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Celtic Cross Spread

 

The Celtic Cross is the most well-known tarot spread and also the largest available here, involving ten cards. This spread begins with a pair of crossing cards at the center of the issue, essentially being two significators. When two significators are involved, they may strengthen or oppose each other, which speaks of the nature of the situation. Above and below the initial cross, we have two cards which are symbolic of the intellectual (top) and emotional (bottom) basis of the issue. The Before and After cards show the past and immediate future.

At the right, four cards are laid out, going upward. At the bottom you have a card representing yourself, and the next card shows how others may affect the situation. Card #9 indicates what you may be hoping for, or possibly, what you hope will not happen. Finally at the top is the outcome, meaning the distant or ultimate future.

Spread Positions

  1. This is it (what you asked about)
  2. This crosses it (strengthens or opposes)
  3. This crowns it (higher influences)
  4. It rests upon this (lower influences)
  5. This came before
  6. This comes next
  7. This is you
  8. The external world around you
  9. Your hopes, fears, and secret desires
  10. The result or outcome

 

 

 

Celtic Cross

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Celtic Cross Reading

The Crown

The Hanged Man

The Outcome

Page of Wands


Hopes and Fears

10 of Swords


External Forces

The Tower


The Querent

2 of Swords

The Recent Past

Queen of Pentacles

The Crossing Card

4 of Pentacles


The Significator

6 of Pentacles

The Future

4 of Swords


Foundation card


The Hierophant

 

 

The Significator represents what the main theme of the reading deals with, the initial situation.

 

 

6 of Pentacles

A person in the guise of a merchant weighs money in a pair of scales and distributes it to the needy and distressed. It is a testimony to his own success in life, as well as to his goodness of heart.

Reversed Meaning:

Desire, cupidity, envy, jealousy, illusion, resentment, rivalry, grudge.

 

 

 

 

The Crossing Card denotes an added impulse that compounds the initial card, whether complimentary or contradictory.

 

4 of Pentacles

A crowned figure, having a pentacle over his crown, clasps another with hands and arms; two pentacles are under his feet. He clings to what he has.

Upright Meaning:

Possessiveness, desperation, obsession, gift, legacy, inheritance, materialism.

 

 

 

 

The Crown stands for what the asker is aware of consciously.

 

The Hanged Man

A man hangs upside down from the Tau cross. This is a card of self-sacrifice and enlightenment.

Upright Meaning:

Wisdom, circumspection, discernment, trials, sacrifice, augury, prophecy, pause, reflection, ideas, imagination, meditation.

 

 

 

 

Foundation card reveals unconscious driving forces that the querent may not be aware of.

 

The Hierophant

Seated on his throne, the Pope symbolises the male understanding of the spiritual workings of the world and traditional values. Two monks flank him on either side.

Reversed Meaning:

Society, concord, overkindness, weakness, doormat, misinterpretation, misunderstanding.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Recent Past represents past events and concerns.

 

Queen of Pentacles

The face suggests that of a dark, intelligent woman, who has the quality of greatness. She contemplates her pentacle, using it as a tool of skrying and divination.

Upright Meaning:

Opulence, generosity, magnificence, liberty, meditation, divination, intelligence, dignity, potence, grand, important, majestic.

 

 

 

 

The Future depicts that which lies ahead.

 

4 of Swords

The effigy of a knight in the attitude of prayer, at full length upon his tomb.

Reversed Meaning:

Wise administration, circumspection, economy, avarice, precaution, testament.

 

 

 

 

The Querent represents the asker and their attitude towards the subject of the reading.

 

2 of Swords

A hoodwinked female figure balances two swords upon her shoulders.

Reversed Meaning:

Imposture, falsehood, duplicity, disloyalty, treason, back-stabbing.

 

 

 

 

External Forces represents the influence of others in your life as well as trends in your relationships with others.

 

The Tower

Lightning strikes the top of a Tower, knocking the crown off the top. Reminiscent of the Tower of Babel, two figures fall from grace.

Upright Meaning:

Misery, calamity, deception, ruin, catastrophe, distress, adversity, disaster, discord, falling apart, going all to pieces, injury.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hopes and Fears shows the expectations you have concerning the outcome of your question.

 

10 of Swords

A murder victim, pierced by ten swords showing the act of excessive force.

Upright Meaning:

Pain, affliction, tears, sadness, desolation. It is not especially a card of violent death, but the feeling of utter victimisation and hopelessness.

 

 

 

 

The Outcome of your question. Interpret this card in the context of the entire reading and as an indicator of the path you are currently on, but not necessarily bound to.

 

Page of Wands

A young man stands in the act of proclamation. He is unknown but faithful, and his tidings are strange.

Reversed Meaning:

Anecdotes, announcements, bad news. Also, indecision and the anxiety which accompanies it.