© Lisa Mendes

Lisa Mendes

‘Cosmology, Astrology & Geosophy -

Angles as Orientation, Chart as Map’

2009

E-mail: lmendes@btinternet.com
 Cosmology, Astrology & Geosophy -

Angles as Orientation, Chart as Map

There is an internal landscape, a geography of the soul; we search for its
outlines all our lives. Josephine Hart

In 1943, Otto Neugebauer wrote a paper on a series of Demotic horoscopes that he assembled from several
different collections. 1 One of the most interesting things about these ostraca is the titles assigned to the four
angles. Two of these, the Midheaven (MC) and Immum Coeli (IC) are called ‘The Lake of the Sky’ and ‘The
Lake of the Dwat, respectively, whilst the Ascendant and Descendant are simply known as ‘rising’ and
‘setting’.’ 2 (See Fig. 1 below) Such ascriptions openly
suggest a link to the circular journey through the
Egyptian cosmos, which was undertaken by deceased
souls, and the Egyptian god Ra during his daily cycle,
as well as certain star constellations as they rose and
set above and below the horizon over the course of a
year. 3 . The Sun god’s voyage in his barque across the
sky by day; and through the Dwat by night, was how
the Egyptians mythically described the diurnal cycle
of the sun. In all cases, this cosmological journey was
associated with death and rebirth.

Figure 1. (Neugebauer, 1943) A diagrammatic

representation of the four angles, with their Egyptian
names and an unknown system of house division,
possibly based on a similar one to Manilius.

Although the origin of the astrological angles and houses in is shrouded in mystery, 4 some historians have
suggested that they are mapped on the diurnal cycle of the sun. In this essay, I wish to suggest that certain
conventions integral to astrology, including the angles, evolved out of a common tradition of Near Eastern
‘cosmic geography’ within which, space could be interpreted on multiple levels 5 . I also hope to show how the
work of scholars such as Henry Corbin on visionary geography could lead us to a new appreciation of
astrology’s geocentric orientation.

A good place to start might be the earliest known map produced in this region - the Babylonian Map of the
World. (Figure 2.) Drawn on a clay tablet found in Sippar (modern Iraq) and dated to circa 600BCE 6 it
depicts Mesopotamia encircled by a body of water which connects several triangular regions called nagu. At
the centre of the map lies Babylon - the ‘hub of the universe’. 7

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
Commenting on the interpretation of space in the tablet, Catherine Delano-Smith makes the point that the
Mesopotamians did not just represent space descriptively – they also conceived of it as having mythical and
cosmological dimensions. 8

Although usually referred to as a map of the world, this should be taken in its wider sense to mean
a cosmological map9.

Figure 2. Babylonian Clay Tablet Map (British Museum) dated to circa 600 BCE (Achaemenid/Persian period) with restored
missing section (centre right.) North is at the top of the map. Figure 3. is an interpretive reconstruction by Karl Maasz (reproduced
from Unger, 1937) based on the original tablet and accompanying inscriptions as well as related cuneiform texts.

The texts name various legendary beasts thought to live in the regions beyond the ocean surround the
world. Catherine Delano-Smith makes the point that the Mesopotamians did not just represent space
descriptively – they also conceived of it as having mythical and cosmological dimensions: as envisaged
by the ancient Babylonians and where, in one region at least, “the sun is not seen”10. The Babylonian
map is not isolated in its cosmo-geographic conventions. Hans Klimkeit has shown that Egypt also
viewed itself as the ‘centre of the world – the “kingdom in the middle.”’ 11 Equally, the mapmakers of
ancient Greece appear to have subscribed to a similar perspective12, judging by the writings of
Herodotus13 and the geographer, Agathemenus (c. 4th century BCE) who wrote that:

...the ancients drew the inhabited world as round and Greece lay in the middle, and Delphi [lay] in
the middle of it for it was the umbilicus of the Earth...and swift-flowing Oceanus completed a circle
around the Earth. 14

Jonathan Z. Smith has described this as a centrifugal worldview. 15 Mircea Eliade referred to the central place
around which everything else revolved as the axis mundi. 16 Gregory Shaw suggests that this model, which he
calls the ‘cosmic state’, whilst typical of ancient cultures like Egypt & Mesopotamia 17 also represents the ideal
society outlined by Plato in his Laws and Republic.18 Within this worldview, “evil and the ‘demonic’ only
arise when something is ‘out of place’.”19 Central to this ‘locative view of existence,’ 20 is the need to maintain
cosmic order and harmony, often achieved through regular rituals and rites, becomes extremely important.
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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
For the ancient Greeks, kosmos meant ‘order.’ The ancient Egyptians had a similar principle,
embodied in Maat, their goddess of Justice.21 In Mesopotamia, Shamash the sun god, with his
omniscient presence in the sky by day, and the underworld by night, was responsible for meting out
justice and holding people to their agreements. 22 This cosmological conviction seems to have pervaded
not only their ritual and religious life but also their ordering of space, including architecture and city
planning. As with the Greeks and Delphi, the Babylonians seem to have organised their cities around a
central sacred temple, which was situated at the top of a step pyramid. Cuneiform inscriptions compare
these temples to mountains linking the three worlds of underworld, earth and heaven. 23 Ziggurats may
therefore have been viewed as ladders or stairways to the home of the celestial gods 24, or as with Delphi,
the point where sky and earth met. 25 No doubt the Egyptian pyramids could also be added to this list.26 In
astrology, the correspondence between the macrocosm and the microcosm is a fundamental philosophical
concept that underpins its workings. The following extract from a Babylonian diviner’s manual expresses
this idea of cosmic sympatheia27:

The signs on earth, just as those in heaven, give us signals. Sky and earth both produce portents;
though appearing separately, they are not separate [because] sky and earth are related. 28

According to scholars, the circular boundary of water - marratu (‘sea’) - was interpreted as a terrestrial
mirror of the ‘Heavenly Ocean’ – the Milky Way 29 . Similar symbolic conventions can be observed in all three
of the abovementioned civilizations, including the Nile in Egypt, 30 and the Greek Oceanus, as described by
both Hesiod and Homer. 31 Within astrology, the circle of the horoscope contains all the elements of the
‘known world’ for the native. Jean Hinson-Lall has described the astrological chart as consisting of a ‘double-
mandala’– the two circles of heaven (the zodiac) and earth (the houses) superimposed on top of each other,
‘implying an intersection between timeless and time-bound orders, between fact and imagination, between
the ego’s world and the soul’s cosmos…’, between the macroscosm and the microcosm. 32

This symbolic geography also extended to other features in the landscape. The mountains to the east of
Mesopotamia, for example, were thought to be the location of the gates of sunrise, out of which the Sun
would emerge from the Underworld at dawn. 33 The Mesopotamian map we looked at earlier mentions this34
along with several other mythical places, including a land of cattle with long horns35 and a region where the
sun does not shine (Region 1836) which may refer to the north.37 Nanno Marinatos has noted that several of
these descriptions appear to overlap with the mythical places visited by the Greek heroes of Homer and
Hesiod.38 Inscriptions on the obverse side of the tablet also mention the kibrāt erbetti‘ – the ‘”four
quadrants” of the Earth’s surface’.39

