Complex Numbers

In the Cards

Today's article is a few years old, but it's not like the subject matter has an expiration date.

     Tarot Mythology: The Surprising Origins of the World's Most Misunderstood Cards  

With their centuries-old iconography blending a mix of ancient symbols, religious allegories, and historic events, tarot cards can seem purposefully opaque. To outsiders and skeptics, occult practices like card reading have little relevance in our modern world. But a closer look at these miniature masterpieces reveals that the power of these cards isn’t endowed from some mystical source—it comes from the ability of their small, static images to illuminate our most complex dilemmas and desires.

Symbolism is a powerful thing, and there's nothing supernatural about it. It's not necessary (or desirable, in my opinion) to "believe in" the divinatory aspect of Tarot to appreciate the art that goes into it—just like you don't have to be religious to admire the art in the Sistine Chapel, or the architecture of Angkor Wat.

The article, as with the one a couple of days ago, contains illustrative pictures, which are a pain (and probably a violation of something) to reproduce here. But, as with an old issue of Playboy magazine, it pays to read the article in addition to looking at the pictures.

Even the earliest known tarot decks weren’t designed with mysticism in mind; they were actually meant for playing a game similar to modern-day bridge. Wealthy families in Italy commissioned expensive, artist-made decks known as “carte da trionfi” or “cards of triumph.” These cards were marked with suits of cups, swords, coins, and polo sticks (eventually changed to staves or wands), and courts consisting of a king and two male underlings. Tarot cards later incorporated queens, trumps (the wild cards unique to tarot), and the Fool to this system, for a complete deck that usually totaled 78 cards.

The relationship between Tarot decks and the common French playing cards used for casino games and solitaire is a bit murky, but there are clear parallels: the Fool corresponds to the Joker; there are three court cards instead of Tarot's four; and cups, swords, coins, and sticks have their equivalents in hearts, spades, diamonds, and clubs.

The rest of the article deals with the history of Tarot, both factual and speculative, and it touches somewhat on other decks. Again, the illustrations are what makes this really interesting.

I find randomness appealing in part because it can provide a needed break from one's thinking habits. You randomize a deck of cards by shuffling them; you then draw something that's unexpected, though within the parameters of the deck. It's kind of like the system I use to pick topics here, selecting from a curated list. Being random ensures I don't always pick the easy ones, or stick with a theme for very long. Randomness isn't mysticism, of course; it's just that, sometimes, it can help you jog your mind into a different direction.

We see patterns in the randomness, and perhaps meaning, but the meaning is what we decide it is.

And sometimes it's fun just to look at the art and see all the details.