In the past, in antiquity and even before, as well as in the following eras, humanity has always shown a marked interest in divination. This could involve drawing runes, horoscopes, the wheel of fortune, interpreting cards (spades, diamonds, clubs, and hearts or the minor or major arcana of tarot cards, such as the magician, the high priestess, etc.). Obtaining informed answers to one's questions is the whole point of these divinatory games.
Among these practices, cartomancy has carved out a lion's share over time, in methods to know one's romantic, professional, or other future... Evidence of cartomancy can be found from the 15th century in Spain and from the 16th century in Italy. In the Age of Enlightenment, the discipline enjoyed incredible success in France, and it was becoming increasingly popular, particularly through Ettelia (Jean-Baptiste Alliette, 1738-1791) under the name of cartonomancy for the 32-card deck (Le petit Etteilla or L'Art de tirer les cartes 1753 published in 1791), then the tarot cards, which are based on earlier work: the interpretation of the Marseille tarot cards by Antoine Court de Gébelin.
Cartomancy, as it was understood in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, mainly comes from a legacy of cartomancy as relaunched by Court de Gébelin and Etteilla; the widespread (but not exclusive) use of the Marseille tarot and its derivatives (Wirth, Rider-Waite, etc.) is primarily due to Court de Gébelin. However, in the 21st century, cartomancy still uses the Marseille or Besançon tarot cards, modern tarot decks, standardized decks of French or Spanish suits, and ultimately any type of deck of cards. The 20th century also saw the development of numerous card games in the form of divinatory oracles, which have no visible references to standardized or historical cards or to tarot cards.
In France, in 1948, Paul Marteau, then director of Grimaud playing cards, published The Marseille Tarot, another work that would be important in cartomancy practices related to tarot (tarot divination, tarot reading...), just as Paul Marteau's version of the Marseille tarot (actually a modification of a late copy by Lequart of Nicolas Conver's tarot) had an international impact, which marked an important step in the history of cartomancy, as well as in that of taromancy and tarology.
To be completely comprehensive in the historical and general presentation that we are making here of cartomancy, it should be noted that the activity of "prediction" is generally not recognized by the scientific community outside of statistical models. Popular divinatory practices such as cartomancy have no scientific basis but come in many names, types, and methods of reading and trends: the cross reading, the Egyptian tarot, the Gypsy tarot, phone readings, numerology, angel tarot, cross cartomancy, Gypsy tarot, couple tarot, yes-no tarot, Chinese tarot, Belline oracle, reading through ordinary cards, etc.
For zetetics, the essential basis for cartomancy lies in the Barnum effect (or Bertram Forer effect) nonetheless, whether free or paid services, consulting an oracle or attending a live psychic reading (through one or more card readings) in order to obtain answers to a specific question, to know one's future, or to have it read by a psychic, all represent solutions favored by a certain public, and this is not new. Many sites offer free tarot readings (Marseille tarot reading, immediate free cartomancy session, chat, consultation with a gracious psychic...), however, divinatory arts are not a matter of chance and require knowledge and expertise that deserve compensation, so beware of these types of offers without registration or value.
