A Wicked Pack of Cards: The Origins of the Occult Tarot

Duckworth and Co. Ltd.
ISBN: 0-7156-2713-9
£35

Books on Tarot are ten-a-penny at this time, and many of them say the same boring things that have been repeated over and over for decades. But A Wicked Pack of Cards is different, as it brings to light the truth about the origins of the Tarot, and thereby breaking away all the myth and superstition that previously shrouded its history.

Did the Tarot come from Atlantis? Did the Gypsies create it? Was it of Egyptian origin? Is it Celtic? Nope to all the above, as A Wicked Pack of Cards comes to the logical conclusion that the Tarot arose sometime between the 13th and 15th century in Italy and the surrounding areas.

And for once this is not just a speculative conclusion either: the authors of this book are professional historians, one a playing card historian and a philosopher (Dummett). The book presents the cold, hard evidence and works its way through a scholarly maze of writings, extant packs of cards, myth, superstition, and the figureheads of the Tarot renaissance, until it reaches its conclusion: No matter what the Tarot is to us now, it began as a simple playing card game similar to Bridge. Only later on did it become an occult tool, when people such as Eliphas Levi came on the occult scene and began to link the Tarot with other occult systems such as the Qabalah.

As well as the search for the Tarot's origins, this book provides and excellent look at the figureheads: Eliphas Levi, Etteilla, Paul Christian, Jean-Alexandre Vaillant, and Mlle. Le Normand. However, it only takes the reader up to the time of Papus in the late 19th and early 20th century, but I hear that a second book has recently been published to continue where this one left off: A History of the Occult Tarot, 1870-1970.

I highly recommend this book to anybody who wants to know the up-to-date historical understanding of the Tarot's origins, though I would remind them that the understanding is by far complete: whilst it is true that the Tarot has origins in Italy between the 13th and 15th century as a card game, there is new evidence popping up all the time to add to this. History is never static, and that is as much true of Tarot history as of anything else. Sadly, this lengthy tome is also quite difficult to read for the layman, since it is written in a very scholarly tone. If you can plough through it however you will be the better for it.