Get to know your ancestors
Are you interested in your family history but frustrated that you can only learn the cold facts about them? Do you wish you could really get inside their head and understand how they may have thought or felt? Until time travel is invented, the next best thing is to use astrology to build a picture of their character and motivations and fears in life.
The first thing you need to do is verify that you have the correct birth date for your ancestor. The best way to do this is to try and source a copy of their birth certificate. In the UK, you can order copies from the General Register Office. In the United States the quickest way is to use a private company like Vitacheck or to contact the state department. If your ancestor was American you might even get lucky and find there is a birth time stated as well!
Now that you have the birthdate the rest is easy! If you don’t have good astrological software then there are plenty of websites online that will give you a free chart like astro.com
Here I am going to give an example of a few things I have found out about one of my ancestors…for reasons of privacy we’ll just call him Freddie.
Freddie - Born June 10, 1873 in Plumstead, Kent
As we don’t know Freddie’s time of birth I have removed his MC and ASC and set the house system to be Whole Signs with Aries on the cusp of the 1st. Again, as we don’t know the time, the Moon could have been anywhere between 7 degrees Sagittarius and 21 degrees Sagittarius. The Sun is between 19 and 20 degrees Gemini.
The first thing that immediately jumped out for me was that Freddie was born on the day of a full moon. This suggests an element of tension during his life between what he knew was logical and what his heart wanted. He has Mars in Libra…a placement in which Mars is not strong, and suggests he wasn’t naturally an aggressive person. In fact, Mars in Libra tends to avoid violence as much as possible. It is interesting and ironic to note therefore, that he was actually born in a military barracks !! Not only that, but as was so often the case in the 19th century, he followed his father’s footsteps into the military. What a wonderful example of “head” winning over “heart”! His confident Moon in Sagittarius will have enjoyed the travel and adventure that the military offered him and his sociable Sun in Gemini conjunct Mercury in Gemini will have enjoyed the camaraderie with his colleagues. Yet that Mars in Libra in opposition to Neptune in Aries will have really struggled with it all, nagging at him in the background to find a more peaceful occupation.
A key development in most people’s life is the infamous Saturn return around the age of 28/29. If you weren’t on the right path before this event, you usually are by the time you are on the other side of it! For some, this transit brings about increased responsibility or settling down. Maybe they get married, maybe they buy a house. For others, a long term relationship will break down. It’s a time where we are forced to be much more authentic and honest to our inner truth. For Freddie, only months after winning a medal in the Boxer rebellion in China, he choses to leave the military in 1902 at the age of 29. What does he choose to do? He decides to go and work in a shop - a far more peaceful occupation! I have no doubt at all, that this will have pleased his Mars in Libra massively!!
We know from historical records that Freddie had 5 children with a wife that he seems to marry in a hurry to legitimize a pregnancy that she is carrying…already in her 7th month by the time of the wedding. He is twenty at the time they marry….at the time when his solar arc Venus / Mars = Lunar nodes = Radix Sun = Solar Arc Sun / Moon = transit Cupido
We don’t know much else about Freddie apart from his date of death. He dies on 21st April 1923 at the age of 49. At this time his solar arc Moon and solar arc Mars/ Saturn = Radix Saturn = Radix Orpheus = Radix Uranus
Meanwhile, transiting Uranus was also equal to his natal Moon and natal Mars / Saturn midpoint as well as his solar arc Mars / Neptune.
I am waiting for a copy of the death certificate to see what reason was given for such an early death but as you can already tell….
…even without a birth time, it is amazing what we can see!
Freddie’s solar arcs and transits on the day he died, April 21, 1923
