Regulus
REG-yoo-luhs
latin: Cor Leonis (Heart of the Lion) · arabic: Qalb al-Asad
Definition
Regulus is Alpha Leonis, the brightest star in the constellation Leo and the most luminous member of a multiple-star system about 79 light-years away. Its zodiac position drifts slowly with precession — the gradual wobble of Earth's axis — and it crossed from Leo into 0° Virgo around 2011-2012 (Robson recorded it at 28°51′ Leo for his 1923 epoch). Because it sits so near the ecliptic, the Moon regularly passes in front of it. In Arabic star catalogues it marks Qalb al-Asad, the "Heart of the Lion."
In Tradition
In Hellenistic, Arabic, and traditional Western fixed-star writing, Regulus is a royal, martial star — one of the four "Royal Stars" of Persia. It carries a Mars-Jupiter nature and themes of honor, leadership, prominence, and victory in conflict, with a long-standing warning that the rise it grants turns unstable if it comes with violence or pride. The Hermes Behenian doctrine — fifteen magically potent stars — ranks Regulus seventh, tied to easing anger, to temperance, and to rulers' favor.
In Practice
Astrologers judge Regulus by a tight conjunction or paran with the lights (the Sun and Moon), the personal planets, or the chart angles, with its zodiac position updated for precession. A conjunction within about one degree of a personal planet is read as a strong lift for whatever that planet governs, and a conjunction on an angle (the Ascendant or Midheaven) is read as conferring public prominence. In the Behenian talisman tradition, electional charts time the making of a Regulus talisman to a Moon-Regulus conjunction kept clear of the malefics — the difficult planets.
Historical Origin
Regulus is catalogued as a primary navigational and calendar star in the Babylonian Mul.Apin and in Ptolemy's star catalogue in the Almagest (2nd century CE). The Arabic name Qalb al-Asad is preserved in Al-Biruni's Kitāb al-Tafhīm (c. 1029). Regulus is the seventh Behenian fixed star in the medieval Latin Hermetic recension preserved as BM Bodleian MS. 52, with a talismanic prescription cited by Greer in his 2017 translation of the Hermes Fifteen Fixed Stars text.
Further Reading
- Vivian E. Robson, The Fixed Stars and Constellations in Astrology
- Bernadette Brady, Brady's Book of Fixed Stars
- Christopher Warnock, The Mansions of the Moon