Cartomancy is a form of fortune telling by using regular cards. This is different than using oracle or tarot cards because people can use any deck of cards that they have and just use it to tell the future like the gypsies can.
Where Did Cartomancy Start?
Cards have been used to tell the future for a long time and it started in China. This was during the 9th century, and they would use dotted cards that were dotted with red and black coloring. The decks that the Chinese people used would be pictures of coins and they were inspired by Mah Jong’s circles and bamboos.
The playing cards then went to India and the Middle East, but it was during the 14th century that the gypsies begin to use playing cards to do readings.
Cartomancy Versus Tarot Readings
Tarot cards have two decks that have 78 cards in total and include the Minor and Major Arcana. Using cartomancy means that you have 52 cards that you use, and you would remove the Knight cards in each of the suits.
Tarot cards that are the minor cards were normally like regular cards because they have ten of cups and other cards that had knights and more. They all changed when Rider Waite made a tarot deck and he started illustrating the cards with much more detail.
Most of the tarot cards that you find today are inspired by that original deck and it makes it easier to understand the cards. You can look at the decks of the Rider Waite cards and figure out what they mean.
Can You Do Tarot Readings with Cartomancy?
The tarot reading can be done with regular cards if you use these cards:
- Playing cards
- Hearts are the cups.
- Spades are the swords.
- Diamonds are the pentacles.
- Clubs are the wands.
- Jacks are the pages.
- The knights are removed.
- Queens are the queens.
- Kings are the kings.
- No major arcana.
- Jokers are the Major Arcana fools.
So, if you have a heart card, this will be the same as having a cup and so on. This means that the cards are representing a tarot deck and the face cards are the same as the ones in the Minor Arcana and the kings and queens stay the same. There is no knight, but the jokers can be used as the fool cards.
Joker Card
The joker card is sometimes included when doing a fortune reading with the regular cards. This card can be similar to the fool card in the tarot reading. You can use it as a chance card.
When using regular playing cards to find the future, you can reverse the meaning, but you have to know that and mark on the top of the card. Most of the cards look the same and so you have to make sure that you put important things on top of the card.
Suits of Cards
The regular decks have four different suits that work with the astrology ideas. When using for fortune telling the cards mean this:
- Hearts are water
- Spades are air
- Dimond’s are earth
- Club is fire
Each suit has a meaning and represents something different:
- Hearts are about love and home and is lucky
- Clubs are success in home and not business.
- Diamonds are about material things or marriage.
- Spades are about bad luck and being around sneaky people.
The face cards are used to show people in your lives such as kings for men and women for queens. The spades can have dark hair, the clubs, hazel and brown hair, hearts are fair complexion and green eyes, and diamonds are light brown and blue eyes.
Cartomancy Spread
Readers usually use one of two spreads. One will be a position spread and the other one is a layout such as reading a story. Some call this a storybook spread.
The methods will be different and are based on the horoscope spread. This means there can be 12 cards in the spread that work with the astrological signs.
Celtic Cross Cartomancy
- Center card is the issue.
- Horizontal card is the main thing you are challenged by.
- The card below the 3rd card is the solution.
- The card to the left of the 4th card is the past.
- The card above the fifth card is what you are good at.
- The card to the right of the sixth card is what is happening in the future.
- The card below the 7th card is how to move forward.
- The card to the right of the 8th card is something you should know.
- The ninth card above the 8th card is what you are afraid of.
- The card above the 10th card is what your future holds.
Cartomancy Reading
You might know about the tarot readings, but the cartomancy readings are a little different because they use a regular deck of cards. They have meanings for each of the cards and if you are guided by your intuition then you can give a good reading and interpret the cards and get answers from them.
Getting a Reading
You can find a psychic or a professional fortune teller online. Find one that has good reviews that can give you the right kind of reading that you are looking for.
A good cartomancy reader can help you to know what kind of decisions that you want to make in your life regarding your relationships, love, health and more.
If you feel drawn to a deck of cards, use them and it can help you to give a good reading. Keep your cards in a velvet pouch to keep them safe.
There is more to learn about a reading than just what the cards mean, and you can find a guidebook online that can help you to practice doing a reading.
