The origins of western astrology can be traced back about 4,000 years to ancient Mesopotamia, a geographical area that roughly coincides with what is now modern-day Iraq.' Around this time, people began recording observations about correlations between celestial movements and earthly events. These observations were usually recorded as simple celestial omens in the form of conditional statements that followed the formula "if x, then y." A hypothetical celestial omen might read: "if there is an eclipse, then the king will die."2 In contemporary discussions, the first part of the statement is referred to as the protasis, while the second part is called the apodosis. The Mesopotamian astrologers began recording hundreds of these types of omens on tiny clay tablets, using the wedge-shaped script called cuneiform. Many of the earliestsurviving omens that were collected are lunar eclipse omens that date to the Old Babylonian period (2000-1600 BCE).3 Eventually, large libraries of celestial omens were amassed, and the astrologers began standardizing their collections by creating compilations, the most popular of which was known as the Entitma Anu Enlil.4
Despite the formulaic nature of the astrological omens, the astrologers themselves did not necessarily think that there was a direct causal connection between celestial and earthly events. Instead, the celestial omens acted as signs or indications of the future that were sent by the gods, and not as causes of the events that they correlated with.' The stars in particular were seen as a sort of "heavenly writing" that was inscribed across the sky. Naturally, as Rochberg points out, "the notion of the stars as a heavenly script implies their capacity to be read and interpreted."6 Thus, in the earliest Babylonian strata of the astrological tradition, astrology was seen to be a type of language. For many Mesopotamian cultures, it became one of the languages through which the gods communicated their intentions to humankind.'
At this time, the type of astrology that was practiced in Mesopotamia was limited to what modern astrologers refer to as "mundane astrology," which is a branch of astrology that deals with large groups of people such as cities and nations. The astrological omens were interpreted as messages that pertained to the state as a whole, or sometimes to the king as the earthly representative of the state. This connection with national affairs made astrology a state-supported activity, and eventually groups of astrologers would come to operate under the patronage of the king. Astrology and astronomy were intertwined at this time, and astrologers assumed both the duties of observers as well as interpreters of the stars.
One of the most well-documented high points for Mesopotamian, state-supported astrology appears to have occurred in the seventh century BCE under the Neo-Assyrian Empire.' By this point there were at least ten different "colleges" of astrologers located in different cities around Mesopotamia.9 These colleges of astrologers consisted of an elite class of literate scholars who served the kings directly by regularly sending them letters and reports regarding their astronomical observations and astrological predictions. We know the most about the Neo-Assyrian period because of the survival of these letters and reports between the astrologers and the kings Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal, whose dynasty occupied Babylon from 721-609 BCE.10 One of the side effects of the development of astrology was that it provided the Mesopotamians with an impetus to develop a more complex mathematical astronomy. Originally astrology was based entirely on observable phenomena such as an eclipse of the Sun, or a halo around the Moon, partially because the Mesopotamians lacked the ability to calculate where the planets would be in the future or where they had been in the past. However, centuries of observing the skies eventually led to the identification of some celestial movements as cyclical and periodic, just like the monthly cycle of the Moon or the yearly cycle of the Sun. This led to the development of complex mathematical models for determining the positions of the planets in astronomy, which in turn allowed for the development of more complicated astrological techniques and doctrines." In the eighth century BCE, the Mesopotamian astrologer-astronomers began a scientific program of meticulously observing the visible planets and recording their locations on a daily basis.12 These records are generally referred to today as the Astronomical Diaries, or simply as the Diaries!' They would eventually be used as a sort of reference bank for astrologers in the following centuries. Several important developments occurred in the history of astrology over the next few centuries. First, there was the ascent of the Achaemenid Persian Empire in the sixth century BCE, which at its height spanned from the Mediterranean across the Middle East, as far as the westernmost portions of India. The astronomical programs that were initiated during earlier civilizations such as the Diaries continued, although some decentralization of astrology seems to have occurred during this time, perhaps indicating that the astrologers did not enjoy the same level of support under the Persian kings that they had under the previous rulers.
