The La Brea Tar Pits are full of mysteries. Here are three of the most puzzling: the Tar Pits are covered with tar, they contain the bones of prehistoric animals, and they could be where it’s been said a group of Tarot prisoners were burned.
It all started with the Tar Pits in 1913. Those of you who’ve got more than 10 minutes of your life will know more about the La Brea Tar Pits than you need to know. They’re in Los Angeles’ Wilshire District. They contain the bones of prehistoric animals. And they’re said to contain the Tarot cards.
That’s not so surprising. The Tarot was said to have been brought to America around 1500 by a Spanish soldier named Cervantes.
“He took the Tarot, and brought it home, and opened it up and studied it,” says Dr. Joseph McHenry, a paleontologist at the University of Texas’ Institute of Archeology, “because he thought it was a magic book for people, a book that could help people lead better lives.”
Cervantes was the first person to describe the Tarot symbols and describe its use in fortune telling. As he used the Tarot’s symbols to create a new system of fortune telling, he claimed he found a set of clues about life and events in the Tarot. In his book, Concerning Magical and Speculative Writings, Cervantes wrote about his study:
“My experience of the Tarot showed me that it was capable of containing, in its secret language, not only the future but also all the elements of the past, present and to come, as well as the elements of my life.
“This new language, to me, had a new and startling significance, for I saw before me not only the possibility of communicating with the great and beautiful past, but also with all sorts of events that would happen in the future, and even with events that would never happen at all, for, as I saw it, all that was left for me to discover was how to communicate with the future.”
McHenry speculates that Cervantes was actually a sort of fortune teller because of his use of the Tarot.
“From [Cervantes’] time — probably from the 15th century to 1450 — people were fortune-tellers, and they were using the
