Skyscript Astrology Forum

Levente Laszlo wrote:The overwhelming evidence, therefore, suggests that if we must make a generalized statement about the practice of Hellenistic astrologers, we can't but say they used whole signs; there is simply no evidence for a practical usage of quadrant-based divisions before the late fifth century.

But if we do make this (arguably somewhat artifical) distinction between practical and theoretical evidence, it is quite possible to draw from it a conclusion more or less opposite to the one typically in favour among astrologers today: namely, that whole-sign places, never (?) explicitly presented as a system in the Greek sources, were a convenient approximation or 'general' (platikos) method, whereas the other two (equal and quadrant), which are so presented, were considered as actually more correct by astrologers themselves (or at least by the more educated practitioners).

I'm not saying that this is a necessary conclusion, but it certainly seems to me at present to be a valid one, with statements both in Valens (if I may use the name as a convenient place-holder) and Firmicus to support it.

Martin Gansten wrote:

Levente Laszlo wrote:The overwhelming evidence, therefore, suggests that if we must make a generalized statement about the practice of Hellenistic astrologers, we can't but say they used whole signs; there is simply no evidence for a practical usage of quadrant-based divisions before the late fifth century.

But if we do make this (arguably somewhat artifical) distinction between practical and theoretical evidence, it is quite possible to draw from it a conclusion more or less opposite to the one typically in favour among astrologers today: namely, that whole-sign places, never (?) explicitly presented as a system in the Greek sources, were a convenient approximation or 'general' (platikos) method, whereas the other two (equal and quadrant), which are so presented, were considered as actually more correct by astrologers themselves (or at least by the more educated practitioners).

I'm not saying that this is a necessary conclusion, but it certainly seems to me at present to be a valid one, with statements both in Valens (if I may use the name as a convenient place-holder) and Firmicus to support it.

I do not think that equal houses require particular ''education'' to calculate. But the abundant evidence of whole signs practice would also necessitate a theoretical and philosophical basis underlying it, which simply did not survive in the available now sources, but can only be inferred.

There are many reasons for preferring whole signs, otherwise no would be discarding other house systems in favor of them in modern times. I already gave an example with the lot.

Something stops being provisional when you depend on it.

Martin Gansten wrote:[...] whole-sign places, never (?) explicitly presented as a system in the Greek sources, were a convenient approximation or 'general' (platikos) method, whereas the other two (equal and quadrant), which are so presented, were considered as actually more correct by astrologers themselves (or at least by the more educated practitioners).

Martin, I'd like to not misunderstand you. So, do you mean your quoted conclusion is the prevalent notion or its opposite? And what do you think its opposite is?

Martin Gansten wrote:[...] if we do make this (arguably somewhat artificial) distinction between practical and theoretical evidence [...]

I don't believe we must make generalized statements about Hellenistic astrological practice, but I do think there is a more or less clear distinction between the actual cases and the rest of the astrological precepts. (The fictitious, didactic examples constitute the "less clear" instances.) What's your opinion?

Levente Laszlo wrote:Martin, I'd like to not misunderstand you. So, do you mean your quoted conclusion is the prevalent notion or its opposite? And what do you think its opposite is?

Sorry if I was unclear. It seems to me that the prevalent notion among present-day astrologers who identify primarily as Hellenistic-style practitioners, and even among some who don't, is that whole-sign places constitute the original 'house system'. It also very often follows from this assumption (because of an explicit or implicit belief that astrology was originally perfect or near-perfect and then deteriorated) that the whole-sign system is the best or even only valid system, except possibly in some very specific contexts. The later preponderance of other systems is, consequently, regarded as a result of innovation or misunderstanding of the original ideas.

All this may or may not be true; I'm just trying to formulate the position as I understand it. An opposite or at least significantly different view would be what I suggested in my last post.

I don't believe we must make generalized statements about Hellenistic astrological practice, but I do think there is a more or less clear distinction between the actual cases and the rest of the astrological precepts. (The fictitious, didactic examples constitute the "less clear" instances.) What's your opinion?

I tend to agree with you on most things, but in this case I generally find the 'actual cases' less clear and open to a greater number of interpretations than the didactic examples. (This in itself is, of course, an extremely generalized statement!)

Levente, Martin pointed out to the exceedingly curious passage by Ptolemy - 3.10 where an ''equal house that starts 5 degrees before the ascendant'' constitutes a twelfth-part and sign. Can you elucidate how this difficult passage makes sense (like you do usually), because it uses terminology that is akin to whole sign aspects?

My initial interpretation would be to agree (with Martin's hypothesis) that Ptolemy uses equal places throughout the Tetrabiblos, but because the majority used whole signs, he uses whole signs terminology to explain his idea. Because Ptolemy does not like Lots and numbers and he believes that there is a moist and turbulent region just above the horizon that injures the emanations, this would make sense in his naturalistic conceptualization (not that others were not ''naturalistic'', it is just that Ptolemy is slightly more adamant about that).

