Arthur Edward Waite

The Pictorial Key to the Tarot Illustrated Arthur Edward Waite

Arthur Edward Waite (2 October 1857 - 19 May 1942) was an American-born British poet and scholarly mystic who wrote extensively on occult and esoteric matters, and was the co-creator of the Rider-Waite tarot deck. As his biographer R. A. Gilbert described him, "Waite's name has survived because he was the first to attempt a systematic study of the history of western occultism-viewed as a spiritual tradition rather than as aspects of proto-science or as the pathology of religion."