The Celtic Cross
Ten cards. A classic — and a trap for beginners.
The Celtic Cross is the best-known spread and uses ten cards. It is thorough, and it is a trap for beginners: someone who cannot link ten cards says ten separate sentences and the reading falls apart.
The ten positions
- 1 Situation · 2 Obstacle — the two at the center. The reading starts here and often ends here too.
- 3 Root · 4 Recent past · 5 Conscious · 6 Near future — the arms of the cross.
- 7 You · 8 Environment · 9 Hope or fear · 10 Outcome — the staff on the right.
Position nine, "hope or fear", carries the most information and most readers skip it. Hoping for something and dreading it at the same time is the most common human state there is.