By watching the night sky, ancient Astronomer-Astrologers knew that specific fixed stars would rise from the horizon at a certain time each night. These changed with the seasons and became known as Decans (deca = 10), because they were in place about 10 days. Of course, their apparant motion was possible only because of the earth's rotation on its axis. Yet, from them the 12 Astrological signs evolved.

Soon, the rhythmic nature of the planets (ostensibly) passing through particular star clusters was discerned. Recognized as the "Circle of Life", and still called by its Greek name, the "Zodiac" began to contain the sacred myths of the people watching.

Known to be supremely powerful, the Sun visits all the signs of the zodiac over the course of a year (among other things, he cast out the terrifying darkness of the night every morning!). At least, he appears to, from the seemingly stable vantage point of Earthlings, watching in the night. These people were without telescopes, they had no space shuttles, no photos of the surface of the Moon, or Mars. Yet they were deeply aware of the rhythms of the Earth, and her closest celestial consorts.

So, those ancient 10-day markers called decans, and the zodiac they generated, could be said to be based upon a very large "clock". It slowly ticks off the annual (apparant) passage of the Sun through his full circuit around the Zodiac. The Sun's total movement is just slightly over a degree per day (avg=1.014 degrees), so that he travels the full 360° circle of the zodiac in a year (360++ days). Remember that in Astrology, the movements are always described just as we see them from our viewpoint, here on Earth.

But there are other clocks in the cosmos. There are those much larger, and therefore slower than the Circuit of the Sun; as well as the smaller, faster ones. Of the smaller ones, the most prominent secondary clock is the Moon, whose appearance quickly changes, as the cool light of the night is reflected off the different faces of her many phases.

The Moon stages herself weekly in "quarters" of a full cycle. Every month, she begins the entire cycle anew. As if racing through the sky, "Luna" passes through all the signs of the Zodiac in quick succession. Every month she visits them all, spending only about 2½ days in each one.

The Astronomer-Astrologers (they were one-and-the-same at the Beginning!) began recording the phenomenon of the wandering planets. They observed them traversing certain of the sky's mythical figures:   star clusters we now know as signs of the zodiac. The diagrams they developed became known as the Horoscope - from the Greek words hora meaning:   "hour", and skopein meaning:   "to look at, to spy upon".

All the planets were given names, and in honor of their Celestial positioning they received the names of the peoples' own mythical gods and goddesses. The planets were ascribed the characteristics, powers, companions and stories of the various dieties they were named after.

To make diagraming their movements easier, symbols were designed for each planet. The simple glyphs were easier to manage than names written out, even as small sandstone or papyrus drawings gave way to sheets of paper as the recording medium. Eventually, the great arc of the sky over head, became represented by a circle, which is the form we use today. The glyphs of the planets were placed inside the circle according to their placement in the sky.

Horoscope can be defined as "a diagram of the positions of the planets and signs of the Zodiac at a particular time and place." In the horoscope, the physical horizon is represented by a horizontal line bisecting the two-dimensional circle. That's the Earth! She's there, in the very center of the horoscope, and her edges appear stretch out flat to meet the sky at the horizon. That's what we actually see, so that's what the chart symbolizes.

The curved line of the circle represents the zodiac, a narrow band of the three-dimensional sky, surrounding the Earth all along the path of the planets. Since the planets (in their apparant motion) all circle the earth within this relatively narrow band of sky, diagraming their placement and inter-relationships is greatly simplified. The grand scheme of the 3-dimensional heavens must be reduced onto a flat writing surface for the horoscope to be drawn. And, it must contain more information than just data regarding the planets.

Many important things are shown in the horoscope. Besides planetary placements and their relative positions with one another, three major Cosmic Clocks are represented, and all are easily recognizable. Brief sketches of them were made in the discussions, above.

The first is the Sun, of course, whose season of the year is shown by his sign. The second is the Moon, whose phase is shown by her relative position with the Sun, although she will also have a particular sign placement when the horoscope is drawn, much like taking her photograph and freezing her quick phase-changes in mid-motion.

The third Cosmic clock is also one of the fastest moving. The daily bi-phasic wave of day-night, light-dark, diurnal-nocturnal is something that we've all come to know very well. Clearly, this clock is solidly based upon the daily rising and setting of the Sun. Scientifically, we know that the sunrise and sunset phenomenon is due to the spin of the Earth on her axis. Yet, experientially, it is quite clear that the Sun rises up in the sky every morning, and sets down below its edge every night.

