Geoffrey wrote: [1] You seem to be saying that "the authorities" all give the ascendant to the quesited in the case of missing ships, and other cases where there is no clear connection between the querent and the quesited. [2] Why is that not good enough for me?

[1] Not at all, Geoffrey, I only stated that your opinion (point 1 and point 2 in my post above) is not supported by all authorities.
[2] This sentence of yours I cannot understand at all - where or when did I say something like that or in that sense?

Johannes

johannes susato wrote:Take your time, Paul!

Ok, just a couple of examples where the ascendant does not signify the querent in the matter. These may all seem a little random and in some cases it could be argued that the ascendant is assigned as it is because the querent may have affiliation with those parties.

Also I just present these to show that the idea that the ascendant only ever signifies the querent is not true with regards the greater tradition - I'm not necessarily agreeing with everything the authors mention.
We should also keep in mind some of these may be meant more for the context of electional astrology but are taken together.

Also none of these are meant to imply that the usual rules of using the ascendant for the querent do not also exist in the tradition. I'm explicitly and deliberately ignoring those examples just to demonstrate the point that it is not always so clear cut as may have been implied by other posters.


So. Some examples

Al Kindi
With regards questions about land.

The ascendant and its lord...preserve that part which farmers are allotted.

This may be because we assume that the farmers ask the question, but probably not as seen in Dorotheus' example on the same question.

Dorotheus
(note that it implies the foremen are not the querent)

With a question being given about foremen and officials..we judge them from the east, but the affairs that are assumed and which pertain to them, from the Midheaven

Sahl
In regards buying and selling land

The east itself takes the inhabitants of the fields and their signification...therefore with any malevolants placed in the east, it shows the inhabitants are fraudulent

Dorotheus says similar things

the east portends the cultivators and inhabitants and what is handed in it...and so infortunes in the east testifies that the inhabitents are fraudulent

Sahl
For leasing fields

..we discover about renting out or contracting for fields we discover the status and manner of contracting for [the fields] from the east, while the seventh designates the one renting them out

Al Khayyat says the same

the one who contracts for it [the field] is distinguished from the east, but the one who rents it out from the seventh

Umar
On the truth of rumours

The east and the Moon and their lords principally respond to a question as to whether or not what a messenger announces is true or false

Al Kayyat agrees

Moreover for rumours ... one will have to observe the lord of the east and the Moon

Regarding illness which I mentioned in an example, there are conflicting varieties and accounts of how to go about determining signification, this applies more to the other houses than the first. I wonder if there is an implied assumption who is asking the question though.

Sahl

we observe the doctor from the east, the infirm person to the tenth

Similar thoughts are laid out by Al Khayyat, on whether a person would be healed by the doctor:

the east is given to the doctor, the tenth to the inform person

Interestingly other authors suggest the doctor is the 7th and the patient the east.

Umar

the east and its lord determine the status of the one growing sick...the ninth and its lord explain the doctor

Even if they don't ask the question?

Aristotle may clear this up for us(?)

Let the east be sought for the infirm person - if, I say, a stranger asked about him: for if he himself sent a closely-related person, the status of the one growing ill should be sought in its own proper place, but again, the east belongs to the infirm person.

Ben Dykes, the translator, adds this note to clarify in case it was not clear above: "Aristotle seems to mean that if the querent is a stranger to the sick person we should use the ascendant; but if the querent were, say, a brother, then the sick person is especially indicated by the third, but also by the ascendnat"

Some obvious examples of not using the ascendant for the querent can be on missing objects where the ascendant represents the east point of a house, but also of questions that ask something about where on a body something happens in which case, as in Al Kindi..

the ascendant designates the head

We also have some 'random person' type questions where the east becomes the quesited rather the querent:

Jirjis
On anyone's status

A malevolent in the east warns of a most grave condition; a lucky one in the same place, the contrary

Clearly this is meant to apply for the status of the person asked about, not the querent asking.

Aristotle
The return of an absent person

With anyone asking about the return of an absent person, the lord of the east responds

Sahl
Saying much the same thing

abou the return of an absent person and when when he is going to come, and exposition of this kind depends on the eastern lord, according to its place and position. For it would be walking through the east or the Midheaven...it declares the quick return of the absent person

Umar
With regards a fugitive or a lost thing

establish the east and its lord and the Moon as significators of the one fleeing. Then the sun himself but even the lord of the Midheaven and of the lunar lodging place supply the signification for the one who has lost, and those who are seeking, the missing things.

I included the last part to demonstrate that it is the absent person who is signified and not the querent.

Umar
To where the fugitive is fleeing

The stars to which the Moon and the lord of the east apply..particularly suggest the place to which he who had fled, has withdrawn

We also have the example of where the first and seventh represent the current situation and the new situation respectively, whatever the context may be for them.

