Question of Signification

1
I don't follow sports, I'm not at all sporty.

However, on another forum, the question came up about an iminent baseball game between the San Francisco Giants and the Texas Rangers.

Having read some discussion about gaming charts, the consensus seemed to be to use the first house as representing the home team.

My question is: Why?
I can see why it would make sense to use the ascendant as the home team in a horary question such as "will our team beat theirs", you would use 'our team' as being the first house and the opponent as being the 7th.

However, I had read an article by Bernadette Brady where she examined Bonatti's method of analysing the charts of conflicts and battles where two armies would meet one another on a field and do battle. Sport is a modern day equivalent. According to Bonatti (as per her understanding), the home team is given to Lord 7 (from what I can make out) and the attacking team is Lord1.

http://www.bernadettebrady.com/Pdfs/Cha ... 0Brady.pdf

She says of field battles:
"The first type of conflict we define as a field battle and is applicable to any
battle where two teams or individuals meet and engage in conflict, with neither party having the advantage of ownership or holding the object that is being fought over."

"This type of conflict is the most common, covering everything from domestic arguments to the majority of sporting events where there are two sides or teams striving to win a game."

Signification is determined as follows:
"The ruler of the 1st house is the challenger; the ruler of the 7th receives the challenge. We are, of course, using old rulerships."

So that being the case, my understanding is that 7th house team is the one who receives the challenge and responds to the threat given by the 1st house team. Well if that's so, then surely the 7th house is more relevant to the home team who respond to the threat from a 'foreign' team who travelled there to do battle with them.

If that wasn't clear though, Brady also describes how Bonatti studied the charts of castle besiegement.

"Instead of looking at the rulers of the 1st and 7th houses, as in a field battle, we examine the rulers of the 1st and 4th. The 1st house is the army attacking the castle; the 4th house is the castle itself. The army in the castle is the 7th house."

Again, this suggests that the army that is at home is the 7th house whilst the army that is doing the attacking (the 'foreign' army) is the 1st house.

Isn't this the total opposite of what modern sports astrologers say today?!

So where did it go wrong?

My only theory is that this is a confusion from horary. In horary you might well ask of your national team "Will my team beat theirs", of course you would therefore apply the 1st house to YOUR home team. But in an electional/sports chart there is no concept of 'my' team being the first house, cos both teams would claim ownership of it. I think that confusion has seeped in here with astrologers recognising that they used the 1st for their own home team when they did horary and applying the same rules in the sports chart, when clearly the older traditional sources such as bonatti looked at it differently.

Interested in hearing what people have to say about it.

2
I literally have no interest in sport, but do have interest in astrology.
I can't really test this theory properly as I don't have enough sport charts to study.

Just took one at random from this forum:
http://skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5654

PallasAthene says:
"ARSENAL (UK) v SPORTING BRAGGA (Portugal)
Kick off 15 Sept 2010 19:45 London, UK
..Arsenal are fav as well as home team, so far so good."

"Mars is very strong by dignity but in the 7th house. "

If you look at how the classical astrologers examined battles, then, if I'm understanding it right, having your significator in your oponenets house is TERRIBLE. It almost certainly indicates that they are in control and that the opponent will almost certainly win. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this as, as I say, I'm no sports astrologer. So if this was the case then we have a strong team, Mars in domicile in Scorpio, but who will ultimately lose as they are in the house of their enemies. That would mean that the losing team will play well but will ultimately lose and that the losing team is the first house.

Who won? Arsenal:
"was looking better at half time : ) but at least Arsenal won. "

I don't know anything about this game but it seems that if we follow the logic that your significator in your opponent's house indicates that you will lose then we certainly cannot apply Lord 1 for Arsenal. If however, as per Bonatti, we apply Lord SEVEN for the home team, then the home team will win because their opponent is sitting under their control in their house such as we have here. Despite their opponent being a good team (domicile) they still lost. From what PallasAthene said here (but at least Arsenal won), it sounds like it wasn't a 'walk over' and that the other team put up a good fight as you woud expect from a dignified team.

3
Hello Paul and welcome to the sports forum :)

It probably won't come as a surprise to you that this issue has been discussed several times in the past. There are many methods and techniques used by astrologers making sports predictions and none of these has proven 100% accurate.

I don't have much time at the moment but I'd just like to make the point that there is no 'right' or 'wrong' method. After trying different methods, I think people probably choose the one that makes most sense to them, that they feel comfortable working with and (most importantly in my view) that they enjoy working with.

Good luck!

(BTW Arsenal beat Sporting Braga 6-0!)

4
Thanks Ficina

When I get a bit more time I'll have a good look through the archives and see what I can find! I've seen a lot of people use Lord 1 as the home team but haven't seen anyone use Lord 7 which is why I brought it up!

5
I seem to recall the Bonatti/Brady battle method being discussed in theory but I don't remember anyone actually using the Desc to signify the home team in practice. Perhaps if anyone does use this method, they will pop up and say so.

I don't think giving the Asc to the home team has anything to do with horary's 'us versus them'. Put simply, the event chart is set up for the home team's location; the Asc is derived from this calculation; ergo the home team gets the Asc because it's 'their place'.

Another argument that has been mentioned in the past is that the Asc is the strongest point in the chart and the home team is considered to be the strongest team because playing on their own ground is an advantage. Of course this argument is equally valid for giving the Asc to the favourite. Yet another method!

