Pentacles

What is the suit of Pentacles?

The suit of Pentacles is the earth suit of the tarot, a group of 14 Minor Arcana cards about work, money, the body, home and everything that is built slowly and lasts. Its emblem is a gold disc marked with a five-pointed star; in older decks it was simply a coin. If Wands are the spark that starts a project, Swords its plan and Cups the love you feel for it, Pentacles are what it produces: the wage, the house, the finished object, the skill in your hands.

Here is the full suit in order, with what each card covers and the planet and sign the Golden Dawn assigned to it:

No.	Card	What it covers	Planet in sign
1	Ace of Pentacles	a tangible opportunity, a seed planted	root of earth
2	Two of Pentacles	juggling, adaptability	Jupiter in Capricorn
3	Three of Pentacles	craft, teamwork, recognition	Mars in Capricorn
4	Four of Pentacles	holding on, saving, control	Sun in Capricorn
5	Five of Pentacles	hardship, feeling left out in the cold	Mercury in Taurus
6	Six of Pentacles	giving and receiving, generosity	Moon in Taurus
7	Seven of Pentacles	patience, waiting for the harvest	Saturn in Taurus
8	Eight of Pentacles	apprenticeship, diligent work	Sun in Virgo
9	Nine of Pentacles	self-sufficiency, earned comfort	Venus in Virgo
10	Ten of Pentacles	family, legacy, lasting security	Mercury in Virgo
Page	Page of Pentacles	a student, a serious beginning	earth of earth
Knight	Knight of Pentacles	slow, reliable progress	earth on the move
Queen	Queen of Pentacles	nurturing abundance, practical care	water of earth; Capricorn
King	King of Pentacles	established wealth, dependable leadership	earth fully ripened

The numbered cards are spread across the three earth signs in ten-degree slices: the Two to Four in Capricorn, the Five to Seven in Taurus, the Eight to Ten in Virgo. Capricorn cards set up the work, Taurus cards weigh what it means to have and to lose, and Virgo cards refine effort into mastery and something to pass on. The titles the Order gave these cards trace the same arc: the Two is the Lord of Harmonious Change, the Four the Lord of Earthly Power, the Eight the Lord of Prudence.

From coins to pentacles: a short history

For most of its life this suit was money. The Mamluk cards that shaped Europe’s first playing cards in the late fourteenth century had a suit of coins, and the Italian decks to which trumps were added in the fifteenth century kept it as denari. In the Tarot de Marseille the suit is called deniers: flat, ornamented coins arranged in patterns, with no scene on any numbered card.

The name changed in the late nineteenth century, when the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn fixed the suit’s link with earth in the scheme Rider–Waite–Smith follows and took up the name Pentacles, which Lévi had already used, after the star-inscribed discs used as protective talismans in ceremonial magic. The shift widened the meaning. A pentacle is not only currency; it is anything that gains value through work and can be kept, protected and handed down.

The Rider–Waite–Smith deck of 1909 gave each numbered Pentacle a scene of its own, and Pamela Colman Smith’s pictures fixed the meanings most readers know today: two figures in the snow passing a lit church window, an apprentice carving the same disc again and again at his bench, a gardener leaning on his hoe and looking at a vine heavy with discs.

What Pentacles bring to a spread

Start with the courts. The Page of Pentacles is someone learning a trade and taking it seriously; the Knight, a person who is slow but keeps their word; the Queen, someone who feeds a household and makes people comfortable; the King, someone responsible for a structure they built. They need not be other people. A court card can also be the approach the reading recommends: the Knight of Pentacles as advice says do not rush.

Ask which floor of life the question lives on. Pentacles are the ground floor: salary, rent, the workplace, the body, the home, time itself. When one turns up in a love reading, look at the material foundation of the relationship, such as living together, shared money or how much time each of you gives. The Ten of Pentacles raises questions about family involvement, home and long-term arrangements; compare those themes with the commitments actually being discussed.

Weigh the emphasis and the gaps. When Pentacles dominate a spread, focus on resources, effort, schedules and practical limits. Their absence puts other themes in the foreground; compare those themes with the material facts of the question. Use the count to choose which details to examine, then read the individual cards in their positions.

Read reversals as too tight or too loose. A reversed disc is a hand clenched around what it has, or a hand that has let go of it. A reversed Four of Pentacles can mean finally loosening your hold or spending without thought; a reversed Eight, work that has turned careless or a craftsperson running on empty. Read the particular cards beside it, their positions and the question: a Four of Pentacles adds a different concern from a Six or Nine. The presence of another card from the suit is not enough to choose between overwork, carelessness and release.

Examine the practical potential. The Ace of Pentacles names a seed or an initial resource; ask what material you have and what a first task requires. The suit speaks about your attitude to money and your habits around it. Its sowing-and-harvest imagery distinguishes stages of effort: the Seven assesses its crop, the Eight works piece by piece, and the Nine represents earned comfort. Read those stages through the work and resources in the question.

Pentacles across four questions

Asking about a promotion. You draw the Three of Pentacles, the Seven of Pentacles and the Page of Swords. The Three concerns skilled collaboration; the Seven concerns assessing effort and results; the Page brings inquiry and close attention to information. Compare those themes with your work, the feedback already received and the criteria for the role. Ask which requirement is clear and which still needs a precise question.

A love reading full of earth. Three of five cards are Pentacles: the Four, the Six and the Knight. This set foregrounds security, holding on, giving and receiving, and a slow, methodical approach. Compare those themes with how time and resources are actually shared between you. Ask what each person contributes in practice and how you experience the pace of the relationship.

The Eight of Pentacles reversed after a long routine. You are tired and have noticed that care has slipped in work you repeat each day. Read the reversed Eight through that known pattern: repetition without attention, uneven effort or a standard that has become difficult to maintain. Examine one recurring task and where its quality changes, then ask what the work currently demands.

Pentacles missing from a money question. You ask about your finances and draw the Five of Cups, the Knight of Swords and the Moon. Loss, haste and uncertainty dominate this set. Compare the Five’s regret with a loss you can identify, the Knight’s urgency with decisions already under consideration, and the Moon’s uncertainty with information you lack. Keep the actual income, expenses and commitments in view while reading those themes.