Anthony Louis's Blog, page 18

Mr. J and the Wynn Key Cycle

Recently I’ve been re-reading some old books and articles by Sidney K. Bennett, aka Wynn. In the January 1937 edition of Wynn’s Astrology Magazine, I came across an interesting case in which Wynn advices a client, Mr. J, about an affair he is having with his secretary behind his wife’s back. Wynn’s advice to Mr. J is derived from his interpretation of the client’s Key Cycle Chart at the time of the consultation.

The Case of Mr J and his Affair with his Secretary

Mr. J, a businessman, consulted Wynn on 16 September 1927. He was involved romantically with his secretary and wanted to rent an apartment and live with her. According to the client, his wife would understand perfectly because they had been married in name only for the past 10 years. His question to Wynn was whether the secretary really loved him or was just after his money. He did not want to divorce his wife because his son and daughter might be upset, and it might also damage his reputation in the community. His business often involved him with religious organizations.

Wynn analyzed the Key Cycle Return of the date of the consultation and warned Mr. J that his wife would pursue legal action against him if he moved in with his secretary, and this would cause a scandal that could damage his business and reputation. How did Wynn arrive at these conclusions?

Wynn begins with the Ascendant of Mr. J’s Key Cycle Return because it symbolizes what in going in his life at that time and place. In the 16 Sep 1927 Key Cycle chart, Pisces rises. Because Wynn believed that Neptune rules Pisces, he viewed transiting Neptune in Leo in the 6th house (secretaries, subordinates, employees) as representing his foggy-headed and unrealistic view of the affair with his secretary. In addition, Mr. J had natal Neptune in the  5th house (children, love affairs) of his birth chart, consistent with his starry-eyed attitude toward romance and his willingness to deceive his children.

In general, Wynn regarded Pisces rising in the Key Cycle chart as indicating a restless period during which the native will make decisions based on emotion than a rational and realistic assessment of a situation. There will be an interest in younger persons and many outpourings of affection. During this Pisces-rising period, there will also be opportunities to advance one’s career interests and to enhance one’s reputation. Because Wynn believed that Neptune ruled Pisces, he looked to the house position and aspects of transiting Neptune to further delineate how the Key Cycle Pisces Ascendant might manifest.

Traditional astrologers would look to Jupiter as ruler of Pisces on the 1st cusp of the Key Cycle chart. Transiting Jupiter conjoins Uranus (disruption, breakups) across the Pisces/Aries sign boundary and is opposed by the transiting Mercury/Mars conjunction in the 7th house (open enemies, lawsuits), which is ruled by Mercury. Mars, in turn, rules the 8th (joint finances, crises) and 9th (legal concerns, religious organizations) cusps.

My reconstruction by modern computer of Mr. J’s Key Cycle chart for this consultation with Wynn on 16 September 1927. The cusps of this chart are based on Wynn’s method of progressing the current Solar Return Angles. The planets are the transits at the time of the consultation.

The transiting Sun, ruler of the Key Cycle 6th (secretaries) occupies the 7th (spouse, sexual partner, lawsuits) and opposes Asc-ruler Jupiter (the native and what’s going on in his life at the time). The ruler of the 6th in the 7th also indicates that the secretary would be willing to marry him or at least engage in a sexual relationship with him.

The MC rules his occupation and reputation in the community. In the September Key Cycle chart, the South Lunar Node conjoins the MC. The 6th ruler Sun almost exactly squares the Key Cycle MC from the 7th house of marriage, partnerships and lawsuits. Additionally, the Moon rules the 5th house of love affairs, which has Pluto on its cusp. The 5th ruler Moon is closely applying to oppose Saturn in the 9th (legal affairs), and Saturn rules the 12th of scandal and personal undoing. These are warnings that Mr. J’s contemplated action of renting an apartment and moving in with his secretary will likely cause damage to his business and standing in the community.

Furthermore, because one degree passes over the Key Cycle MC roughly every 4 days, in about 8o x 4 days, or 32 days (roughly a month later), Saturn will become the ruler of his Key chart’s MC, which signifies his career and reputation. Eyeballing the chart, we can see that when Capricorn rises to govern the Key Cycle’s MC, early Aries will likely be on the Ascendant, Saturn will be in the unfortunate 8th house, Jupiter will be in the 12th of scandal and undoing, Uranus will be angular near the eastern horizon, and Mars will be angular near the Descendant. This combination of astrological factors is especially challenging.

Mr. J completely ignored Wynn’s advice. In fact, he became angry and stormed out of the meeting. Thirty-six days later, on 22 October 1927, Wynn read in the newspaper that Mr. J’s wife, accompanied by the local police, raided the apartment where her husband was living with his secretary. The scandal cost him dearly. He ended up selling the business to a junior partner. His wife sued for divorce and received a large settlement and, because of the publicity, the secretary left him.

In the Key Cycle chart for 22 October 1927, we find Aries rising, making Mars the Ascendant ruler at the time. Interestingly, Mr. J’s natal Mars lies at 28o Cancer 32’ in partile square to transiting Mars at 28o Libra 16’ in the 7th house of marriage and lawsuits. His natal Mars also happens to occupy his 7th house in the birth chart.

Wynn also notes that transiting Mars is four houses away from natal Mars in a partile square. Thus, the current partile square between natal and transiting Mars particularly affects his family and domestic life.

In both Key Cycle charts, his natal Mars occupies the 5th house of love affairs. With Cancer on the 5th cusp of the Key chart, the transiting Moon rules the affair with his secretary. The Moon in the October Key Cycle chart lies on the Descendant, opposes transiting Uranus on the Ascendant, and square the MC (career, reputation, authority figures).

Finally, in the 22 October 1927 Key Cycle chart for Mr. J, Mercury rules Virgo (intercepted in the 6th of employees) and occupies the 8th together with Saturn, ruler of the 12th of scandals and undoing. Transiting Mercury applies to square transiting Neptune (fantasy, illusion, unrealistic assessment) in the 6th of his secretary. Mercury also rules the Key chart’s 3rd of news reports. Based on angularity, the transiting Moon opposite Uranus aspect, from the 7th to the 1st cusps, dominates this chart. In the 22 October Key Cycle chart the Moon rules both the 4th (his domestic life) and the 5th (his children and love affairs).

My reconstruction by modern computer of the Key Cycle Chart of Mr. J for 22 October 1927, when his affair with his secretary became a matter of public scandal in the local news, as Wynn had warned might happen.

Wynn’s original Key Cycle figures for Mr. J from his 1937 article:

Wynn’s original Key Cycle charts for Mr. J from the Jan 1937 article. Mars in bold print is the natal planet. The other planets are the transits of the moment.

Evangeline Adams and the Wynn Key Cycle

In 1926 Sidney K. Bennett (aka Wynn) had a serious accident which prompted him to develop his “Wynn Key Cycle” which he popularized in the 1930s. He does not credit Evangeline Adams with one of the fundamental ideas that makes up his Key Cycle, but there is a striking resemblance to the method of horary astrology which Evangeline Adams was practicing in the 1920s in New York City, long before Wynn’s accident. Adams was the most famous astrologer in the USA at the time, and Wynn was a studious astrologer, so it is highly likely that he was aware of Adams’ methodology.