By the fifth century BCE, the zodiac became standardized to consist of twelve signs that were exactly thirty degrees in length each." Prior to this time, the zodiac was uneven because the zodiacal constellations that fall on the ecliptic have different sizes, with some being very large (e.g. Virgo) and others being relatively small (e.g. Cancer). While the Mesopotamians do not appear to have associated many of the qualities with the zodiacal signs that later became common, such as gender, element, or planetary rulership, this standardization of the spaces occupied by the signs in the fifth century was an important step because it was a necessary precursor for the later introduction of those concepts.
The fifth century was also a pivotal turning point because the concept of natal astrology appears to have been introduced around this time. The earliest surviving birth charts date to the year 410 BCE.15 At the present time there are a total of twenty-eight known birth charts that survived from the Mesopotamian tradition.16 None of these charts are particularly elaborate; they primarily list which sign of the zodiac each of the seven traditional planets were located in on the day of the native's birth, and there is very little technical or interpretive information accompanying them. What these charts make clear, though, is that by this time astrologers had taken the earlier idea that celestial phenomena could provide omens for the state as a whole, and began applying this concept to individuals by looking at the alignment of the planets on the day that they were born.
The development of natal astrology was connected to and complemented by the introduction of the ancient equivalent of ephemerides around the same time frame." Astrologers no longer had to personally observe the sky in order to know where the planets were on a certain date; instead they could look up in these prepared texts where the planets were in the past, or where they would be in the future. This is crucial for the practice of natal astrology because it would then allow astrologers to calculate a person's birth chart simply by knowing the date they were born. While the observational components of astrology continued in some form for many centuries, it was at this point that astrology and astronomy slowly began to diverge, since astrologers acquired the ability to do much of their work without directly witnessing the stars themselves.
After the fifth century BCE, we know that astrology in Mesopotamia continued to become more advanced, and a number of new technical concepts were introduced, although our understanding of the full scope of astrological practice during this period is limited due to a lack of surviving sources. As in modern times, most astrological consultations probably would have been conducted verbally, and thus the surviving Mesopotamian birth charts provide us with very little information about how they were interpreted. Nonetheless, we do know that by this time the astrologers had begun distinguishing between two groups of planets that were thought to provide positive or negative indications, which anticipated the later Hellenistic distinction between "benefic" and "malefic" planets.' We also know that they started grouping the twelve signs of the zodiac into four sets of three, which seems to be a precursor to the later Hellenistic concept of grouping the signs into "triplicities" or "triangles," although at this stage they do not seem to have associated the signs with the four elements of Greek philosophy (fire, earth, air, water).19
There are also some glimpses of interpretive principles surrounding the signs of the zodiac and the planets in natal astrology, preserved in fragmentary form from what must have been a late Mesopotamian manual on the subject, referred to by scholars as TCL 6 14.20 Some of the delineations associated with the planets are particularly interesting:
If a child is born when the moon has come forth, (then his life? will be) bright, excellent, regular, and long. [...] If a child is born when Jupiter has come forth, (then his life? will be) regular, well; he will become rich, he will grow old, (his) day(s) will be long. If a child is born when Venus has come forth, (then his life? will be) exceptionally(?) calm; wherever he may go, it will be favorable; (his) days will be long. If a child is born when Mars has come forth, (then) ......, hot(?) temper(?). [...]
If a child is born when Saturn has come forth, (then his life? will be) dark, obscure, sick, and constrained."
Campion points out that these delineations represent some of the earliest statements connecting a person's psychological disposition with the alignment of the planets on the day of their birth, and he notes that several of the characteristics are consistent with ones mentioned by later Hellenistic astrologers such as Ptolemy.22 Later on, the same text gives some delineations that involve two planets at the same time:
If a child is born when Venus comes forth and Jupiter (had?) set, his wife will be stronger than he. If a child is born when Venus comes forth and Saturn (had?) set, his oldest son will die. If a child is born when Venus comes forth and Mars (had?) set, he will capture his personal enemy.23
The text goes on to list other combinations of planets or fixed stars rising before it breaks off at the end.
What we are left with, then, is an astrology that was still relatively basic, at least compared to some of the later traditions, but which was growing more complex as time went on. The primary contributions the Mesopotamians made to the later astrological traditions were the introduction of the zodiac, the invention of natal astrology, and the development of a complex mathematical astronomy that was capable of determining the positions of the planets in the past and future.
