The Tarot Emperor has real concrete power in abundance. He’s no politician in need of allies and careful diplomacy. He’s raw force. Anybody dealing with him should yield or else perish. On the Tarot Emperor card, he sits firmly on the throne, but in armor — he will stand up and strike at the moment he is challenged. He tolerates nothing but obedience… The Emperor on this Tarot card is indeed a warrior ruler. He sits on a stone throne with his armor on, eager to do battle. The image on the card suggests another warrior ruler, the legendary King Arthur, but it might as well be Alexander, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, or Genghis Khan. It’s the ruler with the force and the firmness to strike down any opposition… So, if the Tarot Emperor card refers to a person, which it often does in divination, it’s someone you just have to obey whether you want to or not. He or she has the power to decide the outcome and it would cost you very dearly indeed to oppose. You are likely to be aware of this beforehand, since you know what power you are up against… If the Tarot Emperor card in your divination spread refers to an event, you have to accept that the outcome is out of your hands. It’s decided elsewhere and you just have to comply — or suffer the consequences. As they say: You can’t fight city hall… If the Tarot Emperor card has a position in the divination spread referring to you, though, it says that you have the power to force the outcome of your choosing, but probably not without a fight. Don’t worry, you will win it.
First Appearance Ducal courts of northern Italy (c. 1440)
First Publisher ○
Appearance List Sola Busca (1490s) — earliest surviving deck [Open Culture] [WaiteSmith.org]; Monde primitif… (Vol. 8: “Du Jeu des Tarots”) (1781) by Antoine Court de Gébelin; Manière de se récréer avec le jeu de cartes nommées Tarots (1783–1785) by Etteilla (Jean-Baptiste Alliette); Dogme et rituel de la haute magie (1856) by Éliphas Lévi; The Tarot: Its Occult Signification, Use in Fortune-Telling, and Method of Play (1888) by S. L. MacGregor Mathers; Le Tarot des Bohémiens (1889) by Papus (Gérard Encausse); Rider Waite Tarot (1909) by A. E. Waite and Pamela Colman Smith [WaiteSmith.org]; The Tarot of the Bohemians (1910) by A. P Morton [Internet Archive]; The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911, 1959) by A. E. Waite and Pamela Colman Smith; Le tarot des imagiers du moyen âge (1926) by Oswald Wirth; The Book of Thoth: A Short Essay on the Tarot of the Egyptians (1944) by Aleister Crowley; Le Tarot de Marseille (1949) by Paul Marteau; The Tarot Revealed (1960) by Eden Gray; Tarot Cards for Fun and Fortune Telling (1970) by Stuart R. Kaplan; The Encyclopedia of Tarot (Vol. 1) (1978) by Stuart R. Kaplan.
Sample Read The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911, 1959) by A. E. Waite and Pamela Colman Smith [Internet Archive]
Description The Tarot Emperor has real concrete power in abundance. He’s no politician in need of allies and careful diplomacy. He’s raw force. Anybody dealing with him should yield or else perish. On the Tarot Emperor card, he sits firmly on the throne, but in armor — he will stand up and strike at the moment he is challenged. He tolerates nothing but obedience… The Emperor on this Tarot card is indeed a warrior ruler. He sits on a stone throne with his armor on, eager to do battle. The image on the card suggests another warrior ruler, the legendary King Arthur, but it might as well be Alexander, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, or Genghis Khan. It’s the ruler with the force and the firmness to strike down any opposition… So, if the Tarot Emperor card refers to a person, which it often does in divination, it’s someone you just have to obey whether you want to or not. He or she has the power to decide the outcome and it would cost you very dearly indeed to oppose. You are likely to be aware of this beforehand, since you know what power you are up against… If the Tarot Emperor card in your divination spread refers to an event, you have to accept that the outcome is out of your hands. It’s decided elsewhere and you just have to comply — or suffer the consequences. As they say: You can’t fight city hall… If the Tarot Emperor card has a position in the divination spread referring to you, though, it says that you have the power to force the outcome of your choosing, but probably not without a fight. Don’t worry, you will win it.
