Astrology glossary & reference

Every term the Natal Wheel app uses, explained in plain language. Cast your own chart, free, at natalwheel.com.

Glossary

Almuten: The planet with the strongest claim on a degree, or on a whole chart, once every kind of dignity is added up.
Angular: On or near one of the four angles (Ascendant, Midheaven, Descendant, IC), the strongest places in the chart.
Antiscion: A degree's mirror image across the solstice axis. Two bodies in antiscia share a declination by symmetry rather than by chance.
Applying: An aspect that is still tightening — the faster planet is moving toward exactness. Stronger and more future-facing than a separating one.
Ascendant: The degree of the zodiac rising over the eastern horizon at the moment of birth: the cusp of the first house and the chart’s point of view.
Aspect: An angular relationship between two planets — conjunction, sextile, square, trine, opposition and the minors — read as a conversation between them.
Aspectarian: The triangular grid of every aspect between every pair of planets in a chart.
Astrocartography: A world map of where each planet would be on an angle if you had been born there.
Behenian: One of the fifteen fixed stars the medieval tradition singled out for talismans and for reading.
Big Three: The Sun, Moon and rising sign: the quickest sketch of a chart.
Bound: One of five unequal slices of a sign, each ruled by a planet. Also called a term. Narrower and more specific than the sign ruler.
Bounds: The five unequal subdivisions of each sign (also called terms), each ruled by a planet; the Egyptian bounds are the traditional table.
Cazimi: Within 17 minutes of the exact Sun: in the heart of the Sun, strengthened rather than burnt.
Chart Ruler: The ruler of the rising sign: the planet that speaks for the chart as a whole.
Chart Shape: The overall distribution of the planets around the wheel (bundle, bowl, bucket, locomotive, seesaw, splash, splay), after Marc Edmund Jones.
Chiron: The centaur between Saturn and Uranus, read as the wound that teaches healing.
Combust: Within about 8° of the Sun: overpowered and hidden by its light.
Composite: A single chart made from the midpoints of two people’s planets: the relationship as its own entity.
Conjunction: Two planets in the same place (0°): their meanings fuse.
Contraparallel: Two bodies at equal but opposite declinations, read like an opposition.
Cusp: The starting degree of a house or sign.
Davison: A relationship chart cast for the midpoint in time and space between two births.
Decan: One of three 10° divisions of a sign, each with its own planetary ruler (the faces).
Declination: A body’s distance north or south of the celestial equator, in degrees.
Descendant: The point setting in the west, opposite the Ascendant: the seventh-house cusp of partners and others.
Detriment: A planet in the sign opposite its domicile: working against its nature.
Dignity: A planet’s condition by sign: strong in its domicile or exaltation, weak in detriment or fall.
Dispositor: The ruler of the sign a planet sits in. Following the chain of dispositors reveals which planet holds the final say.
Domicile: A planet in a sign it rules: at home and fully itself.
Eclipse: A New or Full Moon near the nodes, when the Sun or Moon is darkened: a turning point that echoes for months.
Element: Fire, earth, air or water — the temperament of a sign.
Ephemeris: A table of planetary positions by date; the app computes them with the Swiss Ephemeris.
Equal: Houses of exactly 30° measured from the Ascendant.
Exaltation: A planet in the sign that honours it (the Sun in Aries, the Moon in Taurus…): elevated and effective.
Fall: A planet in the sign opposite its exaltation: diminished, learning humility.
Final Dispositor: A planet in its own sign at the end of a dispositor chain, on which the other planets ultimately depend.
Firdaria: A Persian timing system that hands each planet a fixed number of years in a 75-year cycle, ordered by sect.
Fixed Star: One of the bright stars whose conjunction with a planet or angle adds a distinct colour to it.
Grand Cross: Four planets in two oppositions, all squaring each other: a chart under pressure, built for endurance.
Grand Trine: Three planets each trine the others, forming a triangle: gifts that flow easily.
Harmonic: A chart made by multiplying every longitude by a number, revealing patterns hidden in the natal chart.
Hayz: The best sect condition: a planet in sect, in the hemisphere and the sign gender that suit it.
Hemisphere: The half of the chart (above or below the horizon, east or west) where the planets gather.
House: One of twelve divisions of the sky at the moment of birth, each governing an area of life.
House System: The method used to divide the sky into houses. Placidus (time-based) is the modern default; whole sign gives each house a full sign.
Imum Coeli: The lowest point (IC), opposite the Midheaven: home, roots, the private self.
In Mundo: Measured by the actual sky rather than along the zodiac — where a planet really rises or culminates, latitude included.
In Sect: A planet in the chart that shares its sect — a day planet in a day chart, or a night planet in a night chart — which behaves more constructively.
Ingress: A planet entering a new sign.
Kite: A grand trine with a fourth planet opposing one corner: flow with a direction to send it.
Koch: A time-based house system related to Placidus, popular in German-speaking astrology.
Lilith: The Black Moon: the empty focus of the Moon’s orbit, read as the untamed and the refused.
Loosing Of The Bond: In zodiacal releasing, a jump to the opposite sign that marks a decisive change of chapter.
Lot: A point calculated from three others (usually the Ascendant, Sun and Moon), such as the Lot of Fortune. Also called an Arabic part.
