Major Arcana

Origin and etymology

"Arcanum" comes from the Latin arcanus ("secret, hidden"), from arca (chest, place where the precious is kept). The major arcana are, literally, the "great secrets" of the tarot. The distinction between major and minor arcana was systematised in the 18th century, when French occultists (especially Antoine Court de Gébelin and Etteilla) reinterpreted the Italian Renaissance cards as remnants of an ancient Egyptian wisdom.

The oldest preserved tarots — the Italian Visconti-Sforza of the 15th century — already had 22 distinct figurative cards apart from the suit cards. But it was the 19th-century esotericists who gave them the technical name "major arcana" and proposed the symbolic correspondences (with the Hebrew alphabet, with the planets, with the Kabbalistic Tree of Life) still discussed today.

The Fool's Journey

The 22 major arcana are read traditionally as a sequential narrative: the "Fool's Journey". The Fool (card 0 or 22 depending on numbering) is the virgin soul beginning the path. On the way, it meets the Magician (resources), the High Priestess (intuitive wisdom), the Empress and the Emperor (creation and authority), the Hierophant (tradition), the Lovers (choice), the Chariot (will)...

It then reaches Justice, the Hermit, the Wheel of Fortune, Strength, the Hanged Man, Death, Temperance, the Devil, the Tower, the Star, the Moon, the Sun, Judgement and the World. Each arcanum is a stage of soul transformation. A major arcanum appearing in your spread indicates a fundamental theme — not a minor everyday issue.

How to read them in a spread

In any spread, the presence of several major arcana indicates that the consultation touches a deep stage of your life, not concerns of the moment. If the minor arcana dominate, the reading is more everyday. If majors dominate, transformation is underway, vital decision, cycle change. The Rider-Waite, Marseille and Thoth tarot decks share the same 22 majors with iconographic variations.