My problem with that is that it often does not agree with aspects by signs and I have trouble imagining someone using non-zodiacal aspects.

Thanks

Levente Laszlo wrote: Therefore, all claims based on the assumption that the structure of Anthologies in its present form exhibits anything of Valens's intentions are flawed.
...
As you know, however, there are no nativities in Anthologies utilizing quadrants either topically or dynamically or in any other ways, and this absence of evidence doesn't really substantiate your claim that "Valens used whole signs for topics and then Porphyry for quantitive measurement and then maybe Equal for only some other specialised subject matter".

Actually that's not my claim so I assume you haven't actually read my posts. What I was saying here is that my suggestion is less complicated (answering the charge that it was complex) than other suggestions out there, and offering this as an example of something that I think is more complex. This isn't my claim therefore, I'm giving an overview of a point I actually disagree with. I realise there a lot of posts here and it may be unreasonable to read them all.

The rest, when any evidence is available, use the "whole-sign" method exclusively, and so do early Arabic astrologers, having adopted Hellenistic methods.

They don't though. I've already provided an example from Valens.

At this point I must say that the whole sign adherence starts to read like a religious article of faith.

Therefore, all claims based on the assumption that the structure of Anthologies in its present form exhibits anything of Valens's intentions are flawed.
...
The overwhelming evidence, therefore, suggests that if we must make a generalized statement about the practice of Hellenistic astrologers, we can't but say they used whole signs; there is simply no evidence for a practical usage of quadrant-based divisions before the late fifth century.

Apart from of course where there is.

I have to assume therefore that all claims are flawed, except of course those claims which you yourself conclude with? Anyway I just wondered what Riley's survey had to offer to the arguments about whole sign houses and you haven't actually provided much in the way of that argument.

I have had many discussions about whole sign houses and I know from experience that these things become circular so let's just assume we disagree with one another. But it would be nice to at least get to a point where we disagree having both looked at the evidence without assumption that one person hasn't.

Martin Gansten wrote:

Levente Laszlo wrote:The overwhelming evidence, therefore, suggests that if we must make a generalized statement about the practice of Hellenistic astrologers, we can't but say they used whole signs; there is simply no evidence for a practical usage of quadrant-based divisions before the late fifth century.

But if we do make this (arguably somewhat artifical) distinction between practical and theoretical evidence, it is quite possible to draw from it a conclusion more or less opposite to the one typically in favour among astrologers today: namely, that whole-sign places, never (?) explicitly presented as a system in the Greek sources, were a convenient approximation or 'general' (platikos) method, whereas the other two (equal and quadrant), which are so presented, were considered as actually more correct by astrologers themselves (or at least by the more educated practitioners).

I'm not saying that this is a necessary conclusion, but it certainly seems to me at present to be a valid one, with statements both in Valens (if I may use the name as a convenient place-holder) and Firmicus to support it.

Martin I am going to pull back from this conversation but your post here is such a breath of fresh air and sanity to me.

To anyone else, I'm sorry if I didn't get to any questions or points presented to my posts.

Paul wrote:They don't though. I've already provided an example from Valens.

Paul,

I meant to query this before since you have mentioned it a few times, but there is so much going on in this thread that it passed me by. Do you mean the quotation you provided where Valens talks about the 9th sign also being indicative of rank and occupation because the MC degree falls in it?

convenient approximation or 'general'

No source makes the claim that it is provisional either.

Martin Gansten wrote:It seems to me that the prevalent notion among present-day astrologers who identify primarily as Hellenistic-style practitioners, and even among some who don't, is that whole-sign places constitute the original 'house system'. It also very often follows from this assumption (because of an explicit or implicit belief that astrology was originally perfect or near-perfect and then deteriorated) that the whole-sign system is the best or even only valid system, except possibly in some very specific contexts. The later preponderance of other systems is, consequently, regarded as a result of innovation or misunderstanding of the original ideas.

Well, this seems a very nicely and carefully articulated description of the whole issue. Given the facts that the notion of "places" appears to have originated from decans already incorporated into the signs, the whole-sign system is prevalent in the actual case horoscopes, and it's the simplest system conceivable, the assumption that it constitutes the original "house system" (both in the topical and dynamical sense) perhaps isn't entirely unfounded. Still, even if it's true, it doesn't entail that it's the best or only valid system. The other systems may have been regarded either as purposeful innovations or irreverent degenerations (like they're considered as such even now) but it's a question of personal preferences (or, to use Paul's words, "a religious article of faith"). But, at the end of the day, it has nothing to do with the fact that when the astrologers published their cases, they were apparently happy with using this original and valid (or: old-fashioned and schematic) system.

