The Rider Waite Smith Tarot deck is probably the most popular and well-known of all the Tarot decks available today. The name comes from William RIDER & Son, the original publishers, Arthur Edward WAITE, the scholar and mystic who commissioned the creation of this deck, and Pamela Colman SMITH, the talented but often overlooked artist who drew the Rider-Waite images ( as it is often known) Tarot deck. Waite and Smith were members of the Order of the Golden Dawn, a famous but short-lived 19th-century occult group.
The RWS Tarot deck was published in 1909 and was the first widely available deck with illustrated minor arcana cards. The 56 cards of the Minor Arcana, also known as “pips”, now had a great deal of symbolism depicted in illustrations, as did the 22 cards of the Major Arcana. Until then, the numbered Minor Arcana cards in a Tarot deck showed only 4 Cups, or 6 Wands or 8 Swords. The RWS Tarot with its illustrated “nuggets”, together with the evocative images of the Major Arcana finally revolutionized the world of Tarot. When Waite designed his Tarot deck, he kept the basic sequence of the cards, although he changed the numbering of the Strength and Justice cards in the Major Arcana. There is some discussion as to who actually designed the Minor Arcana cards: did Waite conceive of them and give Smith full instructions, or did he just tell Smith his ideas and allow him to unleash his artistic talents to create the images? Each card bears Pamela Colman Smith’s monogram, usually in one of the bottom corners.
Tragically, the original printing plates were destroyed in the bombing of London and the publication came to an end. In 1971, US Games Inc. began publishing a copyrighted facsimile version of the deck.
These days there are many, many decks that follow the basic RWS Tarot deck template. There are versions of RWS that have been recolored but retain the original line drawings. Versions that have been redrawn generally have the same basic shapes and settings on cards with similar symbolism. An RWS type of deck is generally recommended for beginners, as the basic visual scenes can be more easily associated with key words to make it easier to remember and understand the meanings of each card. However, there are also many experienced readers whose favorite reading platform is an RWS or a variant. Most beginner and novice books use RWS deck illustrations for learning purposes.
One thing is for sure, if Arthur Edward Waite and Pamela Colman Smith hadn’t collaborated and created the RWS Tarot deck, Tarot decks would be quite different from what we are used to today.