Here is a passage from Astrology Your Place in the Sun (1927) by Evangeline Adams:

“... take the exact time the question is asked and work out for this time the Ascendant, or first house, as well as the cusps of the other eleven houses; just as you would if drawing a natal chart.  Instead, however, of placing in this chart the planets as they appear in the heavens at the moment the question is asked, the querent’s radical planets should be placed in this chart.  The Astrologer should now proceed to read the chart in the same manner as if it were the radix, for the chart as it now stands might be considered the horoscope for the birth of the idea,  just as the natal chart is the horoscope for the birth of the individual.”  (page 261)

The crux of Adams’ horary method is the astrological houses calculated for the time and place of the question. The crux of Wynn’s Key Chart is also the astrological houses, which in this case are calculated by progressing the Angles of the Solar Return for the time and place of the date in question. Having read widely in both Adams’ and Wynn’s publications, it seems obvious to me that Adams’ methods prompted Wynn, perhaps subliminally, to focus of the houses particular to a date and time of an incident (as in a horary question) as the crux of the technique.

Just how did Wynn progress the Angles of the Solar Return chart? His idea was simplicity itself. He began with the current Solar Return at the birthplace and also calculated the upcoming solar return of a year later. These two Returns are typically 365 days and about 5 hours 48 minute and 46 seconds apart (the mean duration of a tropical year). He realized that he could progress the MC of the Solar return at a mean rate of 5 hours 48 minute and 46 seconds PER tropical year, or about 29 minutes per month. Such a rate would advance the MC of the current Return so that it arrived at the exact position of the MC in the next return exactly a year later.

Wynn also realized that the real duration of a tropical year can vary by several minutes from year to year, so he individualized the rate of progression according the the year in question. Then having progressed the Angles and cusps of the Solar Return by this rate for the birthplace, he could easily re-located the progressed Solar Return to any location the native happened to occupy on a given date during the year.

In one of his articles about the Wynn Key Cycle he gives the following example of how he progressed the Solar Return MC, from which he then calculated the remaining cusps of the chart:

Suppose someone is born in Chicago on 24 August 1936 at 2:54:40 PM CDT with the Sun at 01 Virgo 26′. This birth time corresponds to a Sidereal Time of 18:06:17. Wynn preferred to work with sidereal time in doing these calculations.

A year later the Sun will return to its natal position on 24 August 1937 at 8:42:51 PM CDT, which corresponds to a Sidereal Time of 23:54:28.

Subtracting the sidereal time of the next solar return from the current one (and disregarding the whole 365 days between the date), we arrive at 23:54:28 minus 18:06:17, which equals 05:48:11, that is 5 hours, 48 minutes and 11 seconds. Then the rate at which the MC will progress is 05:48:11 divided by the 365.242 days in a tropical year:

05:48:11 = 5 hours x 60 min/hour + 48 minutes + 11 seconds / 60 seconds per minute = 348.183 minutes.

348.183 minutes / 365.242 days = 0.953294893 minutes per day by which the birth time must be advanced to progress the MC.

Each “month” or one-twelfth of the year, the MC can be progressed by advancing the birth time at a rate of 348.183 minutes / 12 = 29.01525 minutes per “month”. Note that these rates are specific to the first year of life of this native and will need to be calculated for other years which may vary somewhat in length because Wynn uses the actual length of the year rather than the mean length.

Left-hand chart: Native born in 1936.
Right-hand chart: Solar Return cusps progressed to 25 Dec 1936 with transiting planets for that date at the birthplace.

Wynn found in his research that the progressed Solar Return cusps combined with the transiting planets on a given date, and then compared with the natal chart, offered an extremely useful predictive tool.

If the native were not at the birthplace on 25 December 1936 in this example, Wynn would simply re-locate the progressed Wynn Key chart to the native’s actual location.

The Wynn Key Cycle — a Sample Chart

Recently I’ve been rereading some old texts by Sidney K. Bennett, aka Wynn, and I came across a short article he did about the death of Douglas Fairbanks Sr. in the March 1940 edition of Wynn’s Astrology Magazine.

According to Wynn, in 1925 Douglas Fairbanks Senior had requested a natal chart report for his son, for whom he gave the birth data as 9 December 1909 at 3:38 AM EST in New York City. Here is the birth chart which Wynn used for the younger Fairbanks.

Natal chart of Douglas Fairbanks Jr based on data provided by his father to Wynn in 1925.

Douglas Fairbanks Sr. died on 12 December 1939 in Santa Monica, California, and a few months later (March 1940) Wynn published an article about the impact of the death on his son from the perspective of the Wynn Key Cycle. Here is the son’s Wynn Key chart for the date of his father’s demise. The chart contains the transits of 12 December 1939, and the Angles and houses cusps in Santa Monica, California, based on Wynn’s method of progressing the son’s current solar return.

Wynn Key Cycle chart for the date and place of the death of the father of Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

Wynn notes that Mercury rules the natal 8th house of death and in the Key chart natal Mercury conjoins the Key Chart’s Ascendant, showing “the presence of death in his environment.” Natal Mercury is also closely conjunct the transiting Sun (a father symbol) of the Key Chart. Natally, the Sun rules the 10th house, which Wynn regards as representing the same sex parent of the native. The natal MC occupies the Key Chart’s 8th house.

He also remarks that natal Jupiter conjoins the Key Chart’s MC, indicating some type of expansion. In the birth chart, Jupiter rules the first decan of Gemini which contains the cusp of the natal 8th Placidus house, which signifies legacies and goods of the dead. In addition, Jupiter rules the natal 2nd of the son’s income and finances.

In the Key Chart, transiting Moon and Venus conjoin the Part of Fortune, bringing together 8th and 10th house significations in the very personal 1st house of the native.

In addition, transiting and natal Saturn and the transiting South Lunar Node occupy the 4th house of endings of the Key chart, and both the natal and transiting Sun (a father symbol and ruler of the natal 10th) occupy the Key chart’s 12th of terminations.

Here is the Wynn Key Cycle chart with the transits and progressed Solar Return house cusps for the date and place of the father’s demise, and the son’s natal planets in the outer wheel.

Inner: Wynn Key Chart with transits and progressed Solar Return cusps for date and place of father’s demise.
Outer: natal planets.

As an aside, this is a link to an interesting natal chart report prepared by Wynn for one of his clients: https://www.guggenheim.org/blogs/findings/hilla-rebays-astrological-chart?gallery=HillaHoroscope_cover_web

A Chart from the FBI Most Wanted List

Recently I came across a reference to an old case from the FBI Most Wanted List and was curious to look at the natal chart. I recall reading about this case when I was a teenager because it had to do with a clever bank robber named Frank Sprenz who was technologically quite savvy and also a master of disguise. His modus operandi was to rob a bank and then flee to a nearby airport where he would steal a planet to escape capture.

Sprenz’s criminal history began early and continued throughout his life. According to the Akron Beacon Journal, Sprenz died in in August 2016 at Grafton Correctional Institution at the age of 86. Here is a summary of Sprenz’s early criminal activity by Pauli Poisua from the site Modern Rogue:

“Sometimes, he landed planes in front of bars like it was nothing, went in for a drink, then left when someone pointed out that this was awesome and they should call a newspaper. Because it was at that, and only that point when it briefly occurred to him that a highly wanted criminal probably shouldn’t be pulling off Hollywood stunts like that. This incident marked Sprenz’s two months on the FBI’s Most Wanted list.”

“Sprenz made his name in 1958, when he performed a daring prison escape with four other inmates: They made a cell key from a piece of metal, threw hot coffee on a guard, and legged it. The others were caught (and in one case, killed) within a week, while Sprenz was able to evade capture for over a year. During this time, he used a bunch of aliases and disguises, stole 29 cars and even 3 airplanes. He’d be seen in Pennsylvania, then nab a plane, fly it to Vermont, and freaking deliberately crash it to elude authorities. He used one of those planes to perform a bank heist in Ohio, just casually landing it in front of the bank, robbing the place for $26,000, and then flying the hell away.”

