Category Archives: Geomancy

Divination, Divination Master Post, Fortune-telling, Geomancy

The Meanings of the Geomantic Houses

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In European geomancy, the places occupied by the figures in the Shield are assigned the meaning of the houses of an astrological horoscope. I have no idea if this corresponds to older Middle-Eastern practice or if it is a European innovation. Certainly, if Astrology hadn’t been attached to Geomancy by the Arab magi of old (which it probably was), it got coupled with it as soon as it reached Europe, since Astrology was not only extremely popular–it was also the only method of divination that was not unanimously frowned upon by the church, the reason being that it was perfectly embedded within the shared understanding of how the cosmos was thought to factually work, so that the anticipations given by astrology could be defended as being just part of how life worked and, therefore, scientific (in the old meaning of science). Astrology was indeed often condemned, but it was hard to condemn it without condemning a lot more stuff that the church liked.

The Geomantic Shield, therefore, got assigned the meanings of the astrological houses. As far as I can tell from reading the old manuscripts, the difference between the Shield chart and the square astrological chart was not very marked–if at all. Most manuscripts assign the meanings of the houses to the Shield itself, without bothering to turn the Shield into an astrological chart. This is even true when they describe the modes of perfection. A few manuscripts do show the astrological chart at one point or another, but only to remark on the similarity with the Shield chart.

A Geomantic Shield
The same chart as an astrological horoscope

I may be wrong, but I get the sense that the distinction between Shield chart and Astrological chart was only emphasised following the Golden Dawn’s reshuffling of the houses by following Agrippa. Basically, the GD (again, following Agrippa) assigned the four Mothers to the angles, the four Daughters to the succedent houses and the four Nieces to the cadent houses. This is in line with the old occult fascination for making up bogus secrets to get people interested in your person. People needed to keep occupied, in a world where Monopoly hadn’t been invented yet.

It is also in sharp contrast to the old practice of following the numerical order of the figures (First House = First Mother, Second House = Second Mother, etc., shown in the image above) Note, furthermore, that in the old practice, the Witnesses and the Judge were usually considered normal houses (often called the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth houses.)

The meanings of the houses, as said, correspond more or less to those of a horary chart. You will find that not all sources agree. Here’s a good start (it’s not exhaustive, but it’s something.)

HouseFigureAttributes
First1st MotherThe Querent, Querent’s Body, Appearance, Mind, “Here”
Second2nd MotherQuerent’s possessions, Moveable Goods, Money, Assets, Sustenance
Third3rd MotherSiblings, Neighbors, Letters, News, Communication, Rumors, Short Trips, Regular Journey, Lower Education
Fourth4th MotherThe Father, The Parents in general, Old Relatives, Lineage, House, Property, City, Castle, Buried Treasures, Fields, End of the Matter
Fifth1st DaughterJoy, Mirth, Fun, Festivities, Clothes, Children, Pregnancy, Art, Self-Expression, Sexual Activity, Harvest, Messengers, Diplomats
Sixth2nd DaughterSickness, Trouble, Toil, Difficulties, Surgery, Small animals (pets, goats, sheep, etc.), Servants, Employees
Seventh3rd DaughterMarriage, Partnerships, Partners, Public Enemies, Other People, The Public, Thieves, “There”
Eighth4th DaughterDeath and the Dead, Money from other people, Dowry, Fear, Failure
Ninth1st NieceLong Journeys, Pilgrimages, Church, Spirituality, Higher Education, Faith, Teachers, Courses, Higher Knowledge and Skills, Church People and Prelates, God
Tenth2nd NieceThe Mother, Honor, Ascension, King, Emperor, Government, Job, Profession
Eleventh3rd NieceFriends, Help, Money from the Government, Wishes, Hopes, Fortune, Luck
Twelfth4th NieceEvil, Secret Enemies, Addiction, Prison, Curses, Hexes, Large Animals (Large Cattle, Horses, etc.), Impotence to act
ThirteenthR. WitnessThe Querent, The Querent’s side, What’s in Favor of the Querent, The Past
FourteenthL. WitnessOpposition to the Querent, The Other Party, The Future
FifteenthJudgeAnswer, Ultimate Development of the Question
The meanings and attributes of the Geomantic houses

Note: All images are from the App ‘Simple Geomancy’

MQS

Divination, Divination Master Post, Fortune-telling, Geomancy

Anatomy of a Geomantic Figure

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In a way, Geomantic figures are to Geomancy what cards are to Cartomancy. They represent the basic bundles of meanings that get shuffled around to form the sentence that will answer the question. So we need to familiarise ourselves with them.

Each Geomantic figure is made up of four rows of points. Each row can contain one or two points, so a figure can contain a minimum of four points (Via) and a maximum of eight (Populus.)

