A plain-language definition for anyone researching rider-waite-smith tarot, what it is, where it comes from, and how practitioners use it.
85 plain-language definitions · Cited sources · Persona-authored
By Luna Ravenwood · Updated August 3, 2026
Divination and Dreams Guide
What is rider-waite-smith tarot?
The Rider-Waite-Smith tarot is a 78-card deck created in 1909 by Arthur Edward Waite (text) and Pamela Colman Smith (illustrations), published by the Rider Company. It is the most widely used and influential tarot deck in the modern English-speaking world.
Before 1909, most tarot decks showed the Minor Arcana as simple pip patterns, six cups, three swords, eight wands. The Rider-Waite-Smith deck broke this convention by illustrating every card with a narrative scene, making the deck readable for beginners and codifying the symbolic vocabulary most modern readers still use. The archetype suggests this single decision shaped the entire modern tarot tradition.
Pamela Colman Smith's illustrations were ahead of their time. She was a Jamaican-American artist working in the Symbolist tradition, and her ability to compress an archetype into a single image is why the deck has remained the standard for over a century. Arthur Edward Waite's accompanying text, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, set out the symbolic interpretations that most contemporary tarot books still draw on.
The Rider-Waite-Smith deck was commissioned through the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (a late-Victorian British esoteric society) and published in London in December 1909 by William Rider & Son. Waite drew on earlier tarot traditions, Etteilla, Éliphas Lévi, the Marseilles tarot, and combined them with Kabbalistic and Christian mystical symbolism. The deck has been continuously in print since publication and is now in the public domain in many jurisdictions.
The Rider-Waite-Smith deck is the recommended starting deck for most beginners because the symbolic vocabulary is so well documented. Free tools like the Daily Tarot Card generally use Rider-Waite-Smith imagery or compatible interpretations.
Even decks that don't visually copy the Rider-Waite-Smith often use its symbolic system underneath. Most modern tarot books reference Rider-Waite-Smith meanings as the baseline. Learning the 78 Rider-Waite-Smith card meanings opens almost any modern deck. Arthur Waite's Pictorial Key, now in the public domain, remains the primary source text.
These glossary terms are closely connected to rider-waite-smith tarot:
Rider was the British publisher, William Rider & Son. Waite wrote the accompanying book and designed the deck's symbolic structure. Smith illustrated the 78 cards. All three names appear in modern references; older references often used 'Rider-Waite' only, omitting Smith.
It's the most documented and most-referenced deck, making it the easiest to find study materials for. Many beginners start here; others choose a deck whose imagery resonates more personally. Both approaches are valid.
Yes, in many jurisdictions including the United States. The original 1909 illustrations and Waite's text are out of copyright, which is why so many free and inexpensive Rider-Waite-Smith decks exist.
Marseilles tarot is older (15th-19th century French) and uses pip-style Minor Arcana with no narrative illustration. Rider-Waite-Smith illustrated every Minor card with a scene, which is why it became the modern standard.
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