major arcana
No image of this card
Lady Frieda Harris painted the deck between 1938 and 1943; it was first published in 1969, seven years after her death in 1962. The paintings remain in copyright until 2032 in the UK and EU and 2064 in the United States, so no card images or substitutes appear here.
See the deck at its publisher ↗The Daughter of the Firmament, the Dweller between the Waters
Suit: Trumps Major Arcana
The Star follows the ruin of the Tower with clear water and open sky. It brings hope, renewal and the quiet restoration that begins when inspiration is allowed to flow into life.
A card carries more than one history. Its place in the tarot pack, Golden Dawn path, Rider–Waite–Smith reading and later variants are kept beside their own sources, since the same name can do different work in different decks.
8 sourced claims: 4 traditional , 3 modern , 1 contested
The Book of Thoth remains in copyright. The catalogue therefore gives the deck's titles, ranks and numbering beside the Golden Dawn material it inherits, while citing Crowley by page without reproducing his text.
This deck numbers the card XVII.
This deck's book publishes no upright and reversed lists, so none are shown. Its account of the card is cited below rather than reproduced.
The Thoth deck keeps the name The Star. Book T assigns the Star to Tzaddi and Aquarius; Crowley's Thoth system instead assigns it to Heh while retaining Aquarius. Book T titles it The Daughter of the Firmament, the Dweller between the Waters.
Aleister Crowley and Lady Frieda Harris, Thoth — Part Two: The Atu (Keys or Trumps).
The Star
A naked figure pours water upon land and pool beneath one great star and seven smaller lights, offering the waters of life and gifts of spirit.
A concise paraphrase of Waite's published explanation of the Pamela Colman Smith design, not a universal description of all historical decks.
Waite records two sharply different upright traditions for The Star: one emphasises loss or abandonment, while the other emphasises hope and bright prospects. Reversed, the card can indicate arrogance, impotence or hope that cannot yet be translated into action.
Waite himself warns that many fortune-telling allocations are artificial and arbitrary; these are historical Rider–Waite–Smith meanings, not assertions of fact.
Hermetic Qabalah
Book T establishes this Tarot-to-letter attribution. The path number and endpoints belong to this tradition's canonical Kircher arrangement.
Book T's formal title, Tree or elemental place, astrological attribution, and characteristic reading. This is the system used by the Hermetic Tree.
The Daughter of the Firmament, the Dweller between the Waters
The formal esoteric title printed in Book T.
צ · Tzaddi
A Golden Dawn correspondence, not a claim about the historical origin of the card or a universal Jewish letter-to-card system.
Aquarius
Book T's attribution carried by the Hebrew letter and therefore by this path.
Hope, faith, and unexpected help, shadowed by dreaminess or deceived hope.
Paraphrased from Book T's brief meanings; its dignity method reads a card in relation to neighbouring cards rather than as a fixed keyword.
Historical context and places where influential decks or occult systems differ.
One of the twenty-one figured trumps plus the Fool found beside the four ordinary suits in historical tarot packs.
Museum history dates the earliest documentary references to the 1440s–1450s in northern Italy and identifies tarot's original use as a trick-taking game. The occult-Qabalistic reading is later.
Book T assigns the Star to Tzaddi and Aquarius; Crowley's Thoth system instead assigns it to Heh while retaining Aquarius.
The Tree keeps the attributions of Book T; the Thelemic counterchange appears alongside them as a documented variant.
| Relation | To | First attested |
|---|---|---|
| Tarot trump of | Path 28 · Tzaddi | 1888 CE |
| Hebrew-letter attribution | Tzaddi | 1888 CE |
| Astrological attribution | Aquarius | 1888 CE |