Publisher's Synopsis
'A journey through the Tarot cards is primarily a journey into our own depths'. [1] Where does the Tarot come from? It is surprisingly difficult to answer this question and there are differing arguments from different sources. The Tarot is often associated with Egypt and in 1909 the famous commentator on the Tarot, Papus, declared with conviction that 'it is really a set of hieroglyphics that originated in Ancient Egypt'. [2] Meanwhile Alfred Douglas reports that 'the invention of Tarot cards has [...] been attributed to the Order of the Knights Templar'. [3] There seems to be most evidence to suggest that Tarot has European origins and most likely came from France or Italy during the early fifteenth century, [4] and the earliest known Tarot pack is the beautiful baroque Visconti-Sforza Tarot (circa 1432-50). Tarot cards were probably originally playing cards and according to Helen Farley Tarot did not acquire their esoteric meaning until the eighteenth century when France was gripped by a revival of occultism and also by a fervour for everything Egyptian: Egyptomania. [5] It was at this time that the esoteric, occult, divinatory aspects of the Tarot were promoted and explored, and it is possible to argue that this was when spiritual qualities were imposed on the Tarot.