His dramatic prison escape occurred on 16 April 1958 and was followed by a highly publicized crime spree. In response, the FBI placed him on their Ten Most Wanted List on 10 September 1958. He was finally captured on 15 April 1959, almost a year to the day from his notorious jail break.

Surprisingly, given the notoriety of this criminal, there is nothing posted about him on astro.com (AstroDataBnk). The FBI identifies his birth date at 13 February 1930 in Akron, Ohio, most likely taken from court documents and public records. I did a google search for Sprenz’s birth data and found one reference in the astrological literature to a 1977 article by Karen Ober Savalan in The Astrological Journal XIX.4.176. In 1978 this same author published a book on midpoints which featured the chart of Frank Sprenz as its primary example. Unfortunately, in that book his birthdate is given as 14 February 1930 rather than 13 February 1930 (the official FBI record). Because Karen Savalan does not document the source of Sprenz’s birth data, we do not know which is the correct birth date. In addition, she gives a birth time of 7 in the morning, but she does not indicate the source of the data or whether she rectified the chart on the basis of Sprenz’s life events and the theories of the cosmobiologists.

After reviewing the data which I could find online, my best guess is that Frank Lawrence Spence was born on 13 February 1930 in Akron, Ohio, as in the official FBI reports, and that the 7 a.m. time is either from a birth record to which Savalan had access or is her rectification to make the chart work according to the teachings of Witte and Ebertin. Assuming that the 7 a.m. time is reasonably accurate (but it may not be), and that the FBI version of the birth date is more accurate than the date in Savalan’s book on midpoints, I tweaked the birth time using midpoinds, solar and lunar returns, progressions, directions and transits, and came up with a possible birth time of 7:02:15 AM EST in Akron, Ohio, on 13 February 1930. Here is the resulting possible birth chart for the Flying Bank Robber.

Possible birth chart for Frank Sprenz, based on FBI data.

A Cow was his Undoing:

An interesting feature of this chart is that Mars (ruler of the 9th of air travel and occupant of the 12th of imprisonment, undoing and large animals like cows) is “at the bendings,” being in partile square to the Moon’s Nodes which conjoin the 3rd/9th cusps of local and long-distance travel, including travel by air. Sprenz was finally caught when a cow in Mexico interfered with his take-off as he was planning to fly to Cuba. Taurus on the cusp of the 3rd is the sign of cows and bulls.

Here is an account of the incident from the FBI News site:

“When the news media further increased Sprenz’s notoriety by dubbing him the “Flying Bank Robber,” he decided to flee the country. Using a small plane he purchased with stolen money, he eventually flew to Raymondville, Texas, near the border of Mexico. Fearing he had been recognized, he quickly flew on to Mexico.

Sprenz was right—he had been spotted. Authorities contacted the FBI. The Bureau’s international office, or legal attaché, in Mexico City was put on alert.
Sprenz had refueled and was taking off for Cuba when fate intervened: A cow stepped in front of his plane, causing him to swerve and hit a tree. His plane was damaged beyond repair. An FBI legal attaché agent assisted Mexican authorities in tracking down Sprenz, and he was arrested and later returned to the U.S. He was found guilty of various crimes and sentenced to 25 years in jail. He was paroled in 1970 but later returned to his life of crime, and, ultimately, died in prison.“

If anyone reading this has accurate and verifiable information about the actual birth data, please leave a comment. This is an interesting chart, which belongs in the astrological literature.

A Forgotten Method of Forecasting with New Moons

Perhaps it’s serendipity, but recently I was reviewing the literature on forecasting with lunations for a class I’m teaching on solar returns when Alphee Lavoie posted on Facebook an AstroCartoGraphy chart of the New Moon of 30 April 2022 in Washington, DC, being “progessed” diurnally to 24 May 2022, the date of the school shootings in Uvalde, Texas. The Mars/Dsc line of this May 24th diurnal chart cast for Washington, DC, goes directly through Uvalde. Alphee calls this the “Diurnal New Moon” chart, and he has been testing its astro-mapping in mundane astrology for a number of years.

What fascinated me about Alphee’s post was that the previous day I was re-reading an old book in my astrological library: Leigh Hope Milburn’s The Progressed Horoscope Simplified, written in 1928. In her discussion of forecasting with the New Moon, she writes:

“A chart made up on the day of the New Moon as though it were the native’s own birthday (time, place, etc. of the real birth) and read in conjunction with the radical chart will often throw considerable light on the conditions for the month ahead. Also, a chart made up for the exact moment of the New Moon for the particular locality in which one is interested will reveal, in quite some detail, the conditions for that locality for the next 28 days.”

Alphee’s method is very similar to that of Leigh Hope Milburn. The difference is that in applying the idea to mundane astrology, Alphee uses the actual time of the New Moon in Washington, DC, rather than the “birth time” of the nation. Milburn used the method with charts of individuals and utilized the native’s birth time to create the diurnal chart rather than the actual hour and minute of the New Moon.

Like Alphee, however, she also used the charts of localities of the New Moon to judge conditions at those localities in the month ahead. Alphee appears to have extended this latter technique by using astro-mapping along with a diurnal chart for the New Moon. The use of lunations in astrological forecasting is well-established in the classical literature. Alphee’s application of lunations to mundane astrology via astro-mapping is a valuable contribution, worth knowing about.

Here are the charts:

New Moon in Washington, DC, on left and the “diurnal” chart of the New Moon on the right. The same time and place is used in both charts, only the dates are different.

Alphee’s decision to use astro-mapping with this diurnal technique was brilliant and highly informative. To make clear how it works, I will list the steps to be followed when using this mapping technique with New Moons:

Calculate the chart of the most recent New Moon for the capital of the nation, country, state or particular region you wish to study.For the date of interest in the month following the New Moon, calculate the chart for that day, using the time and place of the New Moon but the date being investigated. In this example, the New Moon occurred on 20 April 2022 in Washington, DC. at 4:28:05 PM EDT. Using the same place and time, we would calculate the “diurnal” chart for 24 May 2022, the day of the massacre.Create an AstroCartoGraphy map of the region being studied, using the diurnal chart.

As Alphee noted in his Facebook post, the resulting astro-map (the one here is calculated in mundo) is shown below. The Mars/Dsc line passes directly through Uvalde, which lies to the left of San Antonio. In the original New Moon chart, Mars rules the 3rd house of early education and the 8th house of human mortality.

In mundo astro-map of the diurnal New Moon chart. The Mars/Dsc line passes directly through Uvalde.

I’ve known Alphee for many years, and he is always coming up with and experimenting with innovative ideas. His use of local space maps in horary astrology to find lost objects is a technique which I now often use. I’m eager to experiment with his astro-mapping of diurnal New Moon charts to see what they reveal about mundane events.

Did William Lilly misunderstand contrantiscions?

William Lilly writes on pages 91-92 of Christian Astrology (1647):

“and as there are Antiscions, which of the good planets we think are equal to a Sextile, or Trine; so are there Contrantiscions, which we find to be of the nature of a Square or Opposition: and to know where it is, you do no more than observe in what sign and degree the Antiscion is, in the sign and degree opposite to that place [is] the Contrantiscion…” (bold is mine).

Note that Lilly specifies that the antiscions “of the good planets” are regarded as equal to a sextile or trine connection between the planets. He does not comment on the antiscions of “bad planets” or on the contrantiscions of either good or bad planets, except to say that contrantiscions are “of the nature of a square or opposition.” This view of contrantiscions appears in most modern texts about the topic of antisicia and contra-antiscia.

