I can not say how long I have been wanting (lusting) after this Nefertari Tarot deck. The gold itself had me in a frenzy, I always wanted a gold foil deck and this one completed my Triple Egyptian Decks beautifully! It is the Tarot Nefertari by Silvana Alasia. ‘The Light of Egypt Ramses’ Bride’
The box itself is the size of the card, small, somewhat thin. Good enough to keep the cards in, though I personally keep all my Egyptian decks in a lined wooden box.
The Guide Book
Honestly, this is pretty basic black and white affair. It is in English, Italiano, Espanol, Francais, Deutsch and Portugues.
There is a basic introduction, to Nefertari, tarot then a basic layout though there is no image to aid with the layout.
Each card meaning is single line, two if you are luck.
The Nefertari Tarot Cards
Truely, we buy these decks mainly for the cards and with this deck, it is certainly THE reason. The gold foil is very shiny and also has a lovely textured surface.
They are based on an older tarot deck by the same designer, though re vamped and re sold to include the gold foil. Designed to look like what you might find in an uncovered tomb, often the images are ‘worn’ in places.
They are a small and nippy (to shuffle) 4.5 inches by 2.5 inches. They are a joy to shuffle, gliding happily along, sometimes a little to happily as they like to leap like lemmings of a cliff sometimes (or my nickname as a demon shuffler was truth).
Unlike other Egyptian decks on the market, the major draw factor for me (gold foil aside) was that the minor arcana were not a simple image. For example, the 2 of swords in the image here is not simply two crossed swords. The 10 of swords is not simply an image of 10 swords. The illustrations work with them to give a meaning to the card (the women with their hands on their heads, cowering , then looking up at the up turned swords, the threat turned away – ending)
I am not a fan of all the multi-lingual names on the top of the cards I have to admit, it takes away some of the ‘presence’ of the cards when using them from a mystical tool to mundane commercial goods.