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The Wessex Astrologer will release on May 13 a new translation of Book 21 of the 26-volume Astrologia Gallica, written in Latin by Jean-Baptiste Morin de Villefranche (1583-1656) and published posthumously in 1661. Morin, as many know, was a physician, mathematician, and natural philosopher, and the leading 17th century French astrologer. Book 21 is the foundational volume of his masterful treatise on astrological theory and method. In this volume, Morin sets out most fully and succinctly the theory of astrological signification and method of determination that he teaches.

Despite the value of this foundational volume of Morin’s powerful and unique astrological work, Book 21 has not until now received a true, complete and accurate English-language translation. Astrosynthesis, published in 1974, is translated from Henri Selva’s 1897 abridged French paraphrase of Book 21 by Lucy Little, a student of Zoltan Mason. By its very nature as a translation from a paraphrased abridgement, it is incomplete and not an actual translation of Morin’s Latin text. Yet it is reliable in its statement of the principles and rules it includes, offers useful supplementary material, and benefits from Zoltan Mason’s teachings on Morin’s work.

Richard S. Baldwin’s version of Book 21, also published 50 years ago in 1974, may appear on its face to be an actual translation of Morin’s complete Latin text. In fact, however, it is more of a paraphrase than a translation. It also omits parts of the Latin text, gets some important things wrong, and adds some things Morin does not say. Further, it too often renders Morin’s strong, clear and exact statements in vague and obscuring ones.

The new translation of the full text of Morin’s Book 21 aims to be literal and exact. It seeks to retain as far as possible Morin’s memorable, engaging and conversational voice. Above all, and to the best of my ability, it allows the power and beauty of Morin’s carefully structured and closely reasoned arguments to come through clearly and fully intact. The translation includes a foreword from Robert Corre that places Morin’s work in context, a translator’s introduction, quite extensive endnotes, a detailed subject index, a separate index of persons, and reproductions of the nativities Morin mentions in Book 21.

The translation is currently available for preorder at https://www.wessexastrologer.com/produc ... s-book-21/, a good source for those in the UK. It is also available for preorder at www.amazon.com. My comment on Why We Need a Translation of Morin’s Book 21 can be found on The Wessex Astrologer website at https://www.wessexastrologer.com/why-we ... pe-sitter/

Penelope Sitter

That's exciting news! Congratulations, Penelope. Looking forward to reading that.

Thank you, Martin. I'm glad you'll read it.

I am reading this now - it is a *very* good edition. You have done a great job with this Penelope and it is lovely to see the work so elegantly translated and so professionally produced. I liked the intro by Robert Corre too.
Still in the process of reading but loving it so far.

Deb wrote: I am reading this now - it is a *very* good edition. You have done a great job with this Penelope and it is lovely to see the work so elegantly translated and so professionally produced. I liked the intro by Robert Corre too.
Still in the process of reading but loving it so far.

Deb,

I'm very glad you like the translation. It was a labor of love. I'm guessing you're also liking Morin's very interesting work, now better represented in this translation of the foundational volume of Astrologia Gallica. .

Deb wrote: Sat May 25, 2024 3:12 am ...and so professionally produced....

And yes, The Wessex Astrologer did a very professional and beautiful job.

hey penelope

i am curious what is different about this translation you've done... when you mentioned this book coming out, i decided to re-read my copy of james baldwins latin interpretation.... i am reluctant to buy another copy of this book of a different translation.... maybe you or someone else feels like talking about these differences with me... if you don't, that's fine too.. thanks james

james_m wrote: Tue May 28, 2024 4:30 pm hey penelope

i am curious what is different about this translation you've done... when you mentioned this book coming out, i decided to re-read my copy of james baldwins latin interpretation.... i am reluctant to buy another copy of this book of a different translation.... maybe you or someone else feels like talking about these differences with me... if you don't, that's fine too.. thanks james

Hi James,

I'm glad you asked about the Book 21 translation. The Baldwin version of Book 21 is largely a paraphrase, and sometimes a summary. The paraphrases, though many are good enough, are often weak, frequently less than clear, fairly often confusing (including by the misuse or disregard of terms-of-art that have exact, very clear and highly clarifying, meanings), and sometimes downright wrong, including some that directly contradict what Morin says. Baldwin's version also omits some parts of what Morin wrote, and even adds a few things Morin does not say.