Michael Horowitz’s study of Mesopotamian cosmic geography has shown that the Babylonians, Sumerians
and Assyrians divided both the sky and the earth into four quarters.40 These were associated with the four
cardinal directions and the four known regions or kingdoms in the area – Subartu, Akkad, Amurru and
Elam.41 Beginning with south, each direction was, in turn, associated with a wind, a constellation and,
in some cases, with the phases of the sun (sunrise & sunset, solstices & equinoxes) and moon.42 The
relationship of the four compass points to cosmological phenomena is further highlighted by the fact that the
Sumerian and Akkadian terms for east and west also mean ‘sunrise’ and ‘sunset.’43 4
© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
Once again, this is not an isolated phenomenon. There is also evidence that the Romans may have laid out
their towns and cities based on two directional axes aligned with the sun and the pole star, something they
may have assimilated from the Etruscans. 44 It is interesting to note that in Egypt, a form of sacred
geography also appears to have been at work. 45

In the unusual landscape of the Nile valley the Egyptian cosmos was written into the natural
topography and given explicit form in the pyramids and temples…The cardinal directions were
embodied in sacred architecture, with the sides of the pyramids aligned in each direction with great
accuracy, often deviating by only fractions of a degree. 46

Interpretive archaeologist, Mike Parker Pearson 47 has called the act of imbuing space with symbolic and
cosmological meaning, ‘spacial semantics’. 48 He suggests that in many societies, it is common for the home
and other architectural structures to be viewed as ‘the cosmos in miniature. 49 ’ He also states that the four
directions often carry symbolic and religious meanings in many cultures. In fact, the very word ‘orientation’
means east-facing and in many cultures worldwide, this direction is considered to be auspicious, possibly
because it is the direction of dawn. 50 Jeremy Naydler describes the mystical significance of directional
orientation for the sun-worshipping Egyptians:

East and west are thus not simply physical directions, they are mythical and metaphysical
orientations. The symbolism of the sun’s diurnal cycle deeply impresses itself upon the Egyptian
landscape. The western side of the Nile has to be the side of the funerary complexes and mortuary
temples, for it is there, beyond the western desert, that Ra descends into the Underworld. The east
has to be the side of rebirth, of new life, for every morning the whole country turns east as it
awakens to the rays of the newborn sun. 51

Parker-Pearson theorises that, within the context of special semantics:

Inhabited space can be transformed into an imago mundi by projection of two or four horizons from
a central point, or by a construction ritual which is based on the paradigmatic actions of myth. 52

He could almost be talking about the construction of a natal horoscope! Alie Bird has also commented on the
semantics of geography within the context of astrology, especially as they relate to the angles. 53
Joseph Crane appears to speak from this ancient perspective in his interpretation of the Ascendant:

The Ascendant is how the astrological moment brings together heaven and earth…The Ascendant is
therefore where the sun rises in the east throughout the year, and where the ecliptic…rises
throughout the day...The eastern horizon, including the Ascendant, is where planets go from
invisibility to visibility. 54

Cuneiform scholar, Francesca Rochberg-Halton has

demonstrated that four-fold symbolism seems to have played
a fundamental part in the way the Mesopotamians made sense
of their world55, a system which she has described as
‘”astrological” geography.’56. Quaternal relationships are
clearly evident in a tablet known as the BagM Beih 2 No. 98,
found in a temple in Uruk and dated to the Old Babylonian
period (circa 1950-1651 BCE). The fragment contains a diagram
(Figure 4 – see left) consisting of ‘a circle enclosing a
5
Fig. 4 BagM Beigh, Uruk (Horowitz, 1998) © Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
square containing four triangles’ which appears to ‘correlate the positions of the four winds, the locations of
sunrise and sunset, and the seasons of the year.’ 57 Within this broad ‘schematic and practical framework’,
omens were categorised and interpreted. 58 For example, the eclipsed Moon was divided into four quadrants,
each of which had a series of symbolic meanings and correspondences, including the four regions, the four
winds and the compass points. 59 Sima Parpola has demonstrated this technique at work during lunar eclipse
omens from Assyria used by diviners of the state around the 6th century BCE (see figs 5 & 6 below). 60

Figure 5. (Parpola, 1983) shows various drawings of the disc of the moon, divided into four quadrants and interpreted using the
location and direction of the shadow cast onto it by the earth. The cardinal directions are added based on the entrance and exit angles of
the shadow. The drawings have been constructed using omen omina in letters from diviner-priests to two Mesopotamian kings (dated
to circa the 6th to 7th centuries BCE) and constructed using eclipse data supplied by Neugebauer and Hiller based on known
Mesopotamian cosmographical conventions. Next to it (Figure 6.) is a schematic drawing of the lunar quadrants and their correlation
with the four directions. Parpola quotes an extract from a cuneiform tablet in which it is written: The evil of an eclipse pertains to the
lord of the MONTH, the lord of the DAY, the lord of the WATCH and the lord of the Quadrant where the Moon begins the eclipse and
where he shifts and sheds it to: these take over the predicted evil.’ (Parpola, 1983)

Evidence of four-fold divisions in relation to cosmic geography in Egypt can be found in Ptolemy’s division of
the world and the zodiac into four and his allocation of countries within each quarter to a matching zodiac
group. 61 Early chart drawings from the Hellenistic period, such as those in fig’s 7 & 8, also seem to reflect an
awareness of this ‘astrological geography’.

Figure 7. (Houlding, 2007) shows a

Greek Horoscope, drawn in the 10th
century in the square style that was
popular during the medieval period.
Figure 8. (Houlding, 2007) is a
horoscope diagram which
Neugebauer says comes from a first
century astrological papyrus (see
Greek Horoscopes, p. 18) However,
it is worth noting that astrological
diagrams in ancient texts seem to be
something of a rarity – most
horoscopes are written out in list
form.

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
Dorian Greenbaum has also noted concerns with solar, lunar and seasonal phases within Greek religion,
such as at Delphi - the cult centre of Apollo – and philosophy, including the writings of Plato. 62 She has
suggested that these emerged out of an earlier, oracular stage of astral divination which she has termed
‘phasic astrology.’ 63 Astrologer, Bruce Scofield has also written about the cardinal directions and the phases
of the sun and the seasons as constituting a ‘first order of astrology’, which he describes as shamanic. 64 This
symbolism seems to have found its way into Hellenistic astrology, with its emphasis on the tropical zodiac,
and in the seasonal symbolism implicit in its 12 signs. 65

It may therefore be significant that the first century Syrian astrologer, Dorotheus of Sidon, refers to the
angles in the horoscope as the ‘cardines.’ 66 In the first chapter of the Carmen Astrologicum (circa 75CE), he
tells us that ‘everything which is decided or indicated is from the lords of the triplicities’ who give signs of
future events in the world through solar and lunar eclipses. 67 The astrology of Dorotheus is clearly at a
crossroads between that of Mesopotamia and later Hellenistic astrology because although Francesca
Rochberg-Halton has traced both techniques back to the four-fold system of Mesopotamian omen
classification already mentioned, 68 the trigon lords also appear in Egypt in the writings of Ptolemy 69 (see
Fig. 9) as well as the work of Geminus, the Stoic philosopher from Rhodes 70 . What is significant from our
point of view is that the triplicities appear to have been associated with the four directional winds (see Fig.
10.)

