A Short History of Tarot

Tarot cards first appear in 15th-century northern Italy, where decks such as the Visconti-Sforza cards were used to play a trick-taking game called tarocchi. They were not created for fortune-telling.

In the late 18th century French writers, notably Antoine Court de Gébelin, claimed tarot held ancient Egyptian wisdom. Historians have found no evidence for this; it was a romantic theory.

The deck most used in English today is the Rider-Waite-Smith deck (1909), illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith with A. E. Waite. Its illustrated number cards made tarot easier to read symbolically.

How Lightkeepers uses tarot

• As a mirror for reflection and storytelling.
• Never as proof of the future, of another person's thoughts, or as a replacement for medical, legal or financial advice.