VI, Suit of CupsSix of Cups tarot card meaning
Upright and reversedSix of Cups in shortIn short
The Six of Cups is memory. In an old courtyard a child in a red hood hands a cup of white flowers to a smaller child, and more flower cups stand all around. Childhood, kindness, the sweetness of the past.
- Memories
- Childhood
- Kindness
Piece oneThe old tower
Behind the children rise an old stone tower and a house with a slate roof. Waite puts the children in an old garden. The buildings stand solid and old, like the places a childhood memory lives in.
"happiness, enjoyment, but coming rather from the past"Waite, 1911
Why it is hereThe tower and the house set the scene in the past. Old stone, a slate roof, a walled yard: the place where a childhood happened. The children play in front of it the way memories do, small and bright against something solid. The stone pillar and the flower cups belong to the same old garden.
Piece twoThe stone pillar
A cup of flowers stands on a grey stone pillar, and the pillar bears a shield carved with a diagonal cross. Waite leaves it unexplained. It makes the courtyard feel like an old family home with its own sign.
Why it is hereThe pillar gives the memory a frame. A cup of flowers stands on it like something kept on display, and the carved shield gives the courtyard its own sign. It's the cold, fixed part of the scene. The children move and give, and the stone stays where it stood, the way old places do.
Piece threeThe gift
An older child in a red hood bends down and offers a cup of white flowers to a smaller child, who looks up at the gift. A small, kind moment, the sort you remember for years. Waite calls it a card of the past and of memories.
"A card of the past and of memories, looking back..."Waite, 1911
Why it is hereThe gift is the heart of the card. One child gives, one receives, and both are small enough to mean it. The cup holds a flower, a gift to keep. Behind them the tower and the house keep the memory safe; in front, the other flower cups wait to be handed on.
Piece fourThe flower cups
In front of the children stand gold cups planted with green leaves and white star-shaped flowers. Waite describes cups filled with flowers. These cups hold something to keep and look at, more than to drink.
"Children in an old garden, their cups filled with flowers."Waite, 1911
Why it is hereThe flower cups turn cups into planters. Waite fills them with flowers instead of drink, and our picture keeps that, so the feeling here is something you keep and tend. There are six: one in the gift, one on the pillar, four at the front. The garden's past keeps blooming in them.
Colour, and where else it appearsEchoes
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The old tower
Honey stone under pale blue sky. The whole card glows like a warm afternoon long ago. In the Five of Cups a grey tower stands across a river, still to be reached. In the Ten of Pentacles a tall tower rises behind a whole family, three generations under one arch. This one looks back. It's the home you remember.
Also in -
The stone pillar
Cool grey stone among warm yellows, the one cold surface on the card. Grey is what lasts. It lifts one cup above the children's heads, steady while they move. The cool colour sets off the gold cup on top and the red hoods beside it, so the warm part of the memory shows brighter against it.
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The gift
Red hoods and soft blue, the colours of a children's book. Both children wear red, as if they belong together. Children come back near the end of the deck. In the Ten of Cups two children dance hand in hand, in red and blue again, under their parents' rainbow. In The Sun a child rides a white horse, one arm flung wide, under a huge sun.
Also in -
The flower cups
Gold cups, cream-white flowers, dark green leaves. The same flower repeats in every cup, like a memory that keeps coming back. Something living in a cup returns in the Page of Cups, where a small blue fish pokes out of his gold cup and looks up at him. His surprise is new. These flowers were planted long ago.
Also in
Colour notes are ours, read from the picture; Waite does not explain the colours.
Six of CupsUpright
Memory and childhood. Waite calls it a card of the past and of memories, looking back, for example, on childhood: happiness and enjoyment, coming rather from the past, things that have vanished.
An old friend, a place you loved, a small act of kindness. Waite gives a second reading too: new relations, new knowledge, new surroundings. Be kind, and let the past warm you without holding you there.
Six of CupsReversed
Waite turns the card toward the future: the future, renewal, that which will come to pass presently.
You let go of the past and look ahead, or something new is about to arrive. Step out of the old garden.
Yes or noYes.
Yes, a gentle one. A kind, happy card. Something or someone from your past may come back into the picture.
Six of Cups in your lifeIn your life
Love
Tenderness, an old flame, a love that feels simple and innocent. Sometimes someone from your past.
Work
Kind colleagues, or a return to an old skill or project. Use what you learned long ago.
Money
Gifts, help from family, small kindnesses. Keep plans modest.
Health
Comfort and care. A card can't diagnose you; if something's wrong, see a doctor.
Spirituality
Inner child work, old memories, simple faith. Remember what you loved as a child.
Advice
Be kind and give freely. Visit the past without moving back in.
As a person
Gentle, kind, a little nostalgic. Looks after others.
Past, present, future
Past: a happy childhood or an old bond. Present: memories and simple kindness. Future: a reunion or a fresh start.
Written by us, from Waite's meanings and the picture.
Symbols and correspondencesAt a glance
- Suit
- Cups
- Element
- Water
- Astrology
- Sun in Scorpio
- Sephira
- Tiphareth
- Upright
- Memories
- Reversed
- Future
QuestionsCommon questions
Yes. A gentle, kind card of memories and simple joys. Its one caution: don't live in the past.
Tenderness and innocence, or someone from your past coming back. An old flame, or a love that feels like coming home.
Yes, a gentle one.
Waite describes children in an old garden, their cups filled with flowers. The cups hold something to give and remember, the small gifts of childhood.
Often, yes. Waite calls it a card of the past and of memories, so an old friend, a former partner or family may return.
Waite calls it a card of the past and of memories, joy that comes from things now gone. A second reading, he notes, turns it toward new surroundings.
The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, 1911Card meanings and quotes: A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, 1911. Element, decan and sephira: the Golden Dawn's Book T. Colours, life situations, yes or no and questions: written by us, from Waite's meanings and the picture.
All 14 Cups