You may have used an oracle deck or heard of tarot cards, but did you realize you could perform a reading with a standard deck of playing cards for a friend or yourself? Anyone is welcome to try this method of divination, known as cartomancy.
In This Article...
Can you use a tarot deck to play cards?
With the exception of Minchiate, an extinct game that required 97 cards, a full Tarot deck, such as one for French Tarot, contains the full 78-card complement and can be used to play any game in the family. However, the Austrian-Hungarian Tarock and Italian Tarocco decks are smaller subsets (of 63, 54, 40, or even 36 cards) that are solely appropriate for regional games. The Latin suits of Cups, Coins, Clubs, and Swords are common in Italy and Spain, and the French suits of Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs, and Spades are used in France, Quebec, West Germany, and the majority of the English-speaking world. Regional tarot decks frequently include culture-specific suits. For example, the German suits of Hearts, Bells, Acorns, and Leaves are used throughout most of Germanic Europe. This pattern is still present in non-Tarot decks, such as those used in the German card game Skat (played with a deck of similar-value cards as in the French piquet deck used for Belote; players in most of western Germany use French suits while players in Bavaria and eastern Germany use German suits).
How can I interpret tarot cards on my own?
How to Conduct Your Own Tarot Reading
- First, make the space.
- Step 2: Discover the question’s core.
- Choose the layout in step three.
- Step 4: Sort the cards and shuffle them.
- Read the cards and tell the story in step five.
- Answering your question is step six.
What number of tarot cards do you draw?
If you find this daunting, Howe advises you to take a deep breath and believe in your own initiative. “In order to see it less as “This holds all of these secret meanings that I have to do all this work to access” and more as “I know all the meanings; it’s just a matter of establishing the connections and being able to articulate them,” use language or knowledge that you already possess. She points out that the four elementsearth, water, fire, and airplay a significant role in the tarot, which is advantageous because the majority of people already have an understanding of the meanings of each element. ” If you do that, your viewpoint will be more personal, and you will be able to express yourself more freely.
Howe suggests the three-card draw and the Celtic Cross as the two fundamental spreads for beginning readers. In the former, three cards are chosen at random from the deck to symbolize the subject’s mind, body, and spirit, or past, present, and future. According to Howe, you could even up the stakes and use a six-card draw, with one card for each location.
How do you determine your future?
Astromancy, horary astrology, pendulum reading, spirit board reading, tasseography (reading tea leaves in a cup), cartomancy (fortune telling with cards), tarot card reading, crystallomancy (reading of a crystal sphere), and chiromancy are examples of common fortune-telling techniques used in Europe and the Americas (palmistry, reading of the palms). The latter three are traditionally linked to the Roma and Sinti people in popular culture.
A different type of fortune telling, often known as a “reading” or “spiritual consultation,” does not rely on any particular tools or techniques but instead relies on the practitioner giving the client counsel and predictions that are purported to have been given by spirits or in visions.
- By interpreting atmospheric conditions, we do aeromancy.
- Alectromancy: by watching a rooster eat some grain.
- Using flour for aleuromancy.
- Astrology: based on the motions of the stars.
- By the stars: astrology.
- Augury: caused by bird flying.
- By the hour, day, month, and year of birth, or the four pillars of Bazi.
- Bibliomancy is the study of books, usually but not always religious works.
- Using playing cards, tarot cards, or oracle cards is known as cartomancy.
- Using patterns in melting or dripping wax, ceromancy.
- Chiromancy: based on the lines on the palms and the shape of the hands.
- By determining auspicious and unlucky days, chronomancy.
- Clairvoyance: the use of inner sight or spiritual vision.
- Cleromancy: the casting of bones or stones, or the drawing of lots.
- Using audible and visual cues to do cold reading.
- Scrying is another name for the practice of crystallomancy.
- Extispicy: involving animal organs.
- Through variances in face and head shape, one may read a person’s face.
- By earthy harmony, says feng shui.
- Gastromancy: using ventriloquism on the stomach (historically).
- Markings in the ground, sand, dirt, or soil are used in geomancy.
- Haruspicy: by the livers of animals offered as sacrifices.
- Astrology at the moment the question was posed is known as horary astrology.
- by water, or hydromancy.
