Gourt Home::Gourt :: House (astrology)
Most Western astrological systems divide the horoscope into a number of (usually twelve) houses whose position depend on the time and location of the initiation rather than on the date.
Description
The houses are divisions of the sky (including that part of it hidden beneath the ground) and are usually numbered from the position of the eastern horizon at the time of the observation. The first house would be the division just about to rise, the sixth house would have just set and houses 7 to 12 would be visible in the sky at the time of the horoscope. There are a range of approaches to calculating these divisions and a wide variety of opinion among astrologers over which house system to use.
To calculate the houses it is necessary to know the exact time of the moment. In natal astrology, if the time of birth is unknown some astrologers will use a birth time set for noon or sunrise, but a meaningful interpretation of such a chart cannot be expected.
The houses are departments of life, described in terms of physical surroundings as well as personal life experiences, and many modern astrologers assume that they have some correspondence with their natural sign, i.e. the first house has a natural affinity with the first sign, Aries, and so on.
In quadrant systems houses are classified as angular (1st, 4th, 7th, and 10th), succedent (2nd, 5th, 8th, and 11th), and cadent (3rd, 6th, 9th, and 12th). Angular houses represent the potential for action, succedent houses give stability and purpose, cadent houses are communicative and enable change or adaptation.
In old astrological writings (e.g. William Lilly), house could also be used as a synonym for domicile or rulership, as in the sentence "The Moon has its house in Cancer" meaning that Cancer is ruled by the Moon.
Significance of the houses
Each house signifies how the effects of the heavenly bodies positioned in it will be felt in the moment for which the horoscope has been drawn.
- First house
- Second house
- Third house
- Fourth house
- Fifth house
- Sixth house
- Seventh house
- Eighth house
- Ninth house
- Tenth house
- Eleventh house
- Twelfth house
House systems
There are many systems of dividing the ecliptic into houses. In most systems, the ascendant (eastern horizon) marks the cusp, or beginning, of the first house, and the descendant (western horizon) marks the cusp of the seventh house. In addition, quadrant systems (i.e. most systems except equal) use the midheaven (medium coeli) as the cusp of the tenth house and the nadir (imum coeli) as the cusp of the fourth house.
Equal house system (born with astrology in subtropical regions) breaks up in extreme latitudes completely, which was the reason, the farther north the astrology moved, for lookup of new house systems. When astrology moved to southern Europe, Porphyry house system was developed and replaced Equal, and later was replaced by Alcabitius developed by Arabs. In northern Europe Regiomontanus was developed and overtook, but later was replaced by Placidus. As no better house system than Placidus was proposed so far, it is the most popular house system in use, although it is bad enough to make a lot of resistance against it's use.
The problem with existing house systems is that most quadrant systems deliver wrong house cusps when a horoscope is drawn for a location in extreme northern or southern latitudes (Campanus, Placidus) or in some places beyond polar circles their definitions provide no cusps at all (Alcabitius, Placidus, Koch), so search for new house systems is still sustained and vivid among astrologers.
Placidus
The most commonly used house system in modern Western astrology. There seems to be no particular reason for its popularity except that calculation tables have always been easily available. The system is based on a division of time rather than space as in most other systems. The times taken for each degree of the ecliptic to rise from the IC to the ascendant, and from the ascendant to the MC, are trisected to determine the cusps of houses 2, 3, 11, and 12. The cusps of houses 8, 9, 5 and 6 are opposite these.The Placidus system is defined only for latitudes between 66°N and 66°S.
Equal
The ecliptic is divided into twelve divisions of 30 degrees each. As long as there is an ascendant, twelve equal houses can be measured from it, so this system works for all locations although there will be anomalies in charts for locations within the polar circles.Whole sign
In the whole sign house system, the houses are also 30° each, but instead of beginning at the ascendant, the first house begins at zero degrees of the zodiac sign in which the ascendant falls. In other words, each house is wholly filled by one sign. This is the system used in Jyotish (vedic astrology), and Hellenistic astrology. It is believed to be the oldest system of house division.Regiomontanus
The celestial equator is divided into twelve, and these divisions are projected on to the ecliptic along great circles that take in the north and south points on the horizon. Named after the German astronomer and astrologer Johann Müller of Königsberg.Meridian
Similar to the above, except that the east point is taken as the ascendant.Campanus
The prime vertical (the great circle taking in the zenith and east point on the horizon) is divided into twelve, and these divisions are projected on to the ecliptic along great circles that take in the north and south points on the horizon. It is named after Johannes Campanus.Porphyry
Each quadrant of the ecliptic is divided into three equal parts between the four angles. This is the oldest system of quadrant style house division. Although it is attributed to Porphyry of Tyros, it appears that this system was actually first described by the astrologer Vettius Valens in his 2nd century work The Anthology.Koch
A rather more complicated version of the Placidean system, but built on equal increments of Right Ascension for each quadrant. Like it, the Koch system is defined only for latitudes between 66°N and 66°S.Topocentric
View 1: This is a recent system, invented in Argentina, that its creators claim to have been determined empirically, i.e. by observing events in people's lives and assessing the geometry of a house system that would fit. The house cusps are always within a degree of those given in the Placidus system, which would seem to corroborate that system. The geometry is somewhat complicated and the reader is referred to this site for an explanation.View 2: Placidus house system computed by space division algorithm, instead of Placidus's original time based algorithm. Thus Topocentric house cusps positions differ by up to 1 degree from original Placidus, eliminating error introduced by time based alg., giving exact position of house cusps.
