Stars and Signs in the Sky

This keeps popping up.

A few days ago, some astrologer was talking about switching to the “True Zodiac”, the sidereal one, because tropical Zodiac was “outdated”.

Then, another one said that “Western astrologers get the signs all wrong”.

Yesterday, I read a Heliocentric astrologer describe something as “True Gemini (and True Sagittarius)” signs.

Now, I opened up Quora (to get some old answers of mine and post it here, as I’ve done before — in this post, this post, this post, this post, and this post).

And that’s the first one I read:

“Of the 88 constellations, why were the current 12 signs specifically chosen over all the rest for the zodiac? For example, instead of Aquarius why not aquila the eagle or the serpent?

Because signs (an ideal division of the sky based on the Ecliptic, the apparent annual motion of the Sun) are not the same thing as constellations (groups of stars).

The twelve constellations more or less on the Zodiac (except for Ophiucus, Cetus and… there’s another one whose name I can’t remember now and won’t research, I’m sorry) bear the same name of the signs because once, a long time ago, they were more or less inside them.”

I have explained it many times, but no one seems to listen. I even did a course explaining the basic concepts behind it (you can buy it here).

So… Time to have another go at it.

First. The Worldview from which astrology comes sees the Cosmos as a set of spheres and circles, some of them with stars on it (and there are seven special stars).

This model is elegant, symbolically precise, informative, and might actually be defended scientifically (to the extent that, with a few precisions and distinctions, a honest physician/astronomer would have trouble to explain what they mean by “it’s the wrong model”).

But I’m not describing it in details here. Just imagine a simplified version of it, in which a giant sphere, called “the Sky”, rotates over a smaller sphere, called “earth”, and that in this first giant ball there are bodies on it.

Most of them are, in practice, fixed. “Fastened” on the sphere, as it were — moving with it (this is, as I said, a simplified version). Hold that thought.

Seven of them are not. They move in relation to this big ball, at their own path, more or less on a “belt” on the sphere.

This belt is like a sheath around one of two important circles drawn on this Sphere, called the Ecliptic (the other important circle is the Equator).

Second. The Ecliptic and the Equator are Great Circles.

A great circle is what the name implies: you can’t draw a bigger circle on a sphere.

It also shares the center with the sphere — and with any other great circle; and it divides the sphere in two equal halves (that’s where the name “hemisphere” comes from).

Two non-identical circles on the same sphere cut themselves in two opposing points. These two points are important because of what comes next.

Three. The Ecliptic is the Sun’s path on the Celestial Sphere (on the Sky).

The other planets wander around that belt I mentioned before — you know its name, in fact, it’s called “the Zodiac”.

The Sun, however, moves exactly on this circle. This means that The Sun crosses the Equator in the two points mentioned above, when it’s moving into the northern hemisphere, one when it’s going southward.

You have already guessed: these points are the equinoxes (a word that means “equal nights [to the days]”).

When the Sun is on any of those, the nights and days have the same duration, and it’s Spring in one of the hemispheres, and Autumn in the other.

So:

Four. The Zodiac is divided into twelve equal parts, starting from the equinoxes, called the signs.

The order in which we count and name them starts in the Vernal Equinox, the point known as 0 Aries.

The signs are, then, twelve “little rectangles”, all of them measuring 30 degrees (one-twelfth of the length of the circle) long and 12 (according to some, 16; the width of the Zodiac) wide.

Five. The Sun never deviates, nor rushes, nor drags.

It means that the Equinoxes are always where they are: then, when we divide the Zodiac like I described, the signs never move. They are there forever.

Yes, they are only defined — they can only exist — in the Traditional, “Geocentric”, model of the cosmos. I’m by no means saying one cannot imagine, or propound, or practice an astrology without them, with other things (I’ll mention them below) in their place. But this is what the signs are, divisions of the Zodiac.

Six. There are other ways of dividing the Zodiac.

The Equinoxes are obviously symbolically important.

They are also invisible, and harder to accurately spot, as the circles (the Equator and the Ecliptic) are not marked in the sky, either.

It’s easier to spot one of those fixed stars I explained earlier. Bright, shiny points on the sphere. Much easier.

The Indian astrology adopted this way of dividing them. Yes, their signs are not connected to the Zodiac, but it doesn’t impair their astrology because their entire symbolical building is different from the Western one, sometimes subtly, sometimes not so subtly.

They spot a star and divide the Ecliptic in twelve equal chunks from it. There are different ways of doing it, but the most common is spotting Spica — which is bright and easy to see during Spring — and starting the Zodiac at the opposing point. As it is in 24 Libra, Indian Zodiac starts around 24/25 Aries in “our” Zodiac.

But I must stress it: after they start the division, it goes as ours do. Their signs are also small quadrangular bits of the Zodiac, each of them measuring 30 × 12.

Which takes us to:

Seven. Stars are grouped into constellations.

I’m not discussing why it is so. I have done it elsewhere. But they are. Constellations are groups of fixed stars (stars that move on the Sky so slowly they can be considered fixed, as opposed to planets, which are the wandering stars) that share some properties and are united via a common myth.

Some of them were, a long time ago, given the same names as the twelve signs, because they are close to the Ecliptic. They are Zodiacal constellations.

Which was named after which? I”m not sure, and it’s — for the purposes of this post — not important.

But…

Eight. Zodiacal constellations are not signs.

They do not measure the same. They do not align neatly in a belt-like fashion. Moreover, some of them are a bit tangled up. Some constellations that are not “Zodiacal” (that is, which do not have the same name as signs, such as Ophiucus and Cetus) are also close to the Ecliptic. They do not have sharp boundaries.

In short, they are groups of shiny dots, not sections of the Sky.

And, what is more important, they were not considered as such. Indian astrologers used signs of equal sizes, they don’t use the constellations, which are not the “true signs” (they cannot be, some are tiny, some are huge).

And the distinction was known since before the Christian era — Ptolemy (who was, of course, referring to knowledge that came way before him) recognized twelve signs, but elevent Zodiacal constellations (the stars of Libra were considered as part of Scorpio, they were the Claws of Scorpio, which is still apparent in their names).

****

So, that’s it. I hope it’s clear.

If you like what I read, please

and share.

****

Apart from the course I mentioned above, I have another small one — for almost whatever you want to pay — on the temperaments.