From Here to There

An Astrologer's Guide to Astromapping

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• Publisher: The Wessex Astrologer
• Year: 2008
• Print ISBN: 9781902405278
• eBook ISBN: 9781910531129

Davis shows how locations of significance and global hotspots can be identified astrologically, bringing the influence of space (where something may happen) into the usual astrological focus on time (when something may happen). This is a critical enlargement of astrological perspective for today's needs, were an understanding of influences around the globe is critical for our very well being

1

History

The Beginning

What we know today as Locality Astrology started with the yearning of astrologers over the centuries to associate terrestrial location with the qualities of zodiacal signs. The first known efforts at this can be traced back to Babylonian and Assyrian tablets.¹

The first known classical attempt, ascribing zodiacal rulerships to nations, is found in Marcus Manilius’ work, Astronomica, written around the beginning of the Christian era. An early attempt that survives was by Claudius Ptolemy in the first to second centuries AD and published in his work Tetrabiblos.² Muslim astrologers of the ninth to twelfth centuries added to these attempts, most notably Al Biruni, writing in 1029. Medieval astrologers followed, most borrowing heavily from the work of Ptolemy. Of note was the work of William Lilly who published in 1647. Further lists were produced by Raphael, Green, Sepharial and Charles Carter, each adding their insights to the correlation of zodiacal qualities with locations on Earth.

Early Influences

In the early twentieth century, works appear that, in hindsight, can be seen as inspirations for the mapping techniques that would follow. For example, there is Sepharial’s work, The Geodetic Equivalent, published c.1924, and Edward Johndro’s book, The Earth in the Heavens, published in 1929, which was about calculating and using “ruling degrees of cities”. In the introduction to his work, Johndro writes about investigating “the important problem of aiding the individual to find his place in the world”, and he concludes, “who among professional astrologers and students has not felt the need of coordinating the heavens and the earth?”

The First Maps³

The earliest locality maps that we would recognise as such were astronomical diagrams of eclipse paths over the Earth. Appearing in astrological magazines, it is possible that Charles Jayne⁴ published the first one in 1941.⁵

• In 1957-58, Donald Bradley, in American Astrology Digest, published a hand-plotted map showing the rising, setting and culminating lines of all the planets over the entire world for the 1958 sidereal⁶ ingress of the Sun into Capricorn. His transformation of this mundane⁷ chart into a world map was probably a first.

• In July 1962, Roy Firebrace, first president of the British Astrological Association and editor of Spica, the British siderealist journal, also published a hand-plotted map, this time of the Sun’s ingress into sidereal Cancer. Though not a first, this further demonstrated the usefulness of astromaps in mundane studies.

• In 1966, a computerised astromap created by programmer Gary Duncan was published in the Llewellyn Annual for that year. It was the first computer-generated map ever published. Again, the map was of a mundane (worldly) moment, affecting large numbers of people.

• Also in 1966, Cyril Fagan (a siderealist) writing in his Solunars column of American Astrology magazine described the mathematics and interpretive methods that were to become so important in Astro*Carto*Graphy. Though he didn’t include an actual map, he spoke of the case study of a young woman who could improve her life by moving to locations where benefic rather than malefic planets were angular.

The Stage is Set: Jim Lewis

In 1969 Jim Lewis comes into this narrative. His work was to become a key contribution to astromapping. That year Lewis joined the Personal Service department of American Astrology. There, he became acquainted with the mundane work of Bradley and Fagan, and especially their emphasis on the importance of angularity in charts and maps.⁸

The Big Leap

At this point, the big leap occurred in the development of astromapping techniques. Jim Lewis recognised and seized upon the potential of astromapping as the best tool to use in his consultations. He began offering natal A*C*G maps to his clients, arduously drawing each one by hand.

Along with this, and as a necessity of his consulting service, Lewis developed a complete interpretive system, using both the natures of planetary energies themselves and feedback from his clients on their relocating experiences.

Though Lewis was not the inventor of the mapping approach, he was certainly the first to develop a complete system of interpretation for it, transforming a natal chart into a world map of rising, setting culminating and anti-culminating lines. This had not been done before in natal astrology. It was a true first.

In my book, Astrolocality Astrology,⁹ I note that his work brings space into our usual time-oriented astrological perspective, thereby better matching the modern view of existence as a space-time continuum. I also point out that his system strengthens astrology itself, emphatically showing us the connection of planetary energies and influences directly upon the earth, where we live and roam.

A*C*G Introduced to the Public

• In 1975, Lewis approached Gregg Howe of Astro Numeric Service (ANS)¹⁰ “to automate the production of A*C*G maps”. ANS successfully employed a breakthrough combination of hardware and software (especially for the computers of the time) to create plotted A*C*G maps. With this setup there was now a precise map, at an affordable price, ready to offer to the wider public.

