Origin of the Celtic Cross in Tarot

[Eric13]

Who knows the origin of the Celtic Cross and why it seems to be as abundant as it is?

I've been doing a lot of reading teaching back to the origin of tarot, the Kabala beginings and I've found some unique geometric designs all based on numerology that I feel make power spreads and I've been using them. Very energized. I also found a spread in the Brotherhood Of Light Book that seems to have been forgotten about using 7 cards. I just wonder if 7 questions are necessary for it.

[Rose Lalonde]

The Tarot Association talks about the history of the Celtic Cross a lot. It showed up in their founder's book Tarosophy, and for free you can read the article on its history on page 22 of the first issue of Tarosophist magazine, by the Tarot Association.

[Eric13]

Thank you, Rose Lalonde. I'll look into this. And thanks for the web site, never knew this existed. I'll check this out too.

[Rose Lalonde]

Sure! (I should've mentioned that it's not a spread I use, so I haven't read through the full history at that link and don't have a horse in the race as far as the true origin. It just looks like Katz has a lot of documentation and old scans to offer in support of his info.)

[Eric13]

It appears our old friend Dr. Waite found it being somewhat obscure and decided to add it to his book and poof, it became widely used. It's just my opinion but I think there are better spreads.

[jiacovelli]

To add to the note regarding Arthur Waite, it has been stated (see https://www.juliettewood.com/tarotabstract.php

(pages 4 and 5; includes citations) that Waite took the previously established spread and gave it the "Celtic" name in the Pictorial Key. This is in line with his overall divergences with his contemporaries and predecessors. I think the gist of those divergences are (1) lessening the focus on Qabalah/numerology and redirecting it to Christian symbolism and (2) adding what we can probably see now as a nationalistic spin, i.e. associating Celtic myth with the cards.

[Eric13]

Interesting...

[Talal]

Marcus Katz is pretty knowledgeable. He and Tali Goodwin wrote an excellent book about that spread called  Secrets of the Celtic Cross: The Secret History of the Worlds Most Popular Tarot Spread Featuring New Tarot Reading Methods. I totally believe that it's origin was with A.E. Waite who basically was trying to move The Pictorial Key to the Tarot.  Tarot divination was something that Waite himself sneered at, ironically. He was only interested in Tarot for the spiritual meanings of the major arcana. The irony is quite delicious: he is only remembered for a deck that he thought was his elasxt significant work, one at which he sneered.

[Cookie]

I think the Celtic Cross is a bastardised version of a Romany Gypsy spread.  Gypsies were the fortune tellers of Europe & the Middle-east centuries before Waite's book was published ... pretty sure it didn't originate from the old duffer. 

[Raggydoll]

I definitely don’t think Waite made up the actual spread but I do think he put the ‘ancient’ and ‘celtic’ in the description. I have heard Mary Greer speculating that Waite might have had high functioning autism, which could explain the way he came across in certain contexts. 

[Cookie]

11 minutes ago, Raggydoll said:

I definitely don’t think Waite made up the actual spread but I do think he put the ‘ancient’ and ‘celtic’ in the description. I have heard Mary Greer speculating that Waite might have had high functioning autism, which could explain the way he came across in certain contexts. 

yeah , that would sense; his books on the kabbalah are just total intellectual & religious snobbery.  I think he pissed loads of people off with his pomposity.  He was probably a Savant or something.  

[Eric13]

His Pictoral book does say, in his own way of writing, that it, and the cards are really designed and open for interpretation. I think he just got lucky and found the Celtic Cross somehow and ran with it. He was also a magician by trade, I don't know about a tarot card reader. 

[Eric13]

@jiacovelli Thank you for that link. That was a fascinating read. I've always felt there's a link between the Grail and the tarot Cups. Waite makes it pretty obvious. 

[devin]

11 hours ago, Raggydoll said:

I have heard Mary Greer speculating that Waite might have had high functioning autism, which could explain the way he came across in certain contexts. 

11 hours ago, Cookie said:

yeah , that would sense; his books on the kabbalah are just total intellectual & religious snobbery.  I think he pissed loads of people off with his pomposity.  He was probably a Savant or something. 

Wasn't intellectual/religious snobbery and pomposity pretty much de rigueur at the top-end of old school occultism? There are many ways of being in the world. 

[kavindave1111]

On 2/22/2019 at 3:53 AM, Eric said:

Thank you, Rose Lalonde. I'll look into this. And thanks for the web site, never knew this existed. I'll check this out too.

 

[Raggydoll]

42 minutes ago, devin said:

Wasn't intellectual/religious snobbery and pomposity pretty much de rigueur at the top-end of old school occultism? There are many ways of being in the world. 

