Mystery Palmistry Deck Continues to Boggle Batya

I am thinking of expanding this column to include Tarot, and the queromancy deck I discussed last week is one of the reasons why. Apparently, somewhere in Argentina is someone who reads palms with a deck of cards that includes palmistry. I hope to locate this person on my next trip.

With regards to the cards themselves, has anyone else heard of this deck? Does anyone else recognize these images? If so, don’t be shy. Please do write in!

The seven, eight, nine, and ten of clubs, apparently called bastos, each sports a palm with one line straight up and down in the mound of intuition, in the spiritual mound or the Mound of Luna. Since I have never seen a line like this, or any indication of what such a line might mean in a palmistry book, I am thinking this deck informs readers of certain potentials and abilities that the querent has yet to discover. For example, the seven of clubs shows a small boy standing in the middle of a field, so the card might mean that a small boy with spiritual powers is coming into the querent’s life. The eight of clubs shows a young woman in the same setting; the nine of clubs, an older man with a horse by the sea; the ten of clubs, a castle.

I would have to cut these up and paint them to try to get a feel for what they impart, of course. The princess of diamonds has a strong intuition line, a strong heart line, and a long life line. The jack of diamonds has the same lines; queen of diamonds, same lines; king of diamonds, same lines.

But the princess of spades has a very long life line, a sinking mind line, no heart line, and a marking on her Jupiter mound that looks like a little horse under a tree. The jack of spades has a shorter life line, a connected mind line, no heart line (perhaps simian?) and a marking on his Jupiter mound that looks like a cup with a lid on it, accompanied by a marking between his Apollo mound and his Mercury mound of a cross, with another marking farther down alongside his strong destiny line.

The queen of diamonds has a long life, drooping mind, no heart, a fork symbol between Jupiter and Saturn, six little horizontal lines under Jupiter, and two marks along the mind line under Apollo and Saturn. The king of spades has a square under Jupiter, a patch between Apollo and Mercury, a long life, and a strong destiny and is clearly simian, with a scowl on his face!

Seven of Spades, (or espadas), looks like an old man counting coins, with one strong destiny line up the center of his palm with two gaps down toward its base, leaving one little island. The eight of spades features an old man pondering a book, and has one strong destiny line not broken or gapped at all. The nine of spades features a crowd shuffling into a church and has a broken destiny line broken into four little pieces (like the judgment card?) The ten of spades features two people (perhaps women?) looking in opposite directions in front of a bald man (a Buddhist priest?) with a destiny line broken in the middle (the chariot?).

Okay, you get the picture… or many of them. I’ve also got the aces: no palms appear, so I will skip the descriptions. I am hoping to hear from some inspired readers on this one! Has anyone seen or used this deck before? Enlighten us, oh readers.