Sacred Rose
25-year-anniversary deck originally released as Majors-only.
by Johanna Gargiulo-Sherman · 2005
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The record
For as many years as I have been on the Internet I have been hearing about this deck. It recently came into my life, and at a very exciting time: 2005 is the 25th anniversary of this deck! What - you added up the dates and they don't make 25 years? The initial release of this deck was a Majors only, gilt edged limited edition in 1980. And it has been going strong ever since! The first thing that struck me about this deck was the LWB (Little White Book), with a marvelous foreword by Stuart Kaplan of U.S. Games. He tells the story of how this deck came into being, starting with one of Johanna's business cards showing up, unsolicited, at the U.S. Games offices in New York City. He was impressed with the quality of her illustrations, and felt that she would be someone that could relate to Tarot. The illustrations on the deck were inspired by the artistry seen in medieval stained glass windows, and in Byzantine icons. There is also a link with the pre-Christian belief in the divinity of nature, which shows strongly in this deck. In fact, the symbolism in this deck is meant to be nature-oriented, rather than coming from a bias towards either the occult or the mundane. Having said that, p
The cards
