The Magician
The Magician is the second Major Arcana card, numbered I. In the oldest Italian decks it was called Il Bagatto — a street performer or trickster with tools on a table, not the ceremonial sorcerer later esoteric tradition depicts.
Last reviewed: 2026-07-21
Historical fact
In 15th-century Italian decks, this card was Il Bagatto ('the little one', a street juggler or trickster), shown with simple tools of his trade on a table — not a ceremonial magician. The reinterpretation as a figure of occult power commanding the four elements comes from 18th-19th century French and English esoteric readings, not the original image.
Interpretation — Rider-Waite-Smith / Golden Dawn
In the 1909 version, the Magician stands before a table holding the four suit symbols (cup, sword, wand, pentacle), one arm raised to the sky and one pointing to the earth. It represents manifestation, directed will, skill, and the conscious use of available resources.
Interpretation — Thoth (Aleister Crowley)
In the Thoth deck, the card is called 'The Magus' and tied to Mercury and the Hebrew letter Beth. It represents communication, intellect, and the link between the spiritual and material worlds — the messenger who turns idea into form.
Curiosities
- The infinity symbol (lemniscate) above the Magician's head in the Rider-Waite-Smith version doesn't exist in older Marseille decks, where the figure wears only a wide-brimmed hat — the lemniscate is an early 20th-century esoteric addition.
- The etymology of 'Bagatto' is debated among Tarot historians: one common hypothesis ties the name to 'bagatella' (trinket, trifling thing), reinforcing the original character's low social status as a street performer, not a figure of power.
- The Magician's association with Mercury in the Thoth system echoes a much older, recurring feature of comparative mythology: the messenger-trickster figure who moves between worlds, also present in the Greek Hermes and the Norse Loki.
For researchers
Tarot art historians, comparing Marseille decks with the Rider-Waite-Smith version, note a recurring pattern: esoteric symbols that now seem 'obvious' in the card's iconography — such as the Magician's lemniscate — are datable additions from the early-20th-century English occult movement (the Golden Dawn), not elements present since the deck's Italian origin. This pattern of retroprojection — reading elaborate esoteric meanings back into older, secular images — is discussed by Michael Dummett as one of the main mechanisms by which Tarot gained its reputation for ancient wisdom, despite its documented origin as a Renaissance card game with no connection to occultism.
This section presents one tradition's interpretation, not a verifiable fact.
Frequently asked questions
- Was the Magician always a sorcerer figure?
- No. Originally he was Il Bagatto, a street performer or small-time trickster — the ceremonial-magician reading is a later esoteric reinterpretation from the 18th-19th centuries.
- What do the four objects on the table represent?
- In the Rider-Waite version, the cup, sword, wand and pentacle represent the four Minor Arcana suits and, by extension, the four classical elements — water, air, fire and earth.
- Is the infinity symbol above the Magician's head ancient?
- No. It's an addition from the 1909 Rider-Waite-Smith deck. Older Marseille decks show the same figure wearing only a wide-brimmed hat, with no infinity symbol at all.
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).