Figure 9. The Lords of the Triplicities, according to Ptolemy
(Table 3, Rochberg-Halton, 1984)
Figure 10. The correlations between the winds
& the triplicities, according to Geminus. Thi s
system correlates with a tablet of Babylonian
eclipse omens from circa . (Table 5, Rochberg-
Halton, 1984)

Worth noting is that Dorotheus calls himself ‘the Egyptian’ and, in his introduction tells us that he has
‘travelled...in many cities’ and ‘seen wondrous things’ both in Egypt and in Babylon.’ 71 Although it was fairly
common, especially within the Hermetic tradition, to attribute one’s sources to Egypt 72 , there still remains
the possibility that some of what he learnt came from astrologers in Alexandria. 73

Dorotheus’ correlation between the angles and the compass points tallies with another early astrological
treatise, the Astronomica of Manilius, thought to have been composed circa 10-15 AD. 74 Long considered to
be something of an oddity within classical astrological literature 75 , this Roman work may, in fact, be a record
of early astrological practices which then either disappeared or were modified as the tradition developed and
became more standardised. 76

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
As with the BagM Beih, Manilius also makes a correlation between the four cardinal angles, associated with
the zodiac signs of Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn, and the seasons in relation to the diurnal and annual
phases of the sun:

Come now, prepare an attentive mind for learning the cardinal points: four in all, they have
positions in the firmament permanently fixed and receive in succession the speeding signs. One
looks out from the rising of the heavens as they are born into the world and has the first view of the
Earth from the level horizon [heliacal rising at dawn]; the second faces it from the opposite edge of
the sky, [sunset]the point from which the starry sphere retires and hurtles headlong into Tartarus
[heliacal setting]; a third marks the zenith of high heaven, where wearied Phoebus halts with
panting steeds and rests the day and determines the mid-point of the shadows [noon]; the fourth
occupies the nadir and has the glory of forming the foundation of the sphere [the lower heaven]. In it
the stars complete their descent and commence their return, and at equal distances it beholds their
risings and settings. 77

In the above quotation, Manilius is clearly equating the four angles with a Hellenized version of the stations
which made up the mythical course of the sun in its daily journey through the sky and the underworld. He
also makes reference to the heliacal risings and settings of star constellations. Like the sun, stars in Egypt
were also thought to die, pass through the underworld and be reborn on the eastern horizon 70 days later at
dawn. 78 Powell has shown that the notion of the death and rebirth of the decans was common knowledge in
Egypt during Hellenistic times. 79 Manilius also makes reference to several other Egyptian images, including
the rising of the Nile at the summer solstice, 80 and it’s mirroring of the heavens 81 so there is a possibility
that, like Dorotheus, Egypt is one of his sources of astrological knowledge. Astrologer, Deborah Houlding
feels that the Egyptian influence on classical astrology, Manilius in particular, has been downplayed 82 :

Regardless of arguments concerning at what stage and to what extent the Egyptians contributed to
astrological philosophy, there is a need to recognise that many of the principles of traditional
astrology…are a legacy of their worldview. 83

However, she acknowledges that it is very likely that the Egyptian ‘outlook on directional qualities mirrored
that of the Mesopotamians and other early civilisations.’ 84

The Astronomica is also the first to mention an early form of the house system - ‘places’ (Greek topos) or loci
in the zodiac where the planets were considered to be most exalted or ‘at home’. 85 The houses were drawn up
using a quadrant system - trisecting the four angles or directional axes of the sky into smaller segments –
Manilius does not state how many but we can assume that it must have been 12 86 . Whitfield points out that
Manilius’ quadrant system did not take into account the obliquity of the ecliptic, 87 which poses technical
problems. However, Deborah Houlding suggests that Manilius’ system may actually have been ‘an idealised
framework of heaven’ in the same way that Platonic philosophy ‘favours the spiritual ideal over material
reality, 88 ’ or that he was harking back to the tradition of Babylonian omen-reading:

Manilius’ text gives us a good indication that the original concept of the houses was based upon
dividing the local celestial sphere (determined by the circles of the local horizon, local meridian and
prime vertical) in a similar manner to how Babylonian priests quartered and then further divided
their other tools of omen analysis. 89

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
If so, then Manilius’ astrology links back to the four-fold divisions of Mesopotamian cosmic geography and
omen-lore. David Pingree has also spotted other remnants of Babylonian astral divination in Manilius,
including the character of certain constellations (I. 255-231, xxi-xxxi); the trine aspect (II.273-286, xli-xlii);
the zodiacal dodecatemoria (II.693-737, li – lii) and the paranatellonta (V.32-709, xciii – xcvii). 90 The last
of these, the parans, as they are called for short, require a relationship with the angles in order to work, once
again emphasising their fundamental importance in early forms of astrology. 91 It is within this syncretic
milieu that Neugebauer’s Demotic horoscopes were drawn up.

One last observation needs to be made about Manilius which is that his quadratic frame of the heavens is
drawn in relation to the observer and a local horizon, perfectly in keeping with the geocentric orientation in
horoscope drawings – a tradition that been preserved in the modern day craft. 92 This concept is articulated
by the psychological astrologer, Dane Rudhyar, who calls the astrologer the ‘seer’ and reminds us that the
observer is symbolically located at the centre of the chart, looking out at the heavens from his standpoint on
the earth. 93 Commenting on the geocentric nature of horoscopy 94 , Rudhyar emphasises the importance of
what he called the ‘Earth as a Signature’ - how astrology ‘cannot leave the earth,’ and, in a homage to his
theosophic roots, suggests that: ‘It may be that the Earth is the body of a cosmic Spiritual entity, the
Planetary Logos. 95 ’ In this sense, the symbol of the Earth ( ) could be seen as a mirror image of the
quartered celestial sphere, as described by Manilius. Curry reiterates the importance of the Earth as the
microcosm:

A horoscope involves, by definition, a division of space proceeding from the intersection of the
celestial equator (extending out from the Earth’s equator) and the ecliptic (the path the Earth travels
around the Sun); to put it another way, it is a map of the heavens, usually the planets, in relation to a
particular place on Earth as well as moment of time. Without the Earth there could be no astrology,
at least as we know it. 96

Once again, we find ourselves back in the realm of maps and cosmic geography.

We shall now return to take another look at our Babylonian imago mundi, this time from the perspective of
Nanno Marinatos, who claims that the Mesopotamian tablet is the map of a cosmic journey. This genre, she
asserts, was modelled on the Egyptian mythical voyage of the sun 97 and was in common use throughout the
ancient world during the Iron Age. 98 We see evidence of a similar idea in Mesopotamian mythology where
the sun god is also described as entering and exiting the gates of the underworld at sunrise and sunset 99 but
which scheme came first remains open to debate. 100 Employing the comparative techniques of art history,
she reconstructs an outline of Homer’s Odyssey based on the spacial conventions of the Babylonian map.
(See Fig. 11 below) By plotting the journey of Odysseus in a circular sequence and in relation to the
horizontal and vertical axes of east-west & north-south 101 , Marinatos simultaneously animates the
Mesopotamian tablet with circular motion 102 . In doing so, she inadvertently creates a dynamic model of the
cosmos which bears strong parallels to both the Demotic horoscopes of Neugebauer and the astrology of
Manilius, who, albeit haphazardly, likened the seasonal imagery of the zodiac to the different stages in the
life cycle of man. 103 (See Fig. 12 below)

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
 Figure 11. The Cosmic Journey of
Odysseus as plotted onto the model of the
Babylonian map of the world. (Marintos,
2001)

In this context, Neugebauer’s Demotic horoscopes take on another dimension - an element of cosmic
participation and movement within the circular space created by the map.

