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- VOLUME I: AN INTRODUCTION TO ASTROLOGY - p.25 AN INTRODUCTION TO ASTROLOGY Chapter 1 The number of planets, signs, aspects, with their several names and characters In the first place you must know that there are seven planets, so called and charactered: | Saturn L, Jupiter K, Sun 0, Venus C, Mercury B, Moon 5. There is also the Head of the Dragon, thus noted P; and the Tail Q. P and Q are not planets but nodes.6 There be also twelve signs: Aries a, Taurus b, Gemini c, Cancer d, Leo e, Virgo f, Libra g, Scorpio h, Sagittarius i, Capricornus j, Aquarius k, Pisces l. Through these twelve signs the planets continually move, and are ever in one or other degree of them. It is necessary you can perfectly distinguish the character of every planet and sign before you proceed to any part of this study; and also the characters of these aspects that follow, viz & U V X R. p.26 You must know every sign contains in longitude 30°, and every degree 60 minutes, &c. The beginning is from Aries, and so in order, one sign after another: so the whole zodiac contains 360°. The 2nd degree of Taurus is the two and thirtieth degree of the zodiac,7 the 10th of Taurus is the 40th, and so in order all throughout the twelve signs. Yet you must ever account the aspects from that degree of the zodiac wherein the planet is: as if Saturn be in 10° of Gemini, and I would know to what degree of the ecliptic he casts his sinister sextile aspect;8 reckoning from Aries to the 10th degree of Gemini, I find Saturn to be in the 70th degree of the zodiac, according to his longitude. If I add 60° more to 70, they make 130, which answers to the 10th degree of the sign Leo, to which Saturn casts his sextile aspect, or to any planet in that degree. 6 More specifically, the Moon’s nodes. The ‘Head of the Dragon’ is the Moon’s north node (P), the point in its monthly journey where the Moon crosses the ecliptic from south to north. The ‘Tail of the Dragon’ is the Moon’s south node (Q), where it crosses the ecliptic from north to south. Since the ecliptic defines the Sun’s apparent path around the Earth, it is only when the Sun and Moon are near the nodes that eclipses occur. The association of the ecliptic and nodes with ‘the dragon’ is very ancient and appears in Babylonian myth, where the spring god Marduk (known to have solar qualities) engaged in battle with Tiamat (primeval chaos). The myth relates the triumph of light over darkness, and reason over instinct, since Tiamat was ‘the terrible dragon of the abyss’, ‘the mother of the unnamed and the unformed’. Upon her defeat, Marduk cut the great dragon in two, putting its head into the Moon’s ascending node, its tail into the descending node, and forcing it to carry six of the zodiacal constellations on its back and six on its belly. In so doing, Marduk defined the year, the days of the year, the planetary orders and the cycles of the Moon. The myth (better known in its Greek form as the victory of Zeus over the titans) is pictorially depicted on a Babylonian boundary stone, dated to the 6th century BC. Scholars believe that it celebrates the development of the mathematically defined zodiac, which becomes increasingly used in astronomical measurement from this period onwards. (For details of the myth see The Babylonian Legends of the Creation and the Fight between Bel and the Dragon as told by Assyrian Tablets from Nineveh by the Trustees of the British Museum, London, 1921; online at http://fax.libs.uga.edu/BL1620xB7/1f/babylonian_legends_of_creation.pdf). Lilly never referred to these points as the north or south nodes, but generally wrote the words Caput and Cauda, a convention I have applied when they appear as symbols in his original text. Caput is the Latin word for ‘head’ (from which the word ‘capital’ is derived); Cauda is the Latin word for ‘tail’. Lilly considered Caput (P) to be a point of increase and essentially benefic; whilst Cauda (Q) is associated with loss and so is considered essentially malefic. See CA p.83 for Lilly’s explanation of their influences. 7 Known as its ‘absolute longitude’: the placement of a planet within the 360° of the circle. Absolute longitude commences with zero at 0° Aries (where the ecliptic crosses the equator to mark the equinox and the beginning of spring for the northern hemisphere) and increases by 30° for each subsequent sign of the zodiac, so that a planet at 2° b by zodiacal longitude is referenced at 32° by absolute longitude. A conversion table is available online at www.skyscript.co.uk/ablong.html (02/06/11). 