The Chariot

From the Latin 'carrus', a wheeled vehicle. The card depicts a triumphal car, the kind used in the 'trionfi' processions that gave tarot its original Italian name. The imagery is inseparable from the Renaissance culture of the triumph.

From the Visconti-Sforza deck onward a young man stands in a chariot drawn by two horses, often crowned and holding a scepter, in the posture of a victorious commander. The image comes directly from the triumphal processions of Renaissance courts and from Petrarch's 'I Trionfi'.

Smith gave him a laurel wreath and a canopy supported by four columns studded with stars. The chariot is drawn not by horses but by two sphinxes, one black and one white, facing in opposite directions. A city lies behind him, and a crescent moon adorns his shoulders. The driver has conquered and now must steer opposing forces.

The black and white sphinxes are the opposing forces — light and dark, will and instinct — that the driver must hold in balance without being able to look back. The laurel marks victory; the starry canopy, the cosmos over which he has gained mastery; the city behind, the worldly achievement already won. The Chariot is the controlled forward motion of a unified will.

The Marseille Chariot is drawn by two horses and the driver holds reins and scepter. Waite's substitution of sphinxes emphasizes the mastery of opposites rather than mere military victory. In the Thoth deck Crowley draws the chariot with a scarab beetle (Khepri) on the canopy, assigns it to Cancer, and places a Holy Grail in the chariot, layering Egyptian and Grail symbolism.

The card echoes the Roman triumph, Plato's chariot of the soul in the 'Phaedrus', and the Renaissance 'trionfo'. Astrologically it corresponds to Cancer. As trump number 7 it represents the first major victory of the journey — outward success achieved through the discipline of inwardly opposed forces.