From the Whole Sky To the Zodiac and Back Again -
A Journey of a Few Thousand Years:
On the Compression of Other Constellations Into the Ecliptic
As Evidenced By The Meanings Given to the Signs or Attributions of the Signs.

by Wendy Z Ashley
© 2006 and 2009

When I first began to search for the myths that might be found in astrology in the Zodiac, I could not help but notice that qualities associated with the 12 Zodiac Signs were actually more appropriate to the animals and persons represented in constellations outside the Ecliptic nearby. Studying the Zodiacal constellations was not enough. Then the more deeply I studied the mythology of the “adjunct” constellations, the more evidence accrued that somehow the motifs in the myths of the constellations above and below the Zodiac had been ‘compressed’ into the Signs of the sky’s Zodiacal Belt.

Since the earliest writers – Ptolemy specifically – aligned the stars of these “extra-Zodiacal” constellations with the degrees of the ecliptic – I thought I might try it out. And it became necessary when a few clients began to exhibit motifs in their lives that corresponded to the myths in their lives better through the stars of their degrees than through the Signs themselves. At first I tried to determine whether a chart might be more accurate if I used the Sidereal Zodiac of the stars instead of the Tropical Zodiac of the Signs. But No, experience showed that that wasn’t consistent either. And since I had then a good 25 years of experience reading horoscopes for clients my experience was considerable. Today I count 46 years of reading horoscopes behind me. So naturally in the last decade or so I have also explored the star alignments by parans that is by associating a star rising during the 24 hours around the birth hour to one or another of the planets when it is on the horizon. So far I have not found it useful to the mythic perspective. For one thing it eliminates any myths of stars that don’t rise or set at the birth latitude, and it is clear that some of us do indeed live out the myth of Mama Bear or of an enthroned Queen for example. I have fallen back on the method approved by the more ancient astrologers. This means that if a client’s planet is at 22 Gemini, I associate it to the star or stars found in a great circle running from the pole of the ecliptic through the ecliptic and down to the other pole again. But I seldom use stars smaller than the 3rd magnitude, unless they were thought notable in earlier “mythic” eras. The star list I use was compiled by and provided me by Michael Munkasy, who had previously provided one to Diana Rosenburg, who uses the stars to compile lists of significant events as well as of persons who have these in their horoscopes. My application is in myth. I use the Signs and the Stars to find that myth that my client is living.

One example I have had published that demonstrates this is in Communicating the Horoscope published by Llewellyn in 1993 and edited by Noel Tyl. My contribution is called “Measurement, Memory and Myth.” It concerns finding and exploring the mythos of a client who has since become a friend, Elizabeth Fitzhugh. She has gained a considerable reputation in the esoteric community as a channeler. She was born sixteen hours after the full moon on March 25 1948. at 11:57 am EST in Philadelphia PA. Her Ascendant is conjunct – by longitudinal alignment (Zodiac degree) with Castor, one of the two twins of Gemini. Her Uranus is conjoined by Zodiacal degree (longitude) with the belt stars of Orion. The Moon rules her chart and the Moon is situated in a dramatic way with the Sun. She was born just after the full Moon just after the Spring Equinox on a Thursday.

Now most of you know that Easter falls on the first Sunday after the first full Moon after the Spring Equinox. Easter that year fell on March 28, Elizabeth having been born on the Thursday before. The Easter Hare, or the March Hare, or the Easter Bunny is a creature with a very long history, very pagan, very pre-Christian, as are the Eggs of Easter as well.
Elizabeth’s mythos is of Artemis and Orion (Greek) or of Oestre -- or as we spell it nowadays – Easter. Oestre / Easter, was the Lunar Hare Goddess of the Spring Equinox of pre-historic times, the Age of Gemini, in Europe. The Hare constellation is Lepus and it sits under Orion which is a “Gemini” constellation. The word Lepus means both Hare and “resurrection,” it means one who “leaps up.” The book I recommend on the mythology of the hare or bunny rabbit is The Lady of the Hare by Jungian analyst John Layard.

