Contrary to popular belief, tarot wasn’t born as an ancient divination tool. Its origins are quite worldly: a card game.
The 15th century: an aristocratic game
Around the 1440s in northern Italy, nobles played a game called carte da trionfi (“triumph cards”). A sequence of illustrated “trionfi” cards was added to an ordinary deck — the ancestor of today’s Major Arcana. It was a trick-taking game, close to the tarocchi Italians still play.
The earliest surviving decks, like the Visconti-Sforza, are lavish hand-painted works for powerful families — not spiritual instruments.
The 18th century: the esoteric turn
Only in the late 1700s, in France, was tarot tied to the occult. Antoine Court de Gébelin claimed the deck held ancient Egyptian wisdom (a theory now debunked), while Jean-Baptiste Alliette — pen name Etteilla — systematised using tarot for reflection. From here tarot began its second life.
The 20th century: reaching everyone
In 1909 the Rider–Waite–Smith deck appeared in England, with all 78 cards fully illustrated and easy to read. This deck brought tarot to a wide public and became the visual standard it remains today.
Knowing tarot was once a card game keeps us from over-mystifying it — and lets us value it for what it is: a rich visual tradition humans have built up over centuries.