In reading through Ben Dykes 2020 translation of Abu Ma’shar’s 9th century Great Introduction to the Science of the Judgment of the Stars, however, I came upon a different view of contrantiscions, which took me by surprise because Lilly’s explanation of contantisicons as being like squares and oppositions had been so ingrained in my brain.

Ma’shar is writing about how the signs of the zodiac can behold one another, which is a matter of importance because the planetary ruler of a sign cannot effectively manage its own domain if it has no way to communicate with it. Such a state of inability to communicate visually is referred to as “aversion.”

All astrologers know that signs connected by major, or so-called Ptolomeic, aspects can behold one another. Thus, a planet in a sign can see what is going on in any other sign which is connected to it by major aspect (sextile, square, trine, opposition). Technically, the conjunction is not an aspect but refers to the actual bodily presence of a planet within a sign.

Ma’shar asks what happens when planets occupy signs which are NOT connected by any major aspect, that is, by direct vision. Are there other connections between the signs which will allow a planet in one such sign to know what is happening in the other? The answer is “yes” because signs can be connected by antiscions, contrantiscions, or by being ruled by the same planet.

Antiscions are basically reflections across the solstitial axis, so instead of direct vision, a planet in one sign can see the reflection of the other sign, so to speak. For example, in the following diagram Aries and Virgo are “inconjunct” or “quincunx” and cannot directly see each other via a major aspect. However, each can “see” the image of the other via its reflection across the solstitial axis. Such signs are said to “agree in power” because their days share the same amount of sunlight (the source of power in our solar system). This is considered a harmonious connection.

Image from my book Horary Astrology Plain and Simple

Contrantiscions are signs which reflect across the equinoctial axis and agree in the amount of time it takes each sign in the pair to ascend across the eastern horizon. Such signs are sometimes considered to communicate by being able to “hear” each other. Nonetheless, it is a form of communication and is regarded as a way in which the signs can “harmonize” with one another.

There is no mention of the contrantiscion acting like a square or opposition. Quite the contrary, Abu Ma’shar gives the example of signs in actual square aspect, which would normally mean conflict and hostility, in fact being in harmony and affection because both signs agreed in ascensions and had a contrantiscion relationship (as do the pairs Taurus/Aquarius, and Leo/Scorpio). In other words, the contrantiscion connection converts signs in square aspect to signs that, nonetheless, harmonize and feel affection for one another because they have a special contrantiscion relationship which permits each one to hear what the other is saying.

While it is true that the antiscion and contrantiscion degrees of a given planet lie opposite each other in the zodiac circle, it does not mean that the contrantiscion is equivalent to an opposition aspect. This notion must have entered the literature some time after the 9th century when Abu Ma’shar wrote his treatise, explaining that the contrantiscion is a connection of “harmony and affection” between signs. Perhaps Lilly’s version is based on a translator’s misunderstanding of the original Arabic text.

Abu Ma’shar’s explanation is similar to that of earlier Hellenistic astrologers. For example, Rhetorius of Egypt around the 7th century wrote: “Signs that are disjunct but having sympathy for each other are all the equal-rising signs [contra-antiscions], and those having equal power [antiscions], and those of like zone [same planetary ruler]. For example, equal-rising are Aries and Pisces, Gemini and Capricorn, Cancer and Sagittarius, Virgo and Libra; of equal power are Gemini and Cancer, Virgo and Aries, Libra and Pisces, Sagittarius and Capricorn; of like zone are Taurus with Libra, Aries with Scorpio. And most of the other disjunct signs they established wholly ineffective as regards sympathy.” (James Holden translation, 2009, pp. 16-17)

Like Abu Ma’shar, Rhetorius regards the antiscion, contrantiscion and same planetary ruler relationships between signs as one of “sympathy” (Rhetorius) or harmony and affection (Ma’shar), and there is no mention of contrantisions being of the nature of oppositions or squares.

Image from my book Horary Astrology Plain and Simple.
Horizontal lines connect antiscions (sign of equal power).
Vertical lines connect contrantiscions (signs of equal ascension).
Abu Ma’shar regards such connections as one of affection and harmony between the signs involved, even though the two signs cannot see each other by major aspect.

Addendum: I’m grateful to Luis Ribeiro for pointing out that Ma’shar used the term “natural opposition” when discussing antiscions and contrantiscions.  Inspired by Luis, I checked Dyke’s translation (2020), and he notes that by “natural opposition” and “natural sextile” Ma’Shar means that the two signs are in aversion (can’t see each other) but are able to harmonize because they are also in antiscion or contrantiscion relationship (see footnote 199 on page 362 of Dykes translation). So it may be that European translators in later centuries did not understand what Ma’shar mean by “natural opposition”, etc.

All written material and images on this page are copyright Anthony Louis 2022.

On the distribution of propitious and impropitious times

As mentioned in the two previous posts, recently I came across the word “hebdómada” in a Spanish-language blog about predictive astrology. Not knowing what it meant, I googled the word and found the following definition:

Definition of hebdomad
1 : a group of seven.
2 : a period of seven days : week.

And regarding its etymology:
1540s, “the number seven;” c. 1600, “a week;” from Latin hebdomad-, stem of hebdomas “seven, the seventh day; a week,” from Greek hebdomas “the number seven; a period of seven (days),” from hepta “seven” (from PIE *septm; see seven) + -mos, suffix used to form ordinal numbers, cognate with Latin -mus.

Over the centuries, astrologers have proposed various ways to distribute the days of the year among the seven traditional planets.

Google also led me to a reference by astrologer Fernando Ruiz Guarin, which explained that hebdomadas were a methods of distributing the solar return year among the traditional seven visible planets to identify periods when each planet would be most active during the year. It was also possible to define sub-hebdomadas to further pinpoint likely dates of manifestation of the significations of each planet, for good or evil. Each planet was assigned a certain number of days during the year, and the sequence apparently began with the ruler of the solar return ascendant and proceeded in the well-known Chaldean order from the slowest planet (Saturn) to the fastest (the Moon).

Curious about the origin of this technique, I contacted Fernando who told me that the method came from a 16th century book about solar revolutions by Italian astrologer Junctinus of Florence. Never having read that book, I searched for it online and was able to download a digital copy of the original text, written in Latin. Unfortunately, there does not appear to be a translation of this text into English, so I browsed the Latin text until I found the chapter entitled “De nativitatum. Annorum per dies distributio” and did my best to translate it into English. Not having read other parts of the book, I did not have a feel for the context or a sense of the author’s style of writing and use of vocabulary in Latin. Nonetheless, I persisted and came up with the following understanding:

Junctinus begins the chapter by stating that the days of a year can be divided among the seven individual planets, from which will arise all the good and bad things that will happen during the year, depending on the condition and nature of the planet in charge of that certain period of days. Then, Junctinus wrote a sentence whose meaning initially puzzled me: “Hospitator ergo siue dominus signi ad quod devoluta fuerit progressio ab horoscopo primos sibi vendicat dies.” I understood this to mean that the host planet (hospitator), that is, the lord of the sign (dominus signi), to which (ad quod) the progression from the Ascendant (progressio ab horoscopo) had rolled down, claimed for itself the first days. I wasn’t sure if Junctinus was referring to the Asc of the solar return or the Asc of the annually profected chart. Junctinus continues, “poft ipsum caeteri prout sunt singuli in natalis themate constitute, inquit Firmicus cap.19.1ib.2..”, that is,  “and after him, the other planets, as they are individually placed in the natal chart (in natalis themate), states Firmicus in ch.19. lib.2.” 

In other words, Junctinus is attributing this method to the 4th century author Firmicus Maternus, so the answer to whether “hospitator” was referring the the solar return ascendant or the profected ascendant could be found in Maternus. What was clear was that the distribution of the days of the year among the seven planets was done in the order in which they appeared in the birth chart, and not in classic Chaldean order.

