Tarot card meanings · Swords
What does King of Swords mean in tarot?
In A. E. Waite's Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910), the King of Swords upright means “Whatsoever arises out of the idea of judgment and all its connexions—power, command, authority, militant intelligence”, and reversed “Cruelty, perversity, barbarity, perfidy”.
Upright
Whatsoever arises out of the idea of judgment and all its connexions—power, command, authority, militant intelligence.Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, Part 3
Reversed
Cruelty, perversity, barbarity, perfidy.Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, Part 3
What does the picture show?
He sits in judgment, holding the unsheathed sign of his suit.Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, Part 3
Where does the King of Swords fall in a reading?
King of Swords belongs to the suit of Swords. On this site you draw three cards, which take three of the places in the ten-card method Waite describes: “This covers him”, “This crosses him”, “This is before him”. The same card reads differently in each place, and the I Ching cast beside it may agree or disagree.
Ask one question. Draw three cards, and cast an I Ching hexagram beside them to see where East and West agree. Free.
Draw three cardsWaite's words are quoted as printed, and left out where they speak of money, law, illness or disaster. The pictures are the 1909 deck drawn by Pamela Colman Smith. For entertainment and self-reflection.