Minor Arcana · Wands · Fire
King of Wands
Read to know yourself, not to surrender yourself: relate to the card; never obey it. These are what two traditions wrote, not predictions.
In Waite's words: The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911)
The physical and emotional nature to which this card is attributed is dark, ardent, lithe, animated, impassioned, noble. The King uplifts a flowering wand, and wears, like his three correspondences in the remaining suits, what is called a cap of maintenance beneath his crown. He connects with the symbol of the lion, which is emblazoned on the back of his throne.
A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (London: William Rider & Son, 1911), public domain.
In the Golden Dawn's Book T (1912)
A KINGLY Figure with a golden, winged crown, seated on a chariot. He has large white wings. One wheel of his chariot is shewn. He wears corslet and buskins of scale armour decorated with a winged lion's head, which symbol also surmounts his crown. His chariot is drawn by a lion. His arms are bare, save for the shoulder-pieces of the corslet, and he bears a torch or fire-wand, somewhat similar to that of the Zelator Adeptus Minor. Beneath the chariot are flames, some waved, some salient.
Swift, strong, hasty; rather violent, yet just and generous; noble and scorning meanness.
If ill dignified — cruel, intolerant, prejudiced and ill natured.
He rules the heavens from above the last Decan of Cancer to the second Decan of Leo; hence he includes most of Leo Minor.
Air of Fire
Prince and Emperor of Salamanders.
Golden Dawn Rank
Book T — Golden Dawn, c. 1888 · the deck's native system (predates this imagery)
RWS King of Wands = Golden Dawn Prince of Wands — Air of Fire.
Editorial note · where Book T's figure and the picture differ. The picture is Pamela Colman Smith's (1909); Waite's words are from The Pictorial Key (1911).
Book T's figure is a Prince: winged, "seated on a chariot" drawn by a lion, holding "a torch or fire-wand". The picture is a King on a throne, the lion "emblazoned on the back of his throne" (Waite), holding a flowering wand.
Correspondences
Rules 21° Cancer – 20° Leo. As Air of Fire, this court is the air aspect of an ardent and swift suit.
Book T as printed in The Equinox I(8), 1912, public domain (notes in square brackets are Crowley's). The correspondences are this site's compilation from Book T. Open it in the Golden Dawn deck.