Figure 12. The cardines and the intervalla

or ages of man according to Manilius.
(Goold, 1977)

With Marinatos’ interpretation in mind, it is noteworthy that Wayne Horowitz has suggested that the
Babylonian Map could represent a bird’s-eye view of the earth’s surface 104 . In Mesopotamian Cosmic
Geography, he compares this representation to themes of flying in Mesopotamian mythology, including the
epic of King Etana, 105 who seeks out the help of an eagle after having a dream in which he travels to a
heavenly realm and meets a goddess. The eagle puts him on its back and flies him up into the celestial
regions in order to find the place he experienced in his dream. 106 Is this simply a myth or the record of a
shamanic journey? 107 We can’t be sure. Certainly flying to the stars is a common theme in shamanism, as is
travelling up and down between different worlds or levels of reality via a vertical axis, pole, ladder, road or
tree. 108 Such journeys to the stars were not unheard of in ancient Near Eastern cultures. In the Pyramid
Texts of the Old Kingdom it is clear that the Egyptians believed that after death, the Pharaoh’s soul ascended
into the night sky to join Osiris (in the form of the constellation Orion) and the immortals - the circumpolar
stars that never set, and therefore, never died. 109 . The texts also employ imagery of Nut as a ladder, which
the King uses to climb into the night sky. 110

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
In The Shamanic Wisdom of the Pyramid Texts, Jeremy Naydler writes:

The image of the sky ladder or stairway is, along with transformation into a bird, one of the most
pervasive symbols of the means of ascent from the world we normally inhabit with our ordinary
consciousness to the spirit world, accessible only to visionary consciousness. The symbolism is
primal, and it emerges in such varied accounts as the dream of Jacob in the Book of Genesis, the
mystical ladders of both the Orphic and Mithraic mysteries… The root of this ladder symbolism is
shamanic: in shamanic traditions worldwide, ascent to the spirit world by means of a ladder is
commonly reported and indeed ritually enacted. 111

Campion notes that pyramids in both Egypt and Mesopotamia ‘appear to have been aligned with …the north
celestial pole’ which he says suggests ‘shared traditions between these two regions.’ 112 He also speculates
that, as with later mystery cults such as Mithraism, the Pyramid Texts could be interpreted as ‘descriptions
of ecstatic rites to be conducted in life, which the king, shaman-like, travelled to the sun and stars.’ 113 Martin
West also suggests that the root of the image of Delphi as the navel of the earth (omphalos) could lie in a
shamanic tradition transmitted to the Greeks from Asia. 114 He draws parallels between the image of the
umbilical cord and the world tree found in Asian shamanic cosmology which connects earth, underworld and
upperworld:

It is to the cosmic centre, where heaven, earth and underworld are all connected that the Asiatic
shaman repairs (in spirit) in order to pass from one world to another in order to obtain hidden
knowledge, converse with the gods or the souls of the dead, and so on. 115

We know that during Hellenistic times, the notion of the soul’s ascent through the planetary spheres to the
Ogdoad, or realm of the fixed stars, was a fairly common concept within the soteriology of mystery cults
linked to the Hermetic, Gnostic and Neoplatonic traditions. In many cases, this religious eschatology was
linked to astrology. 116 Mithraism, for example, associated the different stages of the initiate’s ascent through
the planetary spheres with the different rungs of a cosmic ladder 117 . The Isis cult described by Apuleius in
The Golden Ass also describes an ascent through the planetary spheres before the initiate encounters the
goddess Persephone. 118

Henry Corbin also traces the image of vertical ascent towards the Pole Star in his studies on early Islamic
and Sufi mysticism. 119 His interpretation of core Persian and Arabic texts led him to talk of ‘geosophy 120 ,’ a
fusion of ontology and sacred geography, in which the soul ‘spacializes.’ That is, instead of ‘having to be
situated’ the soul is always the origin of its own spacial references and ‘determines their structure.’ 121 Thus,
for Corbin, orientation is key:

Orientation is a primary phenomenon of our presence in the world. A human presence has the
property of spatializing a world around it, and this phenomenon implies a certain relationship of
man and the world, his world, this relationship being determined by the very mode of his presence in
the world. 122

Translated into astrology, such a statement implies a relationship between the observer and the cosmos
he/she inhabits. However, this cosmos is not just an internal, psychological one – it is simultaneously
internal and external. 123

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© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
Naydler suggests that this is also how oriental cultures such as the Egyptians understood space:

It is evident that in ancient times space was experienced not simply as the condition of the
outwardness of objects in the world but also as disclosing varying degrees of internality. There were
vast and important regions of the cosmos that existed entirely inwardly, in which quite different
conditions prevailed, but from which the externalized world derives, and in which it partakes...This
inner dimension is, of course, the symbolic or vertical dimension. 124

The scholar of magic, Arthur Versluis is happy to use this image within the context of astrology, contrasting
the horizontal dimension of linear time, associated with fate and astral determinism, with the vertical
dimension in which the zodiacal and the planetary hierarchies represent ‘divine principles within man
through the activation of which one realises the celestial world’. 125 In this sense, the natural correspondences
or zodiacal hierarchy can be read as ‘a map of degrees’ or stages of consciousness which relate to a
metaphysical ascent. 126 However, Versluis makes it clear that this vertical motion does not involve an escape
from the earth. Instead, it involves the realisation in the magician that he is ‘in effect manifesting the
celestial realm upon earth.’ 127

For Corbin, the goal of ascent for the Sufi mystic was the ‘cosmic north’ – ‘the summit of the “celestial pole,”
which implies a vertical dimension to man’s existence’ 128 . This involved a similar notion of an upward
movement of consciousness to the intermediary world of the mundus imaginalis – the world of Platonic
forms, of angels and subtle bodies. Translating this into metaphysics, Tom Cheetham writes:

Corbin’s spiritual itinerary is a “quest for the Orient” that determines the orientation of man in the
world. This quest is to find the vertical dimension symbolised by the Pole Star, which makes possible
the ascent of the soul towards the threshold of the worlds beyond. This is a cosmology in which
alchemy, astrology and a geocentric cosmos still have sense. 129

However, contrary to what Cheetham’s assertion may seem to suggest, Corbin tells us that the mundus
imaginalis - the medio mundi or world of the centre - is actually a vision of the Earth which, ‘is revealed to
our philosopher as an “Angel.”’ 130 In Corbin, we hear an echo of Rudhyar’s earlier statement about
astrological orientation. 131 However, the journey to this world involves a change in consciousness – the use
of the active imagination 132 - and not an upward escape. 133

Such an interpretation holds the key to how we, as astrologers, can choose to orient ourselves spacially and
philosophically towards the astrological cosmos. 134 Re-situating astrology within the cosmic geography out
of which it arose, allows astrologers access to a rich repository of symbolism in our interpretation of the
angles without moving too far from the tradition. Doing so also reveals the true value of astrology’s
geocentric orientation and demonstrates that it is far more than just a relic of primitive science. Reclaiming
this ancient worldview allows us to re-inhabit the enchanted world of astrology’s progenitors and once again
find our place within the cosmological order:

What astrology offers is the wonder of being part of an intrinsically meaningful place and moment on
Earth that specifically includes the cosmos, especially insofar as it can be directly experienced...It is
thus an experience at once chthonic, cosmic and intimately personal. 135

12
© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
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References

