Six of Swords
Six of Épées (Tarot de Marseille) · Lord of Earned Success (Golden Dawn) · Science (Thoth)
The Six of Swords shows a ferryman carrying a woman and child across water, and is read as a passage from trouble toward calmer conditions.
Upright transition · moving on · passage · recovery · travel · calmer waters · leaving behind
Reversed stuck · unfinished business · resisting change · turbulent passage · return to old problems
- Astrology
- Mercury in Aquarius (second decan)
- Element
- Air
- Number
- 6
- Golden Dawn title
- Lord of Earned Success
- Yes or no
- Yes
Upright
The Six of Swords upright is the tarot's card of moving on. A difficult chapter is being left behind, not triumphantly but steadily, with the burden carried along. In the Waite–Smith tradition it also has a literal meaning of a journey by water, and many readers still take it to signify travel.
In love it may describe a couple getting through a hard period together, or one person leaving a relationship that had become too stormy. The sense is of relief rather than celebration.
In work and finances, the card suggests a transition: a change of job, a move to a new place, a project steered out of crisis. Problems are not all solved, but the worst is passing.
The advice it offers is to keep going. Accept help, travel light where you can, and trust that the far shore will be quieter than the one you are leaving.
Reversed
Reversed, the Six of Swords is often read as a passage that has stalled. A move is delayed, a person feels unable to leave a situation, or the problems they hoped to escape travel with them. Some readers take it as a rough crossing: change is happening, but the water is choppy.
Reading reversals is a choice, and plenty of readers keep all cards upright. Where they are used, this reversal frequently asks what still needs to be resolved before one can truly move on.
The image
Smith's Six of Swords shows a ferryman standing at the stern of a flat boat, pushing it across the water with a long pole. In the boat sits a woman, hooded and bowed, with a child beside her; both are seen from behind. Six swords stand upright in the bow of the boat. The water on the right, nearest the ferryman, is ruffled, while the water ahead is smooth, and a wooded shore lies on the far side.
History
In the pip decks that dominated before 1909, including the Tarot de Marseille, the Six of Swords was a symmetrical pattern of curved blades. Pamela Colman Smith's ferry scene was new, though the idea of the card as a voyage was older: cartomantic tradition had long read it as a journey or message, and Waite's 1910 text lists journey by water, route, way, envoy and expedient. Reversed, he gives declaration, confession and publicity, with one account reading it as a proposal of love. Some writers have compared the scene to the mythic ferry of the dead, but there is no evidence that Smith or Waite intended this.
Symbolism
Six is the number of balance restored after crisis, and the sixes fall on Tiphareth, the central sefirah of harmony and beauty. Here the harmony is modest: a passage achieved rather than a peace won. The contrast between rough and calm water is the clearest symbol in the card, and the swords that travel in the boat suggest that one takes one's thoughts and memories along.
The Golden Dawn assigned the card to the second decan of Aquarius, ruled by Mercury, and titled it "Lord of Earned Success". Mercury, planet of travel, messengers and the intellect, fits both the journey and Crowley's choice of title, "Science", which he explained as the triumph of reasoned thought over the confusion of the earlier cards. See Zodiac & Planets for the decan system.
In a reading
Readers often use the card to describe a real move or journey, particularly beside the Knight of Wands or the Eight of Wands. With the Three of Swords it suggests healing after grief; with the Death card, a change that has already happened inwardly. In a future position it is usually read hopefully. In a position of challenge it may point to reluctance to leave, or to the difficulty of carrying responsibilities, such as children or dependants, through a transition.
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
- Secrets of the Waite-Smith Tarot — Marcus Katz & Tali Goodwin, 2015