Waite, Marseille and Thoth

One number, three decks

You learn from a tutorial that "card eight is Strength", then open your own deck and find Adjustment printed at VIII. Nobody has necessarily made a mistake. Tarot comes in several systems with different numbering, titles and pictures, and the tutorial may not describe the one in your hands.

Open the full-size diagram

Comparison sketch: side-by-side lists show differences, not card-for-card equivalence; Marseille is not one fixed specification.

Three common names are worth separating, because they are not the same kind of label. RWS (Rider–Waite–Smith) is the collaboration of A. E. Waite and the artist Pamela Colman Smith. Marseille is a historical pattern. Thoth is associated with the work of Aleister Crowley and Frieda Harris.

VIII and XI: the two most useful checkpoints

In his chapter on Strength, Waite states that he exchanged Strength with Justice, which was ordinarily numbered eight. That is why RWS has Strength at VIII and Justice at XI. Thoth's own book lists VIII Adjustment and XI Lust.

Translated titles vary between editions, so keep the original English beside any translation. Then a difference of wording will not be mistaken for a new card.

"Marseille" is not one person's work

The Bibliothèque nationale de France describes Marseille tarot as a historical pattern with Latin suits, made in more places than Marseille itself. So the name cannot be turned into "invented in a given year by a given person".

Some tutorials discuss a museum card, others a modern restoration, and their colours, printed lettering and details may not be interchangeable. To find out what number a card carries, look at that edition's own face or a traceable catalogue image.

When a design is built mainly from suit emblems, count their number, direction and ornament first, and only then look for that tradition's own way of reading them. A common trap is to describe the action of an RWS figure on a picture where that figure does not exist: a detail that is not in the image cannot serve as evidence.

One page, three columns

After switching decks, the easiest mistake is to write three different things in one column. Say you hold a page of notes on RWS VIII and now have to start a new page for Thoth VIII. Work it like this:

The first two columns have to be filled in again; the third cannot simply be inherited. The exercise in symbols versus facts practises the same split.

Keeping the old records after you change decks

1. 1

   Keep the deck field on old records

   Do not delete old notes; add which deck you were using.

2. 2

   Write deck and edition on new ones

   Keywords from two decks must never share a column.

3. 3

   Compare questions, not hits

   To compare two sessions, compare which questions each raised, not which system "hit" more.

BaZiFlow's single-card series uses RWS and separates image observation, Waite's text and modern practice. Keep that scope in mind when reading pip and court cards. Mastering one system and then comparing another reveals the real differences more clearly than mixing explanations, unlabelled, in one set of notes.