The history of tarot, from Renaissance cards to the reading deck
Tarot began as a card game at the courts of fifteenth-century Italy. Here is how it became the deck we read today.
Tarot & Symbols
Meet the figures, symbols and painted worlds of historic tarot. Follow the cards from early Italian decks to the images that still shape readings today.
The Cary-Yale Visconti tarot, painted for the last Duke of Milan
Older than the Visconti–Sforza deck, with Faith, Hope and Charity among its trumps and women knights in its suits. The 67 cards at Yale, and the ones that are lost.
The Rider–Waite–Smith tarot: the deck that gave every card a picture
Drawn by Pamela Colman Smith for Arthur Edward Waite and published in London in 1909, it became the model for nearly every reading deck since.
The Sola Busca tarot, the oldest complete tarot deck
Engraved around 1490 and coloured in Venice in 1491, its 78 cards trade virtues for Roman heroes and gave the Rider–Waite–Smith deck its scenes.
The Visconti–Sforza tarot: the cards of the Dukes of Milan
Painted in gold and tempera for the court of Francesco Sforza, divided between New York and Bergamo, with four cards lost. The story of the most famous tarot deck.
Real tarot online: is a reading drawn on a screen a real reading?
Three things make an online tarot reading real: a fair draw nobody controls, real tarot cards, and a reading of your cards rather than filler. Here is how each works on Fable.
Free tarot reading online: what you get, and what is worth paying for
A free tarot reading should be a real draw, read properly. Here is exactly what is free on Fable, what the complete reading adds, and how to tell a good free reading from a poor one.
Tarot reading online: how a three-card reading works
What happens in a three-card reading, from the question you bring to the last card you turn, and how to begin one here.
Instant tarot reading: three cards for the question on your mind
When a question will not wait, a three-card reading takes about a minute. How to ask, what to look at first, and when an instant reading is not the right tool.