It’s not clear where tarot originated, although some of the wilder theories claim its source as Atlantis or even Ancient Egypt. Being made of more rational stuff I favour the current thinking that the Tarot deck as we know it today developed from playing cards used for card games and gambling in Europe in the fourteenth century. Where playing cards themselves came from is also open to debate, but there is a reference in the Italian Chronicles of Viterbo to a game of cards called nayb (in the Saracen language) which arrived in Viterbo in 1379.Therefore it appears that playing cards came to Europe through an Arab source, possibly from Moorish Spain, sometime around 1370 – 1380.
Tarot seems to have developed from the idea of trionfi or ‘triumphs’ (from which we get our word ‘trumps’) which became popular from around 1420 and has its origin in the German game of Karnoffel. The basic idea was that higher ranked trionfi cards triumphed (trumped) lower ones. Some people have compared the game to an early version of bridge.
Early Tarot Decks
Tarot comes into the picture (sorry about the pun) in northern Italy about 20 years later and the oldest surviving tarot cards are fragments from several hand painted decks created for the Visconti-Sforza ruling families in Milan, northern Italy. In its complete form the tarot deck comprised 56 cards in four suits plus 22 trump cards.
Two of the most famous decks in this Visconti-Sforza collection are also two of the oldest. With 67 remaining cards from the original 78, the beautiful Cary-Yale Visconti also known as the Visconti di Modrone dates back to about 1466, although this date is sometimes disputed. It has six court cards (King, Queen, Knight and Page plus female knight and female page) rather than the usual four. It also includes the three virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity
Cary Yale Deck - The World
Another tarot deck the Pierpoint- Morgan Bergamo also known as the Colleoni-Bergamo dating from about 1451 has its 74 remaining hand-painted cards shared between the Pierpoint Morgan library in New York, the Colleoni family in Bergamo and the Accademia Carrara.
The Spread of Tarot
The game became popular, spreading throughout northern Italy and from there to Germany, Switzerland, France and further afield. In a time when few people could read pictures were a means of entertaining and teaching and it is not surprising the cards had such an impact. It seems to have continued simply as a card game (known as tarocchi in Italian) throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries all over Europe rather than being used for esoteric purposes or divination. The rules of the game were published in the 17th century and various decks were developed, including one of the most famous designs, the Tarot de Marseille which became the standard design on which many subsequent decks were based.
The Magician from Tarot de Marseille
Esoteric Origins
The first mention of the tarot as a divinatory system was in Le Monde Primitif, a work published in 1781 by French scholar and Freemason Antoine Court de Gebelin. He claimed there was a connection between the Major Arcana and the Ancient Egyptian Book of Thoth and saw the tarot as a card game in which a great esoteric secret had been hidden ‘in plain sight’. He also argued there was a connection between the 22 cards of the major Arcana and the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet.
This link to the Hebrew alphabet was more fully explored in the mid-nineteenth century by French occultist Eliphas Lévi who believed tarot was closely linked to ancient Jewish mysticism in the form of Kabbalah and the Tree of Life. Lévi basically argued that the tarot was the key to life, a tool for enlightenment.
Levi’s follower Paul Christian (Jean Batiste Pitois) believed the designs of the Major Arcana originated in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and he also linked tarot to Kabbalistic astrology.
The Golden Dawn and RWS
The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn was founded in 1888 by a group led by Samuel L. MacGregor Mathers, Wynn Westcot and William K Woodman. Followers believed that through study of a mix of mystical sources including tarot, the Tree of Life, freemasonry and alchemy it was possible to become a true magician. The order had a tremendous influence on the meaning and interpretation of the cards.
Two members – A.E. Waite and artist Pamela Coleman Smith - broke away from the Order of the Golden Dawn and London publishers Rider printed their ‘true and rectified’ tarot deck in 1909. This deck was revolutionary because it featured images on the Minor Arcana cards as well as the Major and it is this deck, known as the Rider deck, the Rider Waite deck or Rider Waite Smith (RWS) that is the basis for the 78 card deck we use today. Every little detail in the images had symbolic meaning and the pictures opened up the tarot to everyone.
The Sun from the Rider Waite Deck
The Thoth Tarot
The ex-members of The Golden Dawn were clearly busy bees. Another former head of the organisation Aleister Crowley, a rival of Waite’s, founded his own occult school the Ordo Temple Orientalis, and worked with artist Lady Frieda Harris to create another very influential deck, the highly colourful Book of Thoth Tarot during World War Two, although it wasn’t actually published until 1969. The deck is more closely based on that used by the Order of the Golden Dawn and includes symbolism from many occult systems including Egyptian mythology. Many people worldwide consider it the ‘real’ tarot.
Thoth Tarot The Aceof Disks (Pentacles)
Decks Galore!
Nowadays there are many thousands of different decks available featuring everything from pirates to rabbits! As we live in uncertain times, Tarot itself is experiencing a tremendous growth, with modern tarot readers focussing on using the cards as a tool for development and transformation rather than for fortune telling and prediction. With its layers of meaning, symbolism and links to numerology, astrology and psychology, the tarot really does offer something for everyone.
