The Pictorial Key to the Tarot by A. E. Waite

THE PICTORIAL KEY TO THE TAROT

BEING FRAGMENTS OF A SECRET TRADITION UNDER THE VEIL OF DIVINATION.

By Arthur Edward Waite [b. 1857 d. 1942]

WITH 78 PLATES, ILLUSTRATING THE GREATER AND LESSER ARCANA, FROM DESIGNS

By Pamela Colman Smith [b. 1878 d. 1951]

London, W. Rider [1911]

Scanned, proofed and formatted at sacred-texts.com, September, 2000 and June, 2003 by John Bruno Hare. This text and the accompanying illustrations are in the public domain in the United States of America because they were published prior to 1923.

Further cleaned, proofed, and formatted at queenoftarot.com, January 2010. In just two years this will be public domain worldwide.

Image Gallery

Arthur Edward Waite,1880

Pamela Coleman Smith

Numerological Tarot Methods

Tags: numerology, techniques, interpretation, tarot card meanings, tarot analysis

Any numerological system is essentially arbitrary. I'm making one up, and I hope it'll be internally consistent. This is how I plan to assign divinatory meanings to the cards, in the hope of someday making my own deck. The general idea is that you combine the suit significance with the numerological significance in order to obtain a more specific meaning. If you are using a pictorial deck, you should also combine this with the impressions left by the card itself. If you look at the various schools of thought on divinatory meanings of cards, it is evident that many of those people used this same method. Please note that this is a work in progress, so your comments are triply appreciated!

Newly updated with additional numerological suggestions as of 5/22/13!

Pamela Colman Smith

Tags: england, occultists, rider waite smith tarot deck

Pamela Colman Smith was the skilled artist and seer who was commissioned by fellow member of the Order of the Golden Dawn, Arthur Edward Waite, to illustrate the entire 78 card Tarot deck to his exact specifications, so that any variation introduced would not be her fault.

Arthur Edward Waite

Tags: england, occultists, rider waite tarot deck

Before the Rider-Waite deck was published in 1911, there was no modern deck that featured pictures for each of the 78 cards in the deck. Most decks had illustrations only for the Major Arcana, while the rest of the cards featured simply a pattern of easily recognizable pips. Arthur Edward Waite (1857-1942) wanted to publish a complete, modern version of the tarot that featured pictures for each card in the deck, including the minor arcana.

Queen of Tarot