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Articles:
What’s
in a Zodiac?
Part One
By Joshua McMahon
According to The Random House Dictionary of the English
Language, 2nd unabridged edition, the Zodiac is “1.
An imaginary belt of the heavens, extending about 8 degrees on
each side of the ecliptic, within which are the apparent paths of
the sun, moon, and principle planets. It contains twelve
constellations and hence twelve divisions called signs of the
zodiac. Each division, however, because of the precession of the
equinoxes, now contains the constellation west of the one from
which it took its name. “
This is not entirely true, as we will see. But this definition
reflects not only the disinformation subtly used to discredit
Astrology to the public, but also the bias of the
western Ptolemaic astrology in vogue throughout the English
speaking world. There are actually four Zodiacs used as systems of
measuring the relative positions of planetary placement and
movement, for which I’ve contrived the following schematic for
reference:
FIXED
Sidereal
[]
IMMUTABLE ----- []-------CHANGING
Constellational
[]
Draconic
[]
MUTABLE
Tropical
The Sidereal Zodiac
The zodiac implied by the dictionary is the Fixed Zodiac, the
Sidereal, or star circle. This is the zodiac used by Indian and
Tibetan astrologers. This is by no means the “original” system
used, as Cyril Fagan considered it, but it was definitely current
with astrology’s early history (and thus astronomy’s as well). It
is fixed by virtue of its Fiducial, or starting point. The
Fiducial, by the way, is the differential among all zodiacs- or,
to word it differently, something astrologers won’t agree about-
where the 1st degree of Aries “is”. Technically,
though, a circle can’t really have a beginning or end, so this is
why we have multiple systems, but I digress. The Sidereal Fiducial
is dual, and consists of two fixed stars, Aldeberan and Antares,
located at the mathematical center of the signs Taurus and Scorpio
respectively. Thus, by subtracting 45 degrees from the position of
Aldeberan along the ecliptic, you find the Fiducial in Aries
and its opposite point in Libra. From this point-0 Aries-the
ecliptic is divided every 30 degrees into the signs of the zodiac.
Since these fiducial stars hardly move, we call them fixed
stars, and the Sidereal is thus called the fixed zodiac, or a
zodiac with a fixed starting point. The reason the
dictionary is incorrect is the fact that constellations are not
of equal size. Therefore the reason the Sidereal zodiac is
star based is not because it aligns with the constellations,
but because it uses stars to calculate the fiducial. What
has precessed is the equinoctial point, or the location along the
equator which the Sun crosses on the spring equinox. This brings
us to our next zodiac, the Tropical.
The Tropical Zodiac
This is the zodiac familiar to the English speaking world, which
uses the equinoctial point as the Tropical Fiducial,
subdividing the ecliptic into 30 degree segments or signs.
The dictionary spoke of that which is known as the precession of
the equinoxes, or the movement of the fiducial. This is why the
Tropical is called the mutable zodiac. Precession occurs because
the Earth does not rotate straight on its axis, and its axial
motion viewed over a suitable length of time, is unstable, in that
it traces a circular path, similar to a spinning top. This causes
the point at which the sun crosses the equator on the spring
solstice to move approximately 1 degree every 72 years. One
tradition in the west views the Sidereal sign this point falls in
to demarcate a symbolic “age” lasting approximately 2,000 years
(hence the present shift into the age of Aquarius). This
relatively slow rate of precession is why the Tropical zodiac is
called mutable. The present difference between the fixed and
mutable zodiacs is about 24 degrees, so its fairly easy to
calculate that these two fiducials were very closely in alignment
approximately 1,728 years ago – about 274 A.D. This is roughly
contemporary with Ptolemy’s Almagest, the original sourcebook of
astrological calculation, and technique of using the
tropical fiducial used in the western world, although scholars
vary in there dating of its origin (anywhere from 100-300 A.D.
In terms of the dictionary definition above, it is the Sidereal
sign
west of the Tropical equivalent that it now contains, not the
constellation, because a Constellation is a pattern of
fixed stars along the ecliptic, whereas a Zodiac Sign
is a 30 degree segment of a circle.
The Constellational Zodiac
The fields of stars along the ecliptic date back into antiquity,
but their use in Astrological measurement of the ancient period is
difficult to prove. Technically speaking, they vary in size from
Virgo spanning about 45 degrees, to Scorpio with a span of a mere
9 degrees. There are actually 13 constellations along the
ecliptic, with Ophiuchus spanning 20 degrees between Scorpio and
Sagittarius. Actually, considering that the sun takes apparently
365.5 days to circle the earth, the constellational zodiac fills
that span – a natural ellipse rather than a circle. These patterns
act as a backdrop for planetary motion that can be visually
experienced, rather than both the Sidereal and Tropical, which
relegate only 30 degrees each for the “signs” they use. As such,
this is the zodiac referred to by astronomers as the
zodiac. In Part Two of this article I’ll discuss why I think this
idea is flawed in my opinion, but for the moment this would
classify as an actual zodiac, rather than a symbolic zodiac that
the other three systems use. But as a system of measurement, its
uneven division of the ecliptic leaves much to be desired, even
though the actuality of planets moving through constellations is
somewhat romantic in conception.
The Draconic Zodiac
This is the black sheep of the zodiac family, having a having a
historical significance that is difficult to trace, but it comes
to use from India, where it was supposedly used in divination. It
uses as its fiducial the Lunar north node, the point at which the
path of the sun and the path of the moon intersect, subdividing
into 30 degree segments from there. This point is called in Latin
Caput Draconus, or the Head of the Dragon, hence the name
Draconic. It moves backwards through the Zodiac at a rate of about
1 degree every month and a half, so I‘ve dubbed it the changing
Zodiac to differentiate it from the slowly mutating Tropical one.
Its quickly moving fiducial gives it very little connection to
anything even remotely static in our experience, unlike the
tropical which won’t change considerably in one lifetime, so it
has a reputation of being untenable in use. That of course is a
subjective judgement that is not relevant to this article, nor
reflective of my opinion, but I digress yet again. Popular use
today considers the union of solar and lunar motion used as a
fiducial to be indicative of spirituality, and this is probably
its most effective use, but extensive research is the only way to
know for sure.
So what’s in a Zodiac, anyway?
Answering that question has been the subject of this article, but
I wanted to divide this issue into two parts so that the
information and technicalities can be considered separate from my
humble opinion. Nevertheless, a holistic point of view seems to be
the wisest, and the relativity of all systems of measurement
precludes any attempt to devise a hierarchy to fit them all into.
Remember that all astrologers are measuring the same thing – the
movement of planets and their relation to each other, but stay
tuned for part two, where I’ll wrap this all up.
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