Queen of Swords Tarot Card Meaning

Sitting on her throne, surrounded by clouds, the Queen of Swords is a majestic figure.

The clouds around her demonstrate that the swords suit is aligned with the element 'air', the other suits being aligned to fire (wands), water (cups) or earth (pentacles).

As a suit, swords represent clarify of thought, logic, reason, justice and truth. As a whole the sword suit asks you to consider how truthful, honest and noble you are being, both with yourself and those around you.

Queens in tarot are inward focusing (as opposed to Kings whose focus is outward). Queens represent feelings and self-expression and ask you to measure your behaviour against theirs.

In the Rider-Waite tarot deck the Queen of Swords is shown holding her sword upright in her right hand, whilst raising her left hand in a gesture of welcome. The sword is not raised in a threatening manner, more to show that she is responsible for upholding truth and justice.

She asks those who draw her as a card to consider how truthful and honest they are being in a situation, and how truthful and honest those around then are being.

The Queen of Swords is a straight talking character. She doesn't have time for beating about the bush, and she isn't interested in people trying to pull the wool over her eyes.

She can read between the lines in an instant and will know the minute someone tries to be less than straight with her. She is quick witted and insightful in what she says, but she is never hurtful. She also loves the lighter side of life and has a great sense of humour.

In a simple tarot card reading she asks the person being read for to consider their actions against hers. Are they being honest with themselves? Do they think they are being taken advantage off? Are they avoiding being honest with someone else?

She is also a reminder that being honest doesn't mean being cruel. There are ways and means of speaking and acting and this Queen has the grace and intellect to know how to get her message across without being unkind.

Reversed cards are hard to interpret as their meaning is so dependant on the situation of the person being read for.

With a reversed card the energy of the card is being blocked to a greater or lesser extent.

A reversed Queen of Swords could indicate that whilst you are trying to be honest others around you are being deliberately dishonest. Or it could be that while you are not finding it as easy to be honest about a situation as you would like to be.

A lot of tarot card interpretation is down to intuition. However, the basic meaning of the cards still needs to be learnt and investing in a good tarot card book, such as those below, can help.