'Platikos and moirikos: Ancient Horoscopic Practice in the Light of Vettius Valens’ Anthologies' -
https://doi.org/10.1163/25899201-12340029
I hope you don't mind if I expand on this existing notice of an academic paper, Martin – and use the reaction to your paper as a way to open up discussion on the standards of scholarship in astrology.
Over the last few days, I have brought attention to your paper on Social Media, and I also posted a video of the lecture given for the AA last year. As you know, our explorations of the issues were independent and coming from different angles, but – for the most part – we seem to be in broad agreement. At least I find nothing in your paper that I substantially disagree with, and I am delighted to see your excellent paper get published, with such a detailed exploration of specific points.
Le's pause for a moment over that fact that yours is a 43 page, fully referenced, peer-reviewed scholarly work, critiqued by experts in the field, presented in an academic journal edited by the emminent Michael Lackner and Charles Burnett, and published by the leading international academic publisher, Brill. I can only imagine how slowly and carefully such papers progress through the barriers to see the light of day.
It is an article that reaches impeccable standards of scholarship. While detailed enough to explore the issue fully, its length is not beyond anyone seriously interested in this issue. All astrologers should be using this article as a reference for
what is currently established through careful scholarship about the use of quadrant house division in ancient astrology.
Yet I have observed the reaction of some highly influential astrologers on social media. Labelling themselves ‘historians’ supposedly free of value judgements, to wide applause your article is treated as non-existent, or denounced as “bad scholarship??? when attention is brought to it. One tells us we must wait for the publication of another paper, which will prove that “WSH is the ancestor of all subsequent house systems… It is the only or the default system in all surviving Hellenistic and Byzantine horoscopes ever using houses??? amongst other things. Of course, this suits the popular storyline of the moment, and the power of social media will ensure your article is disregarded as another ‘bye-the-bye’ in the boring, ongoing saga of astrologers needing to feed petty compulsions to fight over house systems.
That false narrative masks the real problem the astrological community faces – the lack of scholarly standards in what is taught by schools and courses about the known history of our art. When we cross-reference this matter with the results of the Social Media survey conducted by Dru, we see how persuasive and effective the power of Social Media marketing can be, and to what extent information is controlled by the influencers and the popularisers, rather than the scholars.
Now, academics might not care about this – you lot tend to just get on with your stuff... and I know that even in your guise of astrologer, you are not invested in what house system some other astrologer chooses to use. Neither am I. Nor am I an academic; but as an astrologer preparing to ‘get off the stage’ and leave this study in the hands of a new generation, I am concerned that scholarly attitudes are maintained in our internal account of historical information. Hence I think the community should be more vocal and more engaged, and approaches that refuse to acknowledge, or go so far as to denounce modern scholarship, should be taken to task.
Recently, the power of internet ‘influence’ has been such, that anyone arguing or demonstrating that quadrant systems were indeed employed in ancient astrology -- free of any need to use signs for houses, or two house systems at once (meaning quadrants are only used to demark planetary strength, whereas meanings coming from the signs) -- have been labelled ‘Hellenistic astrology deniers’, and other disingenuous tactics have been used to ensure that certain views on things are disregarded as extreme, anti-historical, or deranged.
Hence I am starting this thread to highlight the issue that continues to go unaddressed. No astrologer should be talking about this matter now without recourse to your paper, which has established information based on scholarly review. As in all things, you have probably established only a stepping stone in knowledge that will get deeper and evolve, but we have a more reliable foothold now as a result of your work.
And until such time that others publish to the standard that you have set, they should neither disregard your paper nor denounce it in the name of 'history', because it has already been so rigorously and critically assessed – this is now the hallmark of where the information stands.
(And how lucky we are to have free access to the full paper, without the prohibitive access fees that academic papers sometimes attract - thank you!)
As a reminder to all – another thread exists to discuss the details of Martin’s paper
here.
This thread concerns the broader discussion of astrologers applying appropriate standards when teaching or populating historical knowledge of astrological technique – and not popularising personally favoured approaches based on unproven speculation, or an appeal to authority that does not exist. Astrology is (largely) an unregulated study, so if we are going to stand against the increasing pressure of social media - that whoever has the most power, wealth, popularity, (influence) gets to control the storyline, the whole community needs to be on guard - with increased expectation that anything declared to be a scientific or historical 'fact' is based on scrutinised evidence that has passed the academic bar.
(Which is one reason I personally have opted out of all such platforms.)
