Amethyst Rose
December 15th, 2004, 01:50 PM
The History of Tarot
There are so many misconceptions about the origin of Tarot cards, that it's difficult to separate the myth from fact. Different books will give different explinations, so what I'm going to present here is what I believe, through the readings of many books, to be as close to the truth as I can get. One thing to keep in mind, that all books have in common, is that the history of Tarot isn't known, for certain - there's a lot of speculation and a lot of it has been romanticized.
A very common belief that you may have heard is that the Tarot originally came from Egypt, and was brought to Europe by the Gypsies. One popular book, The Everything Tarot Book, by M. J. Abadie, states that:
"One theory is that in the great library of Alexandria in Egypt, whose female librarian Hypatia was world-renowned for her wisdom and learning, there existed scrolls (which was how books were made in those days) containing all of the wisdom of the ancient world.
One of these "books" was supposedly based on the legendary Book of Thoth, derived from the mystery schools of Egypt. The allegorical illustrations on the Tarot cards are said to contain these secret teachings, which in the Major Arcana represent a course in personal development. The esoteric teachings were hidden in the seemingly innocent pictures."
While this seems like a very romantic notion, for the cards certainly do tell a lesson in personal development, further study has shown me that this belief is false, but it does has it's own history, which I'll get into shortly.
According to Cynthia Giles' book, The Tarot, History, Mystery and Lore, Tarot cards originated in Italy and Spain, in the 14th century. Indeed, the first mention of Tarot cards is in a 14th Century lecture against their use. Tarot cards are an early form of todays playing cards, originally used to play a game called tarocchi (http://www.pagat.com/tarot/ottocen.html). As such, they first appeared in Italy under the name Tarocco, Taroc or Tarocchi Cards. A facsimilie of one of the earliest decks, created in the 15th century, called the Visconti Sforza Tarocci Deck, is still available today, and you can see images of it here: http://www.tarot-decks.com/visconti-sforza.html
So, the next logical question is how did the Tarot cards move from their humble beginning as simple playing cards, to the more esoteric tool of Divination? For that we can thank Antoine Court de Gebelen, (1725-84). In the late 1700's, de Gebelen was a member of a secret society of occultists, and was greatly influenced by Egyptian thought. The story is that he saw the game of tarocchi being played and saw in the cards a vast amount of symbolism which he attributed to ancient Egyptian lore. The deck he saw at the time was the Marseilles type, which had evolved and changed from the Visconti-Sforza deck. It is speculated that the changes in the cards occured when members of a secret society put occult symbols and artwork into the cards. De Geblen didn't realize that the cards he saw weren't the origninal cards, and so when he wrote his treatise, "Le Monde Primitif", which was the start of written works about the secret meanings of tarot cards, he was writing about the modified tarot. It is from his treatise that all the common misconceptions relating the tarot to Egypt stem from. (I encourage you to do a Google search on his treatise, if you want more information on it.)
Soon, the idea that the cards had meaning, and could be used to tell those meanings (divination!) spread. In 1783 Etteilla published a book with his own meanings of the cards and the popularity of tarot as a divination tool grew. While de Geblin had noted that there were 22 trumps and 22 letters in the Hebrew language, in the 19th century, Eliphas Levi Zahed took that correlation further and tied the tarot into the Tree of Life and the Kabalah. This is when the Tarot really began to take of as an occult tool.
The decks which influence us the most in the twentieth century, are the decks from the late 1800's created by the followers of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. The Golden Dawn was started in England by three men: Wescott, Woodford and Woodman. The Golden Down became a very intense and influential occult group. Much of this is to the credit of S. Liddel mathers who wrote a treatise on the tarot. He contributed much of the ritual material and philosophy that is the basis of what is used for the tarot today. He also brought all the systems together with the tarot -- the kabalah, astrology, numerology and magick.
There are two men who were members of the Golden Dawn who contributed the most to the tarot decks in use today. Arthur Edward Waite and Aleister Crowley. Crowley was a protegee of Mathers and his deck was the Book of Thoth, which is intensely involved in symbolism. Waite's deck, however, has a storytelling type of theme so that each card has a story to tell. These cards are considered to be the cornerstone of many of the decks that are used now for divination.
The next big leap in tarot occured in North America in the 1920s when Paul Foster Case, an innitiate of the Golden Dawn in New york, created the BOTA deck. The BOTA deck is in black and white so that you can color them in yourself. This follows the Golden Dawn tradition which was that each member had to make their own deck as a part of their training. His group, B.O.T.A (Builders of the Adytum) still has a correspondence course for the tarot. What followed was a rash of Waite/Crowley copies with wonderful artwork.
So that is the History of Tarot, and I'll end this first lesson here. The next lesson will be on the uses of tarot and common misconceptions.
