The Origin of the Houses

Early on in our astrological study, we tend to encounter this idea of “houses,” but what are they? Where do they come from and what do they mean? To understand that, we must first understand how a chart wheel is constructed. (See part 2 for the history and more detail)

Astrologers will ask you for your birthday yes, but they also ask for your birth time and location. Why? Because those 2 things will help us to situate you in time and space, relative to the sun’s movement across the ecliptic when you were born. The ecliptic appears to us as the path of the sun across the sky, but astronomically it’s more accurate to say it’s the plane of the Earth’s orbit around the sun. In other words, the time and location tell us the condition of your “horizon” as you took your first breath.

The horizon is the apparent division between earth and sky, relative to an observer. It encompasses the visible portion of the ecliptic. When you were born, the sun was in some sign yes, but it was also in some part of the sky relative to you. That point in the sky is dependent on what time it is and where you are in the world.

You may know that this is also how we determine your rising sign or ascendant, which is the sign coming up over the eastern horizon as you were born. In fact, you can watch the sun, moon, planets, and stars rise in the east and set in the west each day. It seems quite natural that our ancestors would model their own astrological maps or “charts” after the apparent motion of celestial objects across the horizon.

Hence, a day came to symbolize a human life and the sun’s progress over the course of that day said something about how that life unfolded. The sun rising in the east at dawn became associated with the beginning and the self (see picture below). The sun at high twelve in the south or at its meridian is when it is brightest and was symbolic of the most visible part of us, what we do. Then the sun set in the west at the close of the day and since this point was opposed to “the self,” it came to signify “the other.” Hidden from view though, is the sun at midnight in the north. This was said to be the time of deepest and darkest mystery, when no light is seen and it became associated with the most hidden and private parts of ourselves.

You may notice the proto significations of the angular houses right there. The first house is the self, the essential you. The fourth house is the home, family, or private life. The seventh house is your peers, partners, and relationships. The tenth house is the career or what you do. These are very simplified meanings, but they suffice for the illustration.

The grander scheme however, that of the passage of the sun over the course of a year, is analogical to the day and you could superimpose those “cardinal directions,” of north, south, east, and west upon the cardinal signs of the zodiac, Aries being the east (the time of the vernal equinox), Cancer being the South (summer solstice), Libra being the west (autumnal equinox), and Capricorn being the north (winter solstice). The winter solstice is esoterically called the “midnight of the year,” after which, the sun was said to “move northward” once again, which occultists maintain relates to the mystery of initiation. For those in the southern hemisphere, however, the solstices are reversed and for them, the sun would reach its lowest point at the Cancer solstice. In fact, there are many ancient stone structures around the world that align with the rising sun or Venus for initiation rituals. These relationships between the cardinal signs with the cardinal points only go this far. They do not determine the house significations. See part 2.

So YOUR chart is a little map of the sky when YOU were born. The objects in the southern, or top half of your chart, were visible at that time, while objects in the northern, or bottom half of your chart, were not visible. That’s why an abundance of planets in the southern hemisphere of your chart is said to indicate an extrovert, while an abundance of planets in your northern hemisphere is said to indicate an introvert.

Similarly, if you were born at the equator, then a sunrise birth would place your sun in the first house, while high noon would put it in the tenth house, sunset in the seventh house, and midnight in the fourth house. This will necessarily change as you move further from the equator because the sun’s position would also change relative to you. Therefore, it can be very challenging to determine the rising sign in polar regions using quadrant house systems likes Placidus.

The moral of the story though, is this: when humans create, they tend to create things according to what they’ve already seen. So, when they invented astrological charts, which are a snapshot of the sky at a particular time, it probably seemed most logical to our ancestors to replicate their own view.

Musician, John Cage, made an interesting statement about art that I’ve carried with me for a long time. He said, “art, contrary to popular belief, is not about self-expression. Art is us imitating nature.” If you puzzle that out, you may agree, but like King Solomon said, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”