above, the deck was very straightforward and organized for the work/business and relationship readings that I did, which is great for tarot beginners.
Conclusion
You don’t have to be a cat lover to enjoy these cards, but if you are, there’s a lot here to enjoy. Just as a small example, on the 7 of Cups, the cups are full of things cats and kittens like – a ball of yarn, bowl of milk, a cushion, etc. etc.
Overall, the Tarot of Pagan Cats deck is just as insightful and useful as when I first bought this deck in 2017. But because of the changes made they are much more suitable for very experienced readers rather than those learning tarot. That is a shame.
Tarot of Pagan Cats Review Recommendation
We have split our recommendations section into two main sections: Novice readers and experienced readers. We will, on occasion, make recommendations for collectors. Just because (for example) a deck is not recommended for beginners but is recommended for experienced readers doesn’t mean the deck is not a good one. Learning the intricacies of the tarot is hard enough but sometimes a deck just would not prove helpful to someone starting out, hence “Not Recommended.”
Novice Readers: Not Recommended
Therse cards are simply not intuitive for beginners. The lack of names on the major arcana is bad enough but when you look at the minors it’s even worse. The face cards are difficult to determine who is who and quite frankly if you have to spend time figuring out what the card even is then it will slow everything down considerably.
Experienced Readers: Recommended with Reservations
An experienced reader will be able to make better use of these cards but even then, the comments above apply. Most experienced readers will be able to learn and retain the imagery of the Tarot of Pagan Cats as to which card is which, but it should not be this difficult.
Collectors: Recommended
The Tarot of Pagan Cats has wonderful imagery and from that perspective it would make a great addition to a collection.
“Tarot of Pagan Cats Review” by Charis