• In 1976 Lewis published a 44-page booklet entitled Astro*Carto*Graphy. The booklet was “dedicated to the astrologers who pioneered understanding of planetary influence, and particularly to the late Donald A. Bradley”. It introduced the Astro*Carto*Graphy name itself, suggested how to use the map, defined the planetary symbols used, gave the general meanings for each of the four angular positions, and most importantly, it contained interpretations for each planet at its angular positions. The booklet finished up with interpretive text for planetary crossings – which he later referred to as Parans.¹¹ The interpretative texts were written with such insight that even today, decades later, they remain among the best available. It was this package of map and booklet that Lewis offered to the astrological community.¹² It was, and still may be, the single most revolutionary development in modern astrology.

• In 1978, Jim Lewis received the Mark Edmund Jones award for his work on A*C*G.

• In 1979, at the suggestion of the late, eminent British astrologer, Charles Harvey, Lewis published his first Sourcebook of Mundane Maps. This was to become an annual publication for the year ahead, which included the coming year’s four ingresses, New and Full Moons and solar and lunar eclipses. Harvey called it a “totally indispensable publication”.¹³

The Stage is Set: Michael Erlewine

In the early 1970’s another astrologer, Michael Erlewine, began to investigate the spatial side of things to see how it could be brought into astrological practice. Erlewine, who is also a musician, computer programmer and businessman, was influenced by the ‘whole system’ writing of Edward Johndro and by his mentor, Charles Jayne. Together, their view was that the three great co-ordinate systems comprising our natal charts, i.e., Ecliptic, Horizon and Equatorial, be studied separately as different reality views.¹⁴ Jayne also felt the Horizon system was so important that it should be studied around its entire plane and not just at the points that intersect the Ecliptic to give us the ascendant and descendant of our natal charts.¹⁵

Initially spurred on by the desire to better understand house systems, Erlewine began working with sky maps. Laying out his natal horizon system on an equatorial star map allowed him to identify the chart’s sensitive points (e.g., house cusps, ascendant, descendant, vertex etc., as well as the planets) etched in the sky. As the result of what he called “a grace”, Erlewine came to see that the sky map was a reflection of the map of the earth – or vice versa. He observed “that heaven and earth are interchangeable, or in the last analysis one living entity – a single whole”.

Further natal investigations utilizing the Horizon co-ordinate system with both the earth and sky perspectives led him to what he called the Local Space chart, “where every object in the universe, celestial and mundane, has an equal and valid position.”¹⁶ Erlewine’s first steps in Local Space (LS) were similar to Lewis’ in as much as they both had to rely on hand drawn maps. In an email to me, Erlewine writes, “I originally was doing Local Space lines on a hand-held calculator. It could take me an entire day to plot the basics of a LS map that can be now done in seconds. I don’t think folks have any idea of what it was like to have none of these tools. [For example] I had to design and print my own heliocentric ephemeris in order to study that.” Here’s a timeline of some of these developments:

• 1975 – Michael Erlewine published The Sun Is Shining: Helio Ephemeris 1653-2050. This is astrology’s first ephemeris from a Sun-centred perspective.

• 1977 – Astrophysical Directions was published. This book, co-authored by Michael and Margaret Erlewine, introduced astrologers to the major co-ordinate systems used in astrology. It is a detailed catalogue of deep space objects of all kinds, and it delineates the methods for astrologers to plot their natal charts on sky maps. To this day, it is the only work of its kind.

The First Astrology Programs for Personal Computers

• In 1977, Michael Erlewine released the first astrology programs for personal computers¹⁷ (including one for LS). Thus, we can say that in 1977 a new era in astrology had begun. Initially loaded from cassette tapes (and later floppy dis...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1 History
• 2 The Astro*Carto*Graphy Book of Maps
• 3 The Uses of Astromapping in Astrology Martin Davis
• 4 Relocation can be a Career Move Robert Currey
• 5 My Summer Vacation Maya White
• 6 Between Heaven and Earth: The Influence of Astrology on Earth
• 7 Reincarnation in Local Space & A*C*G Maps
• 8 Looking at the World Geodetically Chris McRae
• 9 Would Relocation Change Your Life?
• 10 Jyotish Locality Dennis Flaherty
• 11 A Locality Tale Kathryn Cassidy
• 12 The Stars and Stripes
• 13 The Solar Return Astro*Carto*Graphy Map
• 14 The Business of Place and The Place of Business
• 15 Locality and the Question of the USA Birth Chart
• 16 A History Lesson: The A*C*G, Geodetics and Local Space of the George W Bush Presidency
• Index
• Other books by The Wessex Astrologer