The Star

  • Arcana Major
  • Number XVII
  • Figure on this site the pole star over the sea
Historical evidence

In the earliest decks

The Star is one of the trump cards that were added to the ordinary four-suit Italian pack in the 15th century. The cards were called tarocchi and the trumps trionfi. They first appear in documents from northern Italy: Florence court records mention trionfi in 1440, and the first documented decks date from about 1440 to 1450 in Milan, Ferrara, Florence and Bologna. Tarot is Italian in origin.

The Visconti-Sforza decks were painted in the mid-15th century. The Pierpont Morgan Bergamo deck (about 1451) now holds 74 of its original 78 cards, and the two trumps said to be missing are the Devil and the Tower, so the Star is not among the losses.

In the later Tarot de Marseille pattern, which probably began in northern Italy and reached southern France around 1499, the card is numbered XVII. The Dodal trump plates (Lyon, dated 1715) label it “Le Toille”, a spelling of L’Étoile, “The Star”. The earliest surviving Marseille-pattern cards were made by Philippe Vachier in 1639, and most 17th-century examples come from Noblet, about 1650. The name “Tarot de Marseille” itself was coined only in 1856, by Romain Merlin.

Historical evidence

The Rider-Waite-Smith card

The Rider-Waite-Smith deck was published by William Rider & Son of London in December 1909. A. E. Waite gave the instructions and Pamela Colman Smith drew the pictures. In 1907 photographs of the Sola Busca deck, a Venetian deck of about 1490-1491, were donated to the British Museum, and some scholars think Smith saw them.

What can be said from Waite’s own text (quoted below) is what he asked for: a large eight-rayed star with seven smaller ones, a naked woman pouring water from two ewers onto land and sea, a bird on a tree at the right. The card keeps the number XVII and the name used in the Marseille tradition. Waite swapped the places of Strength and Justice in his deck, but he left the Star where it was.

Myth and literature · Quotation

Waite’s description

A great, radiant star of eight rays, surrounded by seven lesser stars—also of eight rays. The female figure in the foreground is entirely naked. Her left knee is on the land and her right foot upon the water. She pours Water of Life from two great ewers, irrigating sea and land. Behind her is rising ground and on the right a shrub or tree, whereon a bird alights. The figure expresses eternal youth and beauty. The star is l'étoile flamboyante, which appears in Masonic symbolism, but has been confused therein. That which the figure communicates to the living scene is the substance of the heavens and the elements. It has been said truly that the mottoes of this card are "Waters of Life freely" and "Gifts of the Spirit."

The summary of several tawdry explanations says that it is a card of hope. On other planes it has been certified as immortality and interior light. For the majority of prepared minds, the figure will appear as the type of Truth unveiled, glorious in undying beauty, pouring on the waters of the soul some part and measure of her priceless possession. But she is in reality the Great Mother in the Kabalistic Sephira Binah, which is supernal Understanding, who communicates to the Sephiroth that are below in the measure that they can receive her influx.

Myth and literature · Context

Later meanings

None of the later attributions below belongs to the early Italian decks. They were added by occultists, mostly from the late 18th century on.

In 1781 Court de Gébelin claimed an Egyptian origin for the tarot, and in his scheme the Star is linked to Sirius, the Dog Star. Scholars call these Egyptian claims unsubstantiated. Etteilla, who followed him around 1789, titled the card “Desolation”.

Waite, writing in 1910, called the figure the Great Mother in the Kabbalistic Sephira Binah (see his text above). Aleister Crowley’s Book of Thoth (1944) associates the card with Aquarius. The Golden Dawn, active from 1888 to 1903, taught tarot divination, but writers differ on the Star’s exact Hebrew letter and sign, so none is stated here as the Golden Dawn’s own.

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: hope, quiet renewal, guidance after darkness, steady reassurance

Sailors navigating the dark water found their way home by a single fixed point in the sky that never moved no matter how the storm tossed everything else. This card is hope, but a quiet, dependable kind, not euphoria, just a steady point of reference that confirms you're still oriented even when everything else feels uncertain. After a hard stretch, something is returning: not a dramatic rescue, but a small, reliable sign that you're still heading somewhere worth going.

In general: A small, steady sign of hope is more trustworthy right now than a dramatic one would be. Let it orient you.

In love: A quiet return of warmth or connection after a difficult period — not a grand reconciliation, just a steady, reassuring presence again.

In work: Clarity about direction returning after a period of confusion, arriving gently rather than as a sudden breakthrough.

Reversed

Keywords: despair, loss of direction, temporary hopelessness, disconnection from guidance

Despair has a way of convincing you the star was never there, that the sky itself has gone permanently dark. This is rarely true; it's usually just cloud cover, the storm itself blocking the view of something that's still fixed in place above it. If hope feels absent, that's worth questioning rather than accepting outright. Look up again, even when it feels pointless. The light tends to still be there.

In general: Hope feels absent, but that's more likely the weather than the actual state of things. Look again before concluding it's gone.

In love: Feeling like the connection or possibility has disappeared entirely, when it's more likely just obscured by a difficult current moment.

In work: Losing sight of why the work matters during a hard stretch. The purpose hasn't vanished; it's just hard to see through the current noise.

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