card, sometimes placed at the beginning of the deck as 0, or at the end as XXII. The Minor Arcana (lesser secrets) consists of 56 cards, divided into four suits of 14 cards each; Ten numbered cards and four court cards. The court cards are the King, Queen, Knight and Page/Jack, in each of the four tarot suits. The traditional Italian tarot suits are swords, batons, coins and cups; however, in modern occult tarot decks, the suit of batons is often called wands, rods or staves; the suit of coins is often called pentacles or disks and the suit of cups is often referred to as goblets. The terms "Major Arcana" and "Minor Arcana" were first used by Jean-Baptiste Pitois (also known as Paul Christian) and are never used in relation to tarot card games, which operate by a distinct set of rules. Some decks exist primarily as artwork, and such art decks sometimes contain only the 22 Major Arcana. The three most common decks used in esoteric tarot are the Tarot of Marseilles, the Rider–Waite–Smith tarot deck, and the Thoth tarot deck. Aleister Crowley, who devised the Thoth deck along with Lady Frieda Harris, stated of the tarot: "The origin of this pack of cards is very obscure. Some authorities seek to put it back as far as the ancient Egyptian Mysteries; others try to bring it forward as late as the fifteenth or even the sixteenth century ... [but] The only theory of ultimate interest about the tarot is that it is an admirable symbolic picture of the Universe, based on the data of the Holy Qabalah." However, the origin of the Tarot pack is now well documented, showing that it was invented in Italy in the early 15th century (see history section above). Some people today use Tarot cards as a tool for self-exploration and development and some psychologists use Tarot cards as a complementary care therapy. Through Tarot cards, it is claimed that the exploration of the inner self leads to greater freedom within the individual. Notes References Bibliography Daynes, Daniel (2000). Le Tarot, ses règles et toutes ses variantes, Bornemann, April 2000. Decker, Ronald, Thierry Depaulis and Michael Dummett. (1996). A Wicked Pack of Cards. London: Duckworth. Dummett, Sir Michael (1980). The Game of Tarot. Duckworth, London. Further reading External links Tarot Playing cards Italian Renaissance Christian iconography Magic symbols Italian inventions