From Touchstone TarotTM by Kat Black
Queen of Wands
Meanings
The star. This woman is a flame that draws others in. She is confident, passionate and sensual. She laughs easily and lights up a room with her vivid personality, but she can be exhausting.
Reversed (?)
The advocate. A woman who takes action on behalf of others. She loves a cause and is passionately interested… until she isn’t. She has a very short attention span, don’t rely on her for the long haul.
Description
A young woman in a fine red gown decorated in many jewels sits at a throne topped by two carved lions' heads. On her lap sits a black cat. Out of the window a road, tree and distant castle can be seen. The woman gives us a "come hither" look.
The face is that of Marchesa Brigida Spinola-Doria, a hottie if ever there was one. I couldn't find out much about her, but her flushed cheeks, red lips and flirty look in this Rubens portrait made her my chosen face for the Queen of Wands.
The body is that of a young Princess Elizabeth I. In her youth, probably about the time this portrait was painted, Elizabeth was implicated in a sex scandal with Thomas Seymour. He was the brother of her father Henry VIII's third wife Jane and husband of her guardian Catherine Parr, who had been Henry's sixth wife. Confused? I sure am! Oh, what tangled webs the Tudors wove.
Elizabeth very narrowly missed the same fate as her mother Anne Boleyn when Seymour's intrigues escalated to the point that he tried to kidnap her brother King Edward VI with the intention of then marrying Elizabeth and seizing power. He was executed for treason, but there was no direct evidence against Elizabeth. Her interrogator said "I see it in her face that she is guilty" but she stuck by her motto: "video et taceo": I see, and say nothing.
Her dalliances with Seymour and how close they brought her to disaster were said to have taught her to be far more discreet in her dealings with men thereafter. Although she encouraged the public persona of being "The Virgin Queen," there is much evidence to suggest she was anything but.
Artwork
- Wand: TIZIANO, Vecellio (Titian), St Christopher, 1524, Palazzo Ducale, Venice.
- Wand leaves: PONTORMO, Jacopo, Cosimo il Vecchio, c.1520, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
- Window: Unknown Artist of the Flemish School, Edward VI of England, c.1546.
- Throne lions: JORDAENS, Jacob, Portrait of Catharina Behagel, wife of Rogier Le Witer, 1635, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
- Body: SCROTS, William, Elizabeth I when Princess, c.1546, Royal Collection, United Kingdom.
- Black cat face: ADRIAENSSEN, Alexander, Still Life with Fish, 1600s, Groeninge Museum, Bruges.
- Cat body: EWORTH, Hans, Portrait of Lady Dacre, 1540, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.
- Face: RUBENS, Pieter Pauwel, Portrait of Marchesa Brigida Spinola Doria, 1606, National Gallery of Art, Washington.
Members
78 Friends members who have chosen this card as their Significator...
