Mundane Astrology Lesson 1

[ecosophia]

A heads up to let readers know that the first installment of my mundane astrology course has just been posted on my SubscribeStar and Patreon pages. This lesson is a public post, so you can read it even if you're not a subscriber; the lessons to come won't be. (I've explained the details in a previous journal post here.)  Future installments will appear at a rate of approximately one a month until the whole book is finished a couple of years from now. Here are the links: 

SubscribeStar (scroll down a bit)

Patreon

Enjoy!

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I've been doing mundane astrology for my country over the course of the 20th century, and found Pluto does not seem to predict anything. Simply put, for mundane astrology, Pluto seems to have never meant much of anything; I find this fascinating, but I'm not sure what it means.

What I find fascinating is that it seems Pluto matters a lot, but Pluto transits are basically meaningless. In other words, in a rather humorous reflection of Pluto's nature as this disruptive and lying energy, everyone is fixated on something which doesn't matter in the least, while ignoring the actual ways it matters....

[booklover1973]

That was a question that came up regarding the first lesson posted: What about Pluto in the mundane astrology of the 20th century? In which parts of mundane astrology is Pluto relevant, if in any part, and in which part of it it is meaningless?

[ecosophia]

That's something best worked out by retrospective analysis of charts. Between 1930 and 2006, at least in theory, Pluto had the force of a planet, and it might be worth examining charts from that era to see if Pluto predicted anything that was not predicted by other planets.

[mrwhite105]

Yeah, I've certainly noticed that between 1900 and today, Pluto has predicted major events. The outbreak of both world wars, for example, involved Saturn-Pluto transits. Even more recently, 9/11 and the War on Terror was predicted by a Saturn-Pluto opposition, and the Covid pandemic today is represented by last year's Saturn-Pluto conjunction. So far, it seems to me, Pluto is relevant. The question is, as you've predicted JMG, whether or not Pluto will wane in influence from about 2036 onwards (30 years after being officially downgraded from planetary status). 2036 also happens to be a year in which another Saturn-Pluto transit occurs. I think it might continue to have the same influence because it's still generally treated as a planet astrologically. Of course, I might be wrong, but it will be a long time before we'll be able to see what happens with that. Going back before 1900, it seems a lot of outer planet cycles are a bit less reliable in terms of predicting the timing of significant events - Pluto included but not alone. Looking at the period of the French Revolution, as one example, the main aspect there is an approaching Uranus-Pluto opposition, triggered in 1789 by Jupiter conjuncting Uranus and then opposing Pluto. So there's one piece of evidence suggesting that transits involving Pluto might have some value even before 1900. That's what I found in just a couple of minutes of research, so perhaps there is more out there too.

[ecosophia]

Interesting. I'm still in the early stages of my project in retrospective mundane astrology yet, but I've been working fairly closely with the 1939 Aries ingress in London -- the one that C.E.O. Carter bungled so badly -- and even without Pluto, it's a chart predicting war: Mars is in a hard square with both luminaries, and the Moon's angular, a combination that's a classic indication of war; Mars and Saturn are also in mutual reception, and if you exchange their positions (standard practice for delineating a chart with mutual reception) Mars is in the 10th, another classic indication of war. Saturn in the 10th is another very baleful omen. So the Pluto transit was one more warning rather than a standalone indication of war.

[(Anonymous)]

Is that standard practice in natal astrology as well? Because I have had a lot of problems with my Neptune and Saturn placements by house (they sometimes seem like they ought to be swapped); I also read up on Mars and Saturn in aspects and found that it really fits, but Mars and Saturn aren't in aspect, while Neptune and Mars are. I'd been wondering about whether sextiles have wider orbs than I'd been thinking, but this makes sense of a lot more anomalies in my chart! Hmm....

[ecosophia]

Mutual reception is a very specific situation -- when each planet is in the other's rulership, they can be swapped. In the chart we're discussing, Saturn is in Aries and Mars is in Capricorn, so there's mutual reception. Some writers also allow mutual reception by exaltation -- for example if Mars was in Cancer and Jupiter was in Capricorn, you could swap the two -- but unless you have some such connection, you don't have mutual reception and can't swap them.

[(Anonymous)]

Sorry, should have clarified: my Neptune is in Capricorn and Saturn in Pisces; so I definitely have mutual reception.

[ecosophia]

In that case, yes, you have a classic mutual reception. Treat both planets as though they're in their rulership, thus essentially dignified, and reinterpret the chart as though each of them was in the other's place, with the other's aspects -- see if that makes more sense of your natal chart.

