>At 09:39 -0800 2002-01-29, Kenneth Whistler wrote:
>>Michael,
>>
>> > >>At some stage I will be requesting a shamrock, as this is used in a
>>> >>number of dictionaries as a symbol denoting horticulture.
>>> >
>>> >What about U+2663?
>>>
>>> Where on earth did that annotation come from? A club is not a shamrock.
>>...
> That doesn't mean the two are unifiable.
>
> A shamrock is "any of various plants with trifoliate leaves, esp.
> Trifolium minus, T. repens, or Medicago lupulina, used as the
> national emblem of Ireland." Shamrock leaves are *heart-shaped*.
>
> A clover, on the other hand, has round leaves, usually three, four
> when you're lucky. A clover is not used as an emblem for Ireland, not
> is a clover pictured in Íslensk ordabók as a symbol for botany.
Yes, we used to have both growing around the yard.
> Further, the card suits do not derive from symbols of hearts, spades,
> diamonds, or clubs. From
> http://www.themysticeye.com/info/playingcard.htm :
>
> "Designed in the Middle Ages, the tarot deck reflected medieval
> society...--the deck included 56 cards
> divided into four suits: cups (the church); swords (the military);
> pentacles, or 5-pointed stars (merchants); and batons (farmers)...
> Clover leaves. Deriving from batons, also known as wands or staves.
also "rods".
> An interesting page suggesting that the Tarot cards may ultimately
> have derived from China cites anthropologist W. H. Wilkinson writing
> in 1895 on the subject.
> http://www.ahs.uwaterloo.ca/~museum/Archive/Wilkinson/Wilkinson.html
"Somewhere around the 11th century AD, the letter W was added to
distinguish 2 U's from a U & a V; & in the same fashion, the
letter J came into manifestation as a variant form of the Latin
letter I." --- William Eisen 1980 _The English Cabalah_ pg 42
"In the Cabalah, 2 of the suits of the Minor Arcana are the movers &
the other 2 are the moved. The more powerful suits initiate the force,
& the weaker suits react to it." --- William Eisen 1980
_The English Cabalah_ pp 139-140
"The Hermit is a symbol of attainment, rather than a symbol of quest...
[He carries] the Lamp of Truth, & it contains within it the 6-pointed
star of the Seal of Solomon. The Hermit stands isolated & alone.
He is always hooded, & he is robed in a mantle of discretion. The
staff that he leans on is the staff of intuition, & these 3 symbols...
are what constitute his inner strength. But what is the secret of
his power? It is his great symbol of authority, the letter H, the
8th letter of the English alphabet. Turn the number 8 over on its
side & it becomes... the symbol of infinity. Open up the letter H
into its component parts, & it becomes 1-1 or nothing... [The Magician]
stands before a table upon which are the symbols of the 4 natural
elements of earth, wather, air, & fire. These are represented by
a pentacle, a cup, a sword, & a wand, respectively. The cosmic lemniscate
symbol of infinity is above his head, & around his waist is the occult
symbol of eternity -- a serpent swallowing its tail. His black hair,
which is bound by a white band, signifies the limitation of ignorance
by knowledge... Strength A woman, garlanded with flowers [with the
symbol of infinity above her head] & dressed in a simple white robe,
is closing the mouth of a ferocious lion with as much ease as if it
were a lamb. In other decks she is opening it... She is the High
Priestess (the letter F), the counterpart of the Magician (the letter
She is demonstrating that the powers of the mind are far superior to
the physical strength of the lion, & that she is truly 'One to Obey'."
--- William Eisen 1980 _The English Cabalah_ pp 349 & 350 & 366
"Indeed, when religious people quarrel about religion, or hungry
people quarrel about victuals, it looks as if they had not much
of either among them." --- Benjamin Franklin (quoted in Joseph Lewis
_Benjamin Franklin, FreeThinker_; quoted in B. James 2002 January
_The Irish Times_ vol 1 #6 pg 6)
John G. Otto, Eagle Scout, Knight, Cybernetic Praxeologist
Existence, Consciousness, Identity, Life, Liberty, Property, Privacy, Justice
<http://gosc.nisus.com/~giovanni>
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