My next step was to read the relevant 4th century chapter in Maternus, which Junctinus was referencing in his 16th century text. Fortunately, this time I had a copy of Maternus in Latin and looked up the chapter which Junctinus was quoting from. It is reproduced here:

I then proceeded to translate Maternus’ text into English, paying special attention to whether he was discussing the profected chart or the solar return chart. Here is my translation, probably not very polished because it was my first time through the Latin text. This passage occurs in the part of Book II in which Maternus is discussing the potential lifespan of the native. My comments about Maternus’ text are in brackets [ ]:

XXVII ON THE DISTRIBUTION OF TIME [during the lifespan of the native]

We shall briefly demonstrate the distribution of time. The Sun gets 19 months; the Moon, 25 months; Saturn, 30 months; Jupiter, 12 months; Mars, 15 months; Venus, 8 months; and Mercury, 20 months. [These are the standard “minor years” of the planets, as found in Vettius Valens and other sources.]

We will show what this distribution of time means in the books about forecasting by the stars, also what a star [planet] ordains when it takes over the time from another; for everything that befalls us, good or evil, we obtain by reason of the times. Even the end of life will be found in this way and also the nature of the entire nativity, and everything that the order of the planets decrees. [Here Maternus clearly appears to be discussing time lords and profections in which one planet takes over a period of time from another planet.]

Moreover, we find the year with the easiest of reasoning; for it [the year] always takes its beginning from the horoscope [rising sign], and the first year will be the one in which the ascendant is located, the second [year] in the second sign, the third [year] in the third [sign], and so on for the others in order. Some do the same in a diurnal chart, [starting ]from the Sun, and at night [starting] from the Moon; and this makes sense. [Again, Maternus is discussing profections, not solar returns.]

 XXVIII ON THE DIVISION OF THE YEAR

 The days of the entire year are also divided among the individual planets; and the extent to which they are divided, and from whence they begin, I shall take care to show … when illness, debility, profit or loss,  joy, or sorrow may occur. For when benefic planets receive the days, we are freed from all evil; when malefic [planets receive the days], then we are struck by sudden misfortune.

Therefore, in whichever sign the beginning of the year is located, the ruler of that sign receives the first days [of the year], and after him come the others, as they are individually situated. [Two paragraphs previously, Maternus had told us that the beginning of the year is related to the annual profection; now he is saying that the lord or the profected ascendant is the time lord for the first division of the year into seven parts.]

And so, I shall also indicate the number of days allotted to each planet: the Sun, 53 days; the Moon, 71; Saturn, 85; Jupiter, 30; Mars, 42; Venus, 23; Mercury, 57. [There is clearly an error in these figures given because their total adds up to 361 days, but there are 365 days in a civil year. Checking Valens, we find that the error lies in the number of days given to Jupiter, which should be 34. This mistake in Maternus is probably the result of a copyist error between the 2nd (Valens) and 4th (Maternus) centuries. By the time these figures got to Junctinus in the 16th century, two more copyist errors had occurred. The correct figures for the number of days of a 365-day year allotted to each planet are given by Valens in detail with their theoretical justification and are as follows: the Sun, 53 days; the Moon, 71; Saturn, 85; Jupiter, 34; Mars, 42; Venus, 23; Mercury, 57. The total of these seven periods adds up to the 365 days of the year. Astrologers who have been using the values given by Junctinus have been working in error with the method. Junctinus erroneously gives 30 days to Jupiter, which he copied from Maternus, 33 days to Venus (instead of 23), and 36 days to Mars (instead of 42).]

In this span of days, we can find everything that happens to us, after carefully having examined the nature of the sign and the place [house]; for [if a planet is] well located, the allotted time, months or days, is favorable, and it denotes all good things. But if a malefic planet receives the time, months or days, and [the planet] is badly situated, it denotes misfortune, according to the quality of its location [in the chart].

Thus, by studying everything with prudent inquiry, one can explain most accurately the entire substance of the geniture.

END of my translation of Maternus

Returning to Junctinus, he writes that he disagrees with Maternus about the division of the year among the seven planets. Instead, Junctinus says that he would start the sequence with the Lord of the Year (domino anni, the ruler of the profected ascendant) but he would distribute the remaining six periods of day among the planets in the order in which they appear in the annual rotation chart (in annuae conversionis schemate, annual revolution). His disagreement with Maternus appears to be about how to order the planets that follow the Lord of the Year in distributing the days of the year among the seven planets.

The following slide shows what appear to be copyist errors in the number of days assigned to each planet as Valens’ original text traveled from the 2nd to the 4th to the 16th century. Valens’ method was to project the minor years of the planets proportionately onto the 365 days of the civil year. This would involve multiplying the minor years of each planet by 2.83, or alternatively doing the addition in Valens’ formula, that is, adding twice the value of the minor years, plus half the value of the minor years, plus one-third the value of the minor years, to obtain a total number of days allotted to the planet in a one-year period:

It turns out that Abu Ma’shar had his own method of distributing the days of the solar year among the seven planets. He simply divided the year into seven equal parts of 52.18 days, and he assigned the first set of 52.18 days to the ruler of the solar return ascendant. The remaining planets were assigned their sets of 52.18 days in Chaldean order from Saturn to the Moon, slowest to fastest. Abu Ma’shar further subdivided the seven divisions of the year, also in Chaldean order starting with the planet that ruled the sub-period, and each sub-period was one-seventh of 52.18 days in duration. This system is most properly called the hebdomad system because it treats the entire years as if it were a great week consisting of seven great weekdays, each 52.18 days long.

In summary, the astrological literature contains several variations of the idea of distributing the year among the seven visible planets. The variables include:

1) the length of the year: solar year, civil year, sidereal year, etc.
2) whether to use the minor years of the planets to proportionately assign a number of days to each planet, as Valens proposed.
3) whether to divide the year into equal segments of 52.18 days, as Abu Ma’shar proposed.
4) whether to begin the sequence of planets form the Lord of the Year (profected ascendant), or from the ruler of the solar return.
5) whether to use values for the number of days distributed to each planet based on the copyist errors found in Maternus and Junctincus, or to use the original correct values, as explained by Vettius Valens.

My own bias is the following: to distribute the year according to the number of days calculated by the method of Valens, based on the minor years of the planets, because these minor years have played such an important role in predictive astrology for more than two millennia; to calculate the number of days by multiplying the minor years of each planet by 365.2422 and dividing by 129 (the total number of minor years of the 7 planets); in other words, the number of minor years times 2.8312 will give the number of days belonging to that planet in a solar year, from one solar return to the next; to begin the sequence from the Lord of the Year, which has traditionally been the starting point for assessing the revolutions of the years of nativities; but to then follow the sequence of planets after the Lord of the Year, according to how they appear in the solar revolution, because the solar return is specific to the year in question.

Volguine and the 7 Planetary Periods of Junctinus

This is a follow-up to my previous post about the errors in Junctinus’ table of planetary periods, which he used in analyzing solar returns. In Chapter 14 of The Technique of Solar Returns, Volguine discusses Junctinus’s method in which the astrological year is divided into seven planetary periods of unequal duration. Volguine notes that Junctinus attributes the duration of these planetary periods to the Roman astrologer Firmicus Maternus in the 4th century, and he admits that he does not know why the planets are assigned these particular numbers of days.

As I showed in the last post, the table of planetary periods used by Junctinus derives from the work of 2nd century Hellenistic astrologer Vettius Valens. Unfortunately, there are three errors in the number of days allotted to each planet in Junctinus’ text when compared with the original source, which is Vettius Valens, who assigned the number of days on the basis of the minor years of the seven visible planets.

