Man Behind The Cards

Arthur Edward Waite was born in Brooklyn on October 2 1857. His father, an American citizen and a Captain in the American Merchant Marine, died at sea on Sept 29 1858. His widow left America and returned to Britain shortly afterwards.

The death of his 14 year old sister in 1874 led him into psychical research and then Spiritualism. This eventually led into his joining the Theosophical Society and in 1891, The Hermetic Order of The Golden Dawn.

Waite found himself in constant disputes within the Order due to his emphasis on mysticism rather than magic. Despite all this turmoil, Waite became the Grand Master of the organization in 1903 and immediately re-named it The Holy Order of the Golden Dawn. Many members left with William Butler Yeats to form another order and finally in 1914, Waite left The Golden Dawn.

Waite was the author of numerous books on divination, magic, the Cabala, Alchemy and the Rosicrucians. He translated and re-issued several important works on Mysticism and Alchemy.

Despite his prolific writing, Waite is best known for the deck of Tarot cards that he 'rectified' from the Golden Dawn descriptions and other images. He commissioned Pamela Coleman Smith to draw and paint his ideas and this deck was published in 1909.

This deck became known as the Rider-Waite, Rider (his publisher) or the Waite-Smith deck. It was the first deck to use symbolic pictures for the Minor Arcana instead of a literal translation (an illustration of eight cups for the Eight of Cups card).

He published The Key To The Tarot in 1910 and used his deck to illustrate his divinatory meanings.

Arthur Edward Waite will always be remembered for the gift he gave us by his interpretation of the Tarot and his collaboration with Pamela Coleman Smith.