On the right, Populus (eight points); on the left, Via (four points); the result is Via

At least since Medieval Geomancy (and possibly before) each of the four rows corresponds to one of the four Aristotelian/Empedoclean elements: Fire, Air, Water, Earth. The question, however, is how important this notion is. Medieval and Renaissance geomancers seem to have almost completely disregarded this set of correspondences beyond the initial mention of them. This seems to conform to a certain premodern gusto for correspondences. If you read Christopher Cattan’s book on Geomancy, you’ll know the amount of practically useless information about elements and astrology that he shoves down our throats before getting to the practical side, where such information is never elaborated on nor used.

To put it more positively, the Medieval mindset was extremely different from our postmodern one. To the Medieval (and the Renaissance is, in spite of all we hear about it, but a colorful appendage to the Middle Ages) the world was an inherently coherent, fully interconnected system of correspondences, wherein the lower and smaller was inscribed into the larger and higher. The Macrocosm/Microcosm distinction played a major role. The Microcosm, i.e., the world of men, was in small what the Macrocosm was in large. Humans themselves, in their complexion, faculties and powers, mirrored the larger scheme of things.

Because all was seen as interconnected, it was impossible for a writer to describe a single art without describing its connection to the whole, as on such connection dependended the art’s legitimacy in the common view. This is why the four rows of a Geomantic figure, for instance, are made to correspond to the head, neck, trunk and feet of a human (microcosm) as well as to the four elemental spheres (macrocosm.)The very attempt to astrologize Geomancy must have catered to the double need to understand it in light of what was considered an already legitimate science on one hand, and to inject the omnipresent beloved astrological symbolism in it on the other.

All this is well and good. But the point remains that we don’t really know how knowledge of the elements is supposed to help us in a geomantic reading. For that matter, we don’t even know what the numbers One and Two are supposed to mean. What does it mean that the figure called Puella has a single point in its Fire row and two in its Air row? Old manuscripts never explain it. Most modern interpreters see one point as an indication that the corresponding element is active or manifest, two that the element is passive or unmanifest (Nick Farrell has proposed a slight variation of the interpretation, though. Check his blog, which is an endless source of fascinating information on all things magic.) They then launch into endless rationalizations on the complex meaning of these elemental configurations.

Puella, with two points in its second row (Air)

I don’t share this passion for overanalysis, especially because all this has very little bearing on how actual readings work. John Michael Greer says that old geomancers did not mention all this analytical stuff because it was implicit in their view. I am more inclined to suspect that all this overinterpretation of Geomancy is exquisitely new and very typical of our age. If you are familiar with the ridiculous lengths people will go to in order to justify this or that smear on the cardboard of an ancient tarot card as a deep esoteric secret, you’ll see immediately what I mean.

The Medieval mind was very much acquainted with symbols, but it was also very much used to explaining them outright when they saw them. That’s how we got endless libraries of pedantic manuscripts. But their explanations were rarely tortuous and mind-bending. Because symbols were seen as natural parts of the cosmos, the interpretation of symbols was not something to melt your brains on.

We, on the other hand, learn about symbols in roundabout ways, usually only after we’ve become actively interested in them, and when we do find them, we tend to exaggerate in the interpretation to compensate for the fact that we live in a mundane world of nihilism and meaninglessness. So maybe Puella has two points in its Air row because it symbolizes lack of communication or reasoning ability or some such. It’s more likely that the interpretation of the figures stemmed from a combination of how they more or less looked plus remnants of the old Arabic tradition plus the astrological associations.

What is true, however, is that single and double points have different practical effects on the operation of Geomantic Addition, as mentioned previously. Two points act as a mirror for the corresponding number of points in the other figure, while one point changes the number of points in the other figure from odd to even or from even to odd. In this sense, the current interpretation that one point represents activity and two points represent passivity does seem to hold some water.

This is especially noticeable in the figures of Via and Populus, shown above. Populus, whose every row is made up of two points, passively accepts the figure it is added to, replicating it. Via, on the other hand, is made up of one point in every row, so it turns any figure into its opposite. Interestingly, both figures are attributed to the Moon, astrological ruler of mirrors and chief symbol of change. When you add Via and Populus, you get Via, and whether this is because Populus mirrors Via or because Via changes Populus to its opposite is a matter of interpretation.

The astrological attributions of the figures are as follows:

FigurePlanetSign
Via (Way)MoonLeo
Populus (People)MoonCapricorn
Fortuna Major (Greter Fortune)SunAquarius
Fortuna Minor (Lesser Fortune)SunTaurus
Puer (Boy)MarsAries (sometimes given as Libra)
Rubeus (Red)MarsGemini
Puella (Girl)VenusLibra (sometimes given as Aries)
Amissio (Loss)VenusLibra
Acquisitio (Gain)JupiterAries
Laetitia (Happiness)JupiterTaurus
Carcer (Prison)SaturnPisces
Tristitia (Sadness)SaturnScorpio
Albus (White)MercuryCancer
Conjunctio (Conjunction)MercuryVirgo
Caput Draconis (Dragon’s Head)North Node, The BeneficsVirgo
Cauda Draconis (Dragon’s Tail)South Node, The MaleficsSagittarius
The astrological correspondences of the sixteen Geomantic figures

You may find tables with different attributions.

