The twelve houses

The signs divide the zodiac. The houses divide the sky above a particular place at a particular moment — which is why they require the time of birth.

The areas of life

1. First — the person: body, bearing, life.
2. Second — possessions, income, what one can dispose of.
3. Third — siblings, neighbours, short journeys, everyday exchange.
4. Fourth — origins, parents, house and land, the end of a matter.
5. Fifth — children, pleasure, everything one brings forth from oneself.
6. Sixth — illness, work in the sense of toil, subordinates, small animals.
7. Seventh — the other: partner, counterparty, open adversary.
8. Eighth — death, other people's money, debts and inheritance.
9. Ninth — the distant, the foreign, law, teaching, belief.
10. Tenth — profession, standing, office, what is visible.
11. Eleventh — friends, allies, patrons, hopes.
12. Twelfth — the hidden, withdrawal, constraint, secret enemies.

The houses are not equal

This is the part popular accounts nearly always omit, and it is what decides an interpretation.

• Angular houses (1, 4, 7, 10) — a planet acts most strongly here. What stands on an angle shows itself, whether fortunate or difficult.
• Succedent houses (2, 5, 8, 11) — middling strength; the effect comes, but later.
• Cadent houses (3, 6, 9, 12) — a planet acts least here. It is present, but it does not come through.

The older tradition goes further and distinguishes by whether a house sees the ascendant. The second, sixth, eighth and twelfth form no aspect to the first — and are counted difficult on that ground alone.

Being counted difficult on that ground says nothing about what such a house governs; an overview of the twelve houses takes them one at a time, each on a page of its own.

Derived houses

A device that multiplies the twelve houses: to learn something about a person's brother, take his house — the third — as the first and count on. The brother's money then falls in the fourth house of the chart, since that is the second from the third.

A chart of twelve houses thus answers questions about any number of people. Horary astrology uses this constantly.

House systems

Several methods divide the sky — whole sign, Alcabitius, Regiomontanus, Placidus and others. They yield different cusps, and the same planet may fall in different houses depending on the system.

The choice has been argued for centuries. The only defensible requirement: know what your system divides — space or time — and why you chose it. The one indefensible reason is that it was the default in the software.

See also: the ascendant, without which there are no houses.