The concept of a house in astrology most likely originated with the Babylonians. This is no longer as controversial a statement, as it was when I was first studying astrology. Since it's not, I won't spend time trying to make that case. For those still arguing for an Egyptian origin to the concept of houses, I refer you to page 8 of Francesca Rochberg's Babylonian Horoscopes. The current blog post is not about the origin of house systems, but rather about the meanings of the houses. "But aren't the meanings of the houses dependent upon the development of the first house system", some might ask. No. All that is required for there to be meanings associated with the houses, is for there to be a way to divide up the day. This, the Babylonians certainly had. It was called a simanu in Akkadian, and it was an interval of the day/night into twelve equal parts.
So now that we have that circled away (see what I did there?), we can now get to the more interesting point of this post: where do the meanings of the houses in astrology come from? Let's face it, some of the significations of the houses are weird; and attempts to attribute them to the symbolism of the daily cycle, really doesn't work. For example, I have seen it argued that the 10th house is associated with "kingship and high status" because the Midheaven is the highest point in the chart. That seems reasonable enough. But then following that logic, why is the 4th house linked to "ancestral roots and relationships with family and home"? Is there anything in the midnight part of the day that would warrant an association with family? And for that matter, why is the 6th house tied to slaves? Is there anything about 8 pm at night that would connect the 6th to slavery? Is that the time of the day when slaves stop working? Just kidding...
So where do these house meanings that we've inherited from traditional astrology come from? The Greek word for house in astrology is topos and it actually means place, not house. This is an important starting point. It means that the astrological houses were originally conceived of as physical places, not abstract temples in the sky! (So from here onward, I'll refer to them as places.) If they are physical places on earth, then how do we locate them? The answer to this question is rather long and involves 3 years of research that I conducted for my Masters thesis. Since this isn't the place to reprise that work, I refer those who want more detail to my thesis work, a version of which can be found in two presentations that I gave at UAC in 2012, which you can watch for free here. I direct you to especially watch the presentation on the Lands of Gilgamesh, since this story has the most relevant information on the astrological places. For the sake of space, I simply want to pique your interest here with some explanations for the origin of some the more obscure meanings found in the traditional astrological places.
But to start, we need to first recognize three important beliefs that the Babylonians had. The first is that sky and earth are always connected. If something happens in time, it also happens in a place (space-time!) The second is that all cycles are circles. So if the annual cycle can be contained in a circle, so can the daily cycle. That means that if we divide the year into 12 equal signs, we can also divide the day into 12 simanu, in which case, a day becomes equal to a year by analogy. This analogy is the basis of many timing methods used in Hellenistic astrology. This then leads us to the belief that the passage through the months of the year, also implies a passage of terrain on earth --- that is, of place. Hugely important! We can see this belief reflected in the mythology associated with the Sun god, Shamash. He is a celestial shepherd (of his flock, which are the planets along the ecliptic, his 'sheepfold') who literally also 'travels' the earth by moving north and south over the horizon in the course of the year. This is not just a Babylonian belief. Many solar deities in antiquity are also patron deities of travelers for this same reason. Since Shamash is simultaneously also rising and setting daily to the east and west respectively, he was understood to be traveling in a circle over the known world.
Lastly, most cultures in Mesopotamia believed that homophones (i.e. words or logograms with the same sounds) were philologically connected, even though their meanings might differ. This was particularly the case with the Sumerians, who often engage in punning between concepts that might seem semantically unrelated to us. This is not always apparent in the written myths, but it would be understandable when stories were narrated or sung aloud -- which they more frequently were, because most people were illiterate. All of these beliefs are reflected in the very first solar hero story ever written: the Epic of Gilgamesh. It's by analyzing this story and its language, that we get insights into the Babylonian known world and into its representation in the form of the astrological places.
The 4th and 5th Places
In two Hellenistic astrological texts written in Greek, we find the following attributions for the 4th place:
by Vettius Valens: Fathers, subterranean, older persons, stopping places, mystical
by Paulus of Alexandria: Subterranean, fatherland, lands, ships, watery places, end of life
For the 5th place we find:
by Vettius Valens: Children, friendship, community, release of slaves
by Paulus of Alexandria: Children, good fortune
The 4th place is called 'the subterranean pivot' obviously because it is the place in the chart where we find the Imum Coeli (IC or nadir), which translates from the Latin as the "bottom of the sky." It's the place where the local meridian and the ecliptic intersect in the north. It's therefore, 'subterranean' because the planets are at their lowest point below the horizon and therefore 'underneath the earth'.
