~ Wild Unknown 10 of Pentacles ~

Today’s card draw in the Discovering the Wild Unknown series is 10 of Swords.

I want to start off by providing an important notice, which will be included in all of this series. However, other things that will be included that you can skip to are:

• Card Description
• Considering the Card, where I look at how I would interpret certain imagery used
• Traditional Rider-Waite definition

I only include the latter as a comparison, to show how wandering down your own understanding of images and symbols can bring you to a similar meaning, though along a different path with different experiences. This is to help expand knowledge of the card.

I will not, however, be including the definitions from the guidebook, as that is not the point of this. Also, I don’t have rights to that material.

Important Note

I started this series because I had read that people struggled with the deck purely because the definitions in the Little White Book were very Rider-Waite-based, and that there wasn’t much wisdom regarding the animals and symbolism chosen.

This series is to help you to decipher the meanings yourselves. I am by no means saying what I have to say about the cards are correct for anyone outside myself. However, I am providing my daily journal entries regarding the deck to act as a guide so that you can begin your own journey.

When I started tarot, I had no idea what to write in my journal, and thus didn’t. Instead I obsessively read and re-read the Little White Book belonging to the Spiral Tarot (which is why today I can completely quote the book). I didn’t trust myself to know the cards, even when I could recite the definitions. I was afraid to put the book down.

To this fear of lack of knowledge, Kim Krans, creator of The Wild Unknown, writes:

You do know enough. You’ve been a person on earth every day since you were born. You’ve experienced all the emotions and situations these cards depict. Quiet the naysayer…don’t let it prevent you from sitting down with a friend (or yourself) and using these cards to help talk about what’s going on in your life. It will be positive. It will be radical. You’ll find things start to reveal themselves through the cards that have been hidden away, covered with dust.

pp. 10-11, The Wild Unknown Guidebook

Description of the Wild Unknown 10 of Pentacles

There are nine distinctly visible Pentacles in The Wild Unknown 10 of Pentacles. They form a square, tilted to form a diamond. One of the nine Pentacles is in the middle of the diamond, with the tenth, smaller Pentacle, and in the center of the star of the middle Pentacle.

Each Pentacle is white-lined with solid black blank space. The background is a multitude of circles, starting from the center of the Pentacle and moving out like ripples, though without the expansion of space between each ring. The rings start red, but as they expand out, move to orange, yellow, green, blue, then purple.

Traditional 10 of Pentacles

The traditional depiction of the Rider-Waite 10 of Pentacles is a very busy card, showing an older figure sitting to the left of the card in a chair, seeing their family within their castle walls. There are grapes growing around the chair in which the man sits, and the sigil of A. E. Waite is on the chair. There are two dogs that look at the figure, one that has the figure’s hand on its head, while the other dog has the hand of one of the children on it.

The card represents legacy, having built something of worth that is stable enough to hand down to generations. It can often be a card that comes up for retirement as well. The dogs in the card are a loyalty that the family holds toward the figure who built said legacy, and the carrying on of their work.

What I derive from the Wild Unknown 10 of Pentacles

There is one thing that stands out in the Wild Unknown 10 of Pentacles, and that’s layers. Layers, I think, is the key to this card. Each layer of circles represents the elements that came together to create that which will be passed down.

The Pentacles form a 4-sided structure (the shape corresponding to 4 and the number itself in tarot equating to stability), and the center two pentacles almost look as if they’re being seen through a tunnel, indicating time passing, or the future. These are the layers of the Pentacles.

The squares that are the Pentacles form in such a way that they over-lap the circles. To me this is a transference of energy or message. Each circle is bigger or smaller than the last, and yet they never touch. Their message or energy cannot reach the next one to be passed along. However, the square create passage between the circles, and being made of Pentacles, which each carry the meaning of the elements and spirit within their shape, are able to bridge that gap.

Thus, the Wild Unknown of sharing experience, passing on wisdom, and usually associated with generations.

Note: I did look up the philosophical meaning of squares and circles. Circles represent feminine energy while squares—anything with corners, really—represent masculine energy. Circles can also represent spiritual energy due to their infinite cycle. Because of its relation to the number 4, the square itself has to do with material things, thus, Earth. The number 4 occurs in many earthly things—4 seasons, 4 phases of the moon, 4 elements, etc. Thus, the combination of the two brings to light a union between higher and lower, and thus, transcendence.

About the Deck

The Wild Unknown Tarot  is a 2016 Harper One publication, created by Kim Krans. The deck is widely available at most bookstores who carry Tarot cards, but also on Amazon. Kim Krans always wrote The Wild Unknown Guidebook.