Tarot Suites

Tarot

Definition

The four categories — Wands, Cups, Swords and Pentacles — that organise the 56 Minor Arcana cards, each corresponding to an element, a sphere of life and a Jungian function.

Origin

The four-suit structure descends from the 14th-century Mamluk deck, which used Cups, Coins, Swords and Polo Sticks. European decks substituted Wands or Staves for Polo Sticks (unfamiliar in Europe), keeping the four-suit logic that has anchored Western playing cards for 600 years.

Development

Italian and Spanish playing cards retained the Mamluk-derived suits. Anglo-French decks replaced them with Hearts (Cups), Diamonds (Pentacles), Spades (Swords) and Clubs (Wands). Both systems remain in play; tarot uses the older Italian-Spanish form.

In Practice

The standard correspondences are: Wands = fire (action, creativity); Cups = water (emotion, relationships); Swords = air (thought, conflict); Pentacles = earth (money, body). Reading well means knowing these baselines without being mechanical about them.

Deeper Reading

The suit-element correspondence is conventional, not universal. Aleister Crowley reassigned Swords to fire and Wands to air, reflecting a different magical lineage. Most modern readers use the older Golden Dawn assignment retained by Waite.

See Also

  • suits
  • palos del tarot
  • tarot suits