The trumpet
An angel blows a trumpet over the rising dead on Judgement. It is the last trump of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians.
In the tradition
Paul writes that "the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised", in the twinkling of an eye, and Waite echoes the words. Christian art usually names the trumpeting angel Gabriel.
Waite notes that the cross is on the banner as usual and spends his words on the people rising, reading the trumpet as a call that something within answers.
Sources
- A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910). Waite's own guide to the deck he designed with Pamela Colman Smith, with each card's divinatory meanings.
- Various, The Bible (King James Version 1611; the Latin Vulgate, 4th century). The source of much of the Temple, Eden and Revelation imagery in the Rider-Waite-Smith deck.
Updated October 9, 2026.
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