Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot

Published in 1909, the Rider-Waite-Smith was conceived by Arthur Edward Waite and drawn by the artist Pamela Colman Smith, and issued by the Rider house — hence the name, which today also recognises the illustrator long left in the background. Its great novelty was to illustrate every minor arcana with a full scene rather than a simple repetition of suit symbols, which made intuitive reading far easier and fuelled its massive spread.

The deck differs clearly from the Tarot de Marseille in its iconographic style and its symbolism of esoteric inspiration. Where the Marseille invites a structural reading, the Rider-Waite-Smith invites a narrative one: each card stages a moment, a gesture, an emotion that the reader can interpret almost like an image from a story. This is why it became the reference for countless modern decks, most of which are variations on its system of correspondences.

On this page you can explore its twenty-two major arcana, each opening onto a detailed guide of its symbolism and meaning. For anyone studying tarot, knowing this deck is almost essential, since much of the contemporary visual vocabulary of the cards comes directly from the scenes drawn by Pamela Colman Smith at the start of the 20th century.