Eight of Swords tarot card meaning: upright, reversed and symbols

The Eight of Swords shows a woman blindfolded and loosely bound, standing among eight swords stuck in the muddy ground. A castle stands on the cliff behind her. The swords do not fully surround her, and her feet are free. It is a card of restriction, fear and the way out that is closer than it looks. Here is what the Eight of Swords means upright and reversed, the symbols in the 1909 card and a spread for feeling stuck.

At a glance

• Upright keywords: restriction, imprisonment, fear
• Reversed keywords: release, finding solutions, freedom
• Number: 8 in the suit of Swords
• Suit and element: Swords, Air Later tradition
• Astrology: Jupiter in Gemini Later tradition
• Yes or no: No Modern

The element and the planet in a sign (one of the 36 ten-degree slices of the zodiac called decans) come from the Golden Dawn system of the 1880s and 1890s, not from the first tarot decks. The yes or no lean is a modern reading habit. Use these layers if they help you remember the card, and skip them if they get in the way.

The card: what Pamela Colman Smith drew

Waite wrote: “A woman, bound and hoodwinked, with the swords of the card about her. Yet it is rather a card of temporary durance than of irretrievable bondage.” Durance means confinement. Waite himself says it does not last.

The blindfold and bindings

She cannot see and her arms are tied, but the bindings are loose and her legs are free. Part of the trap is real, and part is what she believes.

The open side

The swords stand around her, but there is a gap. If she could see, she could walk out.

The castle

The castle on the cliff may be where she came from or where she belongs. Safety is not far away.

Upright meaning

Upright, the Eight of Swords shows restriction that is partly mental and partly real. Fear, shame or a critical inner voice can bind as tightly as external limits. The swords surround the figure, and the bindings may be looser than they feel, yet panic narrows the view.

Name the real limits and the imagined ones separately. Then take one small step that tests the binding. Ask for help from outside, because someone who is not blindfolded may see the gap.

Reversed meaning

Reversed, the Eight of Swords often shows release, finding solutions and freedom. The blindfold slips. You realize you can leave.

Celebrate the step out, and be gentle if fear returns. Freedom can feel strange at first.

Reversals are optional. Many readers never use them and read every card upright, and that is a complete way to read. If you do use them, decide before you shuffle what a reversed card will mean for you, and keep to that choice for the whole reading.

In love, work and spirituality

Love

Upright, feeling trapped in a relationship or by your own fears about love. Reversed, freeing yourself.

Work and money

Feeling stuck in a job, or believing you have no options. Reversed, seeing a way out.

Spirituality

Limiting beliefs about what you are allowed to practice. Reversed, permission to explore.

As feelings

As someone’s feelings, the Eight of Swords shows feeling stuck, anxious or powerless. They may want to move but feel unable to.

The Eight of Swords as past, present, future and advice

• Past: Fear or a limiting situation held you back.
• Present: You may be more free than you feel. Test the bindings.
• Future: A sense of being stuck may come, and it will pass.
• Advice: Take one small step out of the circle.

A Minor Arcana card usually describes the everyday texture of a situation: a mood, a conversation, a task or a step. If the Eight of Swords appears next to a Major Arcana card, let the Major name the big theme and let this card show how it is playing out in thought and the other things Swords rule. If it keeps coming back over several days, write down what was happening each time.

Is the Eight of Swords a yes or a no?

In modern yes or no readings, the Eight of Swords leans no. Fear blocks the way for now. Tarot is better at showing the shape of a situation than at handing down verdicts, so if the question really matters, turn it into an open question such as “What do I need to know about this?” and draw again.

Affirmation and journal prompts

Affirmation: I separate real limits from the stories that keep me stuck.

Reversed affirmation: I take the next freeing step I can safely make.

Journal prompts:

• Which of my limits are real, and which are fears?
• Who could help me see the gap?
• What one small step would test the binding?

What the Eight means in tarot

Eight is work, skill, speed or a confinement that is ready to break open. The Eights are busy cards. Something is moving, being practiced, being left, or being escaped.

Here is how the Eight looks across the four suits:

• Eight of Wands: swift action, movement, progress
• Eight of Cups: walking away, letting go, seeking meaning
• Eight of Swords (this card): restriction, imprisonment, fear
• Eight of Pentacles: diligence, craftsmanship, skill development

Learning a rank across the suits is one of the fastest ways to learn the Minor Arcana: the number or court rank gives you the shape, and the suit gives you the setting.

The history and art behind the card

In most decks before 1909, the number cards showed only a pattern of suit symbols, the way a playing card does. The Sola Busca deck from late 1400s Italy is the famous exception. Pamela Colman Smith gave every Minor Arcana card a scene with people in it, and that choice is a big reason the Rider-Waite-Smith deck is still the easiest deck for beginners. In Italian decks the suit is Spade and in the Tarot de Marseille it is Épées, curved blades woven into patterns. Smith drew straight swords and big skies full of wind and cloud. Air is the element of the mind, and her Swords scenes are often about what we think and say more than what we physically do.

Waite wrote that this is rather a card of temporary durance than of irretrievable bondage, and the picture agrees. The swords stand around the woman but do not close her in, her feet are free, and the ropes are loosely tied. A castle on a cliff stands behind her, so help and home are not far away. Readers often use this card to ask a simple question: which part of this trap is real, and which part is fear telling me there is no way out?

When A. E. Waite published The Pictorial Key to the Tarot in 1910, he listed these divinatory meanings for the Eight of Swords: “Bad news, violent chagrin, crisis, censure, power in trammels, conflict, calumny; also sickness.” Reversed, he gave: “Disquiet, difficulty, opposition, accident, treachery; what is unforeseen; fatality.” Waite said he was offering “a harmony of their meanings” gathered “from all sources”, which means older fortune-telling lists, not his own reading of the picture. On this site I read the picture first and treat lists like this as history.

A spread for the Eight of Swords

Use this spread when you feel trapped.

1. What binds me? The fear or limit I feel.
2. What is real? The actual limit, honestly.
3. Where is the way out? The gap I can walk through.

Lay the three cards in a row, read each one on its own first, then read them together as a short story. Write one sentence for each position and one small action you will take.

Common questions

Is the Eight of Swords a yes or no card?

It leans no, because fear is in the way. Reversed, it points to freedom.

What does the Eight of Swords mean in love?

Feeling trapped or held back by fear. Reversed, release.

Is the Eight of Swords about anxiety?

Often. It shows how fear and thoughts can trap us. If anxiety affects your daily life, talk to a health professional as well.

Related cards

• Two of Swords: another blindfolded figure, stuck in a choice
• The Devil: the Major Arcana card of chains that can be lifted
• Nine of Swords: the worry that follows if the fear grows

Keep learning

The Eight of Swords is part of the lesson Swords in my free Tarot for Beginners course. To see the whole suit on one page, go to the suit of Swords. To keep walking the suit, read the card before it, Seven of Swords or the card after it, Nine of Swords, or go back to all the card meanings. For the suits and numbers in one place, see The Minor Arcana: suits and numbers made simple. For every card with keywords, affirmations and examples, see my book The Novice’s Guide to Tarot. If you would like a printable cheat sheet for all 78 cards, my 45-page Tarot Workbook is on Etsy.

Sources

• A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (London: Rider, 1910), Part III, sections 1 and 2.
• Pamela Colman Smith and A. E. Waite, the Rider-Waite-Smith tarot (London: Rider, 1909).
• Nicolas Conver, Tarot de Marseille (Marseille, 1760).
• Lauri Mukkala, The Novice’s Guide to Tarot, entry for the Eight of Swords.