The Baldwin version in several ways obscures Morin's beautiful reasoning and his closely structured arguments. It does this by omitting some steps or moves in an argument, or by stating them in a way that makes the argument less clear, less exact, and less enjoyable to follow. Baldwin’s version also often omits very helpful landmarks or guideposts that Morin used to help the reader follow his train of thought. Those guideposts include things as simple as the numbering of points in an argument, which Baldwin sometimes, though not always, omits, and the use of words or phrases that tell the reader what is coming next, or otherwise place a statement in the context in which it appears. The Baldwin version omits Morin’s quite frequent references to other volumes of Astrologia Gallica (the 26-volumw 1661 treatise of which Book 21 is a part) that relate to and are helpful to understand or place in context things Morin says in Book 21. Those cross-references are important for a professional astrologer intent on having the clearest understanding of the horoscopic art and the best grasp on its use, and for anyone else who wishes to study Morin’s work in some depth.

I aimed to do a literal translation of Morin’s Latin. I neither omitted sentences, nor changed them (except very occasionally in very minor ways to make the translation clearer), nor added things Morin did not say (except a few bracketed words that identify themselves as clarifying additions). It was my intention to allow Morin’s voice to come through, and to retain, to the extent possible in a translation and to the extent I was able, the power of Morin’s exact, clear and concise language.

By reading and using the Baldwin version—as I, like many others did for quite a number of years—I was unaware of what an excellent writer Morin is. From the Baldwin version, I was not treated to Morin’s fine writing skills, and to the very clear and exact way he speaks in Book 21. I found what I (mistakenly) took to be Morin’s words interesting in the Baldwin version, but not so engaging and almost conversational as they are in his Latin or in an actual translation rather than a paraphrase. I knew Morin was very good at reasoning and constructing arguments. But from the Baldwin version one cannot see just how very clear and well reasoned, and enjoyable for the rational bit of our minds to follow, Morin’s work in Book 21 is. I feel that I know Morin significantly better by knowing his actual words, a familiarity that one can gain, I believe, even through an adequate translation. Deb mentions above in this thread that this new translation of Morin is elegant. I have to give that elegance to Morin, seeing that the translation has elegance insofar as it renders Morin’s actual words, sentences and paragraphs as well as I was able.

Astrosynthesis, the 1974 translation by Lucy Little, who was a student of New York astrologer Zoltan Mason, is a translation of Henri Selva’s 1897 abridged French paraphrase of Book 21. In reading this work, one immediately sees that the work is a paraphrase, and one can easily see that the work is incomplete. On the other hand, Baldwin’s version appears on its face to be an actual translation, rather than a paraphrase or summary, and appears on its face to be complete. Neither is true.

I was trying to use Baldwin’s version to write a book on the powerful and essential technique of house combinations as Morin explains it in Book 21 (especially in Section 2, Chapters 4 and 5, and also in the chapters on aspects in Book 21). I found that when I checked Baldwin’s version against Morin’s Latin I had to retranslate all but one or two of the passages that I planned to quote or otherwise rely on. I came to the point that I considered it more important that Morin’s work should have a proper English-language translation than that I write on house combinations.

I did the translation because it matters that Morin’s interesting and important work should be well known among astrologers. To be well known and well understood by English speakers, the book needed to have a proper translation. With five of the seven traditional planets in a stellium in the 12th house in Pisces, we should expect Morin’s work would be in various ways and for various reasons relatively invisible—especially when compared to the work’s quality, interest and importance. An inadequate English-language translation of the foundational volume of Astrologia Gallica is one way that his work has been hidden from view to a significant extent. I believe it is important for the great art we practice to benefit from Morin’s teachings. That is my intent in doing the Book 21 translation.

The translation includes, as Deb mentioned in this thread, a Foreword that Robert Corre graciously agreed to contribute. This foreword adds both the value of the substance of what Robert says, and also places the translation appropriately in the lineage that goes from Morin to Zoltan Mason to Robert Corre, who is my teacher. In addition, the translation includes an index of persons (which is particularly helpful for one who wishes to go directly to chart examples Morin mentions in Book 21) and a detailed subject index, quite extensive footnotes to introduce unfamiliar terms and ideas, and to provide some information about the people Morin mentions and the time in which he wrote, and a Translator’s Introduction that some may find helpful as they enter what may be some relatively unfamiliar territory found in Book 21.

You can see on The Wessex Astrologer website my post on “Why We Need a New Translation of Morin’s Book 21” at https://www.wessexastrologer.com/why-we ... pe-sitter/. Tom Callanan wrote a review of the translation published on the Morin Facebook group page—Morin’s Method of Determination, found at https://www.facebook.com/groups/908830242514869. It’s a closed group, but upon request an interested astrologers can soon become a member. You can also see on Anthony Louis’ Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/anthony.louis.336 some comments published in early April on the translation and the need for it.

