Origins of Cartomancy/Card Reading
Despite Hazy History Card Reading Thrives Through Time
How did cartomancy actually get started? Was it tarot or a regular deck of playing cards that catapulted the art of foretelling the future from cards to what it is today?
The history of cards and their use to foretell the future - traditionally called "cartomancy" - is not a subject easily researched, despite that playing cards have been in existence for centuries.
Once historical beginnings are delved into, it’s possible to find as many theories about their exact origins as interpretations of the cards themselves when used for divination.
For instance, a number of historians believe playing cards were originally created to entertain the concubines of the emperor in China during the 12th century.
Since paper was first invented by the Chinese, this assumption seems reasonable enough to those who have tried to sort through the enormous amount of opinion, contradiction and theory which exists on the subject of the exact origin of playing cards.
Other historians are convinced the first deck of playing cards to surface in Europe came from Italy in the 15th century. This deck was comprised by four distinctively styled suits - cards that were used essentially for gambling and games of chance in those days.
These historians assert that tarot cards were invented from this early Italian deck. They believe the four suits of the deck at that time needed to be extended by adding new cards which would "trump" or beat cards of the four ordinary suits in popular card games.
With the addition of 22 cards which had no suit designations attached to them, a deck of 78 cards was created. With that deck, tarot cards are believed by these historians to have been born.
More Opinion
Others insist the Arabs introduced Islamic playing cards to Europe in the 14th century. European playing and tarot cards, these historians believe, evolved from the designated suits and symbolic nature of these cards.
Still others believe that playing cards were brought to Europe from India.
Some sources claim such cards date to an even earlier time and were designed for prophecy:
"The earliest known cards were given the Hebrew name naibi which means 'to foretell', and they were treated with immense respect." (The Book of Destinies, Jane Struthers, Courage Books, 1997)
B.S. Industries, an international playing card manufacturer, maintains “The earliest known use of tarot packs for fortune telling was in Bologna, around 1750 and the use of ordinary packs of playing cards for cartomancy does not date from much earlier than this. This rules out the proposed connection with Egypt first put forward in 1781, which forms the foundation for much of the later occult speculation.”
American Standardization
While the French are reputed to have created the designs we use today – for example, the suits of spades, clubs, diamonds and hearts – it’s also generally accepted that French cards overtook the market and eventually became standardized in popularity throughout England and later, throughout the American British Colonies.
According to the United States Playing Card Company, “Around 1800, Yankee ingenuity soon invented or adopted practical refinements: double-headed court cards (to avoid the nuisance of turning the figure upright), varnished surfaces (for durability and smoothness in shuffling), indexes (the identifying marks placed in the cards’ borders or corners), and rounded corners (which avoid the wear that card players inflict on square corners).” The Joker is also an American invention.
Despite the endless controversy attached to their international origins, all historians agree on one level: playing cards, tarot and cartomancy have captivated the young and old, the rich and poor, the trickster and the gambler – for centuries.
