Skyscript Astrology Forum

Hi all,
I know there are two systems in use:Dorotheus uses Venus as the daytime ruler, Ptolemy, and so does Lily, uses Mars.
As Deb wrote in the article The Classical use of the Triplicities, it seems clear why Mars was given the water triplicity.I quote from the article:"One point that confuses many people about planetary sects is that Mars - notably hot and dry - is aligned to the nocturnal sect which is cold and moist. If this seems confusing, remember that it was done to moderate the natural excess of Mars and not to strengthen it. Mars is damaging through its excess of heat and is better able to produce a beneficial influence when its natural qualities are harnessed than when they are promoted, as they would be if Mars were aligned with the diurnal sect. The same goes for Saturn, which is assigned to the warmth of the diurnal sect in order to moderate its naturally excessive coldness"
Here exactly is my problem: if we want to moderate mars, why should we give him the daytime rulership and not the nighttime? Is it because he is the lesser malefic and does not need too much cooling down? I know Venus is a nocturnal planet, giving her the daytime rulership seems at odd here but that seems to be a better option than Mars. Mars rules Scorpio, Venus is the exalted lord of Pisces, so that would favour Mars, but then why is Mars the night time ruler as well?
Ptolemy writes:"...and along with him (meaning Mars) on account of the sect and the femininity of the signs, the moon by night and venus by day are co-rulers." Is it because Ptolemy writes co-rulers instead of ruler that Mars was given both day and night? Loeb Translation page 87.
I would love to hear other's opinions.
regards,
Tienka Atema

Quoting from Dorotheus' Carmen p. 162 tr. by Pingree:

"the lords of the triplicity of Cancer are by day Venus, then Mars, then the Moon, by night Mars, then Venus, then the Moon."

I'm curious what your source is.

Tienka Atema wrote: I would love to hear other's opinions.
regards,
Tienka Atema

Bezza in his comment to the first book of Tetrabiblos explains quoting from several Medieval and Renaissance authors that triplicities are assigned mostly according hairesis.

The sect in fact is the main point in everything.

Rulers of water signs are Moon for Cancer, Mars for Scorpio, and Jupiter for Pisces, but the latter we should discard because it's a diurnal planet in a nocturnal sign, and take Venus - Pisces exaltation- which shares the same sect.

In every case Mars has a difficult condition because it is nocturnal but masculine and watery trigon on the other hand is feminine and nocturnal; Ashmand translates like that:

The fourth triplicity, formed by Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces, is left to the remaining planet, Mars, who has right in it by means of his house, Scorpio. But, as the signs which compose this triplicity are feminine, the Moon by night and Venus by day, through their feminine condition, govern it, together with Mars.

margherita

margherita wrote:
The sect in fact is the main point in everything.

Rulers of water signs are Moon for Cancer, Mars for Scorpio, and Jupiter for Pisces, but the latter we should discard because it's a diurnal planet in a nocturnal sign, and take Venus - Pisces exaltation- which shares the same sect.

In every case Mars has a difficult condition because it is nocturnal but masculine and watery trigon on the other hand is feminine and nocturnal; Ashmand translates like that:

The fourth triplicity, formed by Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces, is left to the remaining planet, Mars, who has right in it by means of his house, Scorpio. But, as the signs which compose this triplicity are feminine, the Moon by night and Venus by day, through their feminine condition, govern it, together with Mars.

margherita

I find that reasoning sound, I've personally never seen Mars as the water triplicity ruler as all that tricky.

Thank you all for your replies.
Mithra: I have several sources: Dorotheus uses Venus, Ptolemy uses mars as the daytime ruler. But my question is why does Dorotheue favour Venus, not Mars? I would use Venus as well, but Lilly does not. So I am wondering, why does Ptolemy (and Lilly) use Mars as the day time trip lord? Saturn, the other malefic, is the day time ruler of air: that fits, because the reasoning here is that we want the malefics to act moderate so Saturn, as a cold and dry planet, is warmed as a diurnal planet and so he belongs to the diurnal sect. We want Mars a bit cooler, so to speak, that is why Mars belongs to the sect of the Moon. But if we give Mars the rulership by triplicity of the day, he gets warmed up again! That I do not understand.
Margharita: yes, I see the logic of not using Jupiter in this case. But why, if the trip lords are based on sect, use the malefic Mars as a day time ruler here? The reasoning of sect seems to be that the malefics are working less against life if they are tempered. So Mars needs a cooling down: that is why I would use Mars, as Dorotheus does, as the night time trip lord, not the day time trip lord. I learned from Deb that the Ashmand translation is not the best source to quote Ptolemy, because the translation seems to be a bit corrupted. That is why I quoted the Loeb translation. In this translation, Ptolemy is talking of co-rulership , speaking of the trip lords of the water signs. He does not use that phrase when he discusses the other triplicities.
He also uses different trip lords for the fire, air and earth signs, but for the water signs he uses Mars for day and night. Why? To me, the logic is missing here. Or am I missing something here?
regards,
Tienka

