THE BOOK OF THOTH

THE BOOK OF THOTH.

Espen Iden
The egyptian god Thoth.
THE MAJOR ARCANA & THE MINOR ARCANA

The Book of Thoth, or The 78 Tarot cards, are set together of

two parts - the Major Arcana which includes the 22 trump cards
representing the archetypes or the classic ‘trionfi’, and the 56 cards
of the Minor Arcana, which consists of the four suits Cups, Disks,
Swords and Wands, each suit containing four court cards and
ten numbered cards (the Ace is counted as 1).

While the trump cards are representing the paths connecting the
ten Sephirot of the Tree of Life (page 1), the suits are attached to
the four elements Fire, Air, Water and Earth as follows:

Wands - the element of the fire, standing for the spiritual, for
creativity, mysticism, imagination (world of Atziluth)
Cups - the element of water, standing for emotion, feeling,
relationship (world of Briah)
Swords - the element of the air, standing for the intellectual,
the logical and scientific (world of Yetzirah)
Disks - the element of the earth, standing for the materials,
the body, the ‘down-to-earth-matters’ (world of Assiah)
The court cards are the Knight, the Queen, the Prince and the
Princess - in the Thoth deck. This can get a bit confusing when
using other decks, where the court cards are called King, Queen,
Knight and Page (or Child), especially when the Thoth deck calls
‘Knight’ what most others call ‘King’ and ‘Prince’ what most
others call ‘Knight’.

Here it might be helpful to remember the ‘traditional’ view to sort

it like ‘Father of the element’, ‘Mother of the element’, ‘Son of the
element’ and ‘Daughter of the element’.

The ten numbered cards represent the ten Sephirot, i.e. the ten
steps of the element from Kether (Ace) to Malkuth (Ten).

As for the meanings, always remember the one rule that someone
might tell you a lot of the card, but only you yourself will really
know what it means for you.

TEXT: Raven’s Tarot Site - www.corax.com/tarot

AUTHOR OF THE THOTH TAROT DECK: Aleisteir Crowley
ILLUSTRATOR: Lady Frieda Harris
PHOTOGRAPHY: Espen Iden
THE MAJOR ARCANA
The 22 Atu
Johann Heinrich Fussli
Die Elfenkonigin Titania und Zettel, der Weber mit Eselskopf
THE MINOR ARCANA
The Court cards
 THE SUITS
Wands, Cups, Swords, Disks
Espen Iden