8 For a definition of the terms ‘sinister’ and ‘dexter’, see ahead, CA p.108. An Annotated Lilly (ii) © D. Houlding; all rights reserved, 2011. This serialised document is made available for free personal study use. No part may be reproduced or redistributed in any form. The only authorised download is available at www.skyscript.co.uk/pdf/CA.html. 32 - VOLUME I: AN INTRODUCTION TO ASTROLOGY - When two planets are equally distant one from each other 60°, we say they are in a sextile aspect, and note it with this character: &. When two planets are 90° distant one from another, we call that aspect a quartile aspect, and write it thus: U. When planets are 120° distant we say they are in a trine aspect and we write it thus: V. When two planets are 180° distant, we call that aspect an opposition, and character the aspect thus: X. When two planets are in one and the same degree and minute of any sign, we say they are in conjunction, and write it thus R. So then if you find Saturn in the first degree of Aries, and the Moon or any other planet in the first degree of Gemini, you shall say they are in a sextile aspect, for they are distant one from another sixty degrees, and this aspect is indifferent good. If Saturn or any other planet be in the first degree of Aries, and another planet in the first degree of Cancer, you must say they are in a quartile aspect, because there is ninety degrees of the zodiac between them: this aspect is of enmity and not good. If Saturn be in the first degree of Aries, and any planet in the 1st degree … p.27 … of Leo, there being now the distance of an hundred and twenty degrees, they behold each other with a trine aspect; and this doth denote unity, concord and friendship. If you find Saturn in the first degree of Aries, and any planet in the first degree of Libra, they being now an hundred and eighty degrees each from [the] other, [they] are said to be in opposition: a bad aspect; and you must be mindful to know what signs are opposite each to other, for without it you cannot erect the figure. When Saturn is in the first degree of Aries, and any planet is in the same degree, they are then said to be in conjunction: and this aspect is good or ill, according to the nature of the question demanded. Signs opposite to one another are: a b c d e f g h i j k l That is, Aries is opposite to Libra, and Libra to Aries; Taurus to Scorpio, Scorpio to Taurus: and so in order as they stand. *Ephemeris, what, and its use I would have all men well and readily apprehend what precedes, and then they will most easily understand the Ephemeris; which is no other thing than a book containing the true places of the planets, in degrees and minutes, in every of the twelve signs both in longitude and latitude, every day of the year at noon, and every hour of the day, by correction and equation. I have inserted an Ephemeris of the month of January 1646, and after it a Table of Houses9 for the latitude of 52 degrees, which will serve in a manner all the kingdom of England on this side of Newark-upon-Trent without sensible error; and this I have done of purpose to teach by them the use of an Ephemeris, and the manner and means of erecting a figure of heaven, without which nothing can be known or made use of in astrology. 9 Lilly’s Ephemeris and Table of Houses are inserted after the introductory pages, following CA p.24 (noted p.24[i:b]-p.24[i:o]). The Ephemeris is reproduced again here besides his descriptive text for easy reference; this does not occur in the manuscript. An Annotated Lilly (ii) © D. Houlding; all rights reserved, 2011. This serialised document is made available for free personal study use. No part may be reproduced or redistributed in any form. The only authorised download is available at www.skyscript.co.uk/pdf/CA.html. 33 - VOLUME I: AN INTRODUCTION TO ASTROLOGY - Chapter 2 Of the use of the Ephemeris10 The first line on the left-hand page tells you January has 31 days. p.28 In the second line you find the daily motions of the planets and the Dragon’s Head. | In the third line and over the character of L you have M.D. - M signifying Meridional,11 D, Descending;12 that is, Saturn has meridional latitude and is descending.