Zodiac

ZODIAC. - The name derives from the Greek (ζωδισκός κύκλος), a term by which Greek astronomers and astrologers designated that zone of the celestial sphere in which the course of the sun, the moon and the principal planets appears to unfold.

It is divided into twelve signs, called ζώδε by the Greeks, each of 30° and each of which the sun traverses in a month; to the signs there correspond more or less exactly twelve groups of stars or constellations, which are Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces; on the celestial sphere the zone bounded by two circles parallel to the ecliptic, which are 9° distant from it, one to the north and the other to the south, has a width of 18°; the zodiacal belt comprises all the points of the sky in which the moon and the planets can appear.

The history of the z. is very ancient; its origins must certainly be traced back to a series of lunar stations or mansions, and they go back to the Sumerians, since the most ancient names of the twelve zodiacal constellations are Sumerian; the Babylonians then elaborated better and defined more precisely what they had drawn from the astronomical science of their predecessors in the valley of the two rivers. The celestial constellations are the product of Mesopotamian fantasy, which believed it saw them together with images of divinities and sacred animals in the stars of the celestial vault; they were venerated as divine beings and held by astrologers to be particularly significant of future events. They have therefore had great importance not only in the religion of the Sumerians, Babylonians and Assyrians and of those nations which for their civilization depend strictly on these, but also in the astronomy and astrology of the Western peoples, especially of the Greeks and Romans and down to our own days, so that it may be affirmed that most of our zodiacal signs are still the same ones that the Sumerians and Babylonians had traced in the sky. It is not certain that all the Sumerian names of the zodiacal constellations are to be traced back to the Sumerians themselves. The names demonstrate in any case that they arose as a consequence of Sumerian, Babylonian and Assyrian religion, myths and legends. Not a few zodiacal constellations are represented by means of depictions of the gods or of the objects whose name they bear on the boundary stones, kudurru, dating back predominantly to the Middle Babylonian period; the preference given however in such artistic representations in bas-relief to this or that divine figure was not determined by astronomical or astrological reasons, but by religious ones; that is, on the kudurru there were represented those figures of divinities, and among these also of zodiacal constellations, which were held, for reasons unknown to us, to be better suited to preserving the safety of the stone itself and to inspiring respect in any ill-intentioned persons; the kudurru therefore do not offer reproductions of the z. itself, but of a certain number of divinities, among which certain zodiacal constellations were also placed. In any case it is observed that the boundary stones contain images, according to some, of about half of the constellations in question, that is of Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn and Virgo (?), perhaps also of Leo, but the matter is not certain, since the predominantly zodiacal figures of the kudurru in some cases diverge considerably from those of the beings indicated by the names of the constellations in question; some image of a zodiacal constellation is found on tablets or seals.

The Sumerian names of the zodiacal signs are the following: ARIES: mul-lü-ljun-ga = mercenary; TAURUS: mul-mul = constellation; GEMINI: mul-mai-tab-ba-gal-gal = great twins; CANCER: mul-al-lus = crab; LEO: mul-ur-a = lion; VIRGO: mul-ab-sin = ear of grain; LIBRA: mul-zi-ba-an-na = balance; SCORPIO: mul-gir-tab = scorpion; SAGITTARIUS: mul-PA.-BIL. SAG = sagittarius; CAPRICORN: mul-sujur-mai = capricorn; AQUARIUS: mul-gu-la = great constellation (?); PISCES: mul-KUN (mef) = tails. The word mul that precedes these names has the value of constellation and is their determinative; it demonstrates, that is, that the names are names of constellations.

The Babylonians saw in the celestial sphere various roads which they called ḥarrānu = way, road, because they were traversed by the planets and the constellations. They distinguished the roads of Anu, of Enlil, and of Ea, as well as of Sin, of the Moon, and of Shammash, of the sun. They called ḥarrān (d) Sin = road of the Moon, the z., a belt on the two sides of the ecliptic of 10° on each side. A tablet enumerates seventeen constellations, the overwhelming majority zodiacal, of this road, which "stand in the road of the Moon and in whose district the Moon passes in the course of a month and touches them"; moreover "the road of the Moon is traversed by the Sun and by the five planets." This designation of the z. is explained by the circumstance that Sin was a very important god in the Babylonian pantheon. A step forward was made when the z. was divided into twelve compartments, when the duodecimal z. was created. It is not known exactly how they passed to this z., which is still that of the present day. This solar z. is certainly not earlier than the first millennium B.C., but the product of a more recent epoch. A tablet, not earlier than the 5th century B.C., gives the name of fifteen zodiacal constellations; in this epoch they should have passed to dividing the z. into twelve equal parts and to transferring onto these parts the signs and names of the more or less corresponding constellations. A scholar has affirmed that it was intended to establish a perfect correspondence between the solar year with its twelve parts and the z., which was then divided only into four parts, and therefore each of its four parts was divided into three parts of equal length, and it was precisely with this division that the zodiacal signs were created. The most ancient Babylonian mention of the signs is found in a text of 420 B.C., in which among other things it is assumed, for example, that the planets Jupiter and Venus are in the month of Nisānu in the anterior part of Gemini, Mars in Leo, Saturn in Pisces and Mercury sets in Taurus; the names of the signs were taken from the constellations that they contain, so that the sign