[mrwhite105]

Ah, okay, that's interesting. I suppose the Saturn-Pluto transit was the wider, macro-scale indicator for WWII and then the other transits spelled out some of the finer details. Looking over history, it seems that pretty much all of these major crises have taken place under hard outer planet transits and then triggered in the more immediate term by intermediate planets like Mars and Jupiter. If we look at the Saturn-Pluto conjunction which heralded the First World War, we see that Mars squared the Saturn-Pluto conjunction in the summer of 1914 at the same time as Jupiter was retrograding towards conjunction with Uranus. I imagine it would be very rare for any transit to be a standalone indication of a major event. It's probably more reliable for major events to be predicted when multiple transits (inner and outer planets involved) come together in a very short timeframe to spell out similar meanings.

[(Anonymous)]

JMG,

I encourage You to take a look at Aries Ingress 1939 chart for Poland, which Nazis attacked first. Even to my untrained eye, this chart shows war. I can send you a ready chart if You want to.

Mieczysław

[ecosophia]

Thanks for this -- a useful data point.

[thuley]

Excellent!

I'm familiar with combust, but in traditional astrology, there are a couple of exceptions to combust: "in chariot" - in which a planet conjunct the sun is not afflicted when it's in domicile or exaltation, and "in the heart" - in which a planet conjunct the sun is not afflicted if conjunct within one degree. The historical evidence for these schemes is substantial, though I'm not sure how practical they are.

Do you use these schemes in your mundane astrology?

[ecosophia]

Those certainly seem to function in natal astrology, but I haven't seen any evidence for them so far in my mundane charts; combust planets seem to be combust, full stop, end of sentence. It would be worthwhile, however, to explore combustion with those schemes in mind and see whether they make a noticeable difference.

[open_space]

Excited about this! Just gave it a read. I’ve been studying your mundane charts to try to apply trad astrology to Mexico, so this comes in very timely. Maybe by the time the book is finished I’ll have enough to start delineating charts with at least some degree of accuracy.

[ecosophia]

Delighted to hear it. The best way to learn, btw, is to start delineating charts, make your best guess about what they mean, and then see what happens and adjust your predictions accordingly.

Thank you!

[(Anonymous)]

I now have a much clearer picture of how these things relate to each other, and will seek out Parker's Astrology.

While you're dealing in Mundane Astrology here, I note that all my outer planets - Saturn through Neptune - are in their fall, and these are said to be the ones affecting entire generations. For what it's worth. And my image of Taurus is the old country squire who does things the way his ancestors did and hasn't changed an opinion since the days of King George. Making me want to check the birthdate of Her Majesty, who has been a remarkable symbol of continuity in our age. (Capricorn decidedly includes Pan!)

Re: Thank you!

[ecosophia]

The astro.com databank includes the natal charts for an impressively large number of people, including Elizabeth II:

https://www.astro.com/astro-databank/Elizabeth_II,_Queen_of_England

Re: Thank you!

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, indeed. Sun Zero Taurus, Ascendant Capricorn - Her Majesty is decidedly Earth. Moon in Leo - well, Leo's a good sign for a ruler.

Some thing not right?

[(Anonymous)]

Mr Greer:
Either there is an error in my computer’s interpretation of the fonts used in the posted article, or I’m totally missing something. To wit: the symbol ^ and the letters c, d, a, and i in the following: (I’m using * to represent degrees, because I don’t seem to have the little circle usually used)
“If the sun is at 0*^ and saturn between 22*c and 8*d they are in opposition.” And “ if venus is at 20*a and jupiter is between 15*i and 25*i they are in trine”
Help?

Re: Some thing not right?

[ecosophia]

How annoying. Those should be zodiacal symbols; I'll go in and see if I can figure what went wrong. Are you reading this on Patreon or SubscribeStar?

Re: Some thing not right?

[ecosophia]

I've just been to both platforms and replaced the symbols with words, which should come through fine. Let me know if you have any more problems!

Re: Some thing not right?

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you!
sorry for the late reply - I was reading it on Patreon.
It was reading wrong on both iphone and on computer (using Chrome browser) if you are looking for data points.
Thanks again!

Re: Some thing not right?

[ecosophia]

Many thanks for this. It should be clear now -- if you notice any other readability problems, please let me know!

[readoldthings]

Regarding conjunctions to the Sun-- In your experience, is cazimi a useful concept? And, if so, how wide an orb do you give it? From my reading, Bonatti considered a planet cazimi if it was within 17 minutes of the Sun, but earlier Arabic astrologers considered it to extend out 1 full degree.

By the way, my impression so far of lunation charts is that they remind me very much of daily tarot or geomancy readings-- they seem to highlight one or two major events, rather than the big picture view you get with Ingresses.

[ecosophia]

I haven't found cazimi useful in mundane charts yet, though it's only fair to say that to the best of my recollection I haven't yet delineated a chart in which any planet was within 17' of the Sun! I've used cazimi (within 17') extensively in electional astrology with good results -- you can make a helluva planetary talisman, for example, with a planet that's essentially dignified and cazimi -- so it's valid in some astrological uses.

That's very interesting about lunation charts -- many thanks for the data point.