People, even during ancient times, have always looked for knowledge or attempted to solve complicated mysteries. We, as humans, find ourselves seeking answers to complex questions, exploring more about the present circumstances beyond the available information, or trying to see a flash of the unknown future. These innate desires of human beings to know and understand more about their current situation have given birth to a variety of divination methods and instruments. One popular divination tool that anyone will immediately recognize is the tarot cards. Surprisingly, this divination instrument was not initially used as a tool to give a person an insight into the past, current times, or the future. You'd be amazed to learn that the deck used in tarot reading actually has a mundane and humble beginning.
Muslim World Origin
It is believed that during the 1300s, the tarot decks were probably imported into Europe from Egypt. Back then, Egypt was among the nations that composed the Mamluk Sultanate, which also comprised the modern-day Jordan, Syria, Israel, as well as Saudi Arabia's western coastline. According to the World of Playing Cards, tarot card decks were produced in special workshops and were made with great care and thoroughness. These intricately crafted playing cards were used for games and pastime of royal, upper-class, and noble households during the medieval Islamic world that included the Mamluk Sultanate, India, Persia, and different Turkish empires.
Initially, it was all for fun and games
The first known tarot cards in ancient Europe were composed of four suits, namely coins, cups, swords, and batons. This suit-set has remained the same in Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian decks throughout the Middle Ages. You can still find some of these traditional decks today but with some small upgrades. When examining the cards used in tarot reading today, you might notice that they have evolved both in names and symbolism, in correspondence with the modern suits of hearts, diamonds, clubs, and spades. Actually, the playing cards that are commonly used nowadays are stemmed from the French versions of the tarot deck that was developed sometime in the late 1400s. Based on Michael Dummett's “The Game of Tarot” book, the French tarot deck was mirrored from the German version card suits of bells, acorns, hearts, and leaves.
From playing decks to divination instruments
The earliest source of using tarot cards for divination purposes was in the middle of the 16th century. Though Dummett cited that these cards were regularly used for fortune-telling by the 1780s. On the other hand, John Michael Greer revealed in his book “The New Encyclopedia of the Occult” that it was in the late 1700s that the French occultist Jean-Baptiste Alliette circulated a tarot card deck for divination. His version of a tarot deck included 78 cards with ancient Egyptian imagery designs and themes. It contained both major arcana, or trump cards, and minor arcana of numbered and court cards representing kings, queens, jacks, and knights. This original version is where the later editions were patterned like the Tarot of Nine Paths, Thot deck, and Rider-Waite-Smith version.
The exciting story and origin of the tarot cards prove our tendency to adapt, reuse, and repurpose. A tarot deck has transformed from a fun pastime in the ancient Islamic world to a divination tool of medieval Europe. They've bloomed into different editions today and use various principles and interpretations adopted from many belief systems across the globe.
