The Tower Art and Meaning
Medieval Tarocchi Deck Fragment
About the Deck
Also mistakenly known as the Gringonneur deck, but this is a misnomer. This could not have been the deck of Charles VI, because it is too late, and it is Italian in origin.
Provenance
Italy c. 1500
According to Many Schools of Thought
A. E. Waite's Secondary Meanings
The Tower struck by Lightning. Its alternative titles are: Castle of Plutus, God's House and the Tower of Babel. In the last case, the figures falling therefrom are held to be Nimrod and his minister. It is assuredly a card of confusion, and the design corresponds, broadly speaking, to any of the designations except Maison Dieu, unless we are to understand that the House of God has been abandoned and the veil of the temple rent. It is a little surprising that the device has not so far been allocated to the destruction Of Solomon's Temple, when the lightning would symbolize the fire and sword with which that edifice was visited by the King of the Chaldees.
S. L. MacGregor Mathers's Divinatory Meanings
Upright
Ruin, Disruption, Over-throw, Loss, Bankruptcy
Reversed
These in a more or less partial degree.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Ruin. Deception.