Fascinating! But the question then becomes what happens when a planet is in the last degree of the sign. Is it in the next house or not? I have a planet in the last degree of the sign and in the 6th house, not beholding the ASC. Using Placidus, Regiomontanus or any other house system (except whole-sign) it is well in the 6th house and cadent. Using whole-sign houses it is almost in the 7th.

After about 6 mths of knowing my wife I concluded she must have a Sag Moon and Libra rising, this meant her birth time had to be between 5.16-5.22pm. Her mother gave about 3 birth times all way apart, and AM, so I realised, or hoped, this was a dead end.

Surprisngly about a year later I wrote to the Hospital and they had the record, 5.25pm. My wife was about 31 at the time and I had been told records get destroyed, if they existed, in the first place after 25 yrs.

I therefore use a 5.22pm time and this puts the Moon at 29'59 Sag and IC at 1'5 Cap. In the 12yrs I've known her I can't recall her Lunar dispositions fitting anything remotely Capricornian or 4th house, although she is very close to her father. If you ask her where she feels most secure it will be reading a book on a long train journey, which for some Psychological Astrologers at least, is a tidy Moon in Sag in the 3rd response.

So this 5 degree idea seems wrong for her, and if not applicable to her then why would it be fitting for anyone else. I ignore it. I do like the idea if astrology is useful it needs to be precise. Placidus cusps. Using Psychological ideas this is the only house system I've encountered that seems to resonate with behavourial dispositions.

If this is irreverent to the likes of Ptolemy and Rudhyar then there we are.
Since there is no proof for any of it, it is irrelevant. Had I known the record was there I could have rung up Dean and postulated a challenge but then I'd need a good 50 wives to hint at a smoking gun.

Levente Laszlo wrote:
In my scenario, horary astrologers use the 5-degree rule because it's read in Lilly, and it works. Lilly used it because he read it in Bonatti, and it worked. Bonatti used it because he read it in al-Qab???, and it worked. (No matter he, comparing al-Qab???'s report with Ptolemy's original, mistakenly assumed this rule was to be applied to each house, yet it must be understood for the degree of the Ascendant only.)

margherita

Tom wrote:I can't find the relevant quote and don't have time to hunt for it at the moment, but it seems to me that while it can be interpreted that Ptolemy only meant the 5 degree rule to be used with the ASC, it does not make much sense.

However he meant it to be, this doesn't alter the fact what he presents is his peculiar longevity protocol, beginning with the sectors eligible for the releaser/hyleg, not a new house system. I feel there's no need to speculate which house system Ptolemy used, as he uses houses (apart from the Ascendant and the Midheaven) uniquely for the topic of children. And the inquiry on this very topic, as Hephaestio remarks, is drawn from Petosiris', so possibly involves whole sign houses.

Therefore, if there is practically no use of houses for him, it doesn't make much sense to attribute any kind of house system to him. And if Ptolemy has nothing to do with houses, the 5-degree rule is founded in misunderstanding.

Though, it may work.

Therefore, if there is practically no use of houses for him, it doesn't make much sense to attribute any kind of house system to him.

That wasn't my point. I am not attributing a house system to Ptolemy because of the 5 degree rule. My recollection, and I don't have a text with me at this time, is that he mentioned something about a planet 5 degrees above the ASC being in the ASC. If he said this, then the question arises how does this make sense IF he used whole sign houses? It doesn't.

The best way to handle this question is for someone to post he appropriate quotation or cite the portion of Tetrabiblos that he mentions this "rule."

Tom wrote:

The best way to handle this question is for someone to post he appropriate quotation or cite the portion of Tetrabiblos that he mentions this "rule."

Hi Tom,

I think this might be what you are looking for.

In the first place we must consider those places .... in which the planet must be that is to receive the lordship of the prorogation; namely, the twelfth part of the zodiac surrounding the horoscope, from 5? above the actual horizon up to the 25? that remains, which is rising in succession to the horizon [ie., 1st house]; the part sextile dexter to these thirty degrees, called the House of the Good Daemon [11th house]; the part in quartile, the midheaven [10th house]; the part in trine, called the House of the God [9th house]; and the part opposite, the Occident [7th house]"
Claudius Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos, English translation by F.E. Robbins, Harvard University Press, Loeb Edition, 1980, pp.273-275 (III.10)

Here is Deborah Houlding?s take on this controversy:
http://www.skyscript.co.uk/houprob5.html

Mark

I generally use the 5 degree rule but there are exceptions.

In my natal chart for instance the South Node is only 2 degrees above my 27* Scorpio Asc, yet it definitely operates in a 12th house way in my life. Could it be that the nodes are an exception as they generally move in retrograde direction? What about other planets retrograde?

Rules are helpful but they do need to be applied flexibly and to suit the situation.

My late night thoughts.

Tara

in which the planet must be that is to receive the lordship of the prorogation; namely, the twelfth part of the zodiac surrounding the horoscope, from 5? above the actual horizon up to the 25? that remains,

So here is my concern: what happens after the 25 degrees that remain? To me it is pretty obvious that after that point is the beginning of the next house. Therefore he could not be using a whole sign system as has been suggested by others. The "horoscope" is the ASC degree. Five degrees above that is part of the first house. In whole signs the first house is the whole sign of the ASC. So if the ASC is 28 Leo, what happens 25 degrees past that? Is this an equal house system? Not the way that term is usually understood unless the next house begins five degrees before the 2nd cusp.

Using equal houses, 15 Aries rises so the next cusp is 15 Taurus. But if the first house ends 25 degrees after the horoscope, then the second house begins at 10 Taurus, not 15 where the cusp would be if this were a typical equal house system. It doesn't take much imagination to transfer this to a quadrant house system. I don't see how it is possible for this to apply only to the ASC. Something has to happen 25 degrees from the ASC. Of course it could be that the second cusp is 25 degrees from the ASC, but where is the 3rd, 4th and so on? Ptolemy doesn't say. In fact he doesn't ever use the word "cusp." Another possibility is he doesn't use houses at all except he wishes to define the limits of influence of the ASC.

Again I'm not trying to assign a house system to Ptolemy. I really don't much care what he used or thought others used other than I'm only trying to understand this paragraph. And the way I understand it for now, and I'm open to other explanations, is the house begins 5 degrees before the cusp.

Hi,

An article by Robert Schmidt that has relevance to this discussion:

http://cura.free.fr/quinq/02schmi.html

Mark

Tom, I must admit your reasoning stands perfectly if you build your assumptions exclusively on the Robbins text.

There are, however, serious philological incertainties in the Ptolemy manuscripts, which are further perplexed by not wholly fitting quotes and paraphrases of Pancharius (in Hephaestio), Porphyry, Hephaestio himself, the "Proclus paraphrase", Stephanus the Philosopher, an epitomator of Rhetorius, John Abramius and many more recent authors. These are partially addressed in the Schmidt article linked by Mark and in his translations of Ptolemy and Hephaestio. Therefore an exact solution for this passage is almost unattainable.

To simplify, the two most important questions to be asked are (1) whether Ptolemy's description is supposed to be an outlining of an idiosyncratic house system, and (2) what is the exact reasoning for the 5-degree rule. Sadly, neither of these have been properly resolved so far.