The Fool
The Fool is the first card of the Tarot's Major Arcana, traditionally numbered 0. In many historical decks it is the only card without a fixed number, fueling centuries of debate over its place in the order — before the Magician, or outside any sequence at all.
Last reviewed: 2026-07-18
Historical fact
Tarot originated in 15th-century Italy as a card game called trionfi, played in the courts of Milan, Ferrara and Bologna. The oldest surviving examples are the Visconti-Sforza decks, hand-painted around 1440-1450. In these early decks, the Fool (Il Matto) depicted a vagrant or court jester in tattered clothes, with no esoteric association. For more than three centuries, Tarot was used exclusively as a card game.
Interpretation — Rider-Waite-Smith / Golden Dawn
In Arthur Edward Waite and Pamela Colman Smith's tradition (1909), the Fool shows a young man at a cliff's edge, carrying a small bundle, holding a white rose, with a dog at his feet. It represents the start of a journey, a leap of faith, innocence, and unlimited potential before any choice is made. Reversed, it's commonly read as recklessness that ignores real risk.
Interpretation — Thoth (Aleister Crowley)
In the Thoth deck (1938-1943), the Fool is tied to the element Air and the Hebrew letter Aleph. It represents the divine spark before form — pure, chaotic energy at the moment prior to creation, a more metaphysical reading than the Rider-Waite 'start of a journey' narrative.
This section presents one tradition's interpretation, not a verifiable fact.
Frequently asked questions
- Is the Fool card 0 or card 22 of the Tarot?
- It depends on the tradition. Older Italian and Central European decks often left the Fool unnumbered or placed it between Judgement and the World. Numbering it 0 at the start became standard mainly through 19th- and 20th-century esoteric systems.
- Was Tarot created for divination?
- No. Tarot began as a 15th-century card game. Divinatory use only appears starting in 1781, with Antoine Court de Gébelin, who claimed — without historical evidence — an ancient Egyptian origin.
Sources
- Michael Dummett. The Game of Tarot: From Ferrara to Salt Lake City (1980).
- Arthur Edward Waite. The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910).
- Aleister Crowley. The Book of Thoth (1944).
- Stuart R. Kaplan. The Encyclopedia of Tarot (1978).