is your starsign really what you think it is???

ok, heres the deal.. i found this thing today which totally kills ur thoughts on starsigns so err.. lol.. the book is called Lynne Kelly: a Skeptics Guide to the Paranormal..

it says that astronomy came from a division of the northern hemisphere in ancient times into 12 regions of 30degrees each. images were made from the prominent stars to enable astronomers to see certain parts of the sky..

30 degrees was a convienent way to divide the sky, but not very accurate - for most of the time once allocated to scorpio, the sun now actually rises in a constellation called Ophiuchus.

the sun sign (aka zodiac) is allocated to the constellation into which the sun rises at that time of the year.. the constellations used are those that lie along the apparent path of the sun (eg. if the sun rose in Aquarius at the time of ur birth, then ur an aquarius). the problem is that the range of dates which match the sun rising in each of the constellations has changed greatly over the millenia since they were first described.

when the zodiac was created 2000 yrs ago, the sun rose in aries at the march equinox. now the sun rises in pisces at the same equinox. this is cos the precession of the equinoxes and relates to the fact the earth rotates on its axis over a period of 25 800yrs. this has led to about a 30 degree shift over the 2000 years since the zodiac was created.

the table lets u know what ur star sign is - now.. the dates given in magazines etc r what ur star sign would have been were u born 2000 years ago, under the julian calendar, rather than the gregorian one we use now..

SIGN OF ZODIAC ___OFFICIAL DATE ___REAL/CURRENT DATE

Aries (ram) ________21 mar-20 apr ____19 apr-13 may

taurus (bull) _______21 apr - 20 may___14 may-19 june

gemini (twins)______ 21 may - 21 jun___20 june- 21 july

cancer (crab) ______22 jun- 23 july_____21 july- 9 august

leo (lion)___________24 july- 23 aug____10 aug - 15 sept

virgo (virgin)_______24 aug - 23 sept___16 sept - 30 oct

libra (scales)_______24 sept - 23 oct____31 oct - 22 nov

scorpio (scorpion) __24 oct - 22 nov_____23 nov - 29 nov

Ophiuchus (serpent holder)_non existant__30 nov - 17 dec

sagittarius (archer)__23 nov- 22 dec_____18 dec - 18 jan

capricorn (goat)_____23 dec - 20 jan_____19 jan - 15 feb

aquarius (water carrier)_21 jan - 19 feb____16 feb - 11 mar

pisces (fish)________20 feb - 20 mar______12 mar - 18 april





if you dont believe me, read the book!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

This was not discovered recently. First of all, the zodiac is older than 2000 years. We aren't sure exactly how old it is, but the system began under the Babylonians (I'm using this term loosely to mean various Mesopotamian people), and was refined by the Greeks and later the Muslims. The signs themselves were definitely very early, and we have natal charts from before the common era, although I can't remember dates right now - but I know there are some from at least the 2nd century BCE.

What you are decribing is a familiar argument on which sidereal astrology is based - although sidereal astrology is still off from the reality of the skies, it's still a little closer. Sidereal astrology was "discovered" in the west in the 20th century by Fagan, but in reality it has been used in Vedic astrology for a long time and even Ptolemy in the 2nd century stated an argument between tropical and sidereal. He opted for tropical.

Astroloy has always been an idealized version of the skies. In reality the constellations are not a neat 30 degrees, and they aren't even seperate in some cases since some actually overlap. In fact in real life, the Sun is only in Scorpio for 9 days which even in sidereal astrology is longer. So both are technically wrong.

This brings the argument of constellation versus sign. Sidereal is based on constellations, and tropical is based on signs. Since traditional western astrology is based on tropical, it uses signs - and as such, it is not inconsistant to allow the spring equinox to restart at 0 degrees Aries every year.

In the end, the difference between sidereal and tropical is starting date. Sidereal isn't any more "accurate".

 

so does this change moon signs, asc etc?

 

If you follow sidereal, yes. Like I said above, it basically only changes your reference point.

 

Hmm.... interesting....

 

I'm still on a cusp, so it doesn't change much.

That's quite interesting, though.