50 Fun Facts About Zodiac

The word 'zodiac' comes from a Greek word meaning what?

Zōidion is the diminutive of zōion, animal, reflecting how many signs are beasts or hybrids.

Into how many equal signs is the zodiac divided along the ecliptic?

Each occupies 30° of celestial longitude; the Babylonians set it up by analogy to twelve 30-day months.

The zodiac and its 360-degree measurement originated with which ancient civilisation?

It reached Greek astronomy by the 2nd century BC via Eudoxus and later shaped the Hindu zodiac.

What is the ecliptic?

The zodiac is the band about 8° either side of it, where the planets also travel.

Because of precession, the March equinox point has moved from Aries into which constellation?

It shifts about one degree every 72 years, a full circle in roughly 26,000 years; Hipparchus is credited with discovering it.

Which star catalogue, compiled around 1000 BC in Mesopotamia, did the zodiac draw on?

Some constellations go back further still: Gemini was already 'The Great Twins'.

Which 2nd-century work by Ptolemy laid the basis of Western astrology?

The Almagest was his astronomy; the Tetrabiblos, 'four books', is its astrological companion.

The Dendera zodiac, the first known depiction of the twelve signs, comes from which country?

Horoscopic astrology itself first appeared in Ptolemaic Egypt.

Which is the first sign of the zodiac?

The Sun enters it at the March equinox, typically March 21; it is a cardinal fire sign ruled by Mars.

What animal represents Aries?

The Latin ariēs simply means ram; the Hindu equivalent is Meṣa.

Which planet rules the second sign, the bull?

Taurus is a fixed earth sign ruled by Venus; the Moon is said to be exalted there at exactly 3°.

Which three signs make up the earth element?

Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces are water; Aries, Leo and Sagittarius fire; Gemini, Libra and Aquarius air.

Gemini is represented by which mythological twins?

The Dioscuri; the Babylonians already called the two stars the Great Twins.

What is the ruling 'planet' of the fourth sign, the crab?

It is the cardinal water sign, most often drawn as a crab, though lobsters, crayfish and even turtles have appeared.

In Greek myth, Zeus placed Leo in the sky to commemorate which of Heracles' labours?

Egyptians called the constellation Knem and worshipped it because it rose during the Nile flood.

Virgo is associated with which figure from Greek mythology?

The last immortal to abandon Earth at the end of the Silver Age.

Which is the only zodiac sign represented by an inanimate object?

The scales belong to Themis, Greek personification of sacred law; Libra shares Venus with Taurus.

According to Greek myth, why does the constellation Orion set just as Scorpius rises?

Orion was killed by the scorpion, so the two are never in the sky together; Scorpio is a fixed water sign.

Which sign completes the fire trigon with Aries and Leo?

The archer is also the fourth mutable sign, after Pisces, Gemini and Virgo.

Capricorn is ruled by which planet?

In India the Sun's entry into Capricorn is celebrated as Makara Sankranti in mid-January.

What is the opposite sign of Aquarius?

Aquarius is ruled by Saturn in traditional astrology and Uranus in modern astrology.

Which figure from Greek myth did the Aquarius water carrier come to represent?

To the Sumerians and Babylonians the figure was originally the god Enki.

The astrological symbol for the twelfth sign shows two fish joined by what?

Pisces's fish are, in classical interpretation, the ichthyocentaurs who helped Aphrodite when she was born from the sea.

Which sign is twelfth and last in the zodiac?

It spans 330° to 360°, with the Sun passing through from about February 19 to March 20.

Which constellation has been proposed as a '13th sign' of the zodiac?

Steven Schmidt proposed it in 1970 in a 14-sign zodiac that also added Cetus; the Sun sits in front of it from about November 29 to December 18.

Which body did Schmidt and Berg suggest as the ruler of their proposed 13th sign?

The 13-sign idea took off in Japan in the 1990s via Walter Berg and Mark Yazaki.

What does it mean to be 'on the cusp' in astrology?

The solar disc is about half a degree wide, so it can genuinely sit across the boundary at the moment of birth.

How long is an astrological 'age', such as the Age of Aquarius, said to last?

One 25,920-year precession cycle divided by twelve; the Age of Aquarius follows the Age of Pisces.

The Chinese zodiac assigns an animal to each what?

It repeats every twelve years, combined with ten Heavenly Stems into a 60-year cycle.

Which animal traditionally comes first in the Chinese zodiac?

Legend says it won the Jade Emperor's race, then Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog and Pig.

In legend, who held the race that decided the order of the Chinese zodiac animals?

Historians think the animals were actually attached later to the twelve Earthly Branches of the sexagenary cycle.

How long is the full Chinese cycle that combines the twelve Earthly Branches with the ten Heavenly Stems?

A person born in the year of the Tiger is 12, 24 or 36 in the next Tiger year.

Which animal replaces the Rabbit in the Vietnamese zodiac?

The Water Buffalo also stands in for the Ox; one theory is that the old word for rabbit, mao, sounded like cat, meo.

Which British astrologer's 1930 horoscope for the newborn Princess Margaret launched the sun-sign column?

The Sunday Express had asked Cheiro, who was unavailable, so his assistant Naylor wrote 'What The Stars Foretell For The New Princess' and a regular column followed.

The word 'horoscope' comes from Greek words meaning what?

Hōra plus skopos, the marker of the hour; a full chart maps every planet, not just the Sun sign.

Sun-sign astrology, as found in newspapers, considers only what fraction of a full birth chart?

It uses just the sign of the Sun on the birth date.

Which Roman writer's critique of astrology is called the first working definition of pseudoscience?

In De Divinatione; Cato had earlier warned farm overseers against consulting Chaldean star-gazers.

Antares, the brightest star of Scorpius, is often called what?

Its name means 'rival of Ares' because of its reddish colour; the tail-tip stars Shaula and Lesath both mean 'sting'.

The Pleiades star cluster sits in which zodiac constellation?

Also called the Seven Sisters and Messier 45, it is about 444 light-years away and holds more than 1,000 stars.

Regulus is the brightest star in which zodiac constellation?

Its name means 'little king'.

Roughly how long does one full cycle of Earth's axial precession take?

About one degree every 72 years, which is why the 'first point of Aries' now lies in Pisces.

Who is usually credited in the West with discovering the precession of the equinoxes?

He worked in the 2nd century BC.

What is Hindu astrology traditionally called?

It is one of the six auxiliary disciplines connected with study of the Vedas, and it uses a sidereal zodiac.

Under the tropical zodiac, the Sun is in Leo during roughly which dates?

Leo is the fifth sign, spanning 120° to 150° of celestial longitude.

Which sign spans 90° to 120° of celestial longitude, roughly June 22 to July 23?

It is the fourth sign, and its symbol is usually the crab Karkinos.

Which sign is the cardinal air sign?

Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn are the four cardinal signs, each opening a season.

Which sign is the third of the fixed signs, after the bull and the lion?

Aquarius is the fourth; fixed signs sit in the middle of each season.

Which Hindu festival marks the Sun entering Capricorn each January?

It falls on January 13, 14 or 15; Makara is the Sanskrit name of the sign.

Which sign spans the first 30 degrees of celestial longitude?

The Sun enters it at the March equinox each year.

Which philosopher's falsifiability criterion is used to classify astrology as pseudoscience?

The scientific community holds that astrology has no explanatory power for describing the universe.