What particular Keywords do you find useful for the 16 Court Cards?

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 11 Feb 2004, and now archived in the Forum Library.

Rusty Neon	11 Feb 2004
I thought it would be interesting to have a thread assembling this. :) It's always wonderful to get new insights into the court cards. I realize that keywords aren't the end all of card meanings. After all, any given keywords and its synonyms can only represent a subset of all possible meanings for a card. However, keywords can sometimes be useful as quick memory triggers. Personally, after looking around, I find Rosengarten's list of keywords and card meaning spectrums quite useful for marrying traditional divinatory meanings, the Golden Dawn conceptions and divinatory meanings, and the RWS pictures. http://www.artrosengarten.com/lexicon2.htm

Macavity	11 Feb 2004
I find it useful to extend the Thoth minor keyword system to the courts. A very useful and workable set of keywords are the ones provided by Kate Warwick-Smith in her "Tarot Court Cards" book. Perhaps copyright should be observed here? :D For the Thoth courts, I think it is aknowledged that she (might) have got a bit confused on the Knight/Princes issue (who doesn't some times?) But It's still a fine idea IMO. ;) Macavity

Rusty Neon	11 Feb 2004
Quote: Originally posted by Macavity A very useful and workable set of keywords are the ones provided by Kate Warwick-Smith in her "Tarot Court Cards" book. I don't have the book, but what appears a good overall summary of the concepts of the book can be found at http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/books/court-cards/ http://www.illuminationtarot.com/insights/court_cards.html

lark	11 Feb 2004
I use Kate Warwick-Smiths key words too. They have been very on target. I'm curious to see what Mary Greer has to say in her new book The Tarot Court. Hope it's released soon.

lionette	11 Feb 2004
hi all, Tell me your thoughts on Stuart Kaplan's keywords. I'm still a tarot novice and not sure if this is a good idea, but I've been reading his interpretations in Tarot of the Witches companion book with the New Century deck. And sometimes I use Thoth keywords for other decks too. (Trying to synthesize different ideas and get my own vocabulary, but it's slow going!) Please, oh knowledgable ones, keep this thread active -- I'm so stumped with Court Cards!

Thirteen	12 Feb 2004
Quote: Originally posted by lionette I'm still a tarot novice and not sure if this is a good idea Key words are good for learning the Tarot quickly--but not deeply. So long as one is aware that EVENTUALLY, you're going to need to go back and really start delving into the cards, they're great. Nothing, in fact, will get all those cards into your head faster. Especially, as with Abraham's method, you connect the keywords not only to the majors, but the minors as well. For example, all the 3's to the Empress and her keyword. I like to use the keyword "Create" for the Empress. So 3/cups would be "Create Emotions." And there we have, in RW, our three ladies, being emotional with each other--and if you think of a group of young girls, you'll recall how they can giggle and scream and get more happy and emotional in each other's company. This method won't work perfectly, but it's a great mnemonic device. I used this method when--using the combined knowledge of just about everyone on this forum--I wrote up the "Card Meanings"/Basics for the forum: http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/learn/meanings/ But, once again, it's only a basic method to familiarize oneself with the deck, to get the cards to click into place. Oft times, beginners concentrate on memorizing the meanings of each individual card and fail see any connection between them (like, "what do ALL the pages have in common?"). This is why beginners are so often found flipping through the LWB, never quite able to remember what card means what. They say, "What does page of cups mean again?" Instead of: "Oh, pages = children/messangers" and "Cups = emotions" so..."page of cups = emotional message or child." Quote: Please, oh knowledgable ones, keep this thread active -- I'm so stumped with Court Cards! Which brings us to your Court Cards. Court Cards ALWAYS stump people. Even those of us who've read tarot for a while now find them trouble. The main reason is that more than any other card, they usually stand for people. Not always, but most often. So readers get used to thinking of them as people--and end up stumped when they find the card in an odd position like "Health" or "This crowns you!" What? Start with people in interpeting them. The usual: Swords, Cups, Wands, Pentacles are equlivant to Intellect/fears, Emotions/feelings, Passions/Ambitions and the physical (labor/body). Then the pages, knights, queens and Kings can be seen (Keyword wise) as Messanger/children, fighters/teens, creators/women and motivators/men. So, a King of Cups is an emotional man--not emotional meaning he gets emotional (though he can), but rather that he isn't afraid to show his feelings, to be loving toward family. He inspires (motivates) people to, say, hug each other, or cry openly rather than check their feelings. So, if we got King/Cups in "Health" for example, we might interpet this as meaning a very kind and sympathetic doctor, or as the querent being motivated to be open with their feelings rather than locking them away and, thus, causing health problems (like high blood pressure). This is simplistic, but you can see how the keywords help make it easy to remember things.

Kissa	12 Feb 2004
Thanks Thirteen! I jumped on the occasion to re-read your chapters about the court cards in the Basics. Great job!! Can I print the whole Basics for my journal? Kissa

lionette	12 Feb 2004
... I will study your Basics.

Kissa	13 Feb 2004
Sorry Rusty Neon for jumping off topic in my last message. I don't use keywords but at the beginning of my studies I bought "Tarot for Dummies" by Amber Jayanti and found that the "questions to ask yourself" instead of keywords were really helpful. Example: "The Moon" - what life cycle is ebbing or flowing? - where do you see your abilities waxing or waning? - what path are you about to traverse? [...] - could you be ready to forget yourself or another? - is a psychic sideshow distracting yourself from your spiritual work? etc. For each card (majors AND minors) there are about 20 questions asked. It was more interesting for me than keywords. Kissa

Thirteen	13 Feb 2004
Quote: Originally posted by Kissa Thanks Thirteen! I jumped on the occasion to re-read your chapters about the court cards in the Basics. Great job!! Can I print the whole Basics for my journal? By all means. That's what they're there for. Though I really must do some editing. Every six month or so, I feel the need to tweak the basics, because, of course, folk on the forum have offered such brilliant insights that I feel they should somehow be slipped in there :D

The What particular Keywords do you find useful for the 16 Court Cards? thread was originally posted on 11 Feb 2004 in the Using Tarot Cards board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Using Tarot Cards, or read more archived threads.