Martin Sternbach wrote:

I would certainly like to read the article. How is it available?

I will send you a PM on that.

Mark

Hi Mark,

O. k., I see that the order of the planets among ancient astrologers was not such a cut and dried matter as one might think.

However, the geocentric models that I am referring to (for convenience, let's call them the Platonic and the Ptolemaic model) were the two most widespread ones; the founders of the Thema mundi and the domicile scheme must have been familiar with them. In the case of Ptolemy, we can be certain of this as he was the one who introduced the planetary system named after him.

Thanks

Michael

I have traveled frequently to So. Am, meeting astrologers and doing charts. I specifically did this to answer this question for myself.

My experience showed that the signs do not reverse themselves below the equator. They are are same north or south on our globe.

However, viewing the star constellations up in the sky is a different experience. The constellations are upside down. They are not reversed, but they are inverted.

Sorry to wake this long thread up again, but I recently found an interesting perspective on it, in a book published in French by C. Kerne?z in 1937, Le vrai visage de l'astrologie (the true face of astrology).

Kerne?z had also published a number of books on yoga and the philosophy behind it, and introduced yoga into France. He has a French Wiki page: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constant_Kerne%C3%AFz

In astrology, he was essentially a tropicalist, emphasising the permanence of seasonal characteristics associated with the signs. He takes it for granted that the signs and rulers should be reversed in the southern hemisphere. (As an aside, so do I. I know many or most contributors here find that the northern hemisphere zodiac also works in the south, but I think this is probably, in the rather neat words of Nixx, best explained by "confirmation bias due to previous cognitive conditioning". There are plenty of others out there on the web saying reversing works better; water goes down the plughole in a different direction and, as Paul pointed out in a recent thread on straight and crooked signs - a tropical, not sidereal phenomenon - those simply are reversed in the southern hemisphere, there's no getting away from it.)

The interesting thing about Kerne?z's argument is that in this book he seems to know quite a bit about Indian astrology, and sees the sidereal 12-fold zodiac as working much better in the tropics, and gradually fading in its efficacy as you go north or south. He sees the opposite occurring withe tropical zodiac - it works better outside the tropics, gradually fading as it moves towards the equator. (He also states that many astrologers in north India use the tropical zodiac. This is interesting and new to me; I don't know if it is true, or was when he was there in the early 20th century.)

For me this has a particular appeal, as I was born 1? from the equator and while I have always found tropical astrology appealing in its structural elegance, I've been told some complete rubbish based on signs and rulers, both about character, physical/health matters, and predictions, by everything from Astroflash back in the early 80s and various textbooks or Solar Fire auto-analysis, to a highly respected and and published traditional astrologer. The parts of the latter's analysis that were based on house position, aspects etc with the natural significations of the planets di work better.
When I discovered sidereal, it all made much more sense. I agree with Mark that siderealists also have to deal with the problem of reversal: if you use different significations for the nodes, these should presumably be reversed according to hemisphere. (In fact, and although India is of course north of the equator, in many ways the usual Indian interpretations of the lunar nodes are, in some respects, reversed as per traditional Western astrology: the NN is "bad", the SN has some good qualities, at least in respect of spiritual advancement.)

And yet, I've also seen very convincing tropical configurations for charts for outside the tropics (in solar revolutions, for example, in harmonics, and in transits over long periods in mundane astrology) which simply don't appear in sidereal. So I find Kerne?z's hypothesis interesting and quite convincing.

Graham

hi graham,

thanks for reinvigorating the thread and sharing Kerne?z's viewpoint.. that is interesting.. i also agree with nixx's general view about confirmation bias being something that probably happens a lot in getting people's viewpoint on just about anything, but astrology as well..

i feel i have always had an open view on the relevance of either zodiac, perhaps as i view so much of what we 'believe' as a subjective type matter that can never be fully proven.. i think the folks who work in both zodiacs have an advantage in some respects, but the amount of work to devote to learning and knowing how to use the sidereal, or to learn the indian system of working with sidereal seems especially labour intensive.. i found it interesting Kerne?z's viewpoint on some or many in northern india practicing tropical.. i wonder how much merit there is in that nowadays? i kinda doubt it, but i don't live or interact with indian astrologers to know.. thanks for the post..