Taurus could be denoted by means of the Pleiades or by means of Taurus or by means of the Hyades + Aldebaran; the Babylonian zodiacal signs therefore turned out to be absolutely of equal length; the Babylonians then divided each sign into 30° and therefore the whole circle was divided into 360°. According to an astronomical text the equinoxes and solstices correspond to the midpoints of the signs Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn. It is very probable that to the Babylonians is also to be traced the method of establishing the nighttime by observing the six parts of the zodiacal circle that rise during the night; they moreover observed and noted the stars that rise and set simultaneously, as well as those that rise when others culminate, and it is known that the Greeks observed the stars parana-tellonta, that is, which rise and set together with the rising zodiacal signs, and it is probable that already the Babylonians determined the times by means of this observation. The Babylonians called the zodiacal signs (kakkab)lumati, a name that originally denoted the thirty-six principal constellations of the celestial sphere. A text from Uruk treats of these twelve signs, whose names are the following, in Babylonian:

ARIES: (kakkab) (amēlu) agru = constellation of the mercenary; TAURUS: (kakkab)sappu = constellation of the tuft of hair (?), the Pleiades; GEMINI: (kakkab)mašū = constellation of the twin; it also bears the name tu'amē = twins; CANCER: (kakkab) alluttu = constellation of the crab; LEO: (kakkab) nēšu = constellation of the lion; VIRGO: (kakkab)shēri = constellation of the ear of grain; LIBRA: (kakkab)zibantū = constellation of the balance; SCORPIO: (kakkab)agrabu = constellation of the scorpion; SAGITTARIUS: (kakkab)mašū suzi (?) = constellation of the archer; CAPRICORN: (kakkab)šūjūrumāšu = constellation of the capricorn; AQUARIUS: (kakkab) GU.LA = constellation of the giant (?); PISCES: (kakkab)zibāti = constellation of the tails. These are, taken together, the twelve member parts of the z. (kakkab)lu, in which the Moon and the Sun walk. Therefore it was also said that "Venus and Mercury pass through the zodiacal constellations." The Babylonian word lumati passed into Aramaic with the same meaning of constellation in general and of zodiacal constellation in particular, in the form malvašā. The Babylonian z. passed into the astrology and astronomy of all the Oriental nations and into those of the Greeks and Romans.

In Persia, in Zoroastrianism and Mazdaism, the signs have almost the same names. In Mazdean writings the signs are the ahtar, the twelve captains who belong to the party of Oromasdes, while the seven planets belong to the party of Ahriman; the twelve are the creators and preservers of the world; all the good in this creation Oromasdes transferred into the Sun, the Moon and the twelve zodiacal signs, and these accepted it in order to distribute it according to right and equity. All the good that those constellations confer upon the creatures of Oromasdes the planets take away from them as far as they can. The signs are among the noblest stars. Their names denote the same objects or persons as those of the Greek z., except for the vessel of water (Aquarius); the z. is divided into twenty-eight lunar mansions. In Pahlavi the names of the signs sound thus: ARIES: Varak = lamb, ram; TAURUS: Tōrā = bull, GEMINI: Dō-patkar = two fingers; CANCER: Kalakang = crab; LEO: Shēr = lion; VIRGO: Hušak = virgin; LIBRA: Turāzāk = balance; SCORPIO: Gazdūm = scorpion; SAGITTARIUS: Nīmāsp = half horse, centaur; CAPRICORN: Vahik = goat; AQUARIUS: Dūl = vessel of water; PISCES: Māšik = fish.

To Zarathustra is attributed the doctrine that souls descend from heaven and ascend back to it in the circle of the twelve constellations. In Manichaeism the revolution of the z. makes it rise up to the zenith, as if it were a matter of water-wheels that draw water from the rivers and raise it; it was also said that pious souls go from sign to sign along the sphere that contains them.

