Tarot - 13 - Death Keychain | Something Is Already Ending
Description
Description
Death is thirteen, and in a great many old decks it is the only Major Arcanum left unnamed: just the number, because writing the word felt like inviting it. The Rider-Waite names it and then spends the picture arguing against the literal reading.
Look at what is in the frame. Waite describes a king, a child and a maiden falling before the rider while a prelate stands and waits for him. Behind all of them, between two towers, the sun is coming up. The card is a sunrise with a skeleton in the foreground, which is a fairly clear editorial position.
It gets pulled when something has already ended and has not been admitted to yet. Readers are near unanimous that it is not about literal death, and near unanimous that it is not gentle either. Endings are the price of anything changing.
What You're Getting
- Material: Hand printed in full color on 1/4 inch Baltic birch plywood
- Size: 1.25 by 2 inches
- Ring: 33mm round split ring
- Made: San Diego, California
How to Use It
- Carry it through a stretch you already know is over.
- Good on an altar during a clearing out, literal or otherwise.
- It stands up on a reading table as well as it hangs on keys.
Wear It With
Browse tarot and oracle decks, see the rest of the cards in keychains, and read our piece on the Hanged Man.
Wood, so the grain shows through the print differently on every one. Light enough for keys or a bag, and small enough to stand on an altar or sit on a reading table.