Tarot Popularity Has Increased Significantly Over the Past Year
Could there be an increase in the use of tarot? If so, what is driving this surge of interest from truth-seekers?
Tarot cards, once believed by some people to be evil or dangerous can now be seen everywhere. Tarot has gone mainstream. Christian Dior offers designs for decor, dinnerware, and fashion, but tarot and oracle decks for divination are the bestsellers. U.S. Game Systems, a leading publisher of tarot cards, tells the Financial Times they’ve had to double their print runs in the past year because they sell out so fast.
It’s not just tarot, the New York Times reports data from Yelp showing searches for “supernatural readings” more than doubled in April. Why are so many people turning to these methods now?
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About the Author
Aleister Crowley's Thoth Tarot: An Esoteric Primer
There may be more divination card decks on the market than kombucha flavors, and they just keep coming — animal, mineral, and vegetable (really) themes with everything in between — angels, a Spanish “Días de las Muertes” (Day of the Dead) deck, and a “Crystal Unicorn” tarot. There’s even a “Mystical Manga” deck. But all were preceded by 20th century occultist Aleister Crowley’s Thoth tarot, the product of 500 years of tarot history and Crowley’s vision.
Tarot History
The 14th century Italian aristocracy played a card game, “tarocchi,” using the oldest known cards, the Visconti-Sforza deck. Cards such as the fool, death, the sun, and justice, may have been derived from Venetian carnivale characters.
In 1789, a tarocchi-derived fortune-telling deck emerged, with 22 major and 56 minor arcana cards divided into coins, cups, swords, and wands suits representing the four elements — earth, water, fire, and air. Twenty-two trump cards correspond to the 22 paths on the kabbalistic tree of life. The oracle deck was linked to the Egyptian god Thoth, adding to the tarot’s air of mystery. The cards, their suits, and major arcana were also linked to gypsies, a disparaging name for the Romani people, who many believed were from Egypt (since disproven).
The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn
A fin de siècle fascination with occult subjects in literature and art grew throughout Europe into the early 20th century. Secret societies orders appeared, including The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an esoteric occult society. The Golden Dawn emerged in England and spread throughout Europe, with Crowley as a member of the London temple in 1898 — he fell out with the Golden Dawn in 1902, but was inspired to direct an esoteric order of his own.
“Crowley had been interested in Tarot since his involvement with the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn; indeed, one of the tasks of Golden Dawn membership was to create one’s own tarot deck based on traditional images and magical, qabalistic, and astrological information,” according to Lon Milo Duquette, author of the definitive Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot.
The Rider Waite Major Arcana Cards
Interest in the symbols with their layered meanings in the classic tarot was not exclusive to the Golden Dawn — the Waite-Smith deck, created by Golden Dawn member A.E. Waite, and illustrated by Pamela Colman “Pixie” Smith, was designed for commercial distribution.
“Waite and Pixie Smith were both Golden Dawn initiates, but Waite did not ask Smith to represent qabalistic and esoteric symbolism on the cards which were always intended to be marketed to the uninitiated. The images on Waite-Smith court cards and small cards were not qabalistically based at all, but drawn from visions Smith received while listening to readings from the Grail Romances,” said Duquette. The Waite-Smith deck evolved into the Rider Waite deck, now published by U.S. Games Systems. A version of the earlier Visconti-Sforza deck is also available.
