There are 16 court cards in the tarot which represent a four-by-four pattern of the manifestation of each letter of the Tetragrammaton, expressed through the suits.
As taught in the section on the Minor Arcana, these four suits also correspond to the letters of Tetragrammaton.
The result is an image that expresses the fundamental energies and primal forces of Nature in all the ways it can possibly be expressed. Thus their natures are intensely elemental -- surging, flowing, expanding, and consolidating. They correspond, respectively, to Will, Love, Reason, and, Action in each of the four elements.
As well, twelve of the cards correspond to a particular 30° segment of the zodiac: the first two decanates (i.e. the first 20°) of one sign, of the element to which the card's suit corresponds, and the last decante (or 10°) of the preceding sign which is of a contrary element. By this bridging of two signs, the Court Cards are said to bind together the twelve parts of the zodiac.
The particular sign, in each element, to which a given Court Card is attributed is chosen so that the three Gunas, or characteristics of nature, are balanced in the two signs and the card’s rank. For example, the Knights, which are Cardinal and sulfuric (Rajasic) in nature, each correspond to the last 10° of a Fixed sign and the first 20° of a Mutable sign. The Queens, which are Fixed and salty (Tamasic) in nature, correspond to a Mutable and a Cardinal sign. The Princes, which are Mutable and mercurial (Sattvic), correspond to a Cardinal and a Fixed sign. (As the
Knight, Queen, and Prince correspond to the three Gunas, so does the Princess correspond to that prakriti, or “Nature,” of which they are component characteristics.)
Each decanate of the zodiac has a planetary ruler and a distinctive symbolic quality. (These will be explored in detail in the section on the Minor Arcana.) The natures of the three decanates composing the domain of the Court Cards are of fundamental importance in explaining the nature of each card.
