A tarot deck is 78 picture cards. Most decks in use today follow the Rider–Waite–Smith deck of 1909, and the meanings on this site are written for its pictures. Learn its structure once and you can pick up almost any modern deck.
The deck has two parts. The 22 cards of the Major Arcana are numbered 0 to 21 and named for big figures and forces: The Fool, The Magician, Death, The Sun. The other 56 cards, the Minor Arcana, are built like ordinary playing cards: four suits, each with an Ace, the numbers Two to Ten, and four court cards (Page, Knight, Queen and King).
Big themes and daily life
A useful first rule: the Major Arcana speak about the larger shape of a life, the turning points and lessons that take months or years. The Minor Arcana speak about the weather of everyday life: a conversation, a week of hard work, a small win. When a reading is full of Major cards, readers usually take it as a sign that something significant is moving.
The four suits each have a field. Wands are drive and creative fire; Cups are feelings and relationships; Swords are thought, decisions and conflict; Pentacles are work, money, the body and practical things. You will meet them properly in Unit 3.
What a reading does
Shuffling and laying out cards turns a vague question into a set of pictures in named positions: the past, the present, what helps, what to watch for. Reading them is a structured way of thinking about a situation from angles you might not choose on your own.
This site treats tarot as a tool for reflection rather than a machine for predicting events. A reading can show you what you already half know, give a worry a shape, or suggest a next step. It cannot decide for you, and it is no substitute for medical, legal or financial advice.
