Dolya

The 22 arcana

What each number on a chart is, one page apiece.

A birth date makes nine numbers, and every one of them is one of these 22. Which of the nine seats a number lands in changes what it is read as, so a card has one meaning and up to nine addresses.

Each page below carries the card and the seats: what the card is, in the words every chart holding it is shown, and which of the nine seats it can sit in.

  1. 1. The Magician
  2. 2. The High Priestess
  3. 3. The Empress
  4. 4. The Emperor
  5. 5. The Hierophant
  6. 6. The Lovers
  7. 7. The Chariot
  8. 8. Justice
  9. 9. The Hermit
  10. 10. Wheel of Fortune
  11. 11. Strength
  12. 12. The Hanged Man
  13. 13. Death
  14. 14. Temperance
  15. 15. The Devil
  16. 16. The Tower
  17. 17. The Star
  18. 18. The Moon
  19. 19. The Sun
  20. 20. Judgement
  21. 21. The World
  22. 22. The Fool

Drawn by Pamela Colman Smith for the Rider-Waite deck, 1909. Public domain.

The 22 names follow the Marseille deck, where 8 is Justice, 11 is Strength and 22 is the Fool. Rider-Waite decks swap the first two and count the Fool as 0, so this is a difference in deck, not a mistake in the chart.

Read a chart