Four of Pentacles
The Four of Pentacles is the fourth numeral card of the Pentacles suit. It is associated with control over, and retention of, material resources.
Last reviewed: 2026-07-22
Historical fact
In the Rider-Waite-Smith deck (1909), the Four of Pentacles shows a figure sitting rigidly, clutching one pentacle to the chest, balancing one on the head and one under each foot, with a city visible behind. In decks predating the Rider-Waite-Smith tradition, the card showed only four pentacles arranged in a symmetric pattern, without a human figure. The closed, defensive posture of the figure is a specific detail of Pamela Colman Smith's interpretation of this card in 1909.
Interpretation — Rider-Waite-Smith / Golden Dawn
In the Rider-Waite-Smith / Golden Dawn tradition, the Four of Pentacles represents attachment to possessions and material security, control, and, in excess, miserliness or resistance to change — protecting what one already has, sometimes at a cost. Reversed, it can indicate either a healthy release of control or a deeper material insecurity.
Interpretation — Thoth (Aleister Crowley)
In the Thoth deck, the card carries the title 'Power,' associated with the Sun in Capricorn. The reading emphasizes consolidated material dominion, but also the risk of stagnation when power is hoarded and defended rather than exercised — a reading close to the Rider-Waite-Smith idea of control, with additional focus on the question of personal power.
Curiosities
- Art historians including Stuart R. Kaplan trace much of the visual inspiration for Pamela Colman Smith's Minor Arcana scenes to the Sola-Busca tarocchi, a 1491 Italian deck — the earliest known tarot to illustrate every numeral card with a narrative scene rather than plain suit symbols — which Smith is believed to have studied before designing the 1909 Rider-Waite-Smith deck.
- The Golden Dawn assigned each of the 36 numeral Minor Arcana cards (2 through 10, across all four suits) to one of the 36 decans of the zodiac — a system dividing each sign into three 10-degree segments that originated in ancient Egyptian astronomy and was later adopted by Hellenistic astrology, as in Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos.
This section presents one tradition's interpretation, not a verifiable fact.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the Four of Pentacles mean in Tarot?
- It represents attachment to possessions and material security — control over resources that, in excess, can become rigidity, miserliness, or resistance to necessary change.
- Is the Four of Pentacles always a negative card?
- Not necessarily. It can also be read neutrally, as legitimate financial stability and caution — the context of surrounding cards in a spread determines whether the control it represents is healthy or excessive.
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).