Tarot Encyclopedia

The 78 Tarot Cards

The complete Rider-Waite-Smith tradition — twenty-two archetypal Major Arcana, and fifty-six Minor Arcana spread across four elemental suits. Each card carries a classical reading, a shadow, and a quiet caveat: a card in a spread is one note, not a chord.

Browse by arcana below. Each entry links to a 150-250 word article with upright and reversed keywords.

A gracefully fanned arc of seven identical tarot card backs, each rendered in ornate gold-leaf filigree on deep indigo, set against a midnight-indigo cosmic backdrop with quiet stars and soft golden particle dust.

Archetypal Path

Major Arcana

The 22 archetypal stages — Fool to World

Read about Major Arcana →

Suit of Water

Cups

The suit of emotion, relationship, and inner life

Read about Cups →

Suit of Fire

Wands

The suit of creativity, will, and inspiration

Read about Wands →

Suit of Air

Swords

The suit of intellect, truth, and conflict

Read about Swords →

Suit of Earth

Pentacles

The suit of body, money, and craft

Read about Pentacles →

A note on scope

Tarot is a tool for reflection, not a forecast. Each card invites a question. The cards around it shape the answer. The reader's honesty is the final ingredient — no card is so strong that it can substitute for it.

Past the 78 cards

Tarot is one of four traditions

A deck is a deck. The other tools below ask the same questions through different machinery — nakshatras, numerology, planetary cycles. Same instrument family, different strings.

The full shelf

All tools

Every free tool we ship, grouped by what it actually does. Start here if you don’t yet know what you’re looking for.

27 lunar mansions

Nakshatras

The Vedic zodiac you don’t usually hear about — 27 segments of the Moon’s path, each with its own deity, story, and signature.

Pythagorean + Chaldean

Numerology

Two systems, side by side. Life path, expression, soul urge, personality — from your name and date of birth, with the math shown.

A nine-year cycle, where you are now

Personal year

Numerology applied to time — which year of the nine-year cycle you’re in, and what the cycle traditionally asks of you.

The 29-year reckoning

Saturn return

Saturn comes back to its natal place every 29.46 years. The calculator tells you when yours hits — and what astronomers and astrologers each say about it.

Or take a single tool further
The substrate everything else reads

Your birth chart

The natal computation behind every tool above. Always free, always yours, exportable as JSON or PDF.

When a tool isn’t enough

Deep reports

Six synthesis-style readings that weave all four traditions — Life Crossroads, Annual Forecast, Soul Path, and three more.

Two charts, one reading

Compatibility

The same engine, run on two people — friends, partners, family. Western synastry plus Vedic kuta points.