Skyscript Astrology Forum

Hello Everyone!

My name is Mark and I am from the USA.

Joined this site a month ago through the recommendation of a GM at another Astrology forum since my primary interest is in the traditional area of astrological study.

I have been reading the many informative discussions here & also books concerning traditional astrology and am amazed at the amount of material available on this subject. Wish I had know about traditional astrology from the start.

Even though I am not new to Astrology and actively studied it years ago, the Traditional area is new for me and I look forward to learning all I can with you.

After I reached a point in my first period of astrological study I wanted to learn more about ancient Egyptian civilization, particularly its architecture & why they continuously built those massive structures throughout their long history which spanned 3 or more millennium.

Now that I think about it, was in fact a book I had purchased in my initial astrology studies titled "The Case for Astrology" that lead me to the author's more recent book on ancient Egypt which really opened up a new way of understanding the ancients, which our current modes of though generally fall short on.

Now to the subject... I believe John West makes a strong point & observation in his work titled "Serpent in the Sky:The High Wisdom of Ancient Egypt" on page 91 there is a figure I posted below.

By John Anthony West

The Figure below comes from the second shrine in the Tomb of Tutankhamen. It is one of a row of identical mummiform figures, part of a complex and particularly enigmatic funerary text. But however puzzling the text and reliefs, the astrological significance of this drawing cannot be misunderstood. Rays of force or energy connect the consciousness of the human individual and the stars; there is no other possible interpretation of this figure.
Taken by itself, this little relief is enough to prove astrology existed in Egypt.

Here is a link to a picture of the actual row of the reliefs John is referring to in his quote & figure

http://www.grahamhancock.com/images/hm/c5/p88a.jpg


What pieces of evidence or supported clues have you come across in your studies concerting ancient astrology?

Hi Mark (Leo moon here, also!)--

A good book on the history of astrology is Nicholas Campion, The Dawn of Astrology, which covers ancient Babylonian as well as Egyptian astrology. Other good booka are Francesca Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, on cuniform astrology from Babylon and member Gavin White's book on Babylonian constellations.

I think it is helpful to divide up Egypt according to periods. Civilization existed there for such a long period, and beliefs changed over time and between different communities. After Alexander's conquest of Egypt, a lot of Hellenizing influences occured in Egypt as well as Egyptianizing influences in Greece and Rome, when Egyptians moved to other parts of the empire.

The pictures you posted might just refer to the dog star Sirius. Was there any accompanying text? The Egyptians had a very old star calendar used to time religious festivals as well as the onset of the Nile floods. When Sirius rose, they expected the Nile to flood. They associated the goddess Isis with Sirius, and perhaps you've read the Isis-Osiris myths, which essentially portrayed nature's and the sun's regenerative principles.

This source isn't specifically on astrology but you might also enjoy the site www.sofiatopia.org/maat/hidden_chamber01.htm The author talks about the "spatial semantics" of Egyptian tomb architecture as it portrayed their belief in solar gods who died and were resurrected.

So far as I know, from very early times, the Egyptians had a star calendar, signs based upon constellations on and off the ecliptic divided into smaller 10-degree segments (decans) and a system of planetary exaltations. (See Joanne Conman's article, "Origins of Astrology") at the Kepler College website: www.kepler.edu .)

One question is, at what point does some other kind of star-lore or cultural astronomy become astrology?

I think the origins of the house system used in western astrology come from Egyptian religious beliefs with a Greek overlay or hybridization, but I need to do a bit more research before I would feel ready to make a solid case for it. He doesn't specifically talk about astrology but Plutarch's (1st & 2nd centuries AD) book Isis and Osiris seems to have a lot of information nuggets in these deities' worship that translate into astrological house topical meanings.

Does anyone seriously say that the Egyptians didn't use some kind of astrology? Maybe that astrology did or didn't resemble later forms, but I figured it was a given they used something.

waybread......

A good book on the history of astrology is Nicholas Campion, The Dawn of Astrology, which covers ancient Babylonian as well as Egyptian
astrology. Other good book are Francesca Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, on cuniform astrology from Babylon and member Gavin White's book on Babylonian constellations.

I will check with the local library here for those books or maybe I can find a deal at a online book store.

Checked out a couple of good books recently... The Fated Sky: Astrology in History by Benson Bobrick 2005, Origins of Astrology by Jack Lindsay 1971.
Looking forward to reading Nicholas Campion's take on early Astrology.

The pictures you posted might just refer to the dog star Sirius. Was there any accompanying text?

From looking at the drawing and the photo of those particular reliefs I didn't see the Sopdet (Sirius) hieroglyph included. The Sopdet hieroglyph had a 't' consonant above a star with a tall triangle on the right. There are several variations of Sopdet's glyph spelling but all had a t-star- tall triangle in them I believe.

Found a book online that has translations of some of the treasures found in Tutankhamun's tomb, but have no idea if he covers those particular reliefs which were found on the interior of the second shrine.

Besides, John West who looked into this found that the experts who had studied that group of reliefs found them to be a very complex & enigmatic funerary text.

Would be interesting to read the translation if they are ever able to come to more complete understanding of it.

Those Ancient Egyptians just lived too long ago. lol

Thanks for book list & link!

For those following this thread who may be interested...

The enigmatic text & reliefs on the 2nd shrine are based on a excerpt from an otherwise unknown book of the underworld.

The depictions are hard to decipher and incorporate scripts written in a kind of secret code(cryptography). These scenes depict the Sun God bringing the inhabitants of the underworld to life. The names of Tutankhamen have been re-gilded to render them legible again.

Originally, this shrine was clearly inscribed with the old name 'Tutankhaton' and was therefore manufactured at the beginning of his reign, when his father 'Ankenaton' had created a new capitol, divorced of most of the original neters(Gods).

Of all the exhibits on display, this shrine is without doubt the one possessing the greatest number of riddles.