I suspect that the roots of the Hare Goddess go back to the hunting of hares or bunnies in ages long past, long before there was a chicken in every pot, there was a hare in every pot, it being the easiest animal to trap and capture, not that it doesn’t have its illusive tactics. But to know all of this, to consider what it means you have to know a lot about nature and about the basics of how animals, constellational animals too, acquired their mythic reputations. They are, of course, acquired from direct experience of the animal, and long before there are any occult or magical reputations there are just the facts of how they were hunted, how used, when and why – very matter-of-fact practical information back in the days of myth. The bear as protective mother, for example, is no myth (in the sense of made up) but is a fact and a fact you had better know before venturing into bear territory. Your life will depend upon it. The hare or bunny rabbit is no bear – it has more timid characteristics, but it too is “a big spirit animal” as you shall see.

The hare comes out in March to mate – at night – under the full moon. They gather in large groups on the heaths and in meadows. Later, in the Middle Ages, the gatherings of the hares were thought to be gatherings of wizards or witches in their animal forms. But before that they were simply a harbinger of Spring – Easter – the return of life -- as were the eggs laid by the returning birds. Today although it is the Easter Bunny who brings the eggs, this is an association appropriate to the season, not a fact. And in Easter iconography these days it is not simply the useful egg but the chick that cracks out of it that graces the egg gathering baskets of the holiday. Here we have ages, then and now, facts, symbolism, and magic all mixed together.

The hare or bunny as a spirit animal is magical, because it has a kind of now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t quality. It was believed that a hare would jump into the pot – sacrifice itself for you – if you were hungry. It was a self-sacrificing animal. Another unique quality of Hares and Rabbits is that they do not shut their eyes. Hares are born with their eyes open. (This is why they are used to test cosmetics. Yuck! They cannot rinse away by blinking the irritant that has been dropped onto their eye, so if it is a harmful substance it will soon show.) It is this association with eyes that is a fundamental motif in Elisabeth’s life. But to know that, please read the article and you will see a recurring theme of blindness and sightedness, of inner and outer vision, of the artist and the see-er or seer.

So, in order to penetrate myth, to become familiar with synchronicities, to locate powers in the Zoo-diac, one must know a good deal about the animals and Gods and Goddesses and heroes and she-roes of the stars and of their myths. Then we can take those mythic motifs, the drives and elements as central, even core, to the individual’s life.

I believe the early stars were all representations of animals. Therefore it behooves us as astrologers to know about the animals we are talking about. If a man is a Taurus, one ought to know a good deal about bulls. Of course there are some wonderful books on animal behaviors. Best of all is to talk with someone who knows them intimately. A client once told me that every morning at Sunrise in Egypt the vultures would stand on a high place and spread their wings to the Eastern Sun. They do this so that the rays and warmth of the Sun will evaporate the water that has collected in their feathers through the cold desert nights. When their wings have dried they are then relieved of the weight of that water and can then fly to greater heights to do their watching and hunting from on high. (The water that condenses into their feathers is sipped from their breasts by their nestlings at night.) The Vulture Goddess is associated in Egyptian Myth with being the midwife to the reborn Horus at dawn every morning and, as Mut, with her outspread wings being the protective enfoldment for the child king. But as M’aat, rather than Mut, the vulture is the Goddess of truth and of the passage of time, which creates order, or is order. The long wing bones of this vulture could be hollowed into a flute, which was played from on high to mark the passing hours of time. Her feather is laid on the scales of Justice to be weighed against the heart at one’s death. But the vulture behavior that my client described was of Mut, rather than M’aat. Mut the mother / nurse / grandmother is she who welcomes into her protective arms, the new born Sun child. This, by the way, is the Goddess in the mythos of that client herself who was in Egypt with the Save the Children Foundation. She was herself, as it were, functioning as or for the Goddess Mut. And by the way, the vulture constellation in Egypt is the one that the Greeks called Lyra.