But why the father or fatherland? In the Standard Babylonian calendar, the 4th month was named after the deity Dumuzi (Tammuz in Akkadian), while the 5th month is named Abu, which means 'father' in Akkadian. However, according to Cohen, these two months were reversed in the calendar of northern Mesopotamia. In fact, the festivals and associations with the month of Dumuzi -- a name given to a shepherd deity often depicted as a young child, aligns more clearly with the symbolism of the 5th place of children, while those of Abu, obviously fit the astrological 4th place of the father. Dumu is the Sumerian word for child and in some Sumerian poems, Dumuzi is referred to as "my Damu", which means "my son". So based on the names alone, we have an indication that perhaps the northern Mesopotamian calendar tradition had a greater influence on the transmission of place associations in Greek astrology.
Furthermore, sometimes we find the 4th month spelled abum, which in Sumerian is both a funerary mound, but also a festival to celebrate the dead ancestors. It was believed that during the solstice month of June, the mound was open and the spirits of the dead ancestors could come up from the underworld to haunt the living. The brazier/ghost festival paid tribute to the dead ancestors – a type of festival similar to the Roman paternalia. In poorer homes, deceased family members were actually buried underneath the dirt floor of the family property. In order to protect the living against the spirits of the dead, who were believed to cause illness, a ritual called a maqlu was performed during month IV.
In tablet IV of the Epic of Gilgamesh, which tracks the astrology of the solar year, the heroes stop their journey atop a mountain to perform this very same ritual that will protect them from demons. Thus, we have all of the semantic attributes that Valens speaks of connected to the fourth place. It's unclear why 'watery places' and 'ships' are listed by Paulus. It's possible that he's allowing the Hellenic doctrine of the elements to color his interpretation of this place, since it corresponds to the sign of Cancer. But if we focus on what is most consistent in the tradition, we can clearly see that 'the father, family and paternal ancestors' -- and I would add, 'the physical property' -- all come from the Mesopotamian calendrical tradition.
The matter of children and fertility is definitely tied to the 5th month of Dumuzi and therefore to the 5th place in astrology. But more geographically, these associations come from the attributions linked to the Taurus Mountains and the Anatolia region, in the upper Euphrates, that is, the north-northwestern part of the astrological place circle traversed by the Sun (if we place Babylon at the center). This region was known for its coveted mountain of cedar forests, which to the Sumerians were allegorized as a woman's womb when pregnant. The Turkish form of the old name Anatolia is Anadolu. In Turkish folk etymology, the name is broken down into the words 'Ana' which means 'mother' and 'dolu' which means 'full', thus, 'a full mother'. When I was last in Turkey, the guides there confirmed the ancient beliefs that Turkey, and especially the mountains, have long been linked to ancient mother goddess worship. Archaeology confirms this through the unearthing of countless statues of mother goddesses in this region, such as the Seated Woman of Catalhoyuk. (I don't believe that this region's strong association with mother goddess worship is just about the veneration of individual birth. It may be that they believed that humanity itself had its birth in this region. But that is a matter for a different discussion.)
These beliefs are also present in the language of the Babylonians. The word erēnu means ‘cedar’ or pine. It's related to ēru, which means tree, and erû which means to be ‘stripped bare (of trees, ground), or 'of a woman being prepared for childbirth'. Erû also means 'eagle', an animal that is a major character in the myth of Etana which is about childbirth. Whenever we find eagles and serpents in Mesopotamian myths, we are often dealing with stories about childbirth (ala the garden of Eden story in the Hebrew tradition). Carchemish, a city that sits strategically located on the northern Euphrates, was highly coveted for its abundant cedar timber and was under the protection of a popular mother goddess named Kumbaba (later associated with the Phrygian Cybele, and called Matar Kubileya or 'mother mountain' in Phrygian). Thus, in Tablet V, it's probably not a coincidence that Gilgamesh -- who has a greater interest in gaining fame by cutting down the cedars, than in ensuring his lineage (the real Gilgamesh is believed to have had no heirs) -- conveys this neglectful attitude, by killing the protector of the cedar forest, named Humbaba. There is far more that can be said about this place, as it's depicted in the story, but I want to move onto some other unexplained place meanings.