- Using yarrow stalks, coins, and the I Ching, one can perform a divination.
- Using numbered bamboo sticks that are shaken out of a tube, Kau cim.
- Lithomancy: using jewels or stones.
- molten metal thrown into cold water to induce molybdomancy
- By moles, scars, or other physical characteristics, naeviology
- Necromancy: performed by the dead, by their spirits, or by their souls.
- Nephomancy: using cloud forms.
- by numbers, or numerology.
- Oneiromancy: dream magic.
- naming: nomenclature.
- Lines and bumps on the hand are used in palmistry.
- By parakeets picking up tarot cards, parrot astrology
- Origami is a popular medium for fortune-telling games.
- Pendulum reading: using an object hanging and tracking its motions.
- Pyromancy: using fire as a medium.
- Rhabdomancy is rod-based divination.
- using runes for runecasting or runic divination.
- By gazing into or into reflected objects, or scrying.
- Planchette or talking board for a spirit board.
- Taromancy: Tarot card use is a sort of cartomancy.
- Using coffee or tea grounds for tasseography or tasseomancy.
How should I maintain my Tarot deck?
While rearranging the cards in the tarot deck is a good approach to purify and clear their energy, there are some circumstances in which you might wish to perform a more specialized ritual. If you’re just getting started with tarot, cleaning your deck can be an excellent place to start.
You might want to clean your tarot deck for a variety of reasons, including:
- beginning with a fresh deck
- readings for other people
- You think you need to recharge.
- Your card readings seem a touch “odd” or “disconnected”
- Your deck hasn’t been used recently.
- Your deck has been handled by others
- You feel as though you’ve been using your cards a lot, especially for readings that are emotionally taxing.
Why should you cleanse or clear your tarot deck?
Tarot deck cleansing helps keep the energy flowing between you and your deck. Consider it as a little spiritual hygiene to maintain a strong and clear connection. It’s not necessary, but if you have any of the aforementioned symptoms, try a few of the energetic cleansing techniques listed below and note which ones seem to work the best for you.
How often should you cleanse your tarot deck?
This is another way of stating USE YOUR INTUITION: there are no hard and fast laws. Don’t stress if you don’t believe it is necessary for your deck. Alternately, if you like to cleanse them once per week or once per month, that’s great. If it feels appropriate to you, you can even place your favorite crystal on the balcony each night.
If you frequently place crystals on your deck and store it on an altar while not in use, you might not feel the need to cleanse it frequently because this quick ritual will likely be sufficient to keep your deck feeling nice.
There are numerous ways to cleanse your cards, just as there are numerous reasons why you might desire to do so.
Different ways to cleanse your tarot deck
Use holy smoke. Light a dried rosemary, lavender, cedar, sage, or palo santo cleansing wand until it begins to smoke. Hold the smoke a safe distance below the deck while holding the burning herbs in one hand and the deck in the other so that the smoke drifts upward onto the cards. Turn the deck so that the smoke covers it from all angles. Next, safely put your deck to the ground and put out the fire.
On the deck, set a selenite stone (or a black tourmaline or a transparent quartz). It works well to leave it like way for an hour, but I prefer to leave it overnight.
Set them on display during a new moon. The New Moon is energy of a blank slate; you can purify the deck by setting it on a window sill on a new moon night. At this moment, you can also make a brand-new intention for your deck.
Place the cards in a salty dish. A strong and stabilizing cleaner is salt. My preferred choice for a thorough cleansing is this. Allow it to sit anywhere from one to eight hours in a dry area.
Unorderly shuffle. Spread the cards out on the ground, then shuffle them around like a child playing in dirt. This method’s freedom and randomization serve as an excellent reset.
the shuffle and sort. Set up the deck in rows of seven cards across, commencing with the Major Arcana numbers 0 to 22. (see photo above). Next, arrange the cards, Ace through King, one for each suit, as follows: Swords, Pentacles, Cups, and Wands. View the deck in this configuration, then mix everything up (like the chaotic!) and shuffle it thoroughly.
What does it signify when you play cards?
Facts and trivia about playing cards Each of the four major pillars of the Middle Ages’ economy is supposed to be symbolized by one of the card game’s suits: Hearts stood for the Church, Spades for the military, Clubs for agriculture, and Diamonds for the merchant class.