In addition, Volguine differs from Junctinus in that Volguine insists on using the Chaldean order of planets from slowest to fastest, and he begins his sequence from the ruler of the solar return ascendant instead of the profected Lord of the Year. Volguine gives an example of a man whose mother died on 22 May 1936 when the native was 27 years old. His solar return in 1936 had Gemini rising, so Volguine begins counting from Mercury, ruler of the return ascendant, rather than f rom Saturn, which was Lord of the Year when this man, who was born with Libra rising, was 27 years old. Using his own method, Volguine concludes that the mother died during a Saturn planetary period, and he notes that Saturn rules the 8th of the return chart and occupied the 10th of the mother.

Now let’s see how Junctinus would have analyzed the solar return of Volguine’s client, but with the correct duration of the seven planetary periods as derived by Vettius Valens:

365.24 days in a tropical year divided by 129 (the total duration of the minor years of all seven visible planets) = 2.83 annual days per each minor year. Thus,

Saturn: 30 x 2.83 = 84.9, rounded to 85 days per year.
Jupiter: 12 x 2.83 = 33.96, rounded to 34 days.
Mars: 15 x 2.83 = 42.45, rounded to 42 days.
Sun: 19 x 2.83 = 53.77, rounded to 54. (Valens rounded this down to 53 days.)
Venus: 8 x 2.83 = 22.64, rounded to 23 days.
Mercury: 20 x 2.83 = 56.6, rounded to 57 days.
Moon: 25 x 2.83 = 70.75, rounded to 71 days.

Natal chart of Volguine’s client whose mother died when he was 27 years old. 1936 Solar Return of the man whose mother died on 22 May 1936 when he was 27 years old.

Volguine’s client was born on 14 January 1909 and turned 27 years old on 14 January 1936. His profected ascendant at age 27 was Capricorn, ruled by Saturn, which became Lord of the Year in 1936. In the solar return (RS) chart, Saturn rules the 8th of death and occupies the 10th of the mother. In addition, RS Saturn lies close to return Mars in the 10th and is within orb of square aspect to the Venus/Jupiter conjunction in the return 6th near the cusp of the 7th. Natally, Venus rules the unfortunate 8th and 12th houses of the birth chart, and Jupiter rules the natal 5th, which is the 8th of death from the 10th of the mother. Natal Jupiter also rules the natal 3rd, which is the 6th of illness of the mother in the birth chart. The Sun in the solar return occupies the SR 8th of death and opposes return Pluto on the cusp of the 3rd, which is the 6th of illness of the 10th of the mother. It is not hard to see the ominous symbolism regarding the well-being of the mother during this year.

Junctinus recommends beginning with the Lord of the Year and arranging the planets in the zodiacl order in which they fall in the return chart. In this case, the order would be: Saturn (Lord of the Year), followed by the Moon, Venus, Jupiter, Sun, Mercury and Mars.

The SR year began on 14 Jan 1936, and Saturn is allotted 85 days, which last until 8 April 1936, when the Moon becomes the time-lord for the next period.

The Moon is allotted 71 days, so the lunar period extends from 8 April until 18 June 1936, and encompasses the date of the mother’s demise. In the natal chart the Moon occupies the 12th house, so the native might experience some type of grief or misfortune during this period. In the solar return, the Moon occupies the 5th house, which is the 8th of death from the 10th of the mother. In addition, the SR Moon’s next aspect will be a stressful quincunx to Mars in the 10th of the mother.

Astrologer Fernando Ruiz Guarin uses a variation of this method, but he further subdivides the 71-day period of the Moon into subperiods (as in a dasha system) to pinpoint which of the seven planets acts as a sub-ruler to the date of the mother’s death. The idea is to partition the 71 days allotted to the Moon proportionately, based on the number of days per year allotted to each planet. Sub-dividing the Moon’s 71-day period in Excel, I came up with the following:

8 April 1936Moon period begins21 April 1936Venus sub-period begins26 April 1936Jupiter sub-period begins2 May 1936Sun sub-period begins13 May 1936Mercury sub-period begins22 May 1936Death of mother24 May 1936Mars sub-period begins1 June 1936Saturn sub-period begins18 June 1936End of 71-day Moon period and Saturn sub-period

Hence, by Junctinus’ method combined with the sub-period method described by Ruiz Guarin, the mother passed in the solar return year of 1936, whose Lord of the Year was Saturn, and during the period of the Moon and sub-period of Mercury. If this were a dasha system, we might represent it as Saturn/Moon/Mercury, where Saturn is the maha-dasha, and the Moon and Mercury are, respectively the sub- and sub-sub periods of this Saturn maha-dasha. In the SR chart, Mercury rules the 5th house, which is the derived 8th of death of the 10th of the mother. The same SR 5th house is occupied by the Moon, which is the major period ruler.

An Error in Junctinus’ methodology on Solar Returns?

Junctinus was an Italian astrologer, medical doctor, theologian, mathematician and the author of the influential 16th century astrological text Speculum Astrologiae (1583) which contained the data and charts of the figures of his day, including his own birth chart. Lacking a modern computer, Junctinus calculated his charts by hand and made some errors in calculation in various charts. Nonetheless, he was highly regarded as an astrologer and was employed as a teacher of Catherine de Medici.

Image from https://www.astro.com/astrowiki/de/Datei:Junctinus.jpg

AstroDatabank gives the following as his birth details:

NameJunctinus Gender: MBirthnameGiuntini, Franciscusborn on8 March 1522 Jul.Cal. (18 Mar 1522 greg.) at 01:20 (= 01:20 AM )PlaceFlorence, Italy, 43n46, 11e15TimezoneLMT m11e15 (is local mean time) Franciscus Giuntini (1522 – 1590?) also wrote a text in Latin about Solar Revolutions in the year M.D. LXX (1570)

Francisci Ivnctini florentini S. T. Doctoris also published the following book in the year 1570 on Annual Revolutions and Solar Returns:

Tractatus iudicandi reuolutiones natiuitatum : omnia, quae pertractantur in hoc libro non solum astrologis, sed etiam vniuersis bonarum artium studiosis vtilia, [et] iucunda, atque aliter explicata, quam hactenus fuerint ab aliis tradita : vit sapiens dominabitur astris.

(A treatise for judging the revolutions of births: all things which are handled in this book not only for astrologers, but also for all students of good arts, useful, [and] pleasant, and explained in a different way, than they have hitherto been rendered by others. The wise man will rule over the stars.)

I recently obtained a copy of Junctinus’ 16th century Latin text and began reading some key passages. I was particularly interested in his method of distributing the influence of the annual revolution over the days of the solar return year, which he took almost verbatim from the writings of the 4th century Roman astrologer Julius Firmicus Maternus. For his part, Firmicus Maternus derived the method from the 2nd century Hellenistic astrologer Vettius Valens, who appears to be the original source of the technique. Unfortunately, along the way various errors crept into the transcriptions of the original text of Vettius Valens, and these ended up in the solar revolutions book by Junctinus in the 16th century. Specifically, I am referring to the following chapter from pages 146 and 147 of Junctinus’ Latin text:

Junctinus’ table of the number of days assigned to each planet in the solar revolutions contains several errors, as explained in the remainder of this blog. Junctinus appears to be unaware of the fact that the values assigned to the planets are based on the ancient theory of the minor (small, least) years of the planets, described in the texts of Hellenistic astrologers.

Here is my loose translation of the above Latin text:

ON NATIVITIES

Distribution of the year by days.