Oh, and any questions and discussion can be put in this thread.
There are so many misconceptions about the origin of Tarot cards, that it's difficult to separate the myth from fact. Different books will give different explinations, so what I'm going to present here is what I believe, through the readings of many books, to be as close to the truth as I can get. One thing to keep in mind, that all books have in common, is that the history of Tarot isn't known, for certain - there's a lot of speculation and a lot of it has been romanticized.
A very common belief that you may have heard is that the Tarot originally came from Egypt, and was brought to Europe by the Gypsies. One popular book, The Everything Tarot Book, by M. J. Abadie, states that:
"One theory is that in the great library of Alexandria in Egypt, whose female librarian Hypatia was world-renowned for her wisdom and learning, there existed scrolls (which was how books were made in those days) containing all of the wisdom of the ancient world.
One of these "books" was supposedly based on the legendary Book of Thoth, derived from the mystery schools of Egypt. The allegorical illustrations on the Tarot cards are said to contain these secret teachings, which in the Major Arcana represent a course in personal development. The esoteric teachings were hidden in the seemingly innocent pictures."
While this seems like a very romantic notion, for the cards certainly do tell a lesson in personal development, further study has shown me that this belief is false, but it does has it's own history, which I'll get into shortly.
According to Cynthia Giles' book, The Tarot, History, Mystery and Lore, Tarot cards originated in Italy and Spain, in the 14th century. Indeed, the first mention of Tarot cards is in a 14th Century lecture against their use. Tarot cards are an early form of todays playing cards, originally used to play a game called tarocchi (http://www.pagat.com/tarot/ottocen.html). As such, they first appeared in Italy under the name Tarocco, Taroc or Tarocchi Cards. A facsimilie of one of the earliest decks, created in the 15th century, called the Visconti Sforza Tarocci Deck, is still available today, and you can see images of it here: http://www.tarot-decks.com/visconti-sforza.html
So, the next logical question is how did the Tarot cards move from their humble beginning as simple playing cards, to the more esoteric tool of Divination? For that we can thank Antoine Court de Gebelen, (1725-84). In the late 1700's, de Gebelen was a member of a secret society of occultists, and was greatly influenced by Egyptian thought. The story is that he saw the game of tarocchi being played and saw in the cards a vast amount of symbolism which he attributed to ancient Egyptian lore. The deck he saw at the time was the Marseilles type, which had evolved and changed from the Visconti-Sforza deck. It is speculated that the changes in the cards occured when members of a secret society put occult symbols and artwork into the cards. De Geblen didn't realize that the cards he saw weren't the origninal cards, and so when he wrote his treatise, "Le Monde Primitif", which was the start of written works about the secret meanings of tarot cards, he was writing about the modified tarot. It is from his treatise that all the common misconceptions relating the tarot to Egypt stem from. (I encourage you to do a Google search on his treatise, if you want more information on it.)
Soon, the idea that the cards had meaning, and could be used to tell those meanings (divination!) spread. In 1783 Etteilla published a book with his own meanings of the cards and the popularity of tarot as a divination tool grew. While de Geblin had noted that there were 22 trumps and 22 letters in the Hebrew language, in the 19th century, Eliphas Levi Zahed took that correlation further and tied the tarot into the Tree of Life and the Kabalah. This is when the Tarot really began to take of as an occult tool.
The decks which influence us the most in the twentieth century, are the decks from the late 1800's created by the followers of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. The Golden Dawn was started in England by three men: Wescott, Woodford and Woodman. The Golden Down became a very intense and influential occult group. Much of this is to the credit of S. Liddel mathers who wrote a treatise on the tarot. He contributed much of the ritual material and philosophy that is the basis of what is used for the tarot today. He also brought all the systems together with the tarot -- the kabalah, astrology, numerology and magick.
There are two men who were members of the Golden Dawn who contributed the most to the tarot decks in use today. Arthur Edward Waite and Aleister Crowley. Crowley was a protegee of Mathers and his deck was the Book of Thoth, which is intensely involved in symbolism. Waite's deck, however, has a storytelling type of theme so that each card has a story to tell. These cards are considered to be the cornerstone of many of the decks that are used now for divination.
The next big leap in tarot occured in North America in the 1920s when Paul Foster Case, an innitiate of the Golden Dawn in New york, created the BOTA deck. The BOTA deck is in black and white so that you can color them in yourself. This follows the Golden Dawn tradition which was that each member had to make their own deck as a part of their training. His group, B.O.T.A (Builders of the Adytum) still has a correspondence course for the tarot. What followed was a rash of Waite/Crowley copies with wonderful artwork.
So that is the History of Tarot, and I'll end this first lesson here. The next lesson will be on the uses of tarot and common misconceptions.
Oh, and any questions and discussion can be put in this thread.