Tarot cards have been used throughout history, including the modern day, for help and advice as a form of divination. However, popular media have displayed tarot in a bad light on multiple occasions. The movie Tarot, written by Spencer Cohen, shows a group of people using tarot cards that summon monsters to come and kill them.
It doesn’t end at movies, though. The popular game Phasmophobia is another example of tarot cards either being pure good or something used to cause harm. However, tarot cards are more than just good or bad–they have a history and use.
What are Tarot Cards?
Tarot cards are a deck of 78 cards (if specially made for the use of tarot, although regular playing cards can be used, as well) with 22 major arcana cards and 56 minor arcana cards. When using regular playing cards, most people will cut out a majority of the major arcana and use the joker card as the fool card. Tarot cards are a widely spread and used divination tool and game. Against common belief, tarot cards don’t tell you when you are going to die, or how, but rather the emotions and advice for your future, present, and past. Tarot cards can come in a wide variety of designs, shapes, and colors. There is no one right design or deck for tarot, rather a commonly known one amongst many: the Rider Waite deck.
What is the History of Tarot?
The Rider Waite tarot deck is a commonly used deck. Created in 1909 by Pamela Colman Smith, it was then published by the Rider Company. But tarot cards go even further back. Tarot cards are thought to have started in Italy but spread throughout Europe. According to Remptongames.Medium, tarot cards were found as early as the 1300’s. The use of tarot wasn’t necessarily always used for divination, sometimes just a simple card game. When the 1700’s came, however, tarot was more widely spread in use of divination and spirituality. This is known as Cartomancy–using cards for divination or/and spirituality purposes.
What is Tarot?
Summing everything up, tarot cards are a form of divination playing card games and are a form of art. While not everyone may agree with how tarot is used modernly or even in the past, at the end of the day they are cards used by many for a variety of reasons, letting many be able to be enjoy them for spiritual purposes, a fun game, and/or artistic interpretation.
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