1 Neugebauer, 1943
2 Neugebauer, 1943, p. 117-118, esp. Fig 1
3 See Roberts, 2000, as well as Barber & Barber, 2004, p. 179 Cf with Marinatos, 2001, pp. 381-7
4 Houlding, 2006, p. ix. Campion, 2008, p. 203-4. Note what he says about the ‘potentially misleading tendency to

assume a fundamental unity of theory and practice’ during the Hellenistic period in Egypt, were modern
astrology seems to have emerged out of
5 This is perfectly in keeping with the methodology outlined by Delano-Smith, 1982, p. 10 where she discusses

the interpretation of Palaeolithic rock art as maps: ‘The second point that has to be borne in mind is that while
maps may be taken at face value as a record of the spatial location of selected features they can also be analysed
for hidden or even unconsciously given messages. Each map, therefore, needs to be understood at all its levels, in
terms of both surface and deeper meanings. If all this is true for maps from the historic period, it is pari passu
applicable to the prehistoric period, yet the meaning as opposed to the content of a figure from the prehistoric
period may be very hard to discover.’
6 Delano-Smith, 1996, p. 209. However, scholars think it can be traced back to as early as 900-1000 BCE
7 See Unger, 1937, pp.1-5
8 See Horowitz, 1998, p.106 on hi comments about the Gilgamesh epic. These could equally apply to any form of

Mesopotamian mythical geography

9 See Horowitz, 1998, p.106 on hi comments about the Gilgamesh epic. These could equally apply to any form of

Mesopotamian mythical geography

10 See Unger, 1937, pp.1-7 and Delano, 1996, p. 209
11 Klimkeit, 1975, p. 270-271. See also Park, 1994, pp. 257-8
12 Klimkeit also notes the overlap and says it was typical of ancient Egypt, Greece and ‘other Western Semites.’

see Klimkeit, 1975, p. 269

13 Horowitz, 1998, pp. 40-41, Herodotus, IV. 36. See also Marinatos, 2001, p.395
14 Quoted in Horowitz, 1998, p. 41
15 Smith, 1993, pp.129-132
16 Eliade, 1959, p. 22-3.
17 Shaw, 1995, pp 8-10.
18 Shaw, 1995, pp. 8-10 There is some suggestion in this that he may have been influenced by teachings from the

Egyptians and other oriental societies during his travels. See Shaw, 1995, p. 7, esp. note 16
19 Shaw, 1995, p. 9. See also Smith, 1978, pp. 88-103
20 Smith, 1993, pp. 132-147 Not how he compares this notion to Cornelius Loew’s ‘cosmological conviction’ which

he defines as ‘the conviction that the meaning of life is rooted in an encompassing cosmic order in which man,
society and the gods all participate.’ (p. 132)
21 It should be said that the Egyptians had an equal respect for Set, god of chaos and dismemberment, who in the

Old Kingdom, was ruler of Upper Egypt, and after whom Seti I named himself. Set, along with Sokar, were
revered even though they were terrifying and had very destructive and dark aspects. See Roberts, 2000, p. 239.
Note 2. See also Eliade on the notion of terrible power, divine wrath and the mysterium tremendum in Eliade,
1959, pp.8-10
22 See Heimpel, 1986, p.143; Reiner, 1995, p. 4,8 Campion, 2008, p. 55
23 British Museum: http://www.mesopotamia.co.uk/staff/resources/background/bg22/home.html, accessed April

2009. See also Burrows, 1937, pp. 45-46 His suggestion is that the Sumerians had come from ‘mountainous
country where they would have been accustomed to worship on high places. ’ He also alludes to a link between
heaven, earth and underworld via a vertical axis in the temple The temples were also commonly referred to as
‘Bond of Heaven and Earth’, ‘Bond of Earth and Underworld’ etc Marinatos points out that in the epic of
Gilgamesh, the mountain Mashu was said to have ‘its roots in the underworld and its peak in the firmament.’
(Marinatos, 2001, p. 389)
24 Stairways to heaven were a common image in Mesopotamian literature e.g. Nergal & Ereshkigal. There is

mention of a pure lapis lazuli stairway to heaven in an Old Babylonian extispicy prayer. Horowitz has shown
that the word for a ziggurat stairway - ‘simmelat šamāmi’ also means ‘ladder’. See Horowitz, 1998, pp. 65-66
25 Burrows in Hooke (Ed.), 1935, p. 60. West has noted that the theme of ascent to heaven via various metaphoric

means, including ladders, a cosmic mountain or the image of a navel in the earth seems to be a fairly common
one in Semitic mythic and poetic traditions. See West,1997,pp.50,149-151
26 See Campion, 2008, pp. 93-95
27 The fact that Babylonians saw everything within the cosmos as inter-related meant that omens could be

communicated through various means, from sheep’s livers to the stars which, incidentally, were sometimes
referred to as domesticated livestock, whilst the wandering planets were called known as bibbu which means
‘wild sheep’ in Akkadian. See Reiner, 1995, p.7 However, she is also at pains to point out that the stars
performed a dual function in relation to mankind – as god, exerting a direct influence, as well as acting as a
medium of communication – signs or omens aka ‘the heavenly writing’ – between man and the divine. (See esp.
18
© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
pp. 15 - 16) It is interesting in this regard that the constellation of Anu (Orion) was known to the Babylonians as
the True Shepherd of the god of the sky. (See p. 3, 17) Peter Kingsley has found etymological links between the
name ‘Poimandres’ as used in the Hermetic literature, and the word ‘shepherd’ See Kingsley, 1993, pp.2-3. See
also Reiner on the association of the stars and planets with sheep. Reiner, 1995, p.7
28 Greenbaum, 2007, p. 12
29 Unger, 1937, p.4. See also Curry, 2004, p 28 – 29 for similar myths in other early cultures
30 See Faulkner, 1966, p. 154 where in the Pyramid Texts the King is described as travelling ‘the Winding

Waterway in the north of the sky.’ Naydler also describes how the Egyptians thought that Ra travelled across
the ‘heavenly Nile’ in his sun barque over the course of the day. The earthly Nile was considered to be ‘but an
image’ of the heavenly Nile. See Naydler, 1996, p. 8
31 Horowitz, 1998, p. 41
32 See Hinson-Lall, 2003, p. 9
33 British Museum website on Mesopotamia at:

http://www.mesopotamia.co.uk/staff/resources/background/bg22/home.html, accessed April 2009. See also West’s

comments about the myth of Gilgamesh, who journeys to the Twin Mountain (Masha) from where the he is able
to watch the coming forth of Shamash (the sun god) at dawn. West, 1997, p. 142
34 See the Eighth Region in Horowitz which is described as the gates of the dawn. See Horowitz, 1988, p. 164-5.

For more on the gates of the Sun, see Heimpel, 1986, pp. 132-133. Interestingly, a mountain appears to be placed
just in front of it. Perhaps this is the mythical Twin Mountain mentioned in the Gilgamesh epic? For the placing
of the gates of sunrise in the Twin Mountains, see West, 1997, pp. 140-143 and Heimpel, 1986, pp. 14-143 On the
gates to Hades as also being the gates of the sun in Homer, see Nagy, 1973, p. 140
35 Horowitz, 1988, p. 151. On links between cattle and shamanism, see Burkert, 199, pp. 88 - 90
36 No 5. in Figure 2 in Unger
37 Unger suggests that this may indicate that the Babylonians had knowledge of the fact that the sun does not

rise for several months during the winter in northern climes. See Unger, 1937, p. 2. However, Horowitz, taking
his lead from a British Museum leaflet, suggests that perhaps this is a reference to the fact that, from the
latitude of Mesopotamia, the Sun never travels through the northern part of the sky. See Horowitz, 1988, p. 159
In a later work, he does, however, state that Mesopotamian texts regularly mention a perpetually dark or
sunless region which is usually situated either to the north or the east. Here he does equate this idea to the
Polar Regions. See Horowitz, 1998, p. 100. Marinatos thinks this region may be the Underworld/Hades. See
Marinatos, 2001, p.389
38 See Marinatos, 2001, p. 389 on the similarities between the triangular nagu and regions such as Hades and

the island of the sun in Homer’s Odyssey. On this, see Nagy, 973, p. 140. On overlapping themes in both Greek
and Semitic mythology, see Burkert, 1979 and West, 1990
39 Horowitz, 1988, p. 164
40 Horowitz, 1998, p.259