But it is not only Orion, or Lepus, or Lyra that can be seen as affecting the lives or destiny of an astrological client, rather than the Zodiac Sign. All of the Signs would appear to have had neighboring constellational motifs and drives compressed into the Signs of the Zodiac. And I here include some of the qualities associated with the Signs of the Zodiac that are better attributed to constellations nearby. In fact, since beginning my search for the myths of the Zodiac I have now come to include the extra-zodiacal constellations as the “sign” of a client if it is so indicated. The Greeks numbered 44 of these constellations. Today we’ve added to the Greek collection with 44 more. Other cultures have traditions of more or fewer than these in their skies.

Perhaps Rams carry the archetype of the warrior better than any other animal – they are given to individual combat over the ladies after all – but I don’t think so. I believe that it is the constellation just below Aries that is of an animal more dramatically associated with the courage and resolution to war and that is the constellation Cetus. The Greeks identified the constellation Cetus as a Shark – not a whale as its name implies. In fact old maps depict Cetus as a fish with the head and paws of a dog – a dogfish, another term for a shark. It was called a “dogfish” because it hunted in packs and was a ferocious fighter. As a seafaring and fishing people the Greeks were intimately familiar with the behavior of sharks. Any man who caught a shark had a big fight on his hands – not just with the difficulty of ‘landing’ the creature, not just when it was in the water, but even afterward when it was in the boat. Sharks do not stop thrashing and biting just because they are out of the water you know. I know because I was married to a fisherman. My husband had a stainless steel .38 that he had to use to subdue the Mako sharks – 6 to 10 feet long – that he would occasionally, and inadvertently have caught on a line meant for cod. I often use the film “Jaws” to illustrate the archetype of the “warrior” for my students, actually the film has three kinds of warriors – the “I didn’t plan on having to deal with this” warrior, played by Roy Scheider in the film, then there is the Woods Hole “scientist wanna-be” warrior played by Richard Dreyfus, and finally there is the “professional soldier who dies with his boots on” warrior, played by Robert Shaw. They are each and all fighting the great shark so’s to save the town. It works really well. They even have a scene where the three compare “war wounds.” Joseph Campbell told us over and over again that modern myths are “in the movies.”

Taurus the Bull was associated with the plowing of the fields and his feces made the land bear its fruits in plenty. But it is not the Bull alone responsible for the fertility of the land, but it is also the River constellation, Eridanus, below Taurus which brings life to the land. Eridanus is the constellation holding the mythos of the great Irish writer James Joyce. In fact his book, Finnegan’s Wake is a paean to the river goddess he calls “Anna Livia Plurabelle.”

Gemini has the reputation of being quick and a trickster but neither of the twins in myth has that reputation. I have written above about a friend whose mythos is of Lepus, the constellation under nearby Orion. For Elizabeth the hare is associated with death and resurrection. For another Gemini it might be Bre’r Rabbit as the one familiar with trickery. Another young woman I know who was born in Gemini actually has the mythos of the two dogs that guard the portals of The Milky Way. Canis Minor and Canis Major lie under Gemini. The Milky Way intersects the Zodiac at Gemini and its opposite Sagittarius. One of those dogs is a thief, the other is the household guardian protecting against the thief. Maybe you’ve seen the trickster as Coyote the cartoon character who can’t outrun The Roadrunner. This Gemini woman is crazy about being ‘on the road.’ She’s lived in her van and driven across country to settle in coyote country with her pet wolf. This aspect of Gemini makes it a very ‘doggy’ sign, and above Gemini is the little he-bear, Ursa Minor, the constellation carrying the mythos of John F. Kennedy. J.F.K. however, as a native of the sign of siblings certainly had brothers intimately sharing a destiny.

Cancer has the reputation of being the sign of food and motherhood BUT it is not the Crab that carries these characteristics but instead it is the Great Bear above Cancer. The crab instead symbolizes crossing the boundary between the sea and the land, between the here and now and the great beyond. The crab is an animal that lives in the intertidal zone between land and sea. So the Crab symbolizes another characteristic of the Sign, that of being intuitive or psychic, or in ancient thought, the crab would be the animal at the door between those now alive and those who had passed on. And as for food and motherhood it is the bear that is the consummate overprotective mother, and is the gourmand who eats and eats and eats. The Great Mother Bear is in the Sky above Cancer.

