Five of Cups
The five of cups in the tarot's Minor Arcana: a cloaked figure looking at three spilled cups, two still standing behind him. A. E. Waite read it as loss, but with something left over.
Meaning
Waite describes the card: "A dark, cloaked figure, looking sideways at three prone cups two others stand upright behind him; a bridge is in the background, leading to a small keep or holding."
What does the Five of Cups mean?
Waite's meanings are "it is a card of loss, but something remains over; three have been taken, but two are left; it is a card of inheritance, patrimony, transmission, but not corresponding to expectations"; reversed, "news, alliances, affinity, consanguinity, ancestry, return, false projects". His list of additional meanings adds "generally favourable; a happy marriage; also patrimony, legacies, gifts, success in enterprise", and reversed, "return of some relative who has not been seen for long".
In older decks
In Italian packs the suit is coppe, cups: the earliest suit marks, the British Museum's catalogue of 1876 records, were coppe, danari, bastoni and spade, "cups, money, clubs, and swords". Papus reads it as "victory over the obstacles after a struggle".
See also
The Fool, The Magician, The High Priestess, The Empress, The Emperor, The Hierophant.
Sources
- The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, by A. E. Waite, William Rider & Son, London, 1910 (the sacred-texts.com transcription, on the Internet Archive), The Lesser Arcana; Some Additional Meanings of the Lesser Arcana
- The Tarot of the Bohemians, by Papus, Chapman & Hall, London, 1896, translated by A. P. Morton (scan on the Internet Archive), The Divining Tarot, second lesson: the minor arcana
- A Descriptive Catalogue of Playing and Other Cards in the British Museum, by W. H. Willshire, Trustees of the British Museum, London, 1876 (scan on the Internet Archive), General history: the marks of the suits
Last reviewed September 28, 2026 by Rory Hansen. How we research