41 Rochberg-Halton, 1984, p. 127 Francesca Rochberg-Halton has shown that the Mesopotamians appear to have
developed a system which she calls ‘”astrological” geography.’ ‘This system enabled regions of the earth
(including countries and cities) to be correlated with celestial phenomena.’
42 See esp. Horowitz, 1996, pp. 36 – 38 where he shows in relation to ritual calendars that ancient

Mesopotamians used a combination of factors, such as the appearance of the first crescent moon at sunset (i.e.
due west) after the Spring Equinox. New Year’s Day (the Spring Equinox) may have been marked by the heliacal
rising of a certain constellation (possibly the Pleiades, see Horowitz, 1998, p. 199) at dawn. The calendar thus
used a combination of seasons, cardinal directions as well as solar, lunar and stellar in relation to the horizon in
order to work out what date it was.
43 Horowitz, 1998, pp. 165-6, 172-3 There is evidence that the Babylonians were mapping the sky and the phases

of the sun and moon from very early on. The first millennium BCE astrological texts, the Mul Apin mention the
paths of Enlil, Anu and Ea, three divisions of the sky used to track the movements of the Moon and stars by
night; and by day, the positions of sunrise and sunset at the solstices and equinoxes.
44 Parker-Pearson & Richards, 1994, p. 39. The Etruscans also employed the use of a ritual space (templum) in

divinatory techniques such as augury. On Etruscan temple orientation and the templum used in divination, see
Aveni & Romano, 1994. On the shape of the templum, see Frothingham, 1914
45 See Campion, 2008, pp. 93 – 95 esp. his discussion of the alignment of temples to solar events such as solstices,

as well as the connection between the pyramids and constellations such as Orion and the Pole star which seem to
have been an integral part of funerary cult right up until the New Kingdom when the emphasis on the sky
appeared to change to that of the earth. This coincides with the internment of pharaohs in the Valley of the
Kings. The Dwat or underworld now appears to be the location of Osiris, god of the Dead and the pharaohs now
seem to aspire to journey into the earth rather than ascend to the sky as they had done during the Pyramid Age.
See also Polz, 2008, p. 530 where he suggests that Hatshepsut, the first ‘pharoah’ to build her tomb in the valley
of the Kings, did so by taking Egyptian mythical geography about the location of the Dwat and embodying it by
building in the western mountains where the sun was thought to enter the underworld.

19
© Lisa Mendes, University of Kent, 2009
46 Parker-Pearson & Richards, 1994, p. 39 See also Naydler, 1996, pp. 1-10
47 His approach has been referred to alternately as ‘ethno-archaeology, ’ a ‘post-processual’ or contextual
archaeology and finally, as theoretical/interpretive/symbolic archaeology. Basically, his approach is to use
analogy to attempt to cultural interpret ruins and artefacts, focusing on social processes, a technique borne out
of anthropology. See Hodder (ed.) 2007, pp. 1-16 and Hughes, 2005, p. 9 at:
http://digital.library.unt.edu/permalink/meta-dc-4871:1 )
48 Parker-Pearson & Richards, 1994, p. 28
49 Parker-Pearson & Richards, 1994, p. 22. Here he quotes Preston Blier’s theory of the ‘condensed metaphor’ of

architecture. He illustrates that often elements of a house or dwelling can symbolically stand for essential
features of the whole cosmos e.g. Cellar/crypt = Underworld, Living space = Earth, Roof = Sky. He notes how this
seems to be one of the key conventions underlying Chinese geomancy and feng shui. (p. 20) Note also his
discussion about the definition and application of Lethaby’s term ‘sacred architecture.’ (p. 11)
50 Parker-Pearson & Richards, 1994, p. 15. However, he does state that this is not a universal law – goes on to

show that some cultures are ‘occidented’

51 Naydler, 1996, p. 8
52 Parker-Pearson & Richards, 1994, p. 13
53 Bird, 2007, pp. 63-65
54 Crane, 2007, p. 15
55 Rochberg-Halton, 1984, p. 127
56 Rochberg-Halton, 1984, p. 127
57 Horowitz, 1998, pp. 193 - 207
58 Rochberg-Halton, 1984, p. 127. See also Rochberg-Halton, 1988, p. 60
59 Later, the quadrants also appear to have been associated with a planetary lord, determined by zodiacal

triplicities - triangular relationships between the stellar position of the eclipsed Moon, and the ‘places’ (i.e.
constellations) of the malefic planets, Nergal (Mars) and Ninurta (Saturn.) The triplicities appear to be the
forerunners of the triplicities associated with the four elements in Hellenistic astrology, as well as the trine
aspect, which became part of the system of aspects later developed by the Greeks. Rochberg-Halton suggests that
this system evolved in Mesopotamia around the fifth century BCE during the period of ‘scientific mathematical
astronomy’ which was much more abstract and systemised than the omens that had gone before. She further
states that the Babylonians did not use mathematical geometry in their astrological computations. In fact there
is only evidence of the trine being used in Babylonian astrology – the rest of the doctrine of aspects appears to be
a wholly Greek invention, probably based on Pythagorean geometry. See Rochberg-Halton, 1984, pp. 127-9. Van
Binsbergen, 1996, p. 55 suggests that a Pythagorean contribution to a divination system such as astrology may
be reflected to the extent to which the sacred numbers could divide the 360 degree circle of the zodiac into
portions e.g. 360/2 = 180 = opposition; 360/4 = 90 degrees = square etc, as well as the meanings assigned to
these.
60 Parpola, 1983, pp. 406-7
61 Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos, II, 13. Campion, 2008, p. 215. Campion says that Ptolemy got this idea from Manilius.

This system was to become a mainstay in medieval political and mundane astrology.
62 Greenbaum, 2007, p. 14 Greenbaum shows that Plato also appeared to emphasise the importance of aligning

to cosmological rhythms in his Laws where he recommends that State leaders should assemble for particular
tasks relating to justice and government annually, after the summer solstice and daily, at dawn ‘ in accordance
with the Sun’s cycle.’
63 Greenbaum, 2007, pp. 20-21 She explicitly states that it is the solar mythology and imagery relating to light &

dark that is ‘the common element in the relationship of phasic astrology to the oracle.’ The sun, she has shown,
became intimately bound up with the god Apollo, who was originally a god who inhabited dark places, including
the Underworld. (See pp. 14 – 15) See also Kingsley, 1999, pp. 87-92 and Cornelius, 2003, pp. 138 – 141.) This is
a theme I wish to develop further in my dissertation.
64 Scofield, 2000, p.61
65 See Powell, 2007, p. 67, 109 See esp. Fig 11 who suggests that the 3 paths of Enlil, Anu & Ea in Mesopotamia,

in addition to mapping stars by night, also acted as a ‘schematic solar year’, mapping the solstices and
equinoxes. He suggests that this schema was ‘a forerunner of the Babylonian sidereal zodiac and of Euctemon’s
tropical calendar - and thus also of the tropical zodiac introduced into [Greek] astronomy by Hipparchus.’
66 Dorotheus, Ch. I. – 1, lines 1-3 (tranls. Pingree)
67 Dorotheus, Ch. I. – 1, lines 1-3 (transl. Pingree) Note that this is Pingree’s translation from the Pahlavi

version
68 Rochberg-Halton, 1984, pp. 121-7
69 Tetrabiblos I. 4-5
70 Rochberg-Halton, 1984, p. 123
71 Dorotheus I, Preface.
72 See Rochberg-Halton, 1988, p. 51 and Fowden, 1993, pp. 214-215 Cf Iamblichus De Mysteriium

