Meaning
Richmond's Knaves are young men of their suit, and the Jack of Spades is the deft one: “A man who is engaged in some line of work requiring quickness and skill”, with “keen perceptions”. The figure belongs to the reading, not to the sex or the nature of anyone born on the card's days.
We read the card as quick hands and a clever mind. The tradition sees its people as skilful and resourceful, good at reading others and able to turn a hand to many kinds of work; it finds them at their best when that cleverness is used openly and honestly, and grown into responsibility.
In the spreads
The Jack of Spades sits in the Mars row, Uranus column, after the Two of Diamonds, its Moon card, and just before the Eight of Clubs, the fixed card that is its Mercury card. Its path then runs along the Jupiter row, the Six of Diamonds, the Four of Spades, the Ten of Hearts, the Ten of Diamonds.
It gives to the Seven of Clubs and receives from the Ten of Clubs, the first crown card. Its two birthdays, 3 January and 1 February, fall under Capricorn and Aquarius.
Life path and karma cards
Read from the Life Spread: the card before the Jack of Spades, then the ten after it, the order running on from the crown line back to the top right. The names of the places are Camp's, used descriptively.
| Place on the path | Card |
|---|---|
| Moon (the card before it) | Two of Diamonds |
| Mercury | Eight of Clubs |
| Venus | Six of Diamonds |
| Mars | Four of Spades |
| Jupiter | Ten of Hearts |
| Saturn | Ten of Diamonds |
| Uranus | Eight of Spades |
| Neptune | Ace of Hearts |
| Pluto | Ace of Diamonds |
| Result | Queen of Diamonds |
| Cosmic Lesson | Five of Hearts |
| Karma card it gives to | Seven of Clubs |
| Karma card that gives to it | Ten of Clubs |
Birthdays and ruling cards
The ruling card is the card of the life path in the place of the Sun sign's ruling planet; Leo takes the birth card itself and Scorpio two cards.
| Birthday | Sun sign and its ruler | Ruling card |
|---|---|---|
| 3 January | Capricorn (Saturn) | Ten of Diamonds |
| 1 February | Aquarius (Uranus) | Eight of Spades |
For every sign, as the tradition's modern rulers give them: Aries (Mars): Four of Spades; Taurus (Venus): Six of Diamonds; Gemini (Mercury): Eight of Clubs; Cancer (the Moon): Two of Diamonds; Leo (the Sun): Jack of Spades; Virgo (Mercury): Eight of Clubs; Libra (Venus): Six of Diamonds; Scorpio (Mars and Pluto): Four of Spades and Ace of Diamonds; Sagittarius (Jupiter): Ten of Hearts; Capricorn (Saturn): Ten of Diamonds; Aquarius (Uranus): Eight of Spades; Pisces (Neptune): Ace of Hearts.
Correspondences
Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.
- Suit in Richmond (1893, p. 28)
- The emblem of winter and the fourth quarter: the spade, “an instrument of labor”, and the acorn that “becomes a new tree in time”; quoted with its item on mortality left out sourced
- The suit's season and planets in Richmond (pp. 27 to 28, 41)
- Winter; Uranus, ruling “from a point of labor”, and Saturn, whose reading we leave out. Facts about his book, not about anyone born under the card sourced
- Number in Richmond (pp. 42 to 45)
- Knaves: a young man of the suit, a figure in a reading and not the sex of anyone born under the card sourced
- Richmond's table for the card (p. 174)
- “A man who is engaged in some line of work requiring quickness and skill”, with “keen perceptions” sourced
- Our keyword line (2026)
- Quick hands and a clever mind. our construction
- Our theme for the suit
- Work, Will, Routine, Inner Strength our construction
- A suit element or a single planet
- None in Richmond or any founding text; the sets other sites give disagree, and ours was dropped in October 2026 disputed
How the schools read it
- Olney H. Richmond (1893)
- An emblem of solar value 50 and spirit value 55, read through its suit, labour, and its number, a young man of the suit: one meaning under each of the seven planets, most of them events (p. 174).
- Randall and Campbell, Lein, Camp (1947 onward)
- Read the birth card as character rather than events. Camp's line adds the life path, the karma cards and the yearly spreads used on this page, and gives the card a nickname, which we do not use.
- EsoTerrier
- Read here as quick hands and a clever mind, used openly and grown into responsibility.
Claims about it
-
The cards show past lives and mark old souls, and the Spades are the suit of old souls.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: Nothing of this is in Richmond. In Camp's system “karma” names a relation between two spreads; reincarnation is a belief, not part of the arithmetic.
-
Each suit has an element and a ruling planet.
disputedWhat the record shows: No founding text gives the suits elements, and the sources that do disagree with each other. Richmond gives each suit a season and two planets (pp. 27 to 28, 41), which we report as his. We dropped the attributes in October 2026.
-
Each card has a traditional nickname.
disputedWhat the record shows: The nicknames are Camp's coinages, or Randall and Campbell's, not Richmond's; taken as a set they mark a text as derived from his. We use none of them.
Elsewhere on EsoTerrier
- Seven of Clubs its first karma card, the card it gives to
- Ten of Clubs its second karma card, the card that gives to it
- Two of Diamonds its Moon card, the card before it in the Life Spread
- Eight of Clubs its Mercury card, the card after it in the Life Spread
- Natal Chart where the Sun sign that picks the ruling card is worked out
