March is here, and with it comes Women’s History month. Now, I consider myself a feminist, and always have, my grandma was divorced before it was cool, and hearing how she was treated when she went to do things as a single woman, well, let’s just say the match was lit. Flash forward to college, women’s history, witch studies and here we are.

The first woman I want to talk about is Pamela Coleman Smith. We would not be having this conversation if she wasn’t involved in the first mass produced deck. She changed the way we look at tarot, and it’s popularity, why? She was the artist for the Rider-Waite deck which was published in 1909, which can also be found as the Coleman Smith deck or some variation of that title as we have become more aware of her and her contributions. There is an amazing book Pamela Coleman Smith-The Untold Story, which can go into this much deeper than this little blog, but in short, she lived an interesting and full life. She published art and literary zines, she made theater posters and sets, wrote children’s book and of course was in the Golden Dawn and with Alfred Waite and modernized the tarot. Sadly she earned very little in the way of monetarty compansaion, and died penniless.

Before the Rider-waite deck, the minor arcana was usually pip cards-just the numbers like in a playing card deck.* She added images of people doing things in day to day life, telling us an action story of our lives, and making it appealing to create a story of our lives with these images. There is movement here, action, personalities. This is still the most popular deck and has been the inspiration for so many beautiful decks, and so many amazing readers.

So in honor of women’s history month lets disucss some of the women in the deck. (Rember these cards speak to us as archetypes and energy so they can represent all of us)

All images in this blog are from the Vintage Tarot by Arthur Edward Waite & Pamela Coleman Smith

The High Priestess: Let’s start at the beginning, yes, the Fool card is the actual beginning of the deck as #0, and can be seen as either or both genders, but The High Priestess card #2 speaks very clearly to a feminine image. As we move through the major arcana we see the pure energy of the Fool becoming dualistic in nature (we see male and female images think emperor/empress, magician/High Priestess…), returning once again to non-dualistic image in the last card of the Majors -The World card.

We see the High Priestess, arriving in our journey after the magician. The Magician learned about controlling and creating his outer physical world, and now? The High Priestess is here to help us dive deeply into the Self. She is a woman in control of, and developing her inner world, her abilities to see and understand that which is underneath it all, that which is unseen and powerful. She is connected to our intuition-reminding us that the answers are within. She is connected to the moon, in her crown and below her feet. In Marcus Katz & Tali Goodwin’s book Secrets of the Waite-Smith Tarot they remind us of so many little nuanced images we need to notice. The Pomegranates (which we will see again in the next card I discuss), on this card are on the veil behind her reminding us that we can manifest the divine within us. We are ready, when we see her, to dive in. She is a reminder of (what many used to see as ‘feminine’) intuition.

The Empress comes along right after her in the Major Arcana and is the embodiment of our ability to be creatrixes. She can bring (birth) what she wants to into the world. She has been called the “mom” of the deck, and as an archetype that it the kind of mom I want to be. Relaxed, abundant, creative, patient and beautiful, knowing that all will flow like the water behind her. She knows this beacuse she is connected-connected to nature, to the flow of knowldege and emotions and her magic. She is connected to the universe with her crown of 12 stars too. She is fertility- when this deck was created, back in the day, there was an idea of keeping the woman happy and cared for, for the best outcome of the baby, so she is reclined and dressed beautifully. I can say I agree with this idea! But shouldn’t we all be kept that way all the time! Again, we see the pomegranates as in the card above. Here though we see this as the divine in nature all around her.

The Strength card is so beautiful in my eyes, she is grace, and courage all wrapped up in one image, and one of the 3 cards that has the infinity symbol. She finds this infinite nature through the combination of the those two things. She and her lion are fierce grace. She can face this lion, who most people would fear, with love, compassionate beauty and grace. This truly is what the world needs.

The Star card. In Rachel Pollack book’s 78 Degrees of Wisdom she cites the connection between the cards spoken of above (The High Priestess, The Empress, and Strength). This card is the card of hope, healing and renewal-she is the in the pool of water that is the same water behind the High Priestess’s veil, the water behind the Empress, and she is both of these wo embodied, but naked and “joyfully experiencing her inner self”. She is able to stand on the land and the water, she is alchemy, and wholeness. We see all of these energies growing and evolving to be more whole as we make our way through the Major Arcana all the way to The World card.

The queens- are all seen as yin/water element. They are the introspection of the energy of the suit, in other words, they internalize and can dive deep into that energy.

Each has a different way of alchemizing their fluidity and the energy of the suit they represent.

The Queen of Swords brings us a sense of power, truth and assertiveness. She lives in the world of rational thought, combined with her intuitive, depth-she combines air and water. She can flow with her thoughts and be assertive in her own right coming from a place of intellect. When her energy is off, say on a bad day when no one is listening? She may become more aggressive, rather than assertive and balanced. We all have those days…and sadly sometimes feminine rage is needed and the only time some people listen.

The Queen of Cups bring us fluidity, grace and the ability to wade in the waters of empathy and emotion. She is the friend that can hold you and help you grieve; she can listen and cares for you-sometimes with things we don’t even know we need. She can also become overwhelmed with other people's emotions and suffering. She needs to be careful to fill her own cup too-to provided herself the same love and grace that she gives others.