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73 See Powell, 20007, p. 112 where he says that: ‘It was in Egypt, primarily in Alexandria, that [Western]

astrology developed.’
74 Whitfield, 2001, p. 42-3
75 Crane, 2007, xiii
76 Campion, 2008, p.203 makes the point that, in Hellenistic times, to assume ‘a fundamental unity of theory and

practice’ is misleading.
77 Manilius, Astronomica, Book II, 788-855 (Goold transl.)
78 See Powell, 2007, p.89-90 on the philosophy of birth and death surrounding the decans and their heliacal

rising and setting, as well as the notion of their 70 day disappearance, which appears to have been extrapolated
from the cycle of Sirius, the star of Isis to other constellations. The relationship between the decans and the solar
cycle is clearly found in the Egyptian Amduat. See Faulkner, 1954, p. 36. One verse reads:
‘The western horizon of Atum
The eastern horizon of Sokar.
The stars which rise in the east.
The stars which set in the west.’
The astrologer, Bernadette Brady, has incorporated this mythology into her work with star constellations
through her computer program, Starlight, which uses the system of paranatolleta as outlined in the work of the
Syrian astrologer, Vettius Valens (c.120-175CE). For an academic assessment of Valens’ astrology, see
Greenbaum, 2006
79 See his discussion of the Papyrus Carlsberg. Powell, 2007, pp.88-89
80 Astronomica, Book III, 633 - 636
81 Astronomica, Book III, 271-5 He does this in a syncretic fashion, ascribing the seven tributaries of the Nile to

the seven planetary spheres of the Platonic cosmos but it’s roots in the idea of the Nile mirroring the Milky Way
is clear Cf the notion of the Seven Heavens & Seven Earths in Mesopotamian cosmic geography and mythology
in Horowitz, 1998, pp. 216-220
82 Houlding, 2006, p. 7 ‘Manilius displays enough confidence in his description of house meanings to suggest that

he was relaying a current consensus of opinion rather than a newly-invented technique, whilst his general
referral to the mythological beliefs of older civilizations allows for the credible theory that house meanings were
established under the influence of Alexandrian study.’ See also Burkert, 2004, pp. 71 – 98 on the influence of
Egyptian mythology on Greek religion; Fowden, 1993, pp. 14-22 on the esteem in which Egypt was held by the
Graeco-Romans and the influence it had on their religion and culture
83 Houlding, 2006, p. 7. See esp. the diagram on p. 9
84 Houlding, 2006, pp. 5, 7
85 This theory clearly has its roots in the triplicities and the bit nisurtu of the Babylonians mentioned earlier.(See

Note 22) See also Campion, 2008, p. 70

86 Bouché-Leclerq attempted to suggest that this may have been an eight-house system, the octotropos, possibly

based on a comparison with the Etruscan templum which used a 16-house division and in keeping with the
Babylonian four-fold system – all multiples of 4.(Goold, 1977, Introduction, p. lxi ) See Jack Lindsay on the
possible origins of Etruscan divination in Mesopotamian omen divination (Lindsay, 1971, p. 17) as well as
Collins, 2008, p.325 cf van Binsbergen, 2004, on the possible origins of Islamic geomancy in astrology. This
system also carries 16 figures/possible combinations.
87 See Whitfield, 2001, pp. 48; Houlding, 2006, pp. 97-99
88 Houlding, 2006, p.97, 100
89 Houlding, 2006, p. 96
90 Pingree, 1980a, p. 264. On the Babylonian constellations, see also Powell, 2007, Appendix I, p. 140; on the

origin of the trine aspect in early eclipse triplicities, and the micro-zodiac n Mesopotamia, see Rochberg-Halton,
1984, 1988; on the paranatella, see Whitfield, 200, p. 50; Crane, 2007, pp. 20-22
91 See Crane, 2007, p. 22 ‘Angles are important for paranatella which means “co-rising” and is usually shortened

to “paran.” When a planet or star is on one angle and another planet or star is at the same or a different angle,
they are said to “co-rise.” This brings together the two celestial bodies [i.e. constellations] interpretatively.’
92 See Rudyar, 1991, who says that: ‘Astrology has been essentially geocentric, even if it accepted some ideas

belonging to the heliocentric picture of the solar system. I see now that when it deals with human beings as
individual, it should be “person-centred”, for individual is in a very real sense the center of his own universe. It
is the way he orients himself to the universe as a whole that matters. In a deeper sense, he is the whole sky,
focused at a particular point of space-time.’ Cf This interpretation in the Renaissance astrologer, Marsilio Ficino
in Voss, 2007, pp. 103-104. On the dangers of internalising the cosmos in psychological astrology, see Hyde,
2005, pp. 11, 15 where she emphasises the need to maintain a ‘cosmic sense’.
93 See Greenbaum, 2007, p. 16-17 on the dual perspective of appearance v reality implied within astrology in

relation to geocentrism vs. heliocentrism; and Crane, 2007, p. 1 on experiencing reality I astrology
94 Rudyar, 1991, p. xi

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95 Rudyar, 1936, p. 141. Compare this to what Henry Corbin writes about the Mazdean Imago Terrae - the Earth
as an Angel in Corbin, 1977, pp. 3-16. See also Curry’s comments on the effects of the Copernican revolution on
astrology, which led to a ‘Cartesian’ split between the physical cosmos (astronomy) and the perspective implied
by the geocentric astrological chart: ‘Despite the departure from perfect Platonic circles initiated by Kepler, it
was also immensely boosted by the Copernican revolution displacing the Earth from the centre of the solar
system, thus deepening and hardening the split between what we ‘know’ and what we experience – and between
a hypervalued faculty thinking on the one hand (already morphing into scientific rationality) and feeling and
sensing on the other.’ Curry, 2007a, p. 215
96 Curry, 2007a, p. 215
97 Marinatos, 2001, pp. 381-2. See also Klimkeit, 1975, p. 272
98 Marinatos, 2001, pp. 381-2 See also the unusual pharaonic image of the sun’s night journey in a medieval Irish