I can’t really comment on that because I honestly don’t know. I’ve been told that there was a kind and funny side to Waite too, but that he for some reason wrote in a more stiff and elaborate/elusive way. I have seen some of his softer quotes on love and life and I don’t think he was quite the pompous ass that Crowley made him out to be (at least not all of the time). I know that Mary has studied Waite and his works to a great extent and she did not just casually throw around the autism speculation. I’m not an expert on autism nor am I an expert on Waite, but I do know a bit about both those topics and I can see where Mary got that impression. I have several friends and family members on the spectrum and a few of them share similar traits as him. 

[gregory]

Waite himself said the spread had been around for a while.

 

Quote

Waite makes a reference to the Celtic Cross and describes it as “a short process which has been used privately for many years past in England, Scotland, and Ireland.”

But Llewellyn say he invented it. I don't buy that - Kwaw (from AT) who really knows his stuff, said it was Florence Farr who created it. In may have been - Brodie-Innes says:

 

Quote

"As to the divination or fortune telling, there are many ways of laying out the cards; I have myself been shown over a dozen, and I am persuaded there are more, some of them peculiar to indvidual diviners. The first method described by Mr Waite has long been familiar to me. It was sometimes used among others by Mrs Florence Farr Emery, but the devinatory meanings were entirely different". ("The Tarot Cards" an article of The Occult Review Feb 1919).

The history of the Celtic Cross Tarot spread suggests that this spread originated in Europe and is believed to be a modification of earlier spreads which were laid out in the form of a cross.

 

https://tarotamber75.wordpress.com/2012/12/14/history-of-the-celtic-cross-tarot-spread/

 

Why it is all over the place ? Because Kaplan included it in the first decks he started selling when he popularised tarot big time in the 60s and 70s. And others who wanted to join the bandwagon seemed to feel it was THE thing. Even now far too many decks come out with it as a good spread for beginners - which is enough to put them off for life. It is not the best way to start. But as the second deck published by Kaplan (USG) WAS the Waite-Smith, and as PKT is big on it, he put it in his LWB and the rest is history.

[Raggydoll]

The one thing I find interesting is why Waite decided to write about his own pseudonym in third person (Grand Orient) in his Pictorial key. He actually critiques his own writing. Maybe he was trying to confuse people so they wouldn’t know that he was behind that pseudonym or maybe he was amused by the whole thing. Anyway. With that in mind he might well have presented the history of the Celtic cross falsely. And yes, I too find it way more likely that Florence created or introduced it. 

[kavindave1111]

On 2/22/2019 at 3:26 AM, Rose Lalonde said:

The Tarot Association talks about the history of the Celtic Cross a lot. It showed up in their founder's book Tarosophy, and for free you can read the article on its history on page 22 of the first issue of Tarosophist magazine, by the Tarot Association.

Thanks for Reference 

[Barleywine]

I have to agree it's not the best place for a beginner to start. I did so because the only options I could find back when tarot books were scarce were the Celtic Cross, the Astrological spread and the Opening of the Key. I found the CC to be the most approachable of the three (and I was an astrologer well before I was a tarot reader). I used it almost exclusively until I joined AT in 2011 and started making my own spreads. I do think, at least in the ways I've tweaked it, that it's a real workhorse when more detail is needed.

[Eric13]

Waite, in his Pictoral Key writes in a manner that tries to get us all to think creatively. He even says to not use his specific definitions but even to come up with your own. I like the way he writes, or the way his Pictoral book came out. I keep it handy for reference along with several other books. But maybe he also talked that way in real life as well. Many writers have the gift, and it is a gift, to be able to take what's in your head and put it on paper. The greatest writers write metaphorically and a  large aspect of reading the cards is to interpret them metaphorical also. But as far as Waites religious views, well, the Tree of Life is the Ten of Pentacles in his deck. A lot of these so called secret societies of the early 1900's, late 1800's who began making tarot decks leaned toward being agnostic. I see everything from Buddhism to Christianity in these decks, including the site deck. And lets not forget the decks that go back to the 1600's. 

However, it does seem that Wiate simply found and ran with the CC.

[chongjasmine]

I don't know the origins of the celtic cross but I love this spread very much. It reminds me of the cross of Jesus.

[devin]

On 8/13/2019 at 10:41 AM, Raggydoll said:

I can’t really comment on that because I honestly don’t know. I’ve been told that there was a kind and funny side to Waite too, but that he for some reason wrote in a more stiff and elaborate/elusive way. I have seen some of his softer quotes on love and life and I don’t think he was quite the pompous ass that Crowley made him out to be (at least not all of the time). I know that Mary has studied Waite and his works to a great extent and she did not just casually throw around the autism speculation. I’m not an expert on autism nor am I an expert on Waite, but I do know a bit about both those topics and I can see where Mary got that impression. I have several friends and family members on the spectrum and a few of them share similar traits as him. 

Well, Crowley's another example isn't he? Anyway, I think it was just the style of the time.... forget IMHO.... say it like you mean it and everyone else's an idiot! As for the autism thing.... yes, ditto with my family.... but that's another topic for another forum....