Significator cards. Why and how?

Hello all. I've been trying to get my head around the use of significator cards. I did some googling, trying to find out how they are actually used in a reading, and I haven't found anything really helpful in my books.
I know there are various ways of choosing them, and that they are optional. I just don't really understand how they relate to the reading itself. Are they something to focus on while shuffling, do they influence how the cards are read, or is there something else?
If you use them, how do you incorporate significators into your readings?

They are a sort of focus - I think.
It's a bit like sticking a photograph of the sitter on the table, and then arranging the spread around that... so - one is sort of making an "extra energetic link" maybe...or ritually "placing the querent" into the spread.
Do you get what I mean?
Perhaps some people even read the significator as somehow influencing the spread...


When I originally learned Tarot - a significator was optional, and used either as a visual match from the Court Cards, or an Astrological match (though it can be anything which corresponds in some way to the sitter - you can ask the sitter to look through and choose their own card, and then ask them why - which can be quite informative of their mindstate etc.).
Talking with the querent about their Star sign can be a good way to "break the ice" - and get some idea yourself about what sort of patterns of likes or behaviours they may have, which aids in your interaction with them.
My Tarot tutoress would sometimes draw 1-2 cards before the sitter arrived, to get some hint
about them.


But I've never used them because I'm not an astrologist and (coming from a multicultural heritage) the visual match didn't make much sense to me.

I use a significator if I'm using "The first operation" - whereby the significator is an extra card
(not usually one of the existing Courts etc - as I don't wish to reduce the possibility of that card by taking it out) that I add to the deck - as an exercise to find a beginning for a general reading...

Like so:
- I shuffle the significator into the deck,
- Split the deck into 4 piles (Earth, Air, Fire and Water) and look to see which pile the
significator turns up in.
This tells me - the suit to focus on/start with for the sitter,
and if I select the card before and after the significator - I can read those two cards as a "message from spirit/the Universe".

JylliM said:

I just don't really understand how they relate to the reading itself. Are they something to focus on while shuffling, do they influence how the cards are read, or is there something else?

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A card to signify the "sitter," and placed on the table before laying out the spread, is a way of saying, "Here is the central character in this story." It gives reader and sitter a way of seeing the spread as surrounding *them* Affecting *them*—and, thus, it can give the surround cards more context.

The signifier can also help the reader in understanding the cards. If the signifier is, say, the Queen/Wands, then if other wands appear in the spread, you'll see more of a connection between the sitter and those cards, and maybe understand them better. Where as, if there was no signifier, you could miss their importance. Likewise, if Wands are missing. You'd probably point out the lack of Wands anyway, but if the signifier if the Queen/Wands, then it becomes a bigger deal.

Finally, a signifier that is not placed out ahead of time can be very useful in pinpointing who is who in a spread. If your sitter is the Queen/Wands, then if that card shows up on a spread, you can say, "There you are..." rather than wondering if that Queen/Wands is the person's boss or sister. This, by the way, is why Court Cards are best for signifiers. They don't remove a Major from the reading, and they help readers avoid confusion over who/what a court card might mean. Court cards being notoriously tricky

Thirteen said:

...Finally, a signifier that is not placed out ahead of time can be very useful in pinpointing who is who in a spread. If your sitter is the Queen/Wands, then if that card shows up on a spread, you can say, "There you are..." rather than wondering if that Queen/Wands is the person's boss or sister. This, by the way, is why Court Cards are best for signifiers. They don't remove a Major from the reading, and they help readers avoid confusion over who/what a court card might mean. Court cards being notoriously tricky

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Ah great. That's the one... : Thanks for this Thirteen.

Tanga said:

They are a sort of focus - I think.
It's a bit like sticking a photograph of the sitter on the table, and then arranging the spread around that... so - one is sort of making an "extra energetic link" maybe...or ritually "placing the querent" into the spread.

Click to expand...

Thankyou Tanga - this is that nebulous 'something else' which I suspected might be in play. It's what is sometimes hinted at in books but always crowded out by the 'hows' when I also want the 'whys'!
Thankyou also for your explanation of how the significator is used in the First Operation. That's a very practical use.

Thirteen said:

A card to signify the "sitter," and placed on the table before laying out the spread, is a way of saying, "Here is the central character in this story." It gives reader and sitter a way of seeing the spread as surrounding *them* Affecting *them*—and, thus, it can give the surround cards more context.