Christian text in Carey, 1994

99 See Horowitz, 1998, pp. 361, 331, 103 - 106 esp. with regard to the Epic of Gilgamesh in which he is warned

that ‘only Shamash can cross the cosmic sea’ (i.e. the waters of death). ‘A belief that the distant reaches of the
ocean were connected with death may derive from the notion that one could pass directly into the underworld
through the waters of the far reaches of the sea, just as the sun appears to rise and set directly from/into the
ocean.’ See also West, 1990, pp. 142 – 143 on the gates of heaven in Akkadian cosmology, vs. the gates of the sun
in Homer & the paths of night and day in Parmenides. He has also shown that the general direction one must
take to find the lower world is ‘the western horizon, where the sun and other luminaries regularly go down.’ (p.
153)
100 On the importance of the horizon in Egyptian astral religion, see Campion, 2008, p. 95 Cf Marinatos, 2001,

pp. 383-4 on the importance of the horizon and its depiction in Egyptian iconography; and her notion of the
‘cosmic juncture’ (p. 392) See also Neugebauer’s remark about the horizon in relation to zodiacal signs with
regard to the Demotic horoscopes: Neugebauer, 1943, pp. 122
101 On the vertical axis, see Marinatos, 2001, p. 398 – 399. On the horizontal east-west axis, see p. 383-385.
102 On the tendency to do this in Egypt, see Klimkeit, 1975, p. 274 where he notes that: ‘In mythical space…every

point and every distinction has not only it’s own external quality but also a significance and value of its own, a
note determined by an emotional accent. It is a representation of something non-spacial in space.’ Cf with the
visionary geography of the inheritors of the Mesopotamian tradition in Corbin, 1989, pp. 24-36
103 Manilius, Astronomica II, 841-855. See also Goold’s introduction, p. lvi Whitfield writes, ‘These four cardinal

points divided the heavens into four quadrants and it is easy to imagine that these areas would become
associated with the cycle of human life, with coming-into-being, maturing, decline and death.’ (Whitfield, 2001,
p.46) However, this does not automatically mean that astrology becomes a ’machine of destiny’ as in Cornelius,
2003) See Campion on Aristotelianism in astrology, pp. 171 – 2 and on Ptolemy, pp. 211- 212 Cf Brady, 2006,
Foreword, who suggests that both astrology as divination and astrology as planetary causation is essentially the
same thing – a debate about causal agents.
104 Horowitz, 2006 ,p.50 and Horowitz, 1998, p. 43
105 Etana is described as the King of Kish, who forms part of the first royal dynasty in Sumer after the great

flood. In the prologues to some versions, kingship is linked with descent from heaven. In the Sumerian King
Lists, Etana is described as ‘a shepherd who ascended to heaven & who organised the lands.’ Horowitz, 1998, pp.
43-44 See also note 26.
106 Horowitz, 1998, pp. 44-66. The Etana epic features a snake, an eagle, a goddess and the Sun god, Shamash. I

cannot but help see parallels with Peter Kingsley’s work on Empedocles and Parmenides (descending into the
Underworld along the path of the sun in order to meet a goddess) as well as the mythology surrounding
Asclepius, the god associated with snakes and healing, and practice of incubation where people would go to lie in
caves and other dark places in order to receive healing dreams. See especially Kingsley, 1995, as well as 1999.
107 Kingsley notes the overlaps between Mesopotamian myths of ascent and descent to different realms in order

to meet a goddess, such as the story of Nergal & Ereshkigal, which he compares to that of Parmenides in what
he seems to interpret as a shamanic journey. See Kingsley, 1995, Appendix I and pp. 54-55. Horowitz also
compares the Etana epic to the Nergal & Ereshkigal story, see Horowitz, 1998, pp. 65-66
108 On shamanic cosmology, including the 3 worlds or cosmic zones, as ell as he images of the cosmic mountain,

world tree and the pillar of the Pole Star, see Eliade, pp.259 - 273
109 See Naydler, 2005, p. 160 and Faulkner, 1966, pp. 153, 155-157, Campion, 2008, pp. 95-96. Later, during the

Middle and New Kingdoms, this theme was reiterated in the decanal constellations which set on the western
horizon at certain times of the year, as they entered and then returned from the Underworld. Campion also
suggests a shift n temple alignment from the cardinal directions to the solstices, in line with an increasing
emphasis on solar elements in their religion. (p.96) This also coincides with the re-positioning of Osiris and the
Dwat under the earth, marked by the decision to build pharaonic tombs in the Valley of the Kings, beginning
with Hatshepsut. See Polz, 2008.
110 Faulkner, 1966, p.156
111 Naydler, 2005, p. 273

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112 Campion, 2008, p. 35
113 Campion, 2008, p. 89
114 West, 1997, p. 50, 150. See also Kingsley, 1994a, on the Greeks in relation to shamanism
115 West, 1997, 149-150
116 On Neoplatonic ideas about the ascent and descent of the soul through the planetary spheres, see Finamore,

1984. On Hermetic theurgic rituals which attempted to achieve the same end, see Costa Mendes, 2007
117 Beck, 2000, p. 169 Here he quotes the Christian polemicist Celsus, preserved by Origen, that the Mithraists

encoded the opposition of the spheres of the planets and of the fixed stars and the soul's 'route through and out'
(diexodos) in yet another visual symbol, a 'seven-gated ladder':
“These things [i.e., celestial ascent] are intimated in the doctrines of the Persians and their mysteries of Mithras.
They have a symbol of the two celestial revolutions, that of the fixed stars and that assigned to the planets, and
of the road of the soul through and out of them. The symbol is this: a seven-gated ladder (klimax heptapylos)
with an eighth on top.”
118 See Apuleius, Metamorphoses, Book XI, Ch. 23-24, p.99 (transl. Griffiths) See also the comments on this in

Naydler, 2005, pp. 54-56

119 Corbin, 1989, pp. 71-73 on the Mountain of Qaf and the eighth climate: ‘We have already recalled precisely

that this cosmic Orient is not to be sought in the East on our maps but in the “polar dimension.” In fact, this
orient is the celestial pole, the “centre” of all conceivable orientation.’; and Corbin, 1994, pp. 39-55
120 Corbin, 1989, pp. 36 - 50
121 Corbin, 1989, pp.20 - 22
122 Corbin, quoted in Cheetham, 1999, p. 204
123 See Cheetham on this element in Corbin: ‘The inner and the outer interpenetrate. You cannot know who you

are without knowing the terrain you occupy; and yet you cannot truly know what your orientation is within that
terrain without knowing who you are. The ecologists tell us we are defined by our world. Corbin tells us that our
world is who we are. Our inner landscapes define our orientation in the world just as surely as the geographies
of the outer world. The boundaries of the world as we have learned to see them are disrupted. To realize this is
threatening. There are few safe havens in this task of being human.’ See Cheetham, 1999, p. 205. See also
Naydler, 1996, p. 13
124 Naydler, 1996, p. 13
125 Versluis, 1986, pp. 40-41 However, he is quick to point out that in talking about the magus as a microcosm, he

is not advocating the psychologising of the cosmos, as in Jung because he argues, to take esoteric wisdom and
magic out of the realm of metaphysics is to drag it into the realm of ego, which is illusory. See pp. 7-8.
126 Versluis, 1986, p. 41. See also his discussion of the Nag Hammadi text ‘Discourse on the Eighth & Ninth’ (pp.

10 – 11)
127 Versluis, 1986, p. 13
128 Corbin, 1989, p. 71 For a fuller explication of this idea in an esoteric context, see Corbin, 1971.
129 Cheetham, 2001, p. 88
130 Corbin, 1989, pp. 3, 47 See Cheetham, 2003 p. 60 ‘The escape occurs in this world, by the spiritualization of

this world, not by its rejection.’

131 See note 39 with regards to psychological astrology and the potential danger of cutting the astrological cosmos

of from its cosmological context.

132 Corbin, 1989, p. 29. See also Voss, 2009 at: http://www.latrobe.edu.au/eyeoftheheart/issue3.html
133 Corbin, 1989, p. 89: ‘It is here below, on this very Earth, the Shaikh tells us, that one must become an

inhabitant of the Earth of Hurqalya.’ See also Corbin, 1989, p. 29 – 31, 70-71 where he makes it clear that that
the cosmic north is ‘not a region situated in the East on the map’ but instead, the vertical dimension involves an
ascent from one octave to the next through the levels of the subtle body. See his discussion of this methodology in
Corbin, 1971
134 This view is echoed in Curry, 2007a, p.215. See note. 94
135 Curry, 2007a, p.215

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