When the Sun rises or sets, he does so at the perimeter, or horizon, of our line of sight. When the Sun pops up in the morning, above the horizon, the day begins. We call it sunrise and it's the most natural thing in the world to see it, or speak of it.

Sunset, equally natural, also involves the horizon. The Sun employs it in his magic act, drawing it into the duplicity of his apparant disappearance, as Day blends seamlessly into Night.

Scientifically speaking, the Sun doesn't move the way planets do. Experientially, however, he does. Astrology merely reflects the experiences of Humanity.

So, from an Astrological perspective, the Sun is also called rising at dawn. At that time of day, he can be symbolized in the horoscope by drawing him in along the chart's "eastern" edge. Therefore, at sunrise, he would be placed on the left side of the page near the horizontal line that actually represents the physical horizon.

That's because the horoscope, really a sky-map, is drawn as if the person making it were facing south, and looking up into the sky. From that position, the horizon where the Sun rises, is to the left. The top half-circle of the horoscope, illustrated above, is a diagram that represents the half-dome of the day-time sky; east is to the left, west is to the right. We can plot the Sun's travels across it during the course of the day.

When we draw the horoscope, we will place the Sun's symbol wherever he is positioned at the moment. During the morning hours, once the Sun has made his appearance in the sky, he will use all his power and brilliance to convert the scene into bright daylight, hiding the positions of the other planets that may be traveling near him. Nevertheless, we will place him just as far above the horizon as he has traveled by that time of the morning, and we will sketch the others in, as well.

Above, we see him placed first to the left, on the horizon at dawn. By midmorning, he'll be halfway to his overhead, noon position, so that's where we'll draw his glyph. During the afternoon, his arc will begin to lean lower and lower in the sky. By evening, he will set in the west, over to our right-hand side. The little Sun-glyph follows his track, hour by hour as he lowers himself over the edge of the sky....

The bottom half-circle of the chart offers a continuing view of the sky, even after sunset. In it, we can still plot the progress of the solar arc, just as we did during the day.

Once the Sun sets, his movements are still reflected in the western sky, located on the right-hand side of the chart. However, since he descends over the edge of the horizon as he sets, he is placed below Earth's horizon line in the chart. This is where he begins his nightly traverse down and across the curve of the lower hemisphere of the horoscope. During this time of darkness, he is said to be "under the earth".

Once below the horizon, his glyph is placed there. As he approaches midnight, his symbol is made at the very bottom of the circle that represents the sky. As he marks off the hours before sunrise, he is shown arcing to the left, and upwards, sliding towards the horizon he will broach at dawn.

The portion of the horizon where the Sun first rises into our view is called the Ascendant*. It is one of the three most important points in the sky map. Like the clocks themselves, the order of impact and importance in the horoscope, and to the individual, is primarily the Sun, followed by the Moon, and finally the Ascendant.

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*The Ascendant in the Horoscope represents the eastern horizon of the sky (at the skyline, where the celestial spheres meet earthly horizons!). In one of the most familiar events in the world, the Sun rises there at dawn, each morning. As the day progresses, various planets or fixed stars will also move above its borders, and into the realm of the visible sky. Degrees of the Zodiac signs slip above it's edges constantly, at the rate of about ¼° per minute.

The Horizon is of great importance in Astrology, hence the merit for in-depth coverage of its origins and physical correspondances. Day and night charts, in and of themselves, were generally given much greater emphasis by renaissance and earlier Astrologers, who used a broader range of minor rulerships. Much of the data regarding them was lost until recent years, when Project Hindsight, in particular, began steadily unearthing it.

Yet, it is worth knowing how closely the mysterious glyphs, circles, and lines on the horoscope are linked to very real events in our daily world. Hemisphere and quadrant emphasis are useful modern methods of weighing the significators in a chart. Awareness of the daily journey of the Sun will only enhance understanding of its meaning as it is seen residing in various houses in individual charts.

Articles on Using Astrology's Starlit Path:

[Table of Contents]  [Decans]  [Duads]  [Eclipse]  [Declination]
 [Horoscope]  [Ascendant]  [the Angles]  [Combust!]  [Zodiac]
 [Page Designing in Solar Fire^®]  [News'n Views]

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