The 6th Place
As a reminder, here's what the the Hellenistic tradition has to say about this place:
by Paulus: bad fortune, blood money, injury, female slaves
by Valens: slaves, ailments, enemies, weaknesses
If we look at the list, 'slaves' appear as an overlapping signification, as does 'ailments/illness' and 'injury', since illness was believed to be a result of injury by evil spirits, specifically those who were known to inhabit desert regions, such as you might find in Syria. This corresponds to the west-northwestern place in the circle of the Babylonian known world, which is just south of the Taurus Mountains that we left in place V. They knew this region as Amurru, which means 'west' in Akkadian, and is the origin place of the Amorite population that later migrated to Babylon and integrated with the Sumerians to form the Old Babylonian civilization. (By the way, this historical exchange with their neighbors to the west is the reason that the significations of 'marriage' and 'migrations' are repeatedly found in the Hellenistic tradition for place 7 -- which I won't examine here, beyond this tidbit.)
The 6th month of the Babylonian calendar was called Elūlu or Ulūlu in Akkadian. In Cultic Calendars, Cohen (p. 322) tells us that this is the month in which "the goddesses are purified in the sacred river, they have their annual cleansing." During this month's festival, the priestesses of Inanna would enact this same ritual by cleansing in the river, which may be why Valens tells us that "Venus loves cleanliness". The River (Eridu) is one of the Babylonian constellations that rises with the Sun in the 6th month, as does the Furrow (the constellation of Virgo, which itself later became associated with cleanliness and purity). Eridu's Sumerian name is NUN.KI, which means "the place that's split apart'. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, while still in Tablet V, the narrator tells us that "the Sirara and Lebanon split at their feet." This refers to two parallel mountain ranges to the south of where they were ("at their feet' while in Tablet V): the Lebanon and the Anti-Lebanon, the latter forming the border between Syria and Lebanon. So the story is guiding us to the location in the place circle that aligns correctly with the 6th month.
But let's return to the two variations in the spelling of the name for the 6th month: Elūlu or Ulūlu. The verb elēlu is a play on that name and means ‘to become pure, clean, free’, but also to ‘manumit a slave (woman).’ So here we have Valens' slaves, and more specifically, Paulus' female slaves. If we allow the Babylonians some more room to play with words and to add a pause between, Ulū and lu, this verbal phrase means "a man who gives a negative reply, who refuses" (these definitions are direct quotes from my Akkadian Dictionary). A refusal of her marriage proposal, is exactly what Gilgamesh gives Ishtar in Tablet VI, after she becomes smitten with him when she sees him bathing in the river. So we can see slavery being connected through the month's name, but it's also possible that slavery became associated with the people to the northwest more broadly. We know for instance, that the Israelites were under captivity in Babylon during the Neo-Babylonian period, and freed during the subsequent Persian conquest, right around the time that several key astrological innovations occurred. And while this event occurs several centuries after the composition of this version of the Epic, the language in use, indicates that this place-meaning might have already been present. This is because it was common to take populations defeated in warfare as slaves, and because the Amorites of the region had already been conquered by Hammurabi and by two Assyrian rulers by the time that the Kassites were in power in Babylon. So it's reasonable to assume that the northwestern lands might have, over time, become identified as a place where slaves come from or are returned to. This tradition of conquest, would also explain why Valens seems to place 'enemies' in the 6th place.
The last thing I want to deal with is the signification of illness with this place. I've already mentioned demons and spirits being thought of as causes of illness. But in terms of time, the constellation of the Raven, which also rises heliacally in the 6th month, is probably where more of the negative attributions of this place come from. The Sumerian name is UGA which means 'black bird'. But the syllable UG is also the plural and imperfect singular stem of the verb US, 'to die'. Could this be the origin of the raven as a recognized symbol of death, even today? The Akkadian word for raven, erēbu, also means 'to enter and take up residence in: marriage, adoption, servitude, the underworld’. Servitude is once more linked to this place-time through this constellation. But it's use in 'taking up residence in the underworld' is also very intriguing because we know that the 6th place appears as the joy of Mars in the Hellenistic tradition, and that Nergal, his Babylonian counterpart, is god of the underworld. And of course, the constellation of the Raven is always associated with the rulership of Mars in the omen literature. So there's that too.
A longer video presentation of this material is already available on our website. Nevertheless, I'll save a written discussion of some of the other places for future blog posts.
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