In Conjurer or Adept? The Humble Origins of the Tarot Magician, I outlined a plan to look at the 22 Trump cards from an historical perspective. I don’t plan on getting too involved in the history side of things because my main goal is to find new and interesting ways to think of the Major Arcana ( or at least new to me ).

The Visconti

I’m basing these interpretations on some of the research that historians have done on 15^th century European culture and the Visconti-Sforza Tarot.

Central to this is the Visconti family and the culture in which they lived.

The historians that I enjoy reading view the Tarot as deeply influenced by both the religious and cultural preoccupations of the time, as well as the political preoccupations of the Visconti family.

I think it’s important to view the Tarot through two different lenses. The first, through the Visconti family, the second, through the wider cultural realm of 15^th Century Italy.

Today’s Trump – The Chariot

The most common association people make with the Chariot is that of a triumphal procession. Rachel Pollack in Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom starts her discussion on the Chariot by stating:

The Chariot…derives from a number of historical and mythological sources. Primarily it comes out of the processions given in Rome and other places for a conquering hero, when his chariot carried him through the streets that were filled with cheering citizens. The custom apparently answers some deep psychic need for group participation.
Rachel Pollack – Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom

Personally, I think this is an awesome way to look at the card and to be honest it used to be the primary association I made whenever I thought of the Chariot. However, I’ve read an alternative view that I wanted to share.

The Church

The figure in the Chariot was a personification of the Church!

Immediately I was fascinated by this idea. I always wondered about the Thoth’s Chariot Card – he holds a Grail.

When I read about a possible connection to the church, my whole view on this card began to change.

In the Visconti-Sforza Tarot, the white horses that guide the Chariot have wings. This would suggest something more allegorical rather than historical.

Symbolically, the Chariot, cart or boat was often used to symbolise the Church, acting as a vehicle to convey the faithful to Heaven. The image of the Chariot is evoked in the prophecy of Ezekiel (Ezek 1:15) and the Chariot of Fire which carried Elijah off to heaven.

Gertrude Moakley hypothesised that the Chariot represented a carnival float. A float ( or boat? ) can symbolise the Church; the boat receives those whom Christ saves.

Finally, I read a really interesting snippet from Wika answers on bible symbolism. It said that “in Bible symbolism, a horse is a priest/pastor/teacher, a chariot is a doctrine or dogma in which many ride. The horses empower and drive the chariot as teachers empower and drive the dogma.”

Why was it called the Chariot and not the Church?

The titles of the Trumps were not allocated to the cards till some 50 years after the invention of the game! Could it be that it was forgotten?

In terms of the numbering sequence of the Trumps, the Chariot ( or the Church ) is higher than the Pope. This could indicate the Visconti’s contempt of the Pope but, … it also implies their personal respect for religion and what that represents.

How does this help our Tarot readings?

When Lon Milo Duquette’s Tarot of Ceremonial Magick: A Pictorial Synthesis of Three Great Pillars of Magick was first released, I bought it the instant I could. I was always intrigued by some of the definitions he supplied for the Chariot.

In spiritual matters: Light in the Darkness. The burden you carry may be the Holy Grail.
In matters of the heart: Faithfulness. Hope. Obedience. A protective relationship.
In intellectual matters: Firm, even violent adherence to dogma or tradition.
In material matters: Victory. Triumph. Chain of command.
Lon Milo Duquette

I have to admit, a lot of these definitions ( they’re all part of my Tarot repertoire ) have all been really accurate when I’ve used them, but I could never really understand why.

Thinking about the Chariot as the personification of the Church makes a lot of sense to me on a practical divinatory level. I don’t know how valid the history of it is, and I don’t really mind if it turns out to be nonsense; but for me, the Chariot as the Church makes sense.

It makes sense because the Chariot in readings often indicates control, yet protection; violence, yet faithfulness. It’s this weird contradiction that makes it such a fascinating card. It shows up when people have faith but lack belief; when they have prayers but no answers. It rejects those in charge ( the Pope ) but respects authority ( the Church ).

It’s religion without the Pope.

Conclusion

The Chariot used to be a card that I took for granted. I thought the symbolism was self-evident. Nowadays I find it to be a really enigmatic card.

Image by Free Christ Images

(Theoretically) Related Posts:

• If There Is One Technique you Must Learn — This is it!
• A Quick Tip on using The Major Arcana
• Conjurer or Adept? The Humble Origins of the Tarot Magician
• Tarot Lexicon
• Tarot Picture Cards

Historically, the Tarot started life as a game. I find this fascinating because isn’t life itself just a game?

Like life, a game is a mixture of stratagem, skill and chance. We can plan for all eventualities but the element of luck is ever present. Chance has a funny way of overthrowing the “best laid plans of mice and men.”

I’ve always found gamblers fascinating, the way they connect chance and risk to life itself. If we also use the gamblers concept that games simply reflect life, then the game of Tarot made this connection explicitly clear and it accomplished this through its use of imagery, symbolism and the Trump cards ( think of these as representing luck ).

The plan

I plan on writing a series of articles looking at the Trumps from an historical perspective. I’m not going to go completely in-depth, at least not at this time. Rather, I’m really keen to focus on what history can teach us about the Trumps, and how that can enrich our Tarot readings and interpretations.