Bonatti:

If the lord of the 1st were of a better condition than the lord of the 7th, it is better to stayin the land or the house in which he is, or to hold onto the art which he practices, or to exercise the official duty which he exercises. If indeed the condition of the lor dof the 7th were better than the condition of the lord of the 1st, it is better and more useful for him to go to the land which he wants to, or move into another house, or take up another art

Now in regards Lilly's mention of the first for ships. There is some tantalising precedence in the tradition:

Umar
On a ship or the status of those sailing

the moon and east have control over the signfication of the whole cargo, but he eastern lord is in charge of all the men

The ascendant may generally be said to sometimes indicate the ship, implicitly at least:
Al Kindi

but the retrogradation of the lord of the ascendant impedes the journey and leads the ship back with it being incomplete..
The lord of the eighth ... corrupting the lord of the ascendant threatens harm to the ship according to the manner and nature of the one harassing it

These are not exhaustive examples I'm sure there are many, these are just the ones that were easier for me to source.

Hope this helps in dispelling the myth that the quesited can not or should be seen by the ascendant, and also that there is some precedence for assigning the ship to the ascendant as well.

Hello Paul

totally perplexed I only say: Thank YOU!

This will be a more than interesting reading tonight and tomorrow.

Johannes

And a big thankyou from me too Paul, for your industry.

You discovered what I was after, which is a precedent to giving a missing ship to the ascendant (and the Moon) and the men therein to the lord of the ascendant.

I suspect that although questions about missing ships and missing people were not that common in Hellenistic times, they were common enough (based on the statistical sample of surviving horoscopes from that time in 'Greek Horoscopes' by Neugebauer and Van Hoesen, for example) that a tradition of giving the ascendant to missing ships and missing people survived as an exception long after it became more the norm to give the ascendant to the querent in all circumstances. We see the echo of that tradition in Lilly in the 17th century, and even up to the present day in Lehman and Frawley, despite it being illogical within the philosophical framework that developed around astrology!

At least Lehman tries to be consistent and gives cars to the 1st as well. Frawley preserves ships and ships alone for the 1st, giving cars more logically to the 2nd - which is strange for someone who declares that his astrology is based on principle rather than precedent. (Frawley even gives missing persons who are strangers to the 7th rather than the 1st, in agreement with Lilly's student, Coley who thought that the 7th was where they better belonged, rather than Lilly himself and almost every other author of the period. This highlights in even starker contrast Frawley's anachronism of now giving all ships - not just missing ships - to the 1st.)

Thanks again,

Geoffrey

Thanks Johannes and Geoffrey

I tried to bring in, in passing, some references to the missing person idea as well, as it was mentioned in the other thread too.

I must admit I've never read any of Coley's work so I don't really know what source he's using for giving missing person's to the 7th.

However I do know that there is a tradition in which both the 7th and the 1st are used for missing persons so I could make a little list of those references I can find where one uses the 1st and another uses the 7th. I think it's an interesting sort of question and it's one which I'm personally never sure which way to assign the significators - 1st or 7th. Without really being conscious of it, I think I normally use the 1st unless the querent tends to project themselves into the quesiton "Where is he, will he come back to us?" which would assume the querent as the first, rather than "My friends were distraught over their missing son, where is he?" in which case I'd tend to use the 1st.

I'm not saying this is the right way to do things, just that I myself would tend to think along those lines. Perhaps we have assumptions from the varying authors in a similar manner. In other words, perhaps both could be used, depending on context.

As for cars, ships, and the 1st or 2nd. I would think context is hugely important. My understanding of Frawley is that he uses the 2nd (of moveable possessions) for any question regarding cars. I have to say that my own experience contradicts that. I'd use the 2nd in any context where the question focuses on the car as an object (normally for buying or selling), and use the 3rd to represent the state of a journey in the car (I feel the car is incidental to the focus, which is on the journey), but if the focus is on the well being of the person involved then I'd use the 1st (eg "will this journey in the car give me travel sickness").

So really I think context is the defining factor in a lot of questions like these, and perhaps the ancient authors were normally assuming a given context which may explain some of the major differences between them.

Paul wrote: I'd use the 2nd in any context where the question focuses on the car as an object (normally for buying or selling), and use the 3rd to represent the state of a journey in the car (I feel the car is incidental to the focus, which is on the journey), but if the focus is on the well being of the person involved then I'd use the 1st (eg "will this journey in the car give me travel sickness").

Hello Paul

I think Frawley would agree with you. For a cruise on a ship as a given example, he gives the cruise to the 9th, but the ship is given to the 1st.

Now if you owned the ship (or yacht) it could be claimed that a ship is a "moveable possession" so 2nd house? Or where a ship is your home for the duration of the cruise - 4th house? Or if the ship had gold plated railings and a bridge like a Palladian mansion - 10th house? But there is no real logic for the 1st house - except tradition.

If you could dig out some missing persons = 1st or 7th house examples, that would be interesting

Best wishes,

Geoffrey