"
 Kaballah and Tarot 

The article implies that Kaballah and Tarot weren't related until the 19th cent. occult movement. I assume that's a reference to the Golden Dawn. Or Papus. But that's more of an assumption than anything. The cards first appeared, albeit in a somewhat different format, at the same time and in the same place as a flowering of non-Jewish interest in Kaballah. 

I raise this here because 1) I'm not sure how to correct the article, 2) I'm a newbie and would rather not do harm in an attempt to do good, and 3) I'd like to see if anyone else has strong opinions.  

 
Tarot and Qaballah have a 1 to 1 correspondence, and are almost
certainly paralell descriptions of the same mythic archetypes.
The history presented here is propagandist christian; it assumes
that Tarot was started in Italy, which is patently culturacidal
because the cards are part of pagan European mysticism, and they
did all they could to kill off the pagans.
Italies versions were propagandist toy versions of the original,
copied without an understanding of the meanings and changed to suit
the assumptive interests of the new Italian art culture.

 ""1 to 1 correspondence"" is one interpretation, but a poor one. Parallels between the Tarot and the Tree of Life have been drawn (Eliphas Levy?), but they do not parallel other components of the Qaballah, such as the texts on Gematria. While many neo-pagans have adopted and adapted the Tarot, I seriously doubt any kind of pagan origins (although I'd love to see evidence for such).  

 Could you offer any evidence for your statement of a Pagan predevelopment? The ""normal"" knowledge about Tarot cards development in Italy lists various examples of really existing old playing cards called Trionfi and really existent documents which use this word Trionfi.  

 
yes, there is proof that the trionfi cards actually did exist.
No, there isn't proof that this is a verifiable point of origin.
Proof can be very hard to come by in a situation involving cultural
genocide, however, there are a variety of esoteric proofs and even easier to understand basic arguments.

The first of these is the simple question of sociology and anthropology. Okay, if Tarot is a product of Italian culture of that Time period, where out of that culture did those symbols derivate?
The answer is, they didn't and couldn't of, they were obviously
symbols from a system the Italians had no knowledge of.

 So YOU say, buddy. Can you please give us some proof that the Italians DIDN'T have any knowledge of tarot symbolism? And what symbolism! Empresses, chariots, the sun... the moon. A tower. All of it stuff with which Italians would have been completely and totally unfamiliar, huh?  Vince In Milan

Other ""proofs"" as such hinge on increasingly more esoteric facts,
and, as weak an argument as the above sounds, if you know Tarot, it is a VERY sound argument as one starts to apply the basic principle
per card. The Tarot is OBVIOUSLY a wheel of the year mythic architecture, the Elementalist perspective would have been an anacronism in Italian culture of that time period.

  http://www.cafetarot.com/en/history.htm
one side
http://www.tarothermit.com/infosheet.htm
the other side, included for balance, but also to point out
that this article wouldn't exist if somebody didn't have a minority opinion.
http://www.occultforums.com/showpost.php?p=108263&postcount;=24
http://www.geocities.com/astroreports9000/tarot.html

new age noise, but another case of somebody who actually saw
the obvious;
http://www.psychicsahar.com/artman/publish/article_399.shtml

As a side note, Tarot suffered more than its sister system, the Tree
of life, which has also been revisionist histroied to start in the 13th century. Unlike Tarot, the proof of this is patently obvious to any who have studied esoteric judaism. The bibles symbols and images
are based on Qaballah, not the other way around. Everything is derivated in Judaism by virtue of the TREE, including even the hebrew
language. 

At the very least, we can show that the Trionfi is not the original Tarot by refering to the Tarot of the Bohemians.
http://www.lulu.com/content/186892
http://www.supertarot.co.uk/thoth/papus.htm
http://www.sacred-texts.com/tarot/tob/tob00.htm

the trail i