The days of the entire year are also divided among the individual planets, from which arise ailments, weaknesses, gains, losses, pains, and joys: for when benevolent stars [planets] receive the day, we are freed from all evil. But when [the planet is] malevolent, sudden misfortunes befall us. The host, therefore, as the master of the sign to which the horoscope [hour-marker, ascendant] has progressed, claims for himself the first day: and after him, the other planets, as they are individually placed in the figure of this birthday, says Firmicus in ch.19. lib.2.

But, in my opinion, we must take the distribution of the year from the lord of the year [domino anni, that is, the ruler of the profected ascendant of the year], after which we divide the year among the other planets, as they are individually placed in the chart of the annual revolution, according to the sequence of signs. In this space of days, we can find all the things that are coming to us: having thoroughly examined beforehand the location and quality of the signs, for if the star [planet], which will govern those days of our birth, is well placed and benevolent, it determines all good things. The number of days which each planet is allotted in shown as follows:

Days: Saturn – 85, Jupiter – 30, Mars – 36, Sun – 53, Venus – 33, Mercury – 57, Moon – 71.

Junctinus makes clear that he is deriving his method of dividing the solar return year into seven periods, each ruled by a particular planet in the order in which they appear in the solar return chart. He disagrees with Firmicus about which planet initiates the sequence. Firmiucus begins dividing the solar return year into periods of days, beginning with the ruler of the solar return Ascendant. Junctinus disagrees and states that, in his opinion, it is preferable to begin the sequence with the Lord of the Year, that is, the ruler of the annual profected Ascendant. The other planets are then arranged in the sequence in which they appear in the solar revolution, beginning with the Lord of the Year. Each planet is allotted a certain number of days, as indicated in the list provided by Junctinus, the total of which adds up to 365, the number of whole days in a year.

Junctinus appears to have been unaware that Firmicus derived the number of days assigned to each planet from the work of Vettius Valens in the 2nd century. Valens writes (Mark Riley translation):

Vettius Valens, Anthologies, Book IV 71 /158K;150P/

The Anthologies of Vettius Valens of Antioch: Book IV

1. The Distributions of Periods.
We believe that we have set forth an appropriate, in fact, magisterial, explanation of the previous . We will now reveal a topic investigated by many and hidden from view, namely the distribution of propitious and impropitious times. We must preface our discussion with the distributions which have been proven by our own experience. The primary period is one-fourth of the minimum period, as follows:

Star…………………………Period ……………………. One-fourth Period ……………………….. Days/Year

Saturn……………………..30 ………………………….. 7 1/2 ………………………………………….. <85 Jupiter……………………..12 ………………………….. 3> ……………………………………………… 34
Mars ……………………….15 ………………………….. 3 years 9 months………………………… 42 1/2
Venus …………………….. 8 …………………………… 2………………………………………………… 22 2/3 Mercury…………………..20 ………………………….. 5………………………………………………… 56 2/3
Sun …………………………19 ………………………….. 4 years 9 months………………………… 53 5/6 Moon………………………25 ………………………….. 6 years 3 months………………………… 70 5/6

Altogether, the “fourths” total 32 years 3 months.

Let’s compare Valens’ original text with the 16th century rendering by Junctinus, and the errors will become apparent.

PlanetValensValens rounded (up or down)Firmicus MaternusJunctinusSaturn85858585Jupiter34343030error in Maternus & JunctinusMars42 1/2424236error in JunctinusSun53 5/6535353Venus22 2/3232333error in JunctinusMercury56 2/3575757Moon70 5/6717171TOTAL days per year365.5 days365 days361 days ??365 days

The values given by Valens agree with his method of calculation and can be assumed to be a correct rendering of the original method. The errors introduced by Firmicus (Jupiter as 30 instead of 34) and Junctinus (errors in Jupiter, Mars and Venus) are most likely due to copyist errors in transcribing original texts.

My suggestion to practicing astrologers, who use this method of distributing the solar return over the seven visible planets in the course of the revolution year, is to return to the assignment of days as originally proposed and mathematically calculated by Vettius Valens. Here is how Valens calculated the number of days for each planet based on the classical ‘small periods’ of the planets, which were rooted in the recurrence cycles of the planets, that is, cycles at the end of which the planets conjoin the Sun in approximately the same degree of the zodiac. Again from Mark Riley’s translation:

To Find the Days of Each Star.

The days of each star are found in this way: double the star’s period, then take one-half, then one-third of the period. After adding all these figures together, we will find the days. The period of Saturn is 30 days; I double this for a total of 60. One-half of 30 is 15; I add this to 60 for a total of 75. One-third of 30 is 10; I add this to the 75 for a grand total of 85. Saturn will have this number of days. Likewise for the rest of the stars.

My guess is that Valens came up with his formula as follows. He knew that the sum total of the minor years of the visible planets was 129, and he wanted to project 129 onto the length of the year, which he knew was slightly more than 365 days: 129 –> 365. He must have toyed with some arithmetic and realized that 2 x 129 = 258, 1/2 of 129 = 64.5, and 1/3 of 129 = 43, so if you add together 258 + 64.5 + 43, you get 365.5 days, which is very close to the known length of the tropical year.

To illustrate the error regarding Jupiter in the texts of Maternus and Junctinus, we use Valens formual and double Jupiter’s base period (its classical ‘small period‘ — see the table from Arhat Media below), then add one-half of the base period and then one-third of the base period. Jupiter’s base period is given as 12, which is doubled to 24 (2 x 12). Half of the period is 6 (12 divided by 2) and a third of the period is 4 (12 divided by 3). Thus, we must add 24 + 6 + 4 and arrive at 34 as the number of days of the year assigned to Jupiter in Valens’ formula. Hence the value of 30 given by Firmicus and Junctinus are obviously in error and probably represent typographical or copyist errors in transcription.

The following table of the classical small (minor), mean and great periods of the planets is quoted from Arhat Media:

***MoonMerc.VenusSunMarsJupiterSaturnSmall2520819151230Mean66.5484569.540.545.543.5Great1087682120667957

The small periods are derived from recurrence cycles, cycles at the end of which the planets conjoin the Sun in approximately the same degree of the zodiac. 

Bruce Scofield explains the small or minor years of the planets as follows:

Every eight Sun years turns out to be the same as five Venus years. Every 19 Sun years the Moon and Sun meet at the same place. This is called the Metonic Cycle. Every 12 years Jupiter passes through the entire ecliptic and returns to the same place. Saturn does this in about 30 years. These astronomical facts were not lost on ancient calendar and ephemeris makers. In fact, in ancient Western astrology each of the planets has a set of specific years, a list that appears in many ancient texts. Here’s the list:

The Least or Minor Years of the Planets: 

Sun – 19 (Metonic Cycle)
Moon – 25 (309 lunation cycles in 25 Egyptian years of 365 days)
Mercury – 20 (63 synodic cycles in 20 Egyptian years)
Venus – 8 (5 synodic cycles of Venus equals 8 solar years)
Mars – 15 (7 synodic cycles in 15 Egyptian)
Jupiter – 12 (11 synodic cycles in 12 Egyptian years)
Saturn – 30 (29 synodic cycles in 30 Egyptian years )

——–

If we add up the minor (small, least) years of the seven visible planets, we get the sum total of 129 years. Valens sought to project this sum onto the total number of days in a year (365.24 in a tropical year). Valens chose the arithmetic method of adding together twice the period, half the period and a third of the period. A simpler method would have been to multiply each minor period by the ratio of 365 days in a year to 129 total days in the minor periods of the seven planets:

365.24 days in a year divided by 129 total minor days = 2.83 annual days per each minor year day. Doing the math:

Saturn: 30 x 2.83 = 84.9, rounded to 85.
Jupiter: 12 x 2.83 = 33.96, rounded to 34.
Mars: 15 x 2.83 = 42.45, rounded to 42.
Sun: 19 x 2.83 = 53.77, rounded to 54. (Valens rounded this down to 53.)
Venus: 8 x 2.83 = 22.64, rounded to 23.
Mercury: 20 x 2.83 = 56.6, rounded to 57.
Moon: 25 x 2.83 = 70.75, rounded to 71.

