The occult Tarot was born from a scholarly mistake. In 1781, , a French Protestant pastor and Freemason, published a volume of his encyclopedia, Le Monde Primitif . Upon seeing a Tarot deck, he became convinced it was a remnant of the lost "Book of Thoth" from ancient Egypt. He claimed that: The 22 trumps were an encoded alphabet of mystical wisdom.
The cards were brought to Europe by the Roma people (whom he mistakenly identified as Egyptians or "Gypsies").
Shortly after Gébelin’s publication, a Parisian print-seller named (writing as Etteilla ) took these theories further.
Although historically unfounded, this "Egyptian" narrative transformed the deck from a toy into a sacred text. 2. Etteilla and the First Divination Decks (1780s)
The occult Tarot was born from a scholarly mistake. In 1781, , a French Protestant pastor and Freemason, published a volume of his encyclopedia, Le Monde Primitif . Upon seeing a Tarot deck, he became convinced it was a remnant of the lost "Book of Thoth" from ancient Egypt. He claimed that: The 22 trumps were an encoded alphabet of mystical wisdom.
The cards were brought to Europe by the Roma people (whom he mistakenly identified as Egyptians or "Gypsies").
Shortly after Gébelin’s publication, a Parisian print-seller named (writing as Etteilla ) took these theories further.
Although historically unfounded, this "Egyptian" narrative transformed the deck from a toy into a sacred text. 2. Etteilla and the First Divination Decks (1780s)
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