Cult of Tarot Forum

Hi all. My fav deck atm is the shadow and light tarot. It's just beautiful and was gifted to me. However the minor arcana are all pip cards and I'm trying to learn how to read them.
I've done some research, reading about using numerology as a guide, and this seems feasible. I've read, to look for patterns but when I did this for the 8 of cups, I seen a group of 5 cups and a group of three cups, so thought of each of those meaning hopeing to get a clearer answer to what the 8 ment. But it doesn't quite work that way for me.
I have read a lot of ppl call them playing cRds as they are such an old design that is what they started as, so should I be reading into cartomancy to get a better idea??
I'm just trying to get a better idea of how to read these pip cards with minimal imagery. Any advice u can give me wpuld be appreciated cheers

There's a good article about this in the current issue of The Cartomancer magazine.

Otherwise, there's no single way to read pip cards. You need to develop your own technique. It is certainly feasible to read them as playing cards. My personal theory is that's how they were read in the past.

You were on the right track with your numerology but—to use your example—the 8 of cups would not be the combination of the 3 and 5 of cups.

For me, I would read 8s and 8s regardless of how the pips are arranged, BUT, noticing that the 8 is split into 5 and 3 is very respectable. I THINK Jodorowsky works this way in his book (I don't have a copy near me and it's been a while)

So, if you want to decipher the card that way, you need to think about what the relationship between what 3 means and what 5 means and then apply that to cups, which isn't the same as saying 3 of Cups and 5 of Cups.

So, with 5/3 there's an unequal distribution. things are off-balance. I don't know your numerology, but, simplistically, if 3 = growth and 5=disharmony, then the 8 of cups might suggest that things are moving in the wrong direction.

Caitlin Matthews "Untold Tarot" book has a lot of good information on ways to interpret pip cards. My gut says that you may find her "pips-as-trumps" method interesting.

Ahh wonderful, thankyou for your reply. Really appreciate it. I've also had a look at your mentioned book and the reveiws look great so I've just gone and purchased it. So thankyou. It's been hard trying to find information on how to read these cards, they are similar to the marseilles cards but not close enough. I just love the artwork of the major arcana so would love to be able to use the whole deck So thx for the help and advice. Looking forward to reading the book cheers