A tradition of astrology was also developing in ancient Egypt during the same period in which the Mesopotamian tradition was forming. Although initiallydeveloped independently, the two traditions would eventually begin to coalesce sometime around the middle of the first millennium BCE.
Notes
1 While the term "Babylonian" is sometimes used interchangeably in some astrological and academic texts to refer to the people who lived in Mesopotamia, or to refer to the traditions of astrology that originated in that region (e.g. "Babylonian astrology"), this can be misleading since several different cultures and empires were in control of this area during the period under consideration. Between the third and first millennium BCE the area was incorporated into the Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Neo-Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, Achaemenid, Seleucid, and Parthian empires. For the sake of simplicity, I will use the generic term "Mesopotamian" here to refer to this astrological tradition, while occasionally specifying specific cultures when certain innovations are mentioned.
2 For examples of actual eclipse omens see Rochberg-Halton, Aspects of Babylonian Celestial Divination. On p. 94 one omen reads "If an eclipse occurs on the 14th of Du'azu and begins and clears in the south: A great king will die."
3 Koch-Westenholz, Mesopotamian Astrology, p. 36. Pingree (From Astral Omens, p. 12) says that while evidence that celestial omens were being recorded only begins to appear in the first half of the second millennium BCE, they were probably already being recorded earlier in the late third millennium, although no hard evidence has been found yet.
4 For an overview of the Enuma Anu Enlil and its contents see Hunger and Pingree, Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia, pp. 12-22.
5 Discussed in Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, esp. p. 58ff.
6 Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, p. 1.
7 Pingree summarizes this by saying that "the importance of these celestial omens in Mesopotamian royal courts from the last few centuries of the 2nd millennium B.C. till the Achaemenid period depended on their being regarded as the principle means for the gods to signal their intentions to the king." Pingree, From Astral Omens, p. 18. Earlier (on p. 11) Pingree characterizes celestial omens as a "relatively late development," since other forms of divination had been introduced earlier.
8 The majority of our surviving sources for Mesopotamian astrology date to this time period according to Rochberg-Halton, "New Evidence for the History of Astrology," p. 116.
9 Pingree, From Astral Omens, p. 16.
10 For translations of the reports see Hunger, Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings; for the letters see Parpola, Letters from Assyrian Scholars to the Kings Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal.
11 The issue of whether or not astrology was the impetus for the development of more complex astronomical methods is dealt with in Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, p. 160ff.
12 For the dating see Pingree and Hunger, Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia, p. 139ff.
13 For a translation of the Diaries see Sachs and Hunger, Astronomical Diaries.
14 The earliest direct evidence for the standardized twelve-sign zodiac comes from the Diaries, according to Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, p. 130. Cf. Brack-Bernsen and Hunger, "The Babylonian Zodiac."
15 Rochberg, Babylonian Horoscopes, p. 3.
16 All twenty-eight of the extant Mesopotamian birth charts are collected in Rochberg, Babylonian Horoscopes.
17 Rochberg discusses the development and use of "almanacs" and "ephemerides" in the Mesopotamian tradition in The Heavenly Writing, pp. 153-163.
18 Rochberg-Halton, "Benefic and Malefic Planets in Babylonian Astrology."
19 Rochberg-Halton, "Elements of the Babylonian Contribution," pp. 60-62.
20 Translated in Sachs, "Babylonian Horoscopes," pp. 65-70. There are similar delineations on a tablet translated in Rochberg-Halton, "TCL 6 13: Mixed Traditions in Late Babylonian Astrology," which she says comes from the Mesopotamian city of Uruk during the Seleucid/Hellenistic period (c. 334-63 BCE).
21 Sachs, "Babylonian Horoscopes," p. 68. I omitted the delineations for the Sun and Mercury, which are either missing or fragmentary.
22 Campion, "More on the Transmission of the Babylonian Zodiac," p. 199ff.
23 Sachs, "Babylonian Horoscopes," p. 69.
Written by Chris Brennan in "Hellenistic Astrology - The Study of Fate and Fortune",Amor Fati Publications, USA, 2017, excerpts pp.28-33. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.