The great debate
Like any school of thought that disrupts the status quo, astrology is no stranger to controversy. And we at CHANI would like to address the elephant – or snake bearer – in the room: Ophiuchus.
Aside from the fact that astrology is a powerful tool for self-discovery, it is a numbers game. There are twelve zodiac signs, which are evenly divided into four elements (fire, earth, air and water) and three modalities (cardinal, fixed and mutable). However, you may have heard of a “thirteenth sign” that could have sent your astrological identity into a tailspin.
It happens every year, like clockwork. There is a lull in the news cycle and the media is looking for stories to generate clicks. Hidden in their bag of tricks, the controversial ’13th sign’ article is a classic. This breaking news item claims that your sun sign may actually be fake, because there’s a new cosmic villain on the block: Ophiuchus. (Also known as the Snake Bearer.) You might as well make an appointment now for zodiac tattoo removal.
Spoiler alert: We at CHANI do that not work with 13 characters. But we understand how easy it is for such articles to sow doubt – and confusion. According to popular news sources, Ophiuchus is the long-lost part of the zodiac, sandwiched between Scorpio and Sagittarius. Because of this previously unnoticed piece of cosmic pie, the dates of the rest of the sun sign are being questioned. By this reasoning, Cancers born in mid-July could actually be Geminis. In mid-May, Tauruses are actually Aries. And if you were born between November 29 and December 17, a new existential crisis enters the fray. You are now a sign you didn’t even know existed: Ophiuchus, the Serpent Bearer, whose “passionate” nature and “thirst for knowledge” (according to dictionary.com) make it sound like he is the love child of Scorpio and Sagittarius. This snake charmer was supposedly left to languish in the lands of rejected constellations. Banned. Written out of the system. Its existence poses an uncomfortable truth to astrologers around the world.
At least that’s what these debunkers would have us believe.
Introducing… the ecliptic
Before we break down what these articles get wrong (and right), let’s get some Astro 101 straight. To understand why a sign like Ophiuchus invades the zodiac, we need to talk about the 360° celestial band known as the ecliptic. .
The ecliptic is what we call the sun’s path in the sky from our perspective on Earth. We have constellations all over the night sky – from the Big Dipper to Casseopoeia to Orion. But what makes the constellations constellations is that they are located along the track that the sun takes from our view of Earth. Traditional astrology focuses only on the constellations that span this celestial path, such as the strip of images that revolve in a zoetrope.
Something these articles misunderstand is that the signs have never been precisely mapped onto the constellations that span the ecliptic. The star signs – for example Capricorn, Scorpio, Libra, etc. — are arrangements of stars that consist of different sizes. The characters are symbolic representations of those constellations, and each spans 30 degrees of the celestial longitude of the ecliptic. Furthermore, the constellations no longer adhere to the placement of the constellations in the sky – at least not in the tropical zodiac, which many of us in North America use. This is due to the astronomical phenomenon of precession, in which the so-called “fixed” stars deviate one degree every 72 years. Just to make things even more confusing.
Ancient astrologers knew about precession – that’s why they started the zodiac on a day when the hours of night always equal the hours of day. (That way, wherever you are in the world and whenever you are in history, you have a starting point that never changes.) This day is known as the equinox. There are technically two equinoxes per year, but Babylonian astrologers started the zodiac on the zodiac that follows winter in the Northern Hemisphere: the vernal equinoxwhich corresponds to the beginning of Aries season.
The first astrologers also knew about Ophiuchus. They simply made the decision not to include this constellation in their system. Why? Because even though the snake’s tail touches the ecliptic, most of the constellation looms outside this patch of sky.
A symbolic order
Astrology is an excellently ordered system. The astrologers of ancient Babylon chose to work with 12 instead of 13 signs because this corresponded to the 12-month calendar in their solar year. Twelve is also a powerful number to work with conceptually because it can easily be divided into other numbers, such as the four drawing elements and three drawing modalities we mentioned earlier. The number 12 also works seamlessly with the traditional planets – as the celestial bodies (the Sun and Moon) each rule one sign, while Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn each rule two. The symmetry and elegance of this system are part of what laid the foundation for Hellenistic astrology, which we still use today.
It should be noted that there are still astrological traditions that use a constellation rather than a tropical zodiac. For example, Vedic astrology, which originated in India, bases its system on the stars spanning the ecliptic and takes into account the slow drift of the fixed stars. But Ophiuchus is not one of them either.
Just as there are multiple house systems in astrology, no one tradition is better or worse than another. They are simply different lenses through which to organize our world into patterns, stories, and archetypes.
The Ophiuchus debate will likely continue as long as there are clicks to ride. But now you can present your informed rebuttal to the 13th sign observers and reassure your friends that their sun sign is safe. And also their centaur tattoo.
Looking for more information? Read your daily horoscope:
Ram | Taurus | Twin | Cancer | Lion | Virgin | Scale
Scorpion | Archer | Ibex | Aquarius | Fishing
Then download the CHANI app iOS or Android for additional horoscopes, meditations, affirmations, readings for the current moon phase and sign, and more.