As I said, it all comes down to personal choice. Why not give it a go using the Desc to signify the home team and see how you get on? It's quite likely that different methods will produce the same prediction anyway. Many roads lead to Rome. :)

6
Thanks Ficina

I was just wondering if there was a historical basis for using the 1st house as the home team. Are there any examples of Lily, Bonatti, Sahl etc as using the 1st House as the home team in any battle or sporting match?

If not, I'm just wondering how it came about. When I read the brady/bonatti article I just came away thinking that it must be clear that you use the 7th as the home team so didn't understand why people use the 1st. Your suggestion about the home team being 'powerful' and therefore the 1st makes a lot of sense too. Just wondering if it was used by classical astrologers.

7
Paul wrote:... it must be clear that you use the 7th as the home team so didn't understand why people use the 1st
As for me, home team 1st, away team 7th makes much more sense than the other way around.

But if there's a - more or less - working method in which you give the home team the DSC, I would be happy to use it. :)

BTW, many people assign the ASC/DSC according to the team colors. In these cases you can see many home teams assigned to the 7th.

Personally I'm not happy with the assignment based on colors and I always give the home team the ASC - if there is a home team (the match is not played on a neutral ground).

8
Thanks Taurean

In terms of a working method, well, if we are to believe Bonatti, then it is a working method. At least for armies engaging in a field battle. I'm actually reading Bonatti's work and have just come across something similar (finally) myself, but in this case it is to do with horary rather than a mundane event. But brady's article was my introduction to the concept.

"As for me, home team 1st, away team 7th makes much more sense than the other way around. "

But do you know of any traditional source which does this? I'm just trying to figure out where it came from, was it just an assumption that everyone gravitated towards (unlikely) or an author whether traditional or modern who suggested it (more likely).

I dabbled a bit with sport astrology during the world cup a few months back which obviously didn't have any home teams (by and large) and so used the approach of choosing which house described the team better, not just colours, but names as well.

9
I was just wondering if there was a historical basis for using the 1st house as the home team. Are there any examples of Lily, Bonatti, Sahl etc as using the 1st House as the home team in any battle or sporting match?
I don't know. This type of question is probably best addressed to the Skyscript historians and book-collectors. (I doubt they read this particular forum!) My guess is that the use of astrology for team sports is relatively recent.

Using the battle analogy is Bernadette Brady's personal choice and perhaps she's the only one who uses this approach. Her reasoning for giving the away team the Asc could be seen as faulty. Rather than being challengers, the away team are described as visitors and as for them posing a threat, it's they who are more likely to feel threatened. They are playing on a ground that is unfamiliar to them, surrounded by thousands of fans, the majority of whom are cheering for the home team. The Desc would appear to be far more appropriate for the away team.

10
That's true Ficina, however, it's worth remembering that that same logic would also apply to 'visiting' armies who are more likely to be out of their depth fighting at the location of their enemies, and yet, in just such situations, the attacking/visiting army are still given the first house and the home army are given the 7th. The only thing that's changed from Bonatti to modern sports is the use of the word 'team' rather than the word 'army'.

Would be really interesting to understand more of the history of this and see from where using the first house for the home team emerged or if it was just something that was universally presumed to be true when astrology began to grow in popularity.

I also find his (Bonatti's) use of the superior and inferior planets quite interesting. Put simply he suggests that Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are naturally more likely to win in a battle than the inferior planets. In fact, despite what you might think otherwise, he even goes as far as to all but dimiss the essential dignity involved though concedes that a well dignified inferior is probably better than a weakened superior. However it's almost more an after thought than anything. Again, going against the logic you might have expected, he even suggests that a superior planet is so much more powerful that even if it were placed in a cadent house, it would still likely trump any inferior planet in an angle. If however an inferior planet is angular and is being received by a different superior, especially if that superior planet is also angular, then it is likely that the inferior planet is the one that would win.

I just think it's fascinating considering NOBODY seems to use those rules. Is that because nobody was aware of them? Or because they don't work? I might check some of the old charts in the forum and see if it seems to have efficacy in it. Any new charts that people post here I'll try and apply it too and we can see if it works or not, and if not, just drop it and we'll have our answer: Nobody uses it cos they realised it didn't actually work!

11
Hi Paul,

I think you're right about using house 1 for the visiting army, but there are differences between sports and war. In sports the home team are responsible for preparing the ground, stadium, security, etc., and if they fail to do so, they'll lose the match (or won't be allowed to host another game). So it's the home team that actually 'starts the show'. I think house 1 for the home team makes sense.

In war the visiting army determines the time and place of action simply by showing up. In sports the home team invites the visiting team and determines when and where to play.

socrates

12
Paul wrote:Any new charts that people post here I'll try and apply it too and we can see if it works or not
That's great that you want to test out the method and also apply the superior/inferior planets idea (which sounds intriguing). :'

May I suggest the ManU/Spurs game tomorrow? It has an interesting chart with L1 partile conjunct the Desc. I won't say more yet until you (and hopefully others?) have had a chance to look at it. Here are the details:

Man Utd v Spurs
30 October 2010
5.30pm BST at Old Trafford, Manchester
Asc 4?35' Taurus; MC 12?58' Capricorn; Hour-ruler Venus
Odds: 1.62, 4.20, 6.00

It will be interesting to see whether different methods produce the same prediction.