Quadrate Visuals
VISUAL SIX
How do the cards 'hopscotch' thru the Quadrates?
Back in 2003, Daniel Guetzkow and myself were experimenting on drawing a visual of the patterned sequence of the cards thru out each of the Quadrates. For example, if we started with our birthcard in the first quadrate and tracked its position thru out all of the Quadrates, what kind of pattern would it make? I created a visual using the coordinate positions for each box in the Quadrate while Daniel just numbered the boxes from 1-52 on the Quadrate and drew out the resulting pattern on a wheel. We called this visual wheel layout a 'Quadragram'. Below is the visual of both Quadragrams. Using the numbers to trace a card from Quadrate to Quadrate is easier to see on the wheel as compared to the coordinate positions, but as you can see, both wheels have the same pattern, just different reference points. The numbered wheel on the right starts at #1, which is the equivalent of the left wheel's Mer-Mer position at the bottom. The lines in Green indicate the Fixed cards and the turquoise and pink lines indicate the semi fixed cards.
So looking at the wheel on the right, if we start a card on #1 for example, we know that in the next quadrate to follow, that same card will travel to the #27 position, then to the #28 position on the quadrate after that, etc., until eventually it returns to #1 after going thru 45 Quadrates.
The complete 45 numbered pattern sequence from Quadrate to Quadrate is as follows, starting from #1 and ending with #1:
1-27-28-19-47-26-41-45-48-13-15-40-7-8-46-39-16-31-35-38-29-6-17-18-5-30-44-10-24-37-42-32-22-12-49-4-43-23-50-20-34-51-36-25-3-1
So looking at the wheel on the right, if we start a card on #1 for example, we know that in the next quadrate to follow, that same card will travel to the #27 position, then to the #28 position on the quadrate after that, etc., until eventually it returns to #1 after going thru 45 Quadrates.
The complete 45 numbered pattern sequence from Quadrate to Quadrate is as follows, starting from #1 and ending with #1:
1-27-28-19-47-26-41-45-48-13-15-40-7-8-46-39-16-31-35-38-29-6-17-18-5-30-44-10-24-37-42-32-22-12-49-4-43-23-50-20-34-51-36-25-3-1
This was all well and fine, but it still didn't answer my question as to WHY does the card always go from the #1 position to the #27 position in the next quadrate for example, no matter which quadrate it is? So I wrote out the numbers on a blank Quadrate plate, (illustrated below), in the natural order of the card layout, similar to what Daniel did with his wheel and traced the progression of each sequence from 1-27-28-19-47, etc, until I wound up back at #1. All I had for my efforts was a page that looked full of scribbly connected lines with seemingly no pattern to it until I studied the page closer. And then I saw it. I saw the pattern of how the cards jump from Quadrate to Quadrate, which before didn't make any sense to me.
The cards will travel thru out each of the Quadrates on three different levels:
1) The first level is illustrated by the yellow boxes below in positions 52, 11 and 21. These are the FIXED CARDS. They will never change their positions, no matter what quadrate you're in, nor will any card land in their spots. They are fixed in place and therefore do not take part in the exchanging of cards from Quadrate to Quadrate.
2) The second level is illustrated by the semi fixed cards, which are colored in light and dark green. The light colored green boxes lie in positions #2 and 14. The darker green cards lie in positions #8 and 33. Each one of these groups of cards exchange spirit and life cards with each other and alternate with each other from one quadrate to the next.
3) This leaves the third level which consists of the remaining 45 cards. And this is where I realized that they too are following the same "format" as the semi fixed cards except for one distinction. They are not caught up in a loop where the one card resolves back to the original one, making it exclusive to just the two of them, but rather continues on to the next card, sort of like a 'connect the dots' type of sequencing pattern.
To explain this further, if you look at the semi fixed cards for #2 and #14 positions, you will see that the bottom left SPIRIT card in the #2 position seeks its LIFE card equivalent in the #14 position in the bottom right. And when you look at the #14 position, it's spirit card is now the Ace of Clubs. The Ace of Clubs seeks out its life card equivalent which happens to go right back to the #2 position on the lower right. This makes them mutually receptive to ONLY each other and therefore in a continual alternating loop from Quadrate to Quadrate.
And this becomes the important thing to remember when applying this rule to the 45 remaining positions. The SPIRIT and LIFE cards are the rudders that steer where the cards go to from position to position, quadrate to quadrate. The bottom left SPIRIT card will always be followed in the next quadrate by its equivalent bottom right LIFE card. If you remember this, no matter what position the top card is in, all you have to do is look to the bottom LEFT card and match it to the position that carries the same bottom RIGHT card and you will always know where that top card goes to in the next Quadrate.
Using the example in the visual for positions #1 and #27, you will see that in the #1 position, the Ace of Hearts represents the SPIRIT card for that position thru out all the Quadrates. ( Indeed, all of these spirit and life cards will be fixed in those positions thru out all the Quadrates as references for their original SPIRIT and LIFE spread layouts). The Ace of hearts spirit card will ALWAYS be followed by the position of its Ace of Hearts LIFE card in the next Quadrate. You will see from the arrow, that the Ace of Hearts LIFE card is located on the bottom right in position #27.
Once you get to position #27, you start all over again in a new link up. You look at the left hand card and see that the new spirit card is the Ace of Diamonds. Where is its matching Ace of Diamonds LIFE card? If you look right next to it in position #28, you will see the Ace of Diamonds LIFE card in the bottom right hand corner. This means that the same top card, no matter what that card may be, will now hopskotch from position #27 to 28 in the next Quadrate. When you get to #28 position, you start all over again and look for the new spirit card, which is now the 2 of Diamonds. You will find its equivalent life card at position #19 at the bottom right. So you know that the same top card will jump to the #19 position in the next Quadrate and so on and so forth.
By using Thomas Morrell's Quadrate plates, you have the extra advantage of seeing the spirit cards and the life cards always fixed at the bottom of each of the individual Quadrate boxes so that once you know what you're looking for, you can understand how any of the remaining 45 cards will jump from one position to the next in a set pattern of sequences from Quadrate to Quadrate, the spirit card always linking itself to its exact life card in the next quadrate.
As a final example, if you find the Queen of Hearts as the top card in position #1 (at the Mer-Mer coordinate), you can be assured that in the next Quadrate to follow, the Queen of Hearts will always be in the #27 position top card at coordinate Ju-Ur. In the next Quadrate after that, the Queen of Hearts will jump to the #28 position and then on to the #19 position, etc., always being steered in a set pattern, using the bottom linkage points to join the spirit cards and their matching life cards from Quadrate to Quadrate.