I’d be happy to answer any other questions you may have, including about specific topics in the book, specific passages, or anything else about Book 21 or the translation.

Thank you for your interest in the new translation, but especially for your iinterest in Morin’s unique, important and even revelatory work.

hi penelope

this is very generous of you.. thanks! yes, baldwins book never gave the charts that morin discussed in the book and that would have been helpful... it is nice to know that yours does... i think morin is an important astrologer in the history of astrology and i have tried to wrap my head around his astrological approach.. i don't know if you know of the book by patti tobin brittain - 'planetary powers - the morin method'.. the book was helpful in this regard, but it would be interesting to read this translation you've made available.. i have a lot of reading on the go at present, but will strongly consider buying this book when the time is right... thanks for your kindness in this elaboration here..

james

james_m wrote: this is very generous of you.. thanks! yes, baldwins book never gave the charts that morin discussed in the book and that would have been helpful... it is nice to know that yours does... i think morin is an important astrologer in the history of astrology and i have tried to wrap my head around his astrological approach.. i don't know if you know of the book by patti tobin brittain - 'planetary powers - the morin method'.. the book was helpful in this regard, but it would be interesting to read this translation you've made available.. i have a lot of reading on the go at present, but will strongly consider buying this book when the time is right... thanks for your kindness in this elaboration here..

james

James,

My pleasure. Yes, I too like Patti Tobin Brittain's book--Planetary Powers: The Morin Method--which remains readily available. She gives a clear introduction to the method of determination Morin sets out, especially in Book 21. She applies the method in numerous examples, using simplified charts that include only the planets that directly participate in whatever principle or rule she is demonstrating in a particular instance. As she says in her Foreword to the first (1980) and second (2010) edition of the book, she was a student of Gerhard Houwing, an engineer who, she says, was thrilled to have found Morin's work and considered it the key to understanding astrology. If I'm not mistaken, I believe James Holden, who translated most of the specifically astrological volumes of Astrologia Gallica, also studied with Houwing.

Like so many who look into Morin's work enough to really understand what he is saying and what he does in practice, Brittain found Morin's work to be the "concise and concrete method of synthesis" that she had been looking for. When I found Morin's work, I felt, as another long-time astrologer said of his experience on encountering Morin's work, that "the scales fell from my eyes." Like my teacher, Robert Corre, Brittain's teacher, she says, "demanded the concise, the specific, the concrete" and turned away from "the vague, the confused, the irresolute." Morin's work teaches us to be clear, concise and accurate in our delineations of what particular planets signify in a chart and will do in a life.

Morin shows us how we may synthesize a natal chart to see its parts work together to describe human character and temperament as they motivates us to act, the consequential human actions we take, and the outlines of a human life that results from character in action on Earth. To make that assessment and understanding possible, Morin teaches us, as Robert Corre says, to think like an astrologer. Thinking in accord with the method Morin teaches about what the celestial bodies as they are placed among the houses of a chart will do can help anyone who takes up that study and practice to apply the various doctrines and use the techniques they find most powerful in a most concise, clear, accurate and powerful way.

To see the theory and practice of horoscopic astrology continue to develop to be the best it can be, it would be great, and I think very interesting, to see increasing numbers of astrologers take up the study of Morin's very helpful and clarifying work, beginning with the study especially of Book 21. Study of the new the new translation of Book 21 can be facilitated by studying Brittain's useful book along with Morin's (translated) words. I also urge anyone who wants their astrological practice to benefit from a great introduction to Morin's work to study with the leading English-language teacher of Morin's work, Robert Corre, whose website is www.forumonastrology.com.

Thank you for your work and nice presentation here Penelope.
I will certainly respond to your invitation.

If you can read French, maybe you might be interested by this one also from Denis Labouré
"Lire un thème avec Morin de Villefranche"
https://www.academie-astrologie.com/pro ... llefranche

Be well,
Ouranos

Ouranos wrote: Wed May 29, 2024 7:17 pm Thank you for your work and nice presentation here Penelope.
I will certainly respond to your invitation.

If you can read French, maybe you might be interested by this one also from Denis Labouré
"Lire un thème avec Morin de Villefranche"
https://www.academie-astrologie.com/pro ... llefranche

Be well,
Ouranos

Hi Ouranos,

Thank you for your interest and response.

I don't read French, though I can make out the title to mean, I think, "Reading a Chart with Morin de Villefranch." Does something particularly stand out to you about Labouré's comments?