Gender In Tarot
Tw: gender discussion
Before you reblog, please read this fully. I’m curious about other people’s thoughts on the “duality” of the genders in a vanilla tarot deck. Please be respectful on this post, we’re all here to listen to one another on this topic!
I would like to start with a disclaimer: I am nonbinary. As such, I can’t speak for absolutely everyone with or without gender. I just wanted to cover this subject because I noticed a pattern and running theme.
Next, I would like to thank Moss for the incredible help editing this manuscript, and Ciera for helping me find some resources.
🌈
So, let’s start with the Major Arcana and then meander down to the Minor Arcana. Typically, the following cards are considered opposites:
The High Priestess and the Magician or the Hierophant
The Empress and the Emperor
The Moon and the Sun
🌈
The High Priestess is often associated with knowledge, reflection, mystery, and wisdom, among many other things. This card is almost always depicted as a woman, and the name reflects a high priestess of Wicca. The counterpart of the High Priestess is cited as either the Magician or the Hierophant.
The Magician is associated with ability, inquiry, talent, and power. The Magician is almost always depicted as a man and usually with the symbols of all four suits in the deck. The name of the Magician reflects a practitioner of ritual or ceremonial magic.
The Hierophant (sometimes known as the High Priest) is associated with guidance, wisdom, tradition, and status quo. The Hierophant is almost always depicted as a man. The name of the Hierophant reflects a religious leader, and the High Priest name reflects a high priest of Wicca.
🌈
The Empress and the Emperor are pretty obvious counterparts and are almost always depicted as a woman and man respectively. The name of the Emperor comes from an Old French word, which in turn comes from a Latin word, and it basically means “commander” – meanwhile, the Empress is just a feminized form of that word.
The Empress is associated with motherhood, femininity, beauty, and abundance.
The Emperor, meanwhile, is associated with fatherhood, masculinity, authority, and decision.
🌈
The Moon is often used as a symbol for femininity, especially in the context of Wicca and Greek-Roman mythology and is associated with dreams, illusion, and the subconscious, among other things. The Moon isn’t always depicted as a person, but when it is depicted as or with one, it’s typically a woman.
The Sun is used as a symbol for masculinity, particularly in Wicca, Greek-Roman mythology, and Egyptian mythology and is associated with happiness, clarity, and consciousness, among others. Like with the Moon, the Sun isn’t always depicted as a person, but when depicted as or with one, it’s typically a man.
🌈
Are you seeing a pattern here? Masculinity and femininity are depicted as complete opposites, masculinity is often put in more of a position of authority while femininity is treated as more mysterious, and some of these dual cards are a lot more obvious and well-known than others.
Let’s start talking about the Minor Arcana now. We’ll be starting with the suits and then we’ll move to the court cards.
🌈
We all know the four suits by now: cups/chalices, pentacles/coins, swords/knives, and wands/staves. Cups are emotions, pentacles are abundance, swords are the mind, and wands are individuality. For more information, I’ve already covered the suits as a whole, I’ll link it in my sources.
What I want to draw attention to is how these aren’t necessarily gendered. Instead, they’re associated with elements, which are in turn associated with genders. Cups = water = femininity and Pentacles = earth = masculinity.
Swords are often associated with air, and thus, femininity. Rumor has it that Swords used to be associated with fire, and thus, masculinity. And vice-versa for Wands.
Most modern tarot decks stick with Swords = air and Wands = fire. And for all of my surface-level research, the most I’ve found to back up the idea that it was swapped is a Reddit discussion; the points brought up in it are worth looking into. See the sources for that one. With the help of my friend Ciera, I managed to get another discussion from the Tarot Forum, which I will also cite in my sources for those interested in the elemental aspect of tarot.
🌈
Now that I’ve dug into the history of tarot suit associations by accident, let’s finally talk about the court cards. Since the King-Queen duality is pretty self-explanatory, we’ll cover them first.
Kings are almost always depicted as men and represent fatherhood and authority. They are the masters of their suits, usually the outward-focused aspects.
Queens are almost always depicted as women and represent motherhood and wisdom. They are also masters of their suits, but often of the inward-focused aspects.
Knights are also called Princes in some decks, but are usually left alone. Most of the time, Knights are depicted as men, but occasionally you’ll find ones that are referred to with they/them pronouns (again, thank you Murder of Crows Tarot). They are loyal, mature, getting better at their respective suit’s themes, and more experienced than Pages.
Now we get to the Pages, which is where everything goes sideways. Also referred to as Maidens, Princesses, Knaves, and many more names, the Pages are perhaps the most genderfluid cards in the tarot deck. Depending on what the theme of the deck is, the Page may be referred to with he/him pronouns, she/her pronouns, or even they/them pronouns (thank you Murder of Crows Tarot). They are naïve, they’re beginners, and they’re learning the basics of their respective suit.
Sources
My tarot decks and their respective guidebooks: The Dragon Tarot by Nigel Suckling, the Murder of Crows Tarot by Charles Harrington, the China Tarot by Riccardo Minetti, and the Silver Witchcraft Tarot by Barbara Moore.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hierophant
https://www.etymonline.com/word/emperor
Numbers and Suits: https://sta.sh/01i8tsfc9qvr
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Arcana
https://www.biddytarot.com/elements/
http://www.aaurumtarot.com/elements-tarot-know-tarot-suits/
http://www.thewhitegoddess.co.uk/the_elements/water.asp
http://www.thewhitegoddess.co.uk/the_elements/earth.asp
http://www.thewhitegoddess.co.uk/the_elements/air.asp
http://www.thewhitegoddess.co.uk/the_elements/fire.asp
Reddit Discussion: https://www.reddit.com/r/tarot/comments/jilncg/the_suit_of_wands_and_swords/
The Tarot Forum Discussion: https://www.thetarotforum.com/forums/topic/4028-wandsfire-swordsair-or-vice-versa/
