Question by Terry: Before the Magician took its place in the Tarot decks, what Major Arcana card was number one?
Cite: The Occult: A History –Colin Wilson
I never use wiki for a source. Too many errors.
Best answer:
Answer by down with gdi!
you’ve just given me the compulsion to investigate tarot properly, thanks.
Even if divination is forbidden by christianity. heh.
Add your own answer in the comments!
I’m not sure there is an easy, definitive answer to your question. In fact, the Magician isn’t always number one in modern decks.
I highly recommend you read the Wikipedia article on Tarot as a starting point. Afterwards, be sure to check the links at the bottom of that article.
the cards weren’t always necessarily numbered and some Tarot decks had more cards in them than others. The second card in the earliest surviving Tarot decks (eg, Visconti Sforza) was the Mountebank. This card also was sometimes called in some early decks The Juggler. It then became the Magician. Although cards were used for fortune telling from early times, the Tarot was not primarily used for fortune telling or occult studies until about the 18th century when French esotericists found new meaning and use for a deck of cards called Triomfi (Trumps) or Tarocchi or Tarot, that were used since at least the 14th century to play a game similar to Bridge.
The Magician has been call the cobbler in early decks