Lot Of Fortune: The Ascendant plus the Moon minus the Sun (reversed at night): the body, luck, and what comes to you.
Lot Of Spirit: The Ascendant plus the Sun minus the Moon (reversed at night): the will, the career, what you do.
Lunar Return: The chart for the Moon’s monthly return to its natal degree.
Lunation: A New or Full Moon; the phase of the Moon relative to the Sun.
Midheaven: The highest point of the ecliptic at birth (MC), the cusp of the tenth house: vocation, reputation, direction.
Midpoint: The point halfway between two planets; a third planet there activates both.
Minor Dignity: A planet with no domicile or exaltation here, but some claim by triplicity, bound or face — mildly supported rather than at home.
Modality: Cardinal (initiating), fixed (sustaining) or mutable (adapting) — the mode of a sign.
Mutual Reception: Two planets each in the other’s sign, lending one another support.
North Node: Where the Moon’s orbit crosses the ecliptic heading north: appetite, growth, what pulls you forward.
Occidental: Setting after the Sun (visible in the evening sky).
Opposition: Planets 180° apart: tension that seeks balance, often lived out through others.
Orb: The allowance, in degrees, within which an aspect is considered active. Tighter orbs are stronger.
Oriental: Rising before the Sun (visible in the morning sky).
Out Of Bounds: A planet whose declination exceeds the Sun’s maximum (about 23°27′): it plays outside the usual rules.
Out Of Sect: A planet in the half of the day it does not belong to: a night planet in a day chart, or the reverse. It works less comfortably.
Overlay: Where one person's planets fall in the other's houses — which part of their life you land in.
Parallel: Two bodies at the same declination (north or south of the celestial equator), read like a conjunction.
Peak Period: In zodiacal releasing, a chapter angular to the Lot of Fortune. The tenth sign from it is the high point of the sequence.
Peregrine: A planet with no essential dignity where it sits: a wanderer without a home.
Placidus: The most widely used modern house system, dividing the diurnal arc of each degree into equal time segments. Undefined near the poles.
Porphyry: A simple quadrant system that trisects the space between the angles; the fallback where Placidus is undefined.
Profection: An ancient timing technique: each year of life advances the Ascendant one sign, and that sign’s ruler becomes the lord of the year.
Progression: A symbolic forward movement of the chart; in secondary progressions one day after birth stands for one year of life.
Quincunx: Planets 150° apart: an awkward adjustment between things that do not naturally see each other.
Quintile: A fifth of the circle, 72°. Kepler’s addition, read for craft and a particular knack rather than for ease or friction.
Retrograde: A planet appearing to move backward through the zodiac, as seen from Earth. Its themes turn inward or get revisited.
Rising Sign: The sign the Ascendant falls in — how you meet the world and what the world meets first.
Ruler: The planet that governs a sign, and by extension the house that sign occupies.
Saturn Return: Saturn’s return to its natal position at about 29½, 59 and 88: the great thresholds of maturity.
Secondary Progressions: Each day after birth is taken as a year of life, giving a slowly evolving inner chart.
Sect: Whether a chart is diurnal (Sun above the horizon) or nocturnal. The Sun, Jupiter and Saturn belong to the day; the Moon, Venus and Mars to the night.
Separating: An aspect that has passed exactness and is loosening.
Sextile: Planets 60° apart: opportunity that rewards a little effort.
Sidereal Zodiac: The zodiac anchored to the fixed stars, as used in Vedic astrology; it currently trails the tropical zodiac by about 24 degrees (the ayanamsa).
Solar Arc: Every point in the chart moved forward by the progressed Sun’s distance from its natal place, about one degree a year.
Solar Return: The chart for the moment each year when the Sun returns to its natal degree: the year ahead.
South Node: Opposite the North Node: what is familiar, what you release.
Square: Planets 90° apart: friction that drives action.
Stationary: A planet at the turning point between direct and retrograde motion, when its influence is strongest.
Stellium: Three or more planets clustered in one sign or house, concentrating that area of life.
Synastry: Comparing two charts: the aspects between one person’s planets and the other’s, and whose planets fall in whose houses.
T-Square: Two planets in opposition both squared by a third: a focal tension that demands resolution through the apex planet.
Time Lord: The planet in charge of a period under a timing technique such as profections or zodiacal releasing.
Transit: The current position of a planet read against the birth chart.
Trine: Planets 120° apart: ease and natural flow between them.
Triplicity: The three signs of one element, with a set of rulers by day and by night.
Tropical Zodiac: The zodiac anchored to the seasons: 0° Aries is the March equinox. The convention of Western astrology.
Under Beams: Within about 15° of the Sun and dimmed by it — the mildest of the three solar conditions, weaker than combust.
Under The Beams: Within about 15° of the Sun: obscured, but less so than combust.
Vertex: A sensitive point where the ecliptic meets the prime vertical in the west; read for fated encounters.
Void Of Course: The Moon making no further aspects before leaving its sign: a lull.
Whole Sign: The oldest house system: the rising sign is the whole first house, the next sign the second, and so on.
Yod: Two planets in sextile both quincunx a third: the “finger of fate”, a niche talent or task at the apex.
Zodiacal Releasing: A Hellenistic timing technique that releases periods of set lengths from a lot (usually Spirit), sign by sign.