Five of Pentacles
Five of Coins (Deniers, Tarot de Marseille) · Lord of Material Trouble (Golden Dawn) · Worry (Thoth)
The Five of Pentacles shows two poor figures passing a lit church window in the snow: a card of hardship and exclusion, but also of help that may be closer than it seems.
Upright hardship · worry · exclusion · financial strain · isolation · need · loss of security
Reversed recovery · help accepted · improving finances · spiritual comfort · lingering hardship · end of a difficult period
- Astrology
- Mercury in Taurus (first decan)
- Element
- Earth
- Number
- 5
- Golden Dawn title
- Lord of Material Trouble
- Yes or no
- No
Upright
Upright, the Five of Pentacles is traditionally the card of material trouble. It describes hard times, money worries, a sense of being left out in the cold, or the loss of something that once made one feel secure. Readers in the Waite–Smith tradition often point out that the lighted window is right beside the travellers: help, shelter or community is near, if they will look up and ask.
In love, the card can describe two people who stay together through difficulty, or loneliness and a feeling of being shut out. Some readers note that Waite himself mentioned an older reading of the card as one of lovers and affinities.
At work and in finances it may point to a lost job, a lean period, unexpected costs or anxiety about providing for oneself. It does not predict permanent poverty.
The advice is to seek support rather than endure in silence: accept help, reach out to community, and remember that hardship is a season, not a sentence.
Reversed
Reversed, the Five of Pentacles is usually read as recovery from hardship. Help arrives or is finally accepted, finances begin to improve, or the person finds a way back into community. Some readers keep a more cautious reading: difficulties continue, but the worst may be past.
Many readers do not reverse cards and read the upright meaning everywhere. When reversals are used, this card frequently signals that the long winter is ending, while advising patience, practical steps and a willingness to keep accepting the support that made recovery possible.
The image
Two figures make their way through a snowstorm at night. One, a man on crutches with a bandage round his head, hobbles forward; the other, a woman wrapped in a shawl, walks barefoot beside him with her head bowed. Above and behind them a stained-glass window glows with warm light. It shows five pentacles arranged in a pattern sometimes described as a tree or as a branching design. The travellers do not look up at it.
History
In the Tarot de Marseille the Five of Coins is a geometric arrangement of four disks around a central one, and Smith's winter scene, created for the Rider–Waite–Smith deck in 1909, has no forerunner there. Waite's 1910 Pictorial Key calls the figures two mendicants passing a lighted casement and gives the meaning as material trouble above all; he adds, however, that some cartomancers read the card as one of love and lovers, concordance and affinities. Reversed, he lists disorder, chaos, ruin, discord and profligacy. The modern focus on hardship and exclusion follows the image.
Symbolism
The snow, the cold and the bare feet are emblems of want; the church window is an emblem of shelter, charity and spiritual consolation. The irony that the travellers pass the light without seeing it is central to most modern readings. The bandage and crutches add the sense of injury or burden. The window's pentacles, arranged above them, suggest that material and spiritual help are both available.
The Golden Dawn attributed the card to the first decan of Taurus, ruled by Mercury, with the title "Lord of Material Trouble"; Crowley named it "Worry". The fives belong to Geburah, the sefirah of severity, and in each suit they mark a crisis. Mercury in fixed, earthy Taurus has been read as anxious thought about money and resources. The trump of Taurus, The Hierophant, is often recalled when discussing the church in the picture.
In a reading
Readers usually treat the Five of Pentacles as a call to look for support. With the Six of Pentacles it can point to help received; with the Four of Pentacles, to fear of loss; with the Ten of Swords, to a hard ending. In a past position it may describe a difficult period that shaped present caution. Many readers stress that tarot describes possibilities and moods rather than fixed outcomes. See the minor arcana for the fives in each suit.
Sources and further reading
- The Pictorial Key to the Tarot — A. E. Waite, 1910
- The Book of Thoth — Aleister Crowley, 1944
- The Golden Dawn — Israel Regardie, 1937
- Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom — Rachel Pollack, 1980
- Tarot for Your Self — Mary K. Greer, 1984