logo Tarot Playing Cards Lenormand Runes I Ching Mah-Jong Dominoes Smileys 8-Ball Natal Reports Numerology Biorhythms

 

 

Celtic Cross Spread

 

The Celtic Cross is the most well-known tarot spread and also the largest available here, involving ten cards. This spread begins with a pair of crossing cards at the center of the issue, essentially being two significators. When two significators are involved, they may strengthen or oppose each other, which speaks of the nature of the situation. Above and below the initial cross, we have two cards which are symbolic of the intellectual (top) and emotional (bottom) basis of the issue. The Before and After cards show the past and immediate future.

At the right, four cards are laid out, going upward. At the bottom you have a card representing yourself, and the next card shows how others may affect the situation. Card #9 indicates what you may be hoping for, or possibly, what you hope will not happen. Finally at the top is the outcome, meaning the distant or ultimate future.

Spread Positions

  1. This is it (what you asked about)
  2. This crosses it (strengthens or opposes)
  3. This crowns it (higher influences)
  4. It rests upon this (lower influences)
  5. This came before
  6. This comes next
  7. This is you
  8. The external world around you
  9. Your hopes, fears, and secret desires
  10. The result or outcome

 

 

 

Celtic Cross

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Celtic Cross Reading

The Crown

3 of Wands

The Outcome

8 of Cups


Hopes and Fears

2 of Wands


External Forces

4 of Swords


The Querent

King of Swords

The Recent Past

Judgement

The Crossing Card

Page of Cups


The Significator

Page of Swords

The Future

2 of Pentacles


Foundation card


6 of Swords

 

 

The Significator represents what the main theme of the reading deals with, the initial situation.

 

 

Page of Swords

A lithe, active figure holds a sword upright in both hands, while in the act of power walking. He is passing over rugged land, and about his way the clouds are collocated wildly. He is alert and aware, looking this way and that, as if an expected enemy might appear at any moment.

Upright Meaning:

Authority, overseeing, secret service, vigilance, spying, examination.

 

 

 

 

The Crossing Card denotes an added impulse that compounds the initial card, whether complimentary or contradictory.

 

Page of Cups

A fair, pleasing, somewhat effeminate page, of studious and intent aspect, contemplates a fish rising from a cup to look at him. It is the pictures of the mind taking form.

Upright Meaning:

Fair young man, one impelled to render service and with whom the Querent will be connected; a studious youth; news, message; application, reflection, meditation.

 

 

 

 

The Crown stands for what the asker is aware of consciously.

 

3 of Wands

A calm, stately personage, with his back turned, looking from a cliff's edge at ships passing over the sea. Three staves are planted in the ground, and he leans slightly on one of them.

Reversed Meaning:

The end of troubles, suspension or cessation of adversity, toil and disappointment.

 

 

 

 

Foundation card reveals unconscious driving forces that the querent may not be aware of.

 

6 of Swords

A ferryman delivering passengers to the further shore. The course is smooth, and seeing that the freight is light, as the workload is not beyond his ability.

Reversed Meaning:

Declaration, confession, publicity; possibly a proposal of love.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Recent Past represents past events and concerns.

 

Judgement

An angel in the heavens blows a trumpet, calling the dead to rise from their graves.

Upright Meaning:

Change of position, renewal, finality, recompense, solution, promotion, redemption, validation, graduation, spiritual growth, final outcome.

 

 

 

 

The Future depicts that which lies ahead.

 

2 of Pentacles

A dancing young man has a pentacle in either hand, and they are joined by the lemniscate, the sign of eternity.

Reversed Meaning:

Enforced gaiety, simulated enjoyment, literal sense, handwriting, composition, exchanging letters.

 

 

 

 

The Querent represents the asker and their attitude towards the subject of the reading.

 

King of Swords

He sits in judgement, holding the unsheathed sword. He recalls the conventional symbol of justice in the Major Arcana, and he may represent this virtue, but he is rather the power of life and death.

Reversed Meaning:

Cruelty, perversity, barbarity, perfidy, bad intentions, a sharp tongue, insulting, insecurity, arrogance.

 

 

 

 

External Forces represents the influence of others in your life as well as trends in your relationships with others.

 

4 of Swords

The effigy of a knight in the attitude of prayer, at full length upon his tomb.

Upright Meaning:

Vigilance, retreat, solitude, hermit's repose, exile, tomb and coffin. It is these last that have suggested the design.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hopes and Fears shows the expectations you have concerning the outcome of your question.

 

2 of Wands

A tall man looks from a battlemented roof over sea and shore, holding a globe in his right hand, while a staff in his left rests on the battlement; another is fixed in a ring. The Rose and Cross and Lilly are on the left side.

Upright Meaning:

Marriage not possible, riches, fortune, magnificence, surprise, wonder, enchantment, emotion.

 

 

 

 

The Outcome of your question. Interpret this card in the context of the entire reading and as an indicator of the path you are currently on, but not necessarily bound to.

 

8 of Cups

A man of dejected aspect is deserting the cups of his felicity, enterprise, undertaking or previous concern.

Upright Meaning:

Giving joy, mildness, timidity, honour, modesty; the decline of a matter, or that a matter which has been thought to be important is really of slight consequence.