Good morning Tienka

Margharita: yes, I see the logic of not using Jupiter in this case. But why, if the trip lords are based on sect, use the malefic Mars as a day time ruler here? The reasoning of sect seems to be that the malefics are working less against life if they are tempered. So Mars needs a cooling down: that is why I would use Mars, as Dorotheus does, as the night time trip lord, not the day time trip lord. I learned from Deb that the Ashmand translation is not the best source to quote Ptolemy, because the translation seems to be a bit corrupted. That is why I quoted the Loeb translation. In this translation, Ptolemy is talking of co-rulership , speaking of the trip lords of the water signs. He does not use that phrase when he discusses the other triplicities.
He also uses different trip lords for the fire, air and earth signs, but for the water signs he uses Mars for day and night. Why? To me, the logic is missing here. Or am I missing something here?
regards,
Tienka

Yes Ashmand is less considered, yet yesterday the link to Robbins translation did not work. Anyway I generally use the Italian version.

About the triplicity, Mars does not take the day but the night, evidently for the reason of the article you mention, because it should be moderated and in the day it would represent an excess.
But Mars has the main rulership even because it rules the fixed sign of the triplicity- it was the other condition I did not mention- for the other groups in fact we will find Sun for Fire (which comes from Leo), Venus for Earth (from Taurus) Saturn for Air (from Aquarius)

margherita

Thanks, Margeritha! Yes, you are right, Mars rules the fixed sign here.
That could be the explanation, but to me it still seems strange that Ptolemy uses Mars for both night and day. He seems to be the only one and Lilly followed him, without any comment as far as I am aware of. Why did Lilly not follow the others? Do you have any idea?
regards,
Tienka

Tienka Atema wrote:? Do you have any idea?
regards,
Tienka

MY (I mean it comes from my head, no quote to show) idea is that Lilly hardly deviates from Ptolemy and Ptolemy seems to prefer Mars.

If we take for the explanation of triplicity rulers, Venus differently from Mars and Moon has no domicile in the signs of Water triplicity. It could be added just for harmony, to have 3 rulers as the rest of triplicities.

Anyway this is just my opinion.

margherita

Hi Tienka
I think this is a very interesting research project. I only have time for a quick comment, but just wanted to say that it is inconceivable that Lilly would be the only astrologer to follow Ptolemy. Lilly was very well read, and it wasn?t in his nature to go against traditional doctrine. When it came to reporting astrological theory he merely followed and reproduced what the big names before him published. Here for example is a screen shot from Jerome Cardan?s commentary of Ptolemy ? an extremely influential work of that period which Lilly had access to. I think if you track down the other sources that Lilly acknowledged in his preface, you will probably find that it was a commonly reported association around that time. These commentaries were assumed to be more than the work of Ptolemy, because there was so much of the commentator's own belief invested in the works too. You can see from the table how only Mars is given an association with the water triplicity. The table shows that each planet has only one association by day or night, which is why Ptolemy says in his Tetrabiblos that when we get to the water triplicity only Mars is left, so it is given to the water triplicity with assistance from Venus by day and the Moon by night (I?m paraphrasing from memory, so please check the passage). I believe there is a much older reasoning behind this, because it offers similar reasoning to what we find with the assignation of planets to the Chaldean terms. But this isn?t something that I have researched deeply so I should say that this opinion is partly based upon my ?gut impression? and the realisation that the philosophy unerpinning the astrological use of triplicities is very ancient.
Deb

I just read this:

Saturn, the other malefic, is the day time ruler of air: that fits, because the reasoning here is that we want the malefics to act moderate so Saturn, as a cold and dry planet, is warmed as a diurnal planet and so he belongs to the diurnal sect. We want Mars a bit cooler, so to speak, that is why Mars belongs to the sect of the Moon.

Actually, to balance the excess the aim is to make Mars wetter, rather than cooler, because its cheif influence is to dry and burn (I.4, Robbins p.37). Also see Ptolemy 1.7 (p.43) where it is stated that Mars is allocated to the nocturnal sect in order that Mars "which is dry, is given to the moisture of night".

Deb wrote:, but just wanted to say that it is inconceivable that Lilly would be the only astrologer to follow Ptolemy. Lilly was very well read, and it wasn?t in his nature to go against traditional doctrine. When it came to reporting astrological theory he merely followed and reproduced what the big names before him published.

Yes, obviously you are right.

Anyway when you mentioned Cardano I remembered I have the Italian translation of De Iudiciis Geniturarum so I gave a look there:

And this is triplicities table:
Comment of Cardano to the picture "ratio trigonum firmissima est".

So firm that he completely changed his mind in not even ten years.
This is because Cardano completely left at his shoulder all his astrological works after having read the new translation of Tetrabiblos- especially Arab astrology.

About this Faracovi, an great expert of Renaissance philosophy, wrote a lot.

margherita

I'm sorry, regarding my post, for some reason I thought you had the rulers switched - Mars for day and Venus for night. I misread things a bit.