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This is an excerpt from my longer blog post about the Emperor card:
For my version/pendant, I have, as usual, tried to strip it down to what I can fit onto a small oval. The ram’s head for Aries/Mars. The upward triangle for alchemical fire but also referencing the barren (yet phallic) mountains often depicted in this card. The orb or globe representing dominion and power over others.
On the reverse of the pendant I’ve used the sceptre from the Smith-Waite card as the main feature of the sigil. The sceptre is an ankh, Egyptian symbol of life, “to indicate that under the law he bears the power of life and death, and will hopefully use it well,” according to Pollack. The glyph of Mars, which has come to be known in many contexts as the “male” symbol, bursts out of the top of the ankh in a configuration that, after I carved it, reminded me of the Artist Formerly Known as Prince’s symbol. Prince had a powerful Mars signature in his natal chart, with his rising sign being Scorpio, ruled by a Mars in Aries. His sexuality was so important to his public image but was also fluid, a subversion of the Emperor’s masculine power.
