Four of Wands
The four of wands in the tarot's Minor Arcana: four staves hung with a garland, two women raising nosegays, and a manor house beyond. A. E. Waite read it as country life, repose, harmony and prosperity.
Meaning
Waite's Key to the Tarot describes the design: "From the four great staves planted in the foreground there is a great garland suspended; two female figures uplift nosegays; at their side is a bridge over a moat, leading to an old manorial house."
What does the Four of Wands mean?
Waite's meanings are "they are for once almost on the surface—country life, haven of refuge, a species of domestic harvest-home, repose, concord, harmony, prosperity, peace, and the perfected work of these"; reversed, "the meaning remains unaltered; it is prosperity, increase, felicity, beauty, embellishment". His list of additional meanings adds "unexpected good fortune", and reversed, "A married woman will have beautiful children".
In older decks
In Italian packs the suit is bastoni, clubs, one of the four suit marks the British Museum's catalogue of 1876 gives for the earliest cards. Papus, who calls it the Four of Sceptres, reads it as "Obstacles to the Enterprise."
Read next
- Next in Tarot cardsFive of WandsThe five of wands in the tarot's Minor Arcana: a group of youths brandishing staves as if in sport or strife. A. E. Waite read it as imitation, as in a sham fight, and the struggle for riches.
- The same shape in Chinese radicalsMù 目The character for ‘eye’, and radical 109 of the 214 Kangxi radicals, under which characters for looking and seeing are filed.
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
The same shape elsewhere
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Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed September 30, 2026. How we research
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