Chapter 43 Appendix Tarot Games

Tarot is the earliest known game played with tarot cards. It appeared in Europe in the 14th or 15th century and has been shrouded in mystery.There are many theories about the origin of this allegorical mysterious card, from the Egyptian "Necronomicon" to the Hebrew Kabbalah, and then to non-Christian wanderers. Many people may have borrowed the characters on the cards. Symbolic images, teaching the illiterate civilians. Most scholars believe that the gypsies brought tarot to Europe.Since most Europeans at the time mistakenly believed that Gypsies came from Egypt (because the word Gypsy sounds like Egypt), it is easy to understand why there were theories that the Egyptians created the tarot.This theory is still controversial.People just use tarot cards for crude divination, and they don't understand the exact meaning of the complex symbols of the cards.

Despite the criticism of the church, tarot cards became popular in Europe.Many of our earliest interpretations of cards strictly limited their use.Card games were only popular among the wealthy aristocrats, but this has allowed them to survive.The hand-painted faces are decorated with gold leaf and lapis lazuli powder, made of cards in royal courts, and other materials with exotic names, such as "dragon's blood" and "mummy's ashes". It is said that because the church strictly prohibited the use of cards to predict the future, games played with these cards came into being.Portable, simplistic cards made it accessible to the general public, and eventually tarot quickly became so popular that church officials and politicians also took part in the game.The Christian system of symbols was applied to the cards, perhaps in an attempt to make the cards more in line with church regulations.

In general, today's tarot decks have changed little from the decks of the past five hundred years.The complete tarot deck consists of twenty-two major arcana and fifty-six minor arcana, or decks.The first twenty-two cards are called trump cards, and the word trump comes from the Latin triumphi, which means triumph.The word tarot comes from the sixteenth-century Italian word tarocchi, the plural form of tarocco.The word was originally used to refer to the major arcana, and later to refer to the whole deck.Arcana is a Latin word meaning mystery or secret.Tarot is the French derived form of tarocchi, which is widely used in English as a word for cards.

For centuries, scholars have attempted to analyze the occult meanings of the Tarot cards, especially those of the Major Arcana.The very first card (number zero or twenty-two) is called "The Fool", and the subsequent cards are painted with magician, sun, moon, death, hermit, hanging man, lightning-struck Towers, demons, worlds. Regarding the meaning of the cards, the generally accepted theory is that the cards represent the journey of the Fool (ie, the fortune-teller) in his life.The Fool usually appears as a young man walking absent-mindedly on the edge of a cliff.He looked at the sun with both eyes, but did not look at the road under his feet. He was about to face the danger of falling off the cliff.A puppy barks at his feet, either trying to warn the Fool from the precipice, or to drive him away.The people the Fool meets: such as the magician, the hermit, and the Fool's experiences on the journey of life will allow him to understand himself and what is necessary to successfully complete the journey.

The fascination with poker and the enjoyment of playing it continued unabated to this day.Most modern card games are some variation of tarot, with all cards retaining almost all of the minor arcana (i.e., the deck), plus the joker (i.e., the fool's cards).There are four flower cards in the Minor Arcana: King, Queen, Knight and Servant, and each flower card is numbered from one (Ace) to ten.The early Minor Arcana was divided into four categories: swords, chalices, coins and boards, and today they are called spades, clubs, hearts and diamonds. The tarot game, still popular in some parts of Europe, is different in that it keeps the major arcana as well as the minor arcana.The game can be played with two or three players, and later the rules were changed to make it a four-player game.

There are many different versions of the Tarot rules.The following quote from Stuart Kaplan's The Complete Tarot contains the rules for the card game played by the characters in this book.It takes seventy-eight cards, the dealer deals twenty-five cards to each person, and the remaining three cards are kept on the table.When other people deal with the cards, the dealer has to pick out the three discarded cards in his hand and exchange them with the three cards on the table. Scores are recorded before the game begins.The twenty-two trump cards have different points, depending on which cards and how many cards the player is holding.Players can get extra points after "killing cards"-killing cards means that the big card eats the low card.The first one to get one hundred points wins.

The Fool is the lowest card score.It cannot eat any card, but it can be matched as any card.As far as we know, the beauty of the Fool card is that it can be used to replace and protect another more valuable card.For example, if the previous player plays a King of Grails, and the next player plays a Queen of Grails, then he can use the Fool to play instead to keep the Queen card. For those who want to learn more about tarot cards and tarot games, the following books are available: The Compendium of Tarot, Volume 1, by Stuart R. Kaplan, American Card Game Systems, Inc., New York, 1978 The Complete Tarot Guide, by Eden Gray, Gamecock Books, New York, 1981