Martin Gansten wrote:[...] in this case I generally find the 'actual cases' less clear and open to a greater number of interpretations than the didactic examples.

OK, the "actual cases" may be selective or even stretched (like Lilly's examples, which sometimes override his rules) but I guess we can agree that they exhibit the form their author intends to show us. In other words, they're authoritative.

Levente Laszlo wrote:Given the facts that the notion of "places" appears to have originated from decans already incorporated into the signs, the whole-sign system is prevalent in the actual case horoscopes, and it's the simplest system conceivable, the assumption that it constitutes the original "house system" (both in the topical and dynamical sense) perhaps isn't entirely unfounded.

To me it actually seems that the decan connection points more in the direction of equal houses (because the decans associated with given topics are limited zones within a sign) and/or quadrant houses (because not only the rising decans were used, but also the ones culminating [in the accepted sense of the word] at the meridian, the so-called transit decans). I am no Egyptologist, though, so this topic touches the outskirts of my range of knowledge.

OK, the "actual cases" may be selective or even stretched (like Lilly's examples, which sometimes override his rules) but I guess we can agree that they exhibit the form their author intends to show us. In other words, they're authoritative.

I'm not entirely sure what this means. Many of them seem extremely bare-bones, so that I would imagine that they were accompanied by verbal expositions which are, of course, entirely irretrievable.

petosiris wrote:Martin pointed out to the exceedingly curious passage by Ptolemy - 3.10 where an "equal house that starts 5 degrees before the ascendant" constitutes a twelfth-part and sign. Can you elucidate how this difficult passage makes sense (like you do usually), because it uses terminology that is akin to whole sign aspects?

That's a tough passage, indeed, and I'm afraid I'm not able to solve this old riddle. All I can do is present the available facts.

The earliest manuscript that contains the passage (3.11.3) is from the thirteenth century, but in the tradition, there are a couple of texual variants that considerably affect the interpretation. The text lifted from the critical edition is the following:

τόπους μὲν π??ῶτον ἡγητέον ἀφετικοὺς ???ν οἷς εἶναι δεῖ πάντως τὸν μέλλοντα τὴν κυ??είαν τῆς ἀφέσεως λαμβάνειν τό τε πε??ὶ τὸν ὡ??οσκόπον δωδεκατημό??ιον, ἀπὸ πέντε μοι??ῶν τῶν π??οαναφε??ομένων α???τοῦ τοῦ ?????ίζοντος μέχ??ι τῶν λοιπῶν καὶ ???παναφε??ομένων μοι??ῶν εἴκοσι πέντε καὶ τὰς* τα??ταις ταῖς λʹ μοί??αις δεξιὰς ἑξαγώνους (τὰς† τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ δαίμονος) καὶ τετ??αγώνους (τοῦ ὑπὲ?? γῆν μεσου??ανήματος) καὶ τ??ιγώνους (τοῦ καλουμένου θεοῦ) καὶ διαμέτ??ους (τοῦ δ??νοντος).

A translation (a slightly modified version of Schmidt's), with additions for better understanding in round brackets:

First, one must consider as places (topos) for releasing (those places) in which it is always necessary for the star which is going to assume lordship over the releasing to be: the twelfth-part around the Hour-Watcher, from the five degrees pre-ascending the horizon itself to the remaining twenty-five degrees post-ascending it; and the hexagonals (i.e., degrees*) to these 30 degrees on the right - those† of the Good Daimon; and the tetragonals - of the midheaven above the earth; and the trigonals - of the so-called God; and the diametricals - of the descendant.

The textual issues are well summarized in Schmidt's translation (p. 30, fnn. 1-2), but, fortunately, there is a little help from the indirect textual tradition that confirms the readings: (1) William of Moerbeke's 13th-century Latin translation, based on a lost Greek manuscript; (2) Ḥunayn ibn Isḥ??q's 9th-century Arabic translation from the Greek (as I have no access to the Arabic, I rely on the Latin translations by Plato of Tivoli and Aegidius de Tebaldis); (3) Hephaestio's exposition from the fifth century, and its better preserved version re-written by Isaac Argyrus in the fourteenth century; (4) the so-called "Proclus paraphrase" of uncertain age; (5) partial quotations from elsewhere.

* This is the reading of the better manuscripts (also quoted as such by "Rhetorius" [probably Zeno's astrologer from the late fifth or early sixth century]) and "Proclus", and it probably refers to degrees, which is Ḥunayn's interpretation too. Hephaestio doesn't have an article (see this below), and Moerbeke either leaves it uninterpreted and untranslated, or it was missing in his text.

† The reading of the best manuscript, referring back to the hexagonal degrees; it's confirmed by Moerbeke, Ḥunayn, Argyrus, and "Proclus".