Historical stuff that’s relevant to these articles

What is critically important to us is the numbering of the Trumps. This gives us an insight into many things; the status certain characters had within that culture, and an understanding of the game of Tarot (which again links back to the Trumps having a special status). Here’s the key: historians aren’t sure of the exact numbering of the Trumps, so we all rely on the earliest surviving records and informed guesses.

Today’s Trump – The Magician

I’ve always found the Magician an enigmatic character and thought I’d write about what I’ve discovered.

Although the Magician is usually depicted as a very accomplished Magus with the skill and ability to command occult forces, he started life as a street performer, entertainer, juggler and stage magician. It’s believed that the Magician would have been numbered 1 in the sequence of the Trump cards. Although this is exactly the same as today, the significance of this “lowly” numbering is really interesting.

In the game of Tarot this Trump had a low status and only provided a low level of risk taking.

In terms of symbolism, although he was more explicitly turned into a conjurer as time went by, in the Visconti-Sforza he could have also been represented as a merchant or an artisan ( very common to the art culture of the time ). One other really interesting piece of information about this card’s humble beginnings was the red clothes he wore. The colour red was only deemed appropriate for gamblers, foot-soldiers and executioners. Like in today’s modern interpretation of the Magus, there is always a degree of ambiguity to this card. Can we trust him?

This card was known as il Bagatella. I’m sure I remember reading somewhere that this has a connection to the concept of chance! If anyone knows what the actual facts are, let me know.

However, somehow the concept of the Magician and Chance have both become entwined in my mind and it seems to make a lot of sense to me. Just think of its opposite. The Wheel of Fortune is explicitly connected to chance – with its ability to change someone’s status within society ( like the Magician ).

How does this help our Tarot readings?

With the possible connection to the merchants or artisans of the time, it’s easy to see why the Magus can represent self-employment in a Tarot reading.

Also, the connection with “low status”, his questionable morality and skill at trickery and deception (conjurer) all make him a fascinating character. Does his ability to get his hands dirty (executioner) make him dangerous?

Naturally, this card also points to “someone on the make”. With his low status but his skill, cunning and willingness to go the limit, there’s no doubt that this person’s career and position in society is on the climb.

Finally, the Viscontis ( a powerful family who commissioned what has become known as the Visconti-Sforza Tarot deck ) had an uneasy relationship with both the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire. Is this uneasiness reflected in the numbering system? Does it signify that the cards after the Magician – the Popess, Empress, Emperor and Pope are little better than a common conjurer?

Conclusion

These ideas and concepts are far from dated. Rather, I’ve found that they are more relevant than the modern take on the cards. Somehow, reconnecting to the morality plays of 15th Century Italy helps me get a better sense of what is “playing” out in the client’s life.

Do you find a loose connection to history helps with your Tarot readings? What’s your experience of the Magician card? I’d love to hear all your thoughts

(Theoretically) Related Posts:

• Tarot Card Confusion
• Meditation: 8 ways to Divide and Combine the Twenty-Two Trumps
• If There Is One Technique you Must Learn — This is it!
• A Quick Tip on using The Major Arcana
• The Chariot Card! A Triumphant Victory or a Personification of the Church?

I’ve always liked History as a subject and I’ve found a renewed connection to the Tarot through the study of its past.

I thought it would be a good idea, before getting too involved in the details, to look at history itself; and explore the approaches I’ll be taking when gathering and presenting the information; and also the understanding I’ve derived from the information.

It seems to me that my mind understands phenomena through the concepts of History and Nature. When I talk of phenomena, I mean everything that my mind can conceptualise through both Nature and History; this is done through my minds ability to understand the world around it through the divisions of Time and Space.

This understanding, that is the understanding developed through Time and Space, gives me the impression of ‘things’ being in constant development. In those things that appear to develop or change, I take this ‘advance’ so to speak, due to the Element of time. It is through this that I develop or grasp a History of a ‘thing’.

However, because my mind is separated by Time and Space, I’ll never know what the past was like; this is impossible. In order to get a reasonable impression of the Past I have to examine what is in the present. In a philosophical sense, the past lives in the present and our understanding of the past is based upon the present.

When I explore the Tarot, I will be looking for evidence in the present to understand the past; without corroborating evidence from other sources for certain facts put forward, I will have to consider them myths or unsubstantiated until new evidence supports these mythical claims.

This means that the stories told of the Tarot originating from Egypt will be considered unsupported by other evidence. However, the stories told of the Tarot developing in Europe can be supported by more than one source; this will feature largely in my examination of the Tarot’s past.

Notice, in the last paragraph, that I moved away from calling it a history to calling it a story. This was deliberate, and I did this for two reasons. The first reason is we don’t know the past because we are separated from it. As a result, we must look to the present to understand and tell stories (as accurately as we can) about what has occurred and developed.

Secondly, when we do Tarot readings, we look to the cards for corroborating evidence on the client’s past (notice the cards, client and Tarot reader are all in the present) in order to tell a story, and speculate where the clients future is developing.

The future has either not happened, or like the past, is separated from us by Time. In this sense, we tell stories of the future based on the past.

I want to stress the similarity between Historical methodologies and giving a Tarot reading for a client.

This section of Tarot Eon will attempt to look at all the stories presented on the Tarots past as objectively as possible.

Image by Woudloper.

(Theoretically) Related Posts:

• Conjurer or Adept? The Humble Origins of the Tarot Magician
• Predicting The Future: Why A Tarot Reader Must Make A Decision!
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