Tarot (塔羅牌)

The 78 Mirrors of the Soul

Overview

Tarot is the world's most widely used divination system, a deck of 78 cards divided into the 22 Major Arcana (representing universal archetypes and life's major themes) and 56 Minor Arcana (representing everyday events and the four elemental domains of life). Originally created as a card game in 15th-century northern Italy, Tarot was adopted by occultists in the 18th century and transformed into a profound tool for self-reflection, psychological insight, and spiritual guidance.

Origin & history

The earliest known Tarot decks — the Visconti-Sforza cards — were created in Milan around 1440–1450 for the ruling Visconti and Sforza families as luxury playing cards. The 22 trump cards (later called Major Arcana) depicted allegorical figures drawn from medieval Christian iconography, classical mythology, and Renaissance humanism. The cards were not used for divination until the late 18th century, when French occultists Antoine Court de Gébelin and the Comte de Mellet published essays claiming the Tarot encoded ancient Egyptian wisdom — a historically inaccurate but enormously influential claim that launched the esoteric Tarot tradition.

The modern divinatory Tarot tradition was established by the French occultist Etteilla (Jean-Baptiste Alliette) in the 1780s, who published the first Tarot reading manual and created the first deck specifically designed for divination. The 19th century saw the formation of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in London, whose members — including Arthur Edward Waite and Pamela Colman Smith — created the Rider-Waite-Smith deck in 1909, which became the definitive modern Tarot deck and the basis for most contemporary decks. Carl Jung's theories of archetypes and the collective unconscious provided a psychological framework for Tarot in the 20th century, and the New Age movement of the 1970s–1980s brought Tarot into mainstream Western culture.

How it works

A Tarot reading begins with the querent focusing on a question or situation while the reader shuffles the deck. Cards are then laid out in a specific pattern called a 'spread' — from a single card for a simple question to the 10-card Celtic Cross for a comprehensive life reading. Each position in the spread has a specific meaning (past, present, future; situation, obstacle, advice, etc.), and the card drawn for each position is interpreted in context. Cards can appear upright or reversed, with reversed cards typically indicating blocked or internalised energy. The reader synthesises all cards in the spread into a coherent narrative.

Good for

Use cases

Relationship Readings

The Three-Card Spread (past-present-future) and the Relationship Spread are among the most popular Tarot applications. The cards reveal the underlying dynamics, hidden motivations, and likely trajectory of a relationship, providing insight that complements rational analysis.

Career and Life Path Guidance

The Celtic Cross spread is particularly useful for complex career decisions, revealing the querent's current position, the obstacles they face, their unconscious motivations, external influences, and the likely outcome of different paths.

Creative and Artistic Inspiration

Many writers, artists, and musicians use Tarot as a creative tool — drawing cards to generate story ideas, character archetypes, or thematic directions. The Major Arcana's rich symbolic imagery provides a particularly fertile source of creative inspiration.

Key terms

Major Arcana
The 22 trump cards (The Fool through The World) representing universal archetypes, life's major themes, and spiritual lessons.
Minor Arcana
The 56 suit cards divided into four suits (Wands/Fire, Cups/Water, Swords/Air, Pentacles/Earth), each with Ace through 10 plus four court cards.
Reversed Card
A card drawn upside-down, typically interpreted as blocked, internalised, or delayed energy compared to the upright meaning.
Celtic Cross Spread
The most widely used 10-card Tarot spread, covering the querent's situation, obstacle, past, future, unconscious, external influences, hopes/fears, and likely outcome.

API

The askTIAN Tarot API supports three spreads: single card, three-card (past-present-future), and Celtic Cross (10 cards). Returns full card details including arcana type, suit, reversed status, position meaning, and individual interpretations, plus an overall 0–100 fortune score.

Endpoint: POST /trpc/tarot.draw — 1 TIAN Points. See the API documentation and Playground.