CROWLEY, Aleister “Thoth Tarot Deck” [U.S. Games Systems, 1978]

CROWLEY, Aleister. Thoth Tarot Deck.

New York: U.S. Games Systems, 1978. Complete 78-card tarot deck with illustrated instruction booklet. Also includes an intro card, a cover, and a blank for a total of 81 cards. Original printed cardboard box with red and black titling to cream ground. Cards measuring approx. 5" x 3.75", printed in color after the original paintings by Lady Frieda Harris. Box with moderate wear and toning. Cards clean and bright with no significant wear; booklet present. Very Good.

The Thoth Tarot represents the culmination of Aleister Crowley’s lifelong engagement with ceremonial magic, astrology, and esoteric symbolism, with imagery executed by Lady Frieda Harris between 1938 and 1943. Although the artwork was completed during the Second World War, the deck was not issued commercially until the late 1960s, when it was first made widely available in boxed form.

This edition belongs to the early period of public dissemination and sits between Crowley’s wartime occult project and the post-1960s revival of Western esotericism. Its emergence coincided with renewed interest in ceremonial magic, tarot, and alternative spiritual systems during the countercultural era. As such, it occupies a transitional position between private occult working material and mass-market esoteric publishing, bridging pre-war occultism and late twentieth-century tarot practice.