Ingress

Definition

An ingress is the exact moment a planet crosses out of one zodiac sign into the next, switching on the new sign's ruling planet and the house that sign holds in whatever chart you read. Hellenistic and medieval-Latin practice treats three kinds differently: the four solar cardinal ingresses — the Sun into Aries, Cancer, Libra, Capricorn, the equinoxes and solstices — open annual charts for world events; other planets' ingresses switch on transit themes by sign; and the Moon's ingresses, every two and a half days, shift the players in horary and electional charts.

In Tradition

In mundane astrology — the astrology of nations and world events — the Sun's ingress into Aries is treated as the "Revolution of the Years of the World," an annual chart for collective life, read for political, religious, and weather forecasting. Holden's History credits the systematic technique to Masha'allah's lost Kitāb taḥwīl sinī al-ʿālam; Abu Ma'shar's Flores astrologiae opens by naming the Lord of the Year. It runs through Bonatti and Lilly into the modern revival.

In Practice

For a forecast of world events, you cast a chart for the exact moment the Sun crosses 0° Aries, set for the place that interests you — usually a national capital — then identify the Lord of the Year and read the chart for the year ahead. Albumasar's priority cascade picks that Lord: the angular planet carrying the most essential and accidental dignity at the chart's key degrees. The four cardinal ingresses split the year into quarters; an in-between ingress — a slow planet entering a new sign — signals a shift in themes. In horary and electional work, the Moon's ingress is the signal you consult most often: it changes the active significators, refreshes the state of the question, and in horary can mark the line past which a question is too late or too early to judge. Holden notes Carter's caveat that the Aries ingress is only one mundane technique among several, best combined with great-conjunction analysis and lunation charts.

Historical Origin

Holden credits the Aries-ingress technique to Masha'allah's 8th-9th-c. Kitāb taḥwīl sinī al-ʿālam (Arabic, public domain; the lost original survives in medieval Latin). Abu Ma'shar's Flores astrologiae (9th c.) opens with the rule for identifying the Lord of the Year. Bonatti's Liber Astronomiae Vol VIII Part II (13th c. Latin, public domain) and Lilly's Christian Astrology Book III (1647, public domain) carry it forward. Modern coverage: Holden's History and Carter's Introduction to Political Astrology (1951).

Etymology

Origin: Latin. Meaning: Entry, act of going in.

Definition

In Tradition

In Practice

Historical Origin

Etymology

Further Reading