Today with the availability of home computers, it would be simple to use the precise values, accurate to two decimal points, rather than the rounded values to calculate favorable and adverse periods during a solar return year, if one were so inclined.

The choice of whether to begin the distribution with the ruler of the Solar Return ascendant, as Firmicus recommends, or with the Profected Lord of the Year, as Junctinus advises, is worth further experimentation to evaluate which technique gives better results in practice.

Addendum: In researching this matter a bit more, I found that Alexandre Volguine in Chapter 14 of his classic text on the technique of solar returns, first published in France in 1937, discusses the seven planetary periods and quotes Junctinus’ table, repeating the errors in the periods of Jupiter, Mars and Venus. He correctly attributes the source of this method of dividing the year to Firmicus Maternus but adds that he is unaware of how the planetary periods listed by Junctinus were derived.

Volguine writes that he has tested Junctinus’ method for 10 years and found that there is a “good deal of truth” in it, provided that you start from the planet ruling the solar return ascendant (not the Lord of the Year, as Junctinus recommends) and continue in the Chaldean order of slowest to fastest planet (Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon), which is contrary to what both Firmicus Maternus and Junctinus recommend. Perhaps if Volguine were working with the correct planetary periods as calculated by Valens, he would have found the technique to be even more reliable.

—

All original material in this blog is copyright Anthony Louis 2022.

Will Smith’s Meltdown at the Oscars

On Sunday evening , 27 March 2022, in Los Angeles actor Will Smith shocked the world when he hit Chris Rock in the face during the Academy Awards. Mr. Smith was apparently miffed by one of the comedian’s jokes which poked fun at Smith’s wife’s bald hair style:  “Jada, I love ya. G.I. Jane 2, can’t wait to see it.” Smith became enraged that his wife had been singled out in this way and later, during his acceptance speech, he explained that the Devil had come for him at his highest moment, that love makes you do crazy things, and that God was calling on him to love and protect people, and in the process you’ve got to be able to take abuse and disrespect and pretend that that’s okay. Apparently, Chris Rock was unaware that Jada had a medical condition which was causing her hair loss.

Although Mr. Smith refused to apologize immediately to Chris Rock, he eventually issued an apology to the comedian and stated publicly that “violence in all of its forms is poisonous and destructive. My behavior at last night’s Academy Awards was unacceptable and inexcusable.” Watching Smith acceptance speech from Sunday evening, it becomes apparent that he was in the midst of some type of emotional turmoil, probably with long-standing roots in his past. Subsequent to the incident, several commentators have pointed out a description of Smith’s childhood trauma at age 9, which he describes in his autobiography. For example, Dr. Melissa Hankins argues that Smith’s assault on Chris Rock was a response to his childhood trauma, which Smith himself describes as follows:

“And I was probably 9, and I watched my father beat up my mother. And I was too scared to do anything. And just on my young mind, it became imprinted.“

“It’s like, what kind of kid stands there and lets somebody hit their mother and they don’t do anything, you know? And that became really the core trauma of my childhood that my personality and my persona became to form around, to be the opposite of that, you know? I was never going to be scared again.”

“What was really difficult for me is my father’s my hero,” he said. “My father’s the greatest person I’ve ever known, and that dichotomy breaks a young mind, you know? It’s like, how do you love somebody who did that?“

“That really just became the central core of the wound that I was overcoming throughout my childhood, and then ultimately throughout my life.”

One could argue fairly convincingly that Smith’s meltdown at the Academy Awards was triggered by his equating Chris Rock’s joke about his wife’s haircut to the violent physical abuse which his father inflicted on his mother, as he stood helplessly by, powerless to protect the woman he loved.

Does this trauma show up in his natal chart? Here is his chart based on the data from astro.com (Rodden rating A).

NameSmith, Will Gender: MBirthnameWillard Christopher Smith, Jr.born on25 September 1968 at 21:47 (= 9:47 PM )PlacePhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, 39n57, 75w10TimezoneEDT h4w (is daylight saving time)

For issues of traumatic wounds that won’t heal, one can look to both Chiron and Pluto. In Smith’s chart, Chiron at 0 Aries 59′ Rx opposes his natal Sun (at 3 Libra 03′) and is quincunx his natal Mars (at 2 Virgo 41′) in the 4th house of his parents and early family life. If we take the Sun, ruler of the 4th, to represent his father, we see that the Sun is conjunct Uranus across the Virgo/Libra sign boundary, suggesting erratic and unpredictable behavior on his father’s part. Natal Mars is closely semi-sextile the Sun, which I find repeatedly to be a stressful aspect as the two planets are “in aversion” and unintegrated.

Smith also has a stressful yod (finger of God, or finger of fate) configuration. Pluto (at 23 Virgo 03′) is sextile to his Moon/Neptune conjunction (midpoint at 22 Scorpio 48′), with all three of these planets in quincunx to Saturn (at 23 Aries 34′ Rx) on the 12th Placidus house cusp (at 23 Aries 24′). This yod ties the Moon (his emotional life) and Pluto closely to 12th house issues. This symbolism is certainly consistent with his childhood trauma at age 9. Yod’s are powerful configurations in natal charts and often indicate that the native feels fated to pursue a special (God-given) mission or purpose in life. In Smith’s case, by his own admission, one of his life’s purposes became to protect the women he loves from abusive men. With so much stressful involvement of the Pluto, Neptune and Saturn with the Moon in his birth chart, he might benefit from psychoanalysis or intensive psychotherapy to resolve these childhood issues regarding his abusive father so that they don’t continue to interfere with his adult life.

We can now ask whether these natal chart factors became activated at the time of his assault on Chris Rock. Because the Moon is so intimately involved in his emotional state and the yod in his natal chart, I compared his natal chart with the Lunar Return for the period of the Academy Awards in Los Angeles.

Inside: Lunar Return for Los Angeles, in effect during the Awards.
Outside: the natal chart of Will Smith

Will Smith’s lunar return (inner wheel) during the time of the Academy Awards occurred on 21 March 2022, about a week before the event. Libra rises in the lunar return, making Venus the ruler of the return Ascendant in Los Angeles. Transiting Venus is besieged between malefics Mars and Saturn in the lunar return chart in the 4th house of home and family. Transiting Pluto (symbolically linked to abuse) is closely conjunct the 4th cusp of the lunar return chart. Transiting Venus is conjunct his natal MC, highlighting themes of love, marriage and affection. His natal Saturn (outer wheel) closely conjoins the lunar return 7th cusp (marriage) and opposes the return Ascendant. The lunar return Sun (at 0 Aries 30′) closely conjoins his natal Chiron. On 27 March 2022, when he slapped Chris Rock at the Academy Awards, transiting Mercury (speech, communication) was exactly conjunct the position of the Sun in his lunar return for this period. The lunar nodal axis (related to fateful events because eclipses occur near this axis) of the lunar return passes directly through Smith’s natal Moon/Neptune conjunction, which is part of his natal yod, involving natal Pluto and natal Saturn. The New Moon of 31 March 2022 in Los Angeles occurred at 11 Aries 30′, almost exactly conjunct Chiron of the lunar return.