Explanation: Topocentricity mentioned in above linked article applies to objects like Sun, Moon and planets and their house positions. For house cusps positions there's no difference between topocentric or geocentric ones.
Krusinski
Recently published (1995) house system, based on great circle passing through ascendant and zenith (Medium Coeli). This circle is divided into 12 equal parts (1st cusp is ascendent, 10th cusp is zenith), then resulting points are projected to ecliptic through meridian circles (circles passing through equatorial north and south poles, perpendicular to equator, see: meridian (geography)).This house system is also known under the name Amphora, frequently used in the Czech Republic. It was published by Milan Píša in czech astrological journal "Konstelace č. 22" under the title "AMPHORA - nový systém astrologických domů" (1997), and in the book "Amphora - algoritmy nového systému domů" (1998).
Rulership
In Hellenistic, Vedic, Medieval and Renaissance astrology each house is ruled by the planet that rules the sign on its cusp. For example, if a person has the sign Aries on the cusp of their 7th house, then the planet Mars is said to "rule" their 7th house. This means that when a planet is aloted a house, it's nature comes to have some bearing on that specific topic in the person's life, and that planet is said to be very important for events specifically pertaining to that topic. The placement of this planet in the chart will have at least as much influence as the chart as the planets within the house. In traditional Western & Hindu astrology, each sign is ruled by one of the 7 visible planets (note that in astrology, the Sun and Moon are considered planets, which literally means wanderers, i.e. wandering stars, as opposed to the fixed stars of the constellations).
In addition, some modern astrologers who follow the planet=sign=house doctrine which was first taught by Alan Leo in the early part of the 20th century, believe that certain houses are also 'ruled' by, or have an affinity with the planet which rules the corresponding zodiacal sign, eg. Mars is ruler of the 1st house because Aries is the first sign, Mercury rules or has an affinity with the 3rd house because Gemini is the 3rd sign, etc., and this is sometimes referred to as "natural rulership", as opposed to the former which is sometimes called "accidental rulership".
The traditional rulerships are as follows: Aries (Mars), Taurus (Venus), Gemini (Mercury), Cancer (Moon), Leo (Sun), Virgo (Mercury), Libra (Venus), Scorpio (Mars), Sagittarius (Jupiter), Capricorn (Saturn), Aquarius (Saturn), Pisces (Jupiter).
The majority of modern western astrologers believe that Uranus is the ruler of Aquarius instead of Saturn, Neptune is the ruler of Pisces instead of Jupiter, Pluto is the ruler of Scorpio instead of Mars, while Venus and Mercury still have dual rulership of Taurus & Libra and Gemini & Virgo respectively. Some modern astrologers reject the dual rulerships all together and assign no planets to Taurus and Virgo. Some astrologers treat the new planets as co-rulers of the signs in addition to their traditional rulers (or vice-versa), while others who practice more traditional forms of astrology often opt not to assign the outer planets sign rulership at all. Traditional (Hindu) astrology strictly adheres to the traditional rulerships system listed in the paragraph above, and the debate continues between those astrologers those who consider the newly discovered planets as only rulers or even corulers of certain signs and those that do not or opt for them to be rulers at all.
Traditionally, a planet is said to be strengthened (dignified) if it falls within the Zodiac Sign that it rules. If a planet is in the sign opposite that which it rules, it is said to be weakened (detriment).
Why Twelve Houses?
The majority of astrologers use a 12 house division. But one theoretician, Patrice Guinard, Ph.D. * has argued, based on historical records, that there is a basis for an 8 house division. One prominent Astrologer, Marc Penfield, utilises 8 houses.
External links
- RGCSA -- The Research Group for the Critical Study of Astrology
- NCGR -- National Council for Geocosmic Research
- The Original 3,000 Year High-Precision Daily Astrological Online Ephemeris from Khaldea.com -- 600BC to 2400AD -- Calculated for Midnight GMT; also with an Aspectarian included for years 1900 to 2005
"House (astrology)"