Leo is the sign of the mane and of royalty and that makes sense with the proud and well coifed Lion. Leo’s also have the reputation for being brave and heroic – which I suppose lions are, despite many legends and instances of the lion brought low by a thorn so that it must then be rescued by poor Androcles, or by a humble gnawing mouse. . In fact, let us not forget Dorothy’s la famosa “cowardly lion.” But if you are looking for heroes, or fame, here just look below the constellation Leo to find Argo Navis, a ship filled with 50 of the most famous heroes of Greece who are congregated together to go off on a great quest to win a kingship for their captain, Jason.

Virgo is a sign associated with healing, but it is not the grain holding earth goddess represented by Virgo’s stars who is the healer, but Centaurus just below Virgo who wins hands down the reputation for being the healer. There are two centaurs in the sky. The Greeks identified the Sagittarian one as Crotus, the King of the Wild Centaurs. He is the reason why Sag has a reputation for being wild and lawless, an adventurer. The Centaur under Virgo however is the gentle Chiron, “The Wounded Healer.”

Libra is the sign of marriage but how did the scales long ago represent marriage? Social and political equality were not then the objective of a union between a man and a woman as it might be today – at least in the liberated West. It is the bridal wreath, Corona Borealis, worn by Ariadne when she was wedded to Dionysus, which lies in the sky above the Scales that carries the motif of marriage and is probably why Libra acquired that association. In Greece and Egypt the Scales were associated with Justice and Judgment – functions of Athene, not of Ariadne, who betrayed her country for the man she loved. And the Scales themselves properly represent the Goddess of the Law, herself a warrior, in her opposition to the God Ares (Mars) whose sign was opposite hers – Aries.

Scorpio is a sign associated with death and ferocity, at least the stinger of the insect it represents might deliver death, but ferocity is also associated with Lupus, the wolf, which lies directly below the Scorpion.

Sagittarius is the sign of religion but it is not the Centaur that is representative of the religious urge. The Greeks had Apollo as the God of the religious experience and his constellation is not the Centaur but is the Harp – Lyra -- that lies high in heaven above Sag. Two other constellations near Sag carry religious images. Corona Australis under the fore hooves of the animal was the Crown of Semele, mother of Dionysus, whose desire it was to experience a consummate union with Zeus, God most High. And Ara the religious altar lies between Scorpius and Sag. Religion all over the place except in the Centaur / Archer. Similarly the Eagle above the Centaur stands for Jupiter –his bird – Sag’s ruling planet. In addition it is not Sagittarius the centaur that is the hunter in myth although the Sun in Sag was said to be Artemis’s sign. She was specifically a MOON Goddess and the full Moon in Sag would fall in Gemini or in Orion beside it and it is Orion who is fundamentally associated with the motif of hunting. The full Moon lends light to the winter nights when animals are easy to track and fat with dense coats at that season.

It is not the Goat that is so straight laced, driven to attain standards of decorum or is rule bound, as is part of the reputation of Capricorn. The symbol of such a standard is above Capricorn. It is the constellation Sagitta, the Arrow, and an arrow must, of necessity, be straight or it will not fly true. Such a “straight arrow” is a metaphor for one of the Capricornian drives.

Nor is the Waterbearer an emblem of detachment or of having his head in the clouds that can be the reputation of Aquarius. Instead it is the Swan that flies away every winter that has an aloof nature. Those Aquarians who have a friendly and gregarious nature, instead, may be carrying the qualities more associated with the dolphin, a savior animal that makes friends with humans and travels in a friendly group. It is Delphyn above Aquarius that demonstrates the friendly humanitarian impulse.

And it is not the fish of Pisces that carry the idea of imprisonment associated with this sign, although that is not too big a stretch, rather it is the chained woman above Pisces, Andromeda. She had been chained to the cliff waiting to be sacrificed to a sea monster, before a knight on a white horse finally will show up to rescue her. Did anyone say Pisces was a romantic dreamer?