Now, there seem to be two elements that suggest Ptolemy is introducing a "house system": (1) the use of the word "place", and (2) the use of the traditional names (Good Daimon, God, later also Bad Daimon) of the places.

(1) The question of "place". The word topos occurs 180 times in the Apotelesmatics, and mostly it's used in its trivial meanings like "location" or "topic". In 1.22.1 a special meaning is introduced, which is the equivalent of our "dodecatemorion", and it's never used again. Another technical meaning attested in the book is a "place" in the zodiac, that is, a degree occupied by a star or a cardine, or an interval of degrees. It's never used in the sense of "place/house" with the possible exception of 4.6.1 (which see below).

(2) The traditional names. While Ptolemy seems to apply the traditional place names to the new 30-degree sections (provided we accept the readings as above), he actually refers to "the so-called God" and later (3.11.4) to twelfth-part, "which is called Bad Daimon". (The reading is confirmed by Moerbeke, Ḥunayn, Argyrus, and "Proclus".) This suggests he's referring an "equal" convention known by others.

Let's assume he's introduced a new, equal "house system". Curiously enough, he resumes it only once (4.6.1):

[For the topic of children,] it will be necessary to examine (the stars) present or configured with the place at the peak (i.e., the zenith) or (the place) following it, that is, (the place) of the Good Daimon.

Although Hephaestio explicitly tells that Ptolemy selected the whole chapter from the works of Petosiris, which may allow the speculation Ptolemy's simply using whole signs, he might also be bringing in his new "house system" again. Anyway, the earliest horoscope interpretation I know that uses Ptolemy's method, that of Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (Hor. gr. nat. 905.IX.3), interprets (12.1) the midheaven and the Good Daimon as signs.

Let's now see what the interpretations and commentaries say, roughly in chronological order until the late antiquity.

(A) According to Hephaestio (2.11.6-7, skipped by Argyrus), most people would interpret Ptolemy as introducing 30-degree zodiacal sections. The same seems to apply to the Greek "anonymous commentary". However, no instructions are given in either of the sources whether it was used by them outside the length of life calculations, and the issue isn't rehearsed for the topic of children.

(B) The omission of the article enables Hephaestio to hint (2.11.4-5, also Argyrus 25.13) that Ptolemy might be referring to "sides" instead of 30-ecliptical-degree sections and that by this he must be alluding to the expansion or shrinking of the 30 degrees as necessitated by the size of the quadrants. A commentator, Pancharius is reported to have done exactly this (as described in Hephaestio 2.11.8-15 and also, better, in Argyrus 25.14-26), introducing a curious division in which the "cardinal houses" consist of 30 degrees uniformly, and the remaining "houses" are of equal size within a quadrant (one-third of the length of the quadrant, each). Hephaestio doesn't represent Pancharius's system as a new "house system" or as anything for general usage, though.

(C) The fragment of a commentary (preserved in "Porphyry" 43, which is most probably not by Porphyry) attempts to third the quadrants and shrink or expand the 5 degrees pre-ascending proportionately and concludes it's impossible to constitute 30-degree zodiacal sections in this manner. It's likely, therefore, that this author wasn't aware of Pancharius's solution. There's, however, no hint that the author conceived Ptolemy's description as introducing a new "house system".

(D) "Rhetorius" (5.46, copied into the manuscripts of "Porphyry" as 52) third the quadrants with an offset of 5 degrees. This is actually the introduction of the "Porphyry" houses, and the first attestable time Ptolemy's instructions are taken as referring to a "house system". In the same recension of "Rhetorius" appears Pamprepius's horoscope (Hor. gr. nat. 440.IX.29), where whole-signs and a quadrant-based computation are used together.

(E) "Rhetorius" (actually, probably Zeno's astrologer; Ep. IV 12) gives a detailed computation of something that would be called the "Alchabitius" system for a horoscope (Hor. gr. nat. 428.IX.8; possibly Zeno's) with a 5-degree offset, explicitly referring to Ptolemy. The other version of the same horoscope, preserved by M??sh??ʾall??h and Abū ʿAlī al-Khayy??ṭ, apparently uses whole signs, which implies the two computations may have been used together.

(F) Eutocius's horoscope (Hor. gr. nat. 497.X.28 ), as reported by "Rhetorius" (6.52), depicts "Porphyry" houses without the 5-degree offset.

To sum up, until ca. 500, the interpretations of Ptolemy's instructions ranged from an "equal system"-like to a quadrant-based proportional, but there's no evidence that the instructions were considered to be introducing a "house system". It's "Rhetorius" who describes modified versions of the "Porphyry" and "Alchabitius houses" as "house systems" proper, but apparently together with a whole-sign system. It seems the medieval commentators (the earliest available to me being ʿAlī ibn Ri???w??n from the early 11th century) would continue interpreting Ptolemy's words as instructions for a house system while the use of whole-signs parallelly or independently ceases.

That's all.