Because I am now taking a formal Tarot course, I decided to gather up the various decks scattered around the house. In a bookcase cubby hole with two different decks I found a lidded plastic box containing Astro Dice. Like new!
“The powerful symbolism of Astrology is combined with the random selection of Tarot to create this remarkable New Age Oracle,” proclaimed the little blue (not white) booklet inside the clear plastic box.
The book, as you can see, was published by the “Kansas City School of the Occult.” A quick Web search turned up nothing. I was not surprised.
There are plenty of websites mentioning them though. And you can buy them on Amazon, although often without the little white (or blue) book. One site linked them to a British source, The Wessex Astrologer, but they don’t seem to sell them now.
Grok reported, “While the exact individual or group responsible for the initial creation of Astro Dice in this period is not clearly documented, Wessex Astrologer is credited with formalizing and marketing a simplified version of the tool, consisting of three 12-sided dice representing zodiac signs, planets, and astrological houses.” But all the LLMs are only as good as what is fed into them, so this could be a circular vertification.
I think this set dates to the late 1970s, based on various evidence. I wonder who really invented them.
Two thoughts:
1.) Occulture moves its folks to combine, merge, hybridize, and turn to bricolage to create novel ways to make such merging meaningful. Often as a product.
2.) Items like this can be compelling for “complete-ist” collectors of items in this occultural niche.