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| The Star - The Thoth Deck |
I have been reading tarot for personally and professionally for roughly 20 yrs. A brief 3-card tarot reading is available for an introductory price on my etsy store and I will do more in-depth and detailed readings upon request. There are a number of detailed readings available, from the traditional celtic cross to yearly forecasts, relationship/career-specific, etc. There's a tarot spread for virtually every situation/question. I personally use the Thoth deck, the very same deck that was given to me as a gift almost 20 years ago.
The modern tarot is a deck of 78 cards consisting of 2 types of cards: the 22 cards of the "Major Arcana" or "Trumps which are named (such as the Lovers, Death and Judgement), and the "Minor Arcana" or "suit cards" (four suits of fourteen cards, each comprised of cards numbered from one to ten, and four 'court' cards) which roughly correspond to a modern deck of playing cards.
While there is little actual evidence for the existence of the Tarot before the 14th century, many of the ideas symbolically depicted on the cards are much older. While cards like the Juggler (Magus), the Pope (Hierophant), the Devil and the Last Judgement seem fully at home in the context of medieval Europe, others, such as the High Priestess and the Moon, have a more pre-Christian feel to them.
Written records tell that the tarot (or taroc cards, or tarocchi cards) was originally used to play a card game called tarocchi which is similar to Bridge. The game was popular throughout much of Europe for centuries and is still played today, particularly in France. Although it is possible that tarot cards might also have been sometimes used for other purposes, there is no clear evidence of such use until long after the cards were invented. The origin of the word "tarot" may be derived from the Arab word turuq meaning “four ways”.
1375-1378: Playing cards were introduced to Europe from the Islamic invasion of North Africa, Spain and Sicily by Islamic forces during the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt which did not end until 1517. These playing cards were an adaptation of the Islamic Mamluk cards which had suits of cups, swords, coins, and polo sticks (seen by Europeans as staves). The court consisted of a king and two male underlings.
1392: Jacquemin Gringonneur was commissioned to paint a deck of cards for Charles VI of France. These cards are still in existence although only 17 remain.
1420-1440: The tarot first appears in northern Italy. These early decks were costly works of art, hand-painted and decorated with gold leaf. These decks were used for playing a complex game similar to modern bridge by the upper classes (due to the cost associated with the decks). The tarot had the same structure and number of cards as most modern tarot decks, though the names and scoring of the "Trumps" varied.
1422: The earliest surviving full deck was painted by Italian artist Bonifacio Bembo. It is known as the Visconti-Sforza Tarocchi Deck after the family name of its commissioner, the Duke of Milan. 74 cards from this deck are still preserved today- 35 are on display in the archives of the Pierpone-Morgan Library, 26 are on display at the Accademia Carrara, and the remaining 13 cards are at the Casa Colleoni Museum in Italy.
pre-1480: Some time before 1480, the French introduced cards with the now-familiar suits of hearts, clubs, spades, and diamonds. While this deck appears to share a common ancestor with the tarot, it is not a decendent from the tarot.
1487: First mention in literature of the use of regular playing cards for divination, however, no mention is made specifically of the tarot being used in this way.
1500s: The invention of the Gutenberg press allowed for the first mass-printed tarot decks. Not only did this standardize the names and numbers of the Trumps, it also made the tarot more affordable for a wider range of social classes. This mass production also fostered the spread of the tarot from Northern Italy into the rest of Europe. Because of the prior centralization of the tarot to Italy, all of the original tarot names are in Italian.
1530s: The word "tarocchi" (singular tarocco) begins to be used to distinguish them from a new game of triumphs or trumps then being played with ordinary playing cards. (Originally the cards were called "carte da trionfi" cards of the triumphs. The German form of “tarocchi” is "tarock", the French form is "tarot".
1589: Records from a trial in Venice suggest that the use of tarot cards may have been associated with witchcraft (at least in the minds of the accusers). After this, there are no references connecting tarot with magic or divination until the 18th century.
1781: “Le Monde Primitif” (The Primitive World) published in France by Court de Gebelin and the Comte de Mellet and is the first article to refer to the tarot specifically in occult/divination terms. In this article, Mellet makes the first recorded connection between the cards and the Hebrew letters or Jewish Kaballah. Gebelin himself makes the first recorded description of the tarot having Egyptian/secret/occult origins.
1788: The Ettellia Tarot deck becomes the first deck published specifically to be used for divination. Many of the designs wereradically different from the traditional decks and further reinforced the idea of Egyptian origin. Meanings for each card were printed on the cards themselves.
1850s: French occultist, Eliphas Levi, further popularized the connections between the Tarot and the Kabbalah. Though others before him had suggested such a link, his was the work that cemented the association in occult study. The Kabbalah-Tarot system now became the main model for the development and interpretation of the Tarot. It is also during this time that Paul Christian first coins the terms “Major Arcana” and “Minor Arcana”.
1909: The Waite-Smith Tarot deck (also known as the Rider-Waite deck) designed by Arthur. E. Waite and illustrated by Pamela Coleman Smith is first published. Both Waite and Smith were members of an English Rosicurcian society founded in 1888 called the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which follows the symbolic system of the Golden Dawn rather than the earlier French occult traditions. This becomes the first deck to have full illustrations for all the suit cards and has since become the basis for a wide variety of divination-based decks, all using similar symbolism. Waite is also responsible for publicizing, although not inventing, the Celtic Cross spread.
1938-1943: Aleister Crowley designed the Thoth deck, which was painted by Lady Frieda Harris. The deck was not published until 1969, by which time both designer and artist were dead. Thoth is the Egyptian god said to be the inventor of hieroglyphics.
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| The Universe - The Thoth Deck |
Each card in the Thoth deck is intricately detailed with astrological, zodiacal, elemental and Qabalistic symbols related to each card. Colours are used symbolically, especially the cards related to the five elements of Spirit, Fire, Water, Air and Earth. Crowley wrote a book--The Book of Thoth (1944) to accompany, describe, and expand on his deck and the data regarding the pathways within. Unlike the popular Waite-Smith Tarot, the Thoth Tarot retains the traditional order of the trumps but uses alternative nomenclature for both the trumps and the courts.
References:
A Tarot History Timeline - Dame Gabby
Crowley, Aleister. The Book of Thoth.
Olsen, Christina. The Art of the Tarot.
Pollack, Rachel. The Complete Illustrated Guide to the Tarot
Waite, A. E. Understanding the Tarot Deck.
The Everything Tarot Book, by M. J. Abadie
http://forum.tarothistory.com/index.php
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