Who invented the tarot?
The first tarot decks were created in Italy in the 1430s by adding a fifth suit of 21 specially designed cards called trionfi (“triumphs”) and an odd card called il matto to an already existing four-suited pack (“the fool).
Other variants for five players:
- There are 8 cards in the chien and 14 cards are dealt to each player, however the taker is the only one playing. Rarely is this variant played.
- Instead of participating in the hand, the dealer deals to the other four players, who play similarly to the four-handed game. The same dealer deals again if everyone passes until someone places a bid.
Some players in the five-player game with a called king play that you cannot lead the king’s suit in the first trick, with the exception that the king itself may be led if the king’s holder is on lead.
Variations in the bidding
Some players still permit the pousse bid, which was once made between petite and garde; the terms are the same but the score is different. On the other side, some people play sans petite, resulting in garde as the lowest offer.
Petit imprenable
Some games allow a player who is dealt the petit (1 of trumps) alonethat is, without any additional trumps or an excuseto proclaim the petit imprenable rather than cancel the hand (untouchable one). The player then uses the petit as if it were yet another defense; although the trick is lost, the player still retains possession of the card. The declaration of “petit imprenable” varies depending on whether the player plays to the first trick right away after the deal, or waits until the petit itself is played.
Some games allow the player who receives the excuse but no more trumps to cancel the hand as well.
Scoring
There are numerous alternate scoring systems in use in addition to the tournament scoring provided in the official account. For instance:
Scores are as follows: 80 for Garde, 160 for Garde Sans, 320 for Garde Contre, 500 for a petit chelem, and 1000 for a grand chelem. Card points that are above or below the minimum required for the contract are rounded to the nearest 10; there are no multiplying factors; all other scores are as stated above.
Another variation is: petit x1, garde x2, garde sans x4, garde contre x5, grand chelem wins 400 if made and announced, loses 200 if made and announced but wins 200 if made without announcement, and petit chelem (all but one trick) scores zero if made and announced but scores 300 if made and announced but loses 150 if made and announced and lost.
The multipliers available when using the pousse bid are: petite x1, pousse x2, garde x4, garde sans x8, and garde contre x12.
Pools were used to play French Tarot in the past (mouches). For club and tournament play, this method has been abandoned due to its inconvenience, but it is still occasionally used in casual games. Everyone pays the same amount (let’s say $10) to establish a mouche at the start of the game and thereafter anytime there are no mouches, plus the dealer adds an additional $5. A declarer who loses pays into a new mouche that is the same size as the largest mouche; a player who wins a contract takes the largest mouche. The dealer adds 5 to (one of the) largest mouche at the start of each deal (s). When using mouches, there may be no base payment for the gamejust payouts for card points won beyond the required minimum.
Tarot for Two Players
The rules of the game are essentially the same for four players as they are for two players, except that each player has 21 cards in their hand and 18 more on the table in six heaps of three, with the top card of each pile facing up.
The deal is as follows: Deal three cards, one at a time, face down, side by side, to your opponent; follow that with three cards to yourself; next, deal three more cards to your opponent beside the previous three; and last, deal yourself three more cards.
Currently, each player is facing a row of six cards that are all face down. Repeat the process so that each player has six face-down stacks of two cards by dealing new cards on top of existing ones. Then repeat the process while dealing face-up cards on top of the piles, creating six piles of three cards for each player with a face-up card on top. The remaining cards are dealt to the two players three at a time, giving them each a hand of 21 cards.
There is not an auction. The play proceeds according to the standard rules, which are that you must follow suit, trump if it is invalid, and when a trump is led, it must be beaten if at all feasible. You can play tricks with the face-up cards on your piles just like you would with cards in your hand. If you have played from a pile, turn the following card from that pile face up at the conclusion of each trick. The winner is decided using the standard targets at the conclusion of play, when both players have used all of the cards in their hands and piles. For instance, if you have two bouts and your opponent has one, you win if you have 41 or more points, while your opponent needs 51 or more to win. If you choose to keep score, the winner receives 25 points in addition to 1 point for each card point they have over their goal. If the petit is played down to the last trick, the trick winner receives an additional 10 points for the petit au bout. For poignee, there is no score.
