You can buy these cards or just use the ones on the internet.
Smyrna, in the year 1887. Katina is a Smyrnian girl, witty as well as bold. In the boondocks of Smyrna where she lives, she makes an acquaintance that will forever change her life, and the way she sees things: Attart, a mysterious Turkish woman, who initiates her into the Craft. Obstacles have no longer place in the way of a witch, and Katina sets out to climb socially.
Love potions, buyums, talismans and spells are proved unmistakeable, and Katina manages to take four husbands, one better than the other, one richer than the other. As she rises more and more socially, Katina merges in their businesses capably handling commerce, banks and tobacco trade and soon manages to become the grandest dame of Smyrna.
Her writings, spells and her tools of the Craft were found a hundred years later, in a dusty old trunk in the house in Agenia
Mara Meimaridis guides the reader around the world of the Witches: an oriental world of magic and mysteries, taking life and form in Smyrna of 1888.
"Deste" is the Turkish word for a "pile" of cards - the fortune telling cards that Katina was entrusted with by the Elders in the Craft - the Madas. And who is Katina? Who else if not the central heroine of "the Witches of Smyrna" , Mara Meimaridis' best seller. Katina was a clever and cunning girl who grew up in the boondocks of Smyrna and soon managed to reign over the city, its people and its commerce, using witchcraft to marry four husbands, one wealthier than the other, one more powerful than the other. Being a witch, Katina had another valuable weapon in her hands, in the service of her ambitions. This weapon was Deste, the fortune telling cards of the Witches, that passed from mother to daughter in her clan for over a thousand years, until it came to her hands. "I used the cards of Deste to make way for my ambitions and my dreams" she used to say. "I want to know, I always want to know what to expect. If I know what is coming then I shall know how to act."
The reader will discover that these cards are unlike any others he might have seen so far. Colours of the Orient, elements from China, India, Egypt as well as of the Persian cultures have left their mark on "Deste". It is a secret kept in trunks and closets for more than a thousand years, now brought into light.
Deste numbers 65 cards in total, divided in categories of figures, elements and symbols. Every faith is followed by a mythology, and the Witches have their own. Although their mythology is not widely spread, persons that are important in their legends of the past have taken their place among the Deste cards. The reader comes across fascinating figures such as Tattaret, warrior princess and leader of the Khans, the Sultan of Emerald, and Munzour, the black Horse of Ebony that depicts the brightest spirit of Munzuria. One also comes across symbols, such as the Broom which stands for quarrel and dispute, or the Tree, that, being upright, is a herald of good health.
The book presents each card separately, analyzing the meanings, the symbolisms and the predictions. Moreover, there is a description of one way to read the cards, given in such a way that the reader, guided by the book, might take his first steps into his subconscious and, therefore, his destiny.
( Agenia means Aegean & Smyrna is the Greek name of Izmir)
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