Minor Arcana

The Minor Arcana (or Lesser Arcana) are the 56 suit cards of the 78-card deck of tarot cards. The Minor Arcana comprise four suits with 14 cards each. Although there are variations, the Minor Arcana commonly employ the Italo-Spanish suits:
- Wands (alternatively, batons, clubs, or staves),
- Cups
- Swords
- Pentacles (alternatively, coins, disks, or rings).

The King of Swords card from the Rider-Waite tarot deck

In contrast, the corresponding French suits are:
- Clubs (♣),
- Hearts (♥),
- Spades (♠), and
- Diamonds (♦).

Each Minor Arcana card in a suit is numbered one (ace) to ten, except for the court cards (or courts)—page, knight, queen, and king—which are comparable to face cards. In one variation, princess and prince cards replace the page and knight cards. Some Italian decks add two more court cards: the maid and the mounted lady.

Since contemporary decks of French playing cards replace both the knight and the page with the jack or knave, such decks only have 52 cards. The remaining 22 cards in a tarot deck are the Major Arcana. When used for divination the Major Arcana are traditionally more significant, but the Minor Arcana are what allow Tarot readers to understand the subtleties and details that surround the major events and signifiers in a Tarot spread; in general, the Major Arcana represent large turning points and the Minor Arcana represent the day-to-day insights.[1]

Minor Arcana cards in contemporary tarot decks are usually illustrated—a convention popularized by the Rider-Waite tarot deck ca. 1910. Non-illustrated cards bear symmetrical arrangements of pips.

Symbolism

In divinatory, esoteric and occult tarot, the Minor Arcana are believed to represent relatively mundane features of life. The court cards represent the people whom one meets.

Each suit also has distinctive characteristics and connotations commonly held to be as follows:[2]

Latin suit French suit Element Class Faculty
Wands / Batons / Clubs / Staves Clubs Fire (or Air) Artisans Creativity and will
Coins / Pentacles / Disks / Rings Diamonds Earth Merchants Material body or possessions
Cups (Chalices) Hearts Water Clergy Emotions and love
Swords Spades Air (or Fire) Nobility and military Reason

Cards

The following cards are from the Rider-Waite tarot deck, the most popular tarot deck amongst English-speakers; they are divided by suit, and arranged in ascending order of face value.

Wands

Cups

Swords

Pentacles

Ranks

In the Order of the Golden Dawn, number cards are associated with planets, corresponding to their placement in Kabbalah.[3]

  • Threes - Saturn
  • Fours - Jupiter
  • Fives - Mars
  • Sixes - Sun
  • Sevens - Venus
  • Eights - Mercury
  • Nines - Moon
  • Tens - Earth

See also

References
  1. "The Minor Arcana Tarot Cards". Tarot.com. Retrieved 11 December 2014.
  2. Dee, Jonathan (2002). "Introduction to the Minor Arcana". In Liz Dean (ed.). Tarot, An illustrated guide. Silverdale Books. ISBN 1-85605-685-6.
  3. McCann, David. Houlding, Deborah (ed.). "Mercury in Myth & Occult Philosophy". The Traditional Astrologer. Nottingham, UK: Ascella.

Tarot Meanings for the Minor Arcana are also available via Psychic Revelation.

Media related to Minor Arcana at Wikimedia Commons

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