The signifier can also help the reader in understanding the cards. If the signifier is, say, the Queen/Wands, then if other wands appear in the spread, you'll see more of a connection between the sitter and those cards, and maybe understand them better. Where as, if there was no signifier, you could miss their importance. Likewise, if Wands are missing. You'd probably point out the lack of Wands anyway, but if the signifier if the Queen/Wands, then it becomes a bigger deal.

Finally, a signifier that is not placed out ahead of time can be very useful in pinpointing who is who in a spread. If your sitter is the Queen/Wands, then if that card shows up on a spread, you can say, "There you are..." rather than wondering if that Queen/Wands is the person's boss or sister. This, by the way, is why Court Cards are best for signifiers. They don't remove a Major from the reading, and they help readers avoid confusion over who/what a court card might mean. Court cards being notoriously tricky

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Thanks Thirteen. It seems that it does indeed act as a focus, for both querent and reader, partly as a signal of the energies at work in the situation. That's an interesting take which I hadn't thought of, where the significator highlights cards of the same suit, etc.

I like the idea of shuffling the significator back into the deck. That could be very useful if it then turns up in the spread!

I definitely have more clarity on significators now. Thankyou both!

That's the first time anyone has explained the use of the significator card. Thank you, Thirteen! I'm going to start using them now. I don't usually, but this makes a lot of sense to me.

Instead of a card significator I've sometimes used an item the sitter had on them. Like a ring or a coin or something small and meaningful like that. Having something the sitter had been close to for a long time that could be put on the table while I did the reading was a way of adding more of their energy into the reading.

I invariably used a Significator in my Celtic Cross spreads for decades since it's the way I first learned, but there were times when I wasn't entirely convinced I made the right choice of card. For the record, I never used the physical characteristics of past methods, I went with the best astrological earmarks I could assemble or at the very least my own impression of the querent's personality ("knowledge or judgment," as Crowley said). More recently, I have sitters choose the card they relate to best from a narrowed field of candidates after explaining some basic attributes. Except for the Opening of the Key spread, where the Significater serves as an index or "pointer" for the elemental focus, I've come to see the Significator as a way to draw the querent into the reading, especially if they invest a little time and care into selecting the best one. From a reading standpoint, though, I don't see that it serves much purpose beyond forging that connection. In fact, most of the personal spreads I've created in the past couple of years don't require a Significator since the sitters in front of me know full well who they are, they don't need a surrogate in the cards.

By the way, Griz, I like the blending of psychometry and tarot, where the personal object stands in for the Significator card as a means of querent linkage.

Since I usually read from whatever deck feels right for me....I let the querant choose any card from any of my Other tarot decks....

This allows 2 things.

1) I get insight the querant doesn't even think about as relevant - both before and sometimes after the read (in my narrow experience of reading for others)....like 13 says....wands +wands is significant as well as lack. And if it's a major they're likely very vested in the situation.

2) I still get all 78 cards to read with.

violetdaisy said:

Since I usually read from whatever deck feels right for me....I let the querant choose any card from any of my Other tarot decks....

This allows 2 things.

1) I get insight the querant doesn't even think about as relevant - both before and sometimes after the read (in my narrow experience of reading for others)....like 13 says....wands +wands is significant as well as lack. And if it's a major they're likely very vested in the situation.

2) I still get all 78 cards to read with.

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The second reason is why I also pull the Significator from a separate deck, typically a different deck with a similar "vibe" since I own very few duplicates (actually, only the Thoth). Truncating the reading deck for the purpose of segregating a Significator card never made a lot of sense to me. But it wasn't a compelling enough reason to stop using a Significator, as some have done. As I mentioned earlier, Significator selection seems like a charming bit of "tarot theater" that encourages the querent's engagement in the reading but doesn't add substantially to the interpretation. Just my opinion, of course.

Personally, I like significators because they connect me with the deck I'm using, if that makes any sense. I feel like this way, I'm as much a piece of the Tarot's life as it is of mine. I've got at least one default significator from each suit, representing a specific area of my life, and depending on which of those significators in a given deck appeals most to my aesthetic sensibilities can help me decide which deck I use for a specific situation.