Page of Swords

  • Arcana Minor
  • Suit Swords
  • Figure on this site The young rune-carver
Historical evidence

In the earliest decks

The Page of Swords is the lowest court card of the suit of swords. Its rank has had several names: fante in Italian, valet in French, and knave, page or squire in English. Playing cards reached Europe from the Islamic world in the later fourteenth century, and the first court cards there had only three ranks per suit. Before 1390, according to Wikipedia’s account of court cards, Italy and Spain had replaced the earlier lower ranks with a standing knave and a mounted knight. Tarot, which began in fifteenth-century Italy as a card game, added queens, giving four court cards per suit.

The Visconti-Sforza decks of northern Italy (about the mid-1400s) went further. The Cary-Yale deck has six court ranks, including a knave and a damsel, and was probably never played.

In the Tarot de Marseille, the lowest court card is the valet. Its sword pips are drawn as curved lines, a North Italian habit that the Marseille pattern kept, and the earliest surviving Marseille-pattern cards, by Philippe Vachier, date from 1639. The Sola Busca deck, engraved in the late fifteenth century and probably painted in 1491, was the first to illustrate every plain suit card.

Historical evidence

The Rider-Waite-Smith card

In the Rider-Waite-Smith deck the Page of Swords shows a young figure, not a soldier on a battlefield. The sword is held upright in both hands, and the figure strides across rough ground under a restless sky, glancing around. Unlike older Italian decks, where a numbered sword card is mostly a pattern of blades, Pamela Colman Smith drew a full scene for every numbered card. Some scholars think she drew on the Sola Busca deck for these scenes, which Waite and Smith may have known from photographs published in 1907.

Myth and literature · Quotation

Waite’s description

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

Myth and literature · Context

Later meanings

The older Italian decks gave the Page of Swords no fixed meaning. Meanings came later, from occult writers. In the Golden Dawn tradition, a late nineteenth-century magical order, the court cards were reworked: the Page became the Princess, and the ranks were tied to the four elements. The Thoth deck followed this scheme. Waite’s Rider-Waite-Smith deck kept the traditional rank names.

Modern interpretation

As read on this site

This is the meaning used for readings here. Using the tarot to divine is a modern practice, and the Norse figure shown for each card is this site’s own association; the tarot began as an Italian card game. A short history is on the Tarot page.

Upright

Keywords: curiosity, fresh perspective, eager learning, genuine interest

The young rune-carver brings a fresh, curious mind to the old symbols, eager to learn rather than already certain of the answers. This card honors genuine intellectual curiosity, the kind that approaches a subject with real interest rather than performed expertise. Stay curious; the eagerness to learn is itself valuable here.

In general: A fresh, curious approach to learning something is exactly the right posture right now, more valuable than premature expertise.

In love: Approaching understanding a partner with real curiosity, asking questions rather than assuming you already know the answers.

In work: Bringing genuine intellectual curiosity to a new subject or skill, willing to be a beginner in service of actually learning it.

Reversed

Keywords: superficial cleverness, performed intelligence, lack of depth, unearned confidence

Cleverness without depth, all surface and no root, can mimic real understanding convincingly enough to fool both the speaker and the audience, at least for a while. The reversed page of staves has the quick wit but hasn't actually done the work of understanding the subject deeply. Worth checking whether the cleverness here has anything underneath it.

In general: Quick wit is being mistaken for genuine understanding. Worth checking whether there's depth underneath the surface fluency.

In love: Sounding insightful about a relationship without having actually done the harder work of understanding it.

In work: Presenting ideas confidently that haven't actually been thought through past their surface appeal.

Unsure whether this card represents a person or an approach? Read our guide to tarot court cards.

Draw a card for a reading · How to read cards together · Reversed cards

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