Among the Mandaeans (v.) the zodiacal signs are no longer divinities but demons, always intent on doing harm to men; this radical change in their nature must be ascribed to the fact that this religion is fundamentally monotheistic and therefore strongly averse to Babylonian and Greek paganism, and has consequently turned the divinities of the planets and of the twelve signs into demonic beings. Their names in Mandaic are as follows: EMBRA = Aries; TAURA = Taurus; SILMIA = Statues (Gemini); SARTANA = Cancer; ARIA = Leo; SUMBILTA = Spica (Virgo); QUANA = Libra; ARQRA = Scorpio; HITIA = Mare (Sagittarius); GADIA = He-goat (Capricorn); DAULA = Bucket (Aquarius); NUNA = Fish (Pisces). To each sign the Mandaeans assigned a certain number of years and the creation of evil beings or things — to Scorpio, for example, all the evil reptiles that with their venom kill souls. The Twelve belong, in short, to that host of evil beings that wages continual war against Life and light, and which man must therefore above all detest, seeking to escape their snares.

The Babylonian z. passed into the astronomy and astrology of the Greeks and became an important part of it after the latter, in the time of Alexander of Macedon, came into close contact with Babylonian civilization; it always retained its character, on the one hand religious and on the other scientific, served astronomers as much as astrologers for their calculations and their predictions, and was furthermore an object of worship, as already among the Babylonians, in the Greek and Roman astral religion of the Hellenistic age, since this too had deified the individual zodiacal constellations of Babylonia.

Egypt favorably received Oriental astrology already in the Persian period, studied it and developed it further with zeal, in an original manner, directing its attention especially to the z.; the Egyptians divided each sign into three equal parts of 10° and assigned the resulting thirty-six parts to a corresponding number of sidereal divinities. The images of the z. carved in stone found in Egypt attest its wide diffusion (z. of Denderah, Esneh and Akhmim, and frescoes of the tombs).

The Greeks and Romans gave the signs the following names: ARIES: Κριός, Aries; TAURUS: Ταῦρος, Taurus; GEMINI: Διδύμιοι, Gemini; CANCER: Καρδίνος, Camcer; LEO: Λέων, Leo; VIRGO: Παρθένος, Virgo; LIBRA: Ζυγός, Libra; SCORPIO: Σκόρτιος, Scorpio; SAGITTARIUS: Τοξάτης, Sagittarius; CAPRICORN: Αἰγόκερως, Capricornus; AQUARIUS: Ὑδραχός, Aquarius; PISCES: Ἰχθύος, Pisces. In the Hellenistic age the doctrines concerning the z. and its astrological significance had great development also in Rome; among other things, one of the twelve principal gods was there attributed to each month and each zodiacal sign; in the same age the δώδεκα θεοί replaced the Oriental gods.

The z. was of great importance also in the mysteries of Mithras; the zodiacal signs often surround the image of this god in the act of sacrificing the bull, or that of Kronos; or they are carved on the body of this lion-headed god, or are painted or depicted in mosaic on the walls of the temples, often grouped three by three, corresponding to the seasons to which they are attributed. Helios too is surrounded by the z. Reflections of the worship of the twelve signs are found in the twelve garments that the person being initiated into the mysteries of Isis and Serapis put on successively, thereby completing the passage through the twelve signs. Sometimes in the depictions the sphere of the signs comprises and surrounds those of the seven planets: indeed according to the ancients the sphere of the fixed stars embraces the other seven spheres. The image of Pan playing the horn surrounded by a band with the zodiacal signs certainly hints at the concept of the harmony of the spheres. In the z. are then represented, besides the Sun, also the moon and the planets, all of which stars either have their functions in it, or circulate in it, or combine their influences with its. Since the treatment of diseases was made to depend on the position of the stars, it is not surprising that sometimes Aesculapius, with or without Hygieia, is accompanied by the z. Nike too is sometimes represented surrounded by the twelve signs; she is in fact Fortune, in close connection with these, who grants men victory. Even the hippodromes were built according to zodiacal conceptions; they had twelve exit gates for the chariots, which were dwellings of the z. that governs the earth, the sea and the course of human life. Helios sometimes carries in his hand a celestial globe with the z. Often this image means that the scene depicted is to be placed in heaven; yet almost always our signs have a precise doctrinal meaning; the z. can allude to the doctrine of sidereal immortality when it is a matter of a funerary representation or of an apotheosis. The twelve labors of Hercules are also brought into relation with the z.

The z. played an important part also in magic. The success of magical operations was made to depend on the position of the planets in the signs; often the symbol of some sign is drawn and invoked in order to perform the magical spell with good success, and for the same purpose use is made of zodiacal depictions, in which case they are amulets of sure effect. In Egyptian magic the thirty-six decans played a great part, since each of these was brought into relation with a part of the human body. For magical purposes the twenty-four letters of the Greek alphabet were assigned to the twelve signs.

With the passing of time the doctrine connected with the z. spread so widely that its figures were wanted present in almost all manifestations of human life and became a very common decorative motif; even the dishes for food were decorated with them, since to each sign there was made to correspond a dish that stood in some more or less mysterious relation to it; and there is no cause for wonder that architects adorned the walls of rooms with the zodiacal band and had it reproduced in floor mosaics.

Giuseppe Furlani