The origin of Tarot cards is obscure and mysterious! One version of the “true” history of the tarot connects the cards to Egyptian mysteries, Hermetic philosophy, the Kabbalah, alchemy and just about every other mystical system known to mankind! What we do know for sure is that cards first appeared in Italy and France in the late 14th century and that by the fifteenth century wealthy Italian patrons commissioned beautiful decks to be used in a popular card game. Tarot cards eventually became associated with the esoteric sometime in the 18th century.

Tarot is most generally used for foresight. It is assumed that the cards can be used to obtain foresight into the recent troubles and likely future’s of the subject.

Several tarot readers trust the cards assist them tap into a collective unconscious or into their own creative, unconscious as others believe that with tarot they are able to commune with the Divine.

Typically, a tarot reading involves a ‘seeker’, who shuffles the cards and cuts the deck and a ‘reader’, who lays out the chosen cards in a pattern called a spread. Each position in the spread has a meaning, and each card has a variety of symbolic meanings as well. The reader knows how to interpret these cards and combines these two meanings to shed light on the seeker’s questions.

Contemporary tarot decks comprise 78 cards, of which 22 have pictures representing forces, characters, virtues, and vices. The remaining cards are disparted into four ‘suits’ of 14 cards each. Each suit has ten numbered cards and four court cards (king, queen, knight, and page). The court cards may connote diverse people in a tarot analysis , with every suit’s “nature” providing hints about the individual’s physical and emotional characteristics.

Nowadays’ current playing cards all developed from these suit cards.