The seven-card Horse Shoe is a convenient, basic layout that can be used to answer different types of questions, especially concerning questions where insight would be helpful. Like several other spreads, it has cards representing the past, present, and future.
The pinnacle of the Horse Shoe, looking like the top of the mountain, shows the obstacle or challenge that needs to be addressed and overcome. Card #6 suggests a course of action to meet this challenge. The final card shows the outcome or future, should this advice be followed.
Other clues are provided in Cards #3 and #5, which indicate hidden or outside influences that come into play, affecting the journey to your goal.
Obstacle  King of Pentacles |
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Hidden Influences  6 of Wands |
External Influences  7 of Wands |
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The Present  Knight of Wands |
Suggestion  King of Wands |
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The Past  7 of Pentacles |
The Outcome  The Lovers |
The Past Card represents past events that are affecting the question.
7 of Pentacles
A young man, leaning on his staff, looks intently at seven pentacles attached to a clump of greenery on his right; one would say that these were his treasures and that his heart was there.
Upright Meaning:
Money, business sense, barter, ingenuity, purgation, commerce, trade, deal, transaction, good economy, industry.
Knight of Wands
A man on a journey, armed with a short wand, and although armoured it is not on an errand of war. He is passing mounds or pyramids. The motion of the horse is a key to the character of its rider, suggesting his mission.
Reversed Meaning:
Rupture, division, interruption, discord.
6 of Wands
A laurelled horseman bears one staff adorned with a laurel crown; footmen with staves are at his side.
Reversed Meaning:
Apprehension, fear, as of a victorious enemy at the gate; treachery, disloyalty, gates being opened to the enemy, indefinite delay.
King of Pentacles
His face is rather dark, suggesting also courage, but stubborn. The bull's head is a recurrent symbol on the throne. The sign of this suit is engraved or blazoned with the pentagram, signifying the four elements of nature and the spirit which governs them. This suit is sometimes represented as coins or disks, and is symbolic of money and material goods or services.
Reversed Meaning:
Vice, weakness, ugliness, perversity, corruption, peril, bullheadedness, defiance, unruliness.
7 of Wands
A young man on a craggy eminence brandishing a staff; six other staves are raised towards him from below.
Upright Meaning:
Valour, discussion, wordy strife, negotiations, war of trade, barter, competition. It is further a card of success, for the combatant is on the top and his enemies may be unable to reach him.
King of Wands
The nature to which this card is attributed is dark, ardent, lithe, animated, impassioned, noble. The King uplifts a flowering wand, and wears what is called a cap of maintenance beneath his crown. He bears the symbol of the lion, which is emblazoned on the back of his throne.
Upright Meaning:
Dark man, friendly, countryman, generally married, honest and conscientious. The card always signifies honesty, and may mean news concerning an unexpected heritage to fall in before very long.
The Lovers
An angel unifies two lovers which are Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
Upright Meaning:
A choice, decision, attraction, love, beauty, trials overcome, happiness, fulfilment, romance, variety, pleasure.