The Queen of Pentacles, is another space holder. She is grounded and can create that ground and security for others easily. She is the woman who is connected to the earth, she may have a pet she is very fond of (grab your deck and see if you can find the bunny in her card). She is connected to the rythm of life, and is methodical, patient & precise. This is a woman who is often in a career that focuses on supporting others, in a spiritual way, financial, or healthy way-think yoga teacher, financial advisor….She can really empower all of us. If her energy is off, she may feel scattered, and need some grounding, and some nature.

The Queen of Wands. I saved her for last because she is the one that combines the energy of fire and water - she is the alchemist, the witch of the deck. She can see what needs to be created in a unique way and get it done with the fire of her spirit. Her pet, the black cat, reminds us to stay a little feral-if we listen too much to society or other’s opinions, we may not tap deeply into our unique power. A little aside that I love about studying Tarot, are the little sweet stories you find. Here? In the book by Katz and Goodwin I mention above, they have pictures of the cat that was the model for this card (literally the reason I bought the book-but there is so much more good stuff here). His name was Snuffles and belonged to her friend Edy Craig. Somehow warms my heart deeply to see this sweet cat immortalized. If she is having an off day, she may loose her creative spark, she may feel unfulfilled and frustrated not doing her unique soul’s work. She may have writers block…she needs her spark, and her independent thinking.

Each of these queens are aspects of all of us, and we can call on them to help us tap into these attributes. There are times I wear a ring of the Queen of Swords, and others I wear a Queen of Pentacles ring. At times I have a specific card on my desk or altar so I see it and it reminds me of what I am working towards. You can also use any card as a meditation or journaling prompt to tap into what you need. What do these cards need to tell you/help you with? Or you can take the card whose energy you need and then pull a few cards to find out how to tap into that energy.

The Three of Cups-this card is so important to me personally. Why? As I was moving through my divorce quite a few years ago, I turned to my cards with the question: How am I going to get through this? This was the answer. My amazing and close girlfriends. To me this card speaks to us about these people in our lives, and yes-it is not always just the women who get us through, but it is our friends, our chosen family. The people we celebrate with and cry with, who always answer the phone when we need them. This card also reminds us of the three of fates, and the three phases in a woman’s life (maiden, mother, crone). I often see this image of three women too. Now that I have said that if you haven’t noticed you will!

The 2 and 8 of swords both show us women bound. In the 2 we see that it is her choice to pick up or put down the swords, and it is a good reminder for us to check in with our relationship with our boundaries. The blindfold is her closing out the world, this could be to withdraw our senses (sometimes we need quiet and meditation and to turn off the world to see things clearly), or ignoring something intentionally.

In the 8 she is definitely bound by others, and she needs movement here (notice her feet are not bound, she needs to take the first step-she needs to speak up and walk away-in this card the boundary and truth is the movement to leave. The blindfold in this card can also show us our confusion and being trapped in our own thinking. Remember the swords are about our minds usually, and our minds love to play tricks on us!

The Nine of Pentacles is also one of my favorite cards, to me this beautifully drawn woman in an aspiration of peace, contentment and earned abundance. Don’t we all want to feel like this? She has worked hard to get here, she has arrived as they say, and is at peace. Her bird friend reminds us of the connection to nature that the rabbit does in the Queen of Pentacles, but in a different way-perhaps free-er? More ablet to rise from the roots and aim for the sky. And in my eyes she has reached this goal independently. In the next card-the 10 of Pentacles, we see her union with her family and ancestors, but for now? She is relishing in herself, her worth and her jobs well done to create the life she wants, and deserves.

The last two women in the deck I want us to think about is the woman on The Lovers and The Devil card-this is really the same woman, in different situations. To me, these two cards are so similar in image and so different-two sides of a coin.

In The Lovers card she is calm and blessed, there is a sweetness and a feeling of being in the right place at the right time with the right partner. Notice on these two cards too the gaze of the woman, in this card she is looking up to the angel, in the card below she is looking out at us,

In the Devil card…well she is still in a place, and it may be a very tempting, habitual and possibly very fun place-this place though, as hot as it is, may not be in the best interest of this woman (or the man). Haven’t many of us had those relationships and times in our lives? But even here this woman (and man) have the choice to remove the chains-free choice is always here-sometimes though, like in this card, it may be hard to see, or may be something we don’t WANT to see.

How have these energies shown up in your life?

*Tarot started as a card game, which is still played, it started to become used for fortune telling too, and there was, and still is some discussion as to its origin and meaning. Some have said it was from Egypt, some say it has christian and kaballah roots and images (I do agree on this one), and over all we all seem to agree that it has archetypal images that tell the story of the human condition. As Rachel Pollack says in 78 Degrees of Wisdom “Today, we see the Tarot as a kind of path, a way to personal growht through understandingof ourselves and life. To some the Tarot’s origin remains a vital question; for others it only matters that the meanins have accrued to the cards over the years”. I have heard it said that now, these cards are a collection of all our stories, imbued with history, happiness, sadness and guidance from those who came before us.

Women of the Tarot