The figures are also assigned to the four elements (four each). John Michael Greer says that the figures are assigned an outer element and an inner element, but I don’t know where he pulled this from, as I’ve never seen it in older manuscripts. It may be I’m simply ignorant, but until I see confirmation of this practice I will forebear from using the double element.

Another classification that was considered very important in the past was between incoming or entering and outgoing or exiting figures. This tells us whether something will happen quickly or not, or whether it will last or not. Furthermore, the figures are said to be fortunate, unfortunate or mixed, although some ‘unfortunate’ figures can be good and vice versa. Don’t put too much stock into this classification in good and bad, as whether a figure is good or bad depends on the question. Fortuna Minor is often given as bad, only because it is the opposite of Fortuna Major, but it is actually mostly good.

FigureElementQualityFortune
ViaWaterCommonMixed
PopulusWaterCommonMixed
Fortuna MajorEarthEnteringGood
Fortuna MinorFireExitingBad
PuerAirExitingBad
RubeusFireExitingBad
PuellaWaterEnteringGood
AmissioFireExitingBad
AcquisitioAirEnteringGood
LaetitiaAirExitingGood
CarcerEarthCommonBad
TristitiaEarthEnteringBad
AlbusWaterEnteringGood
ConjunctioAirCommonMixed
Caput DraconisEarthEnteringGood
Cauda DraconisFireExitingBad
The Geomantic figures with their element and their movement
Divination, Divination Master Post, Fortune-telling, Geomancy

Geomancy – From the Four Mothers to the Geomantic Shield Chart

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In the previous article I’ve talked about how to generate the four Mothers of a Geomancy reading. These are the four geomantic figures you need in order to answer a question. As I discussed previously, the four Mothers, being actively created by you (or the questioner), represent your point of view, what you actively bring to the table. Afterward, we generate the four Daughters, which represent the consequence of your stance in the outside world around you.

This divides the Shield Chart into two halves: the right half, assigned to the querent or to what speaks in favor of the querent getting his wish; and the left half, assigned to the quesited or to the obstacles. These are like thesis and antithesis: as soon as the thesis is given, the antithesis is called into being automatically. The right half, the querent’s side, culminates into the Right Witness, while the left side culminates into the Left Witness. Here, the separation between thesis and antithesis reaches its apex, and can no longer be carried further, and must therefore be resolved. This is done by adding the Witnesses to form the Judge. This is the only figure in the chart that encompasses both right and left side, which is why the term “Judge” is fitting: the Judge must see the whole picture and take it into account in order to rule fairly.

Let us start with the Four Mothers, and let’s derive the Four Daughters from them.

the four Mothers of a Geomancy reading

Above you find the Four Mothers. These are seen from right to left. To obtain the first daughter, we need to take into account the first row of points in each of the four Mothers. In the example above, the first row of the first Mother has two points, the first row of the second Mother has one point, the first row of the third Mother has two points and the first row of the fourth Mother has one point. This means that the first Daughter is going to be formed of two points in the top row, one in the second, two in the third and again one in the fourth. The other three Daughters are formed in the exact same way, only, we take into account the corresponding row in the four Mothers (i.e., for the second Daughter, the second row of each of the four Mothers, for the third Daughter, the third row of each of the four Mothers, for the fourth Daughter, the fourth row of each of the four Mothers.) At this point, we have the base line of the Geomantic Shield.

From right to left, the four Mothers and the four Daughters

From this base line, which encompasses the two sides of the shield, we begin a new kind of operation, which will allow us to obtain the four Nieces. This operation is called Geomantic Addition. This is a very simple formula. Take the first two Mothers as an example. Now add the number of points in the top row of each. The sum is three (two in the first Mother, one in the second Mother.) Three is an odd number, and odd numbers are represented by a single point. Therefore, the result of this Geomantic Addition is going to be a figure whose first row is occupied by a single dot rather than two. Now we go through the same process row by row. Only at the end, with the fourth and final row, do we find that the operation gives a different result: here, both the first and the second Mother are made up of two points, so the result is four. Four is even, and even is represented by two points.

First MotherSecond MotherFirst Niece
O OOO
O OOO
O OOO
O OO OO O
The process to obtain the first Niece

In general, the process of Geomantic Addition can only yield four scenarios.

First VariableSecond VariableNumber of PointsOdd/EvenResult
O OO O4EvenO O
O OO3OddO
OO O3OddO
OO2EvenO O
All possible scenarios in the process of Geomantic Addition

By pairing first and second Mother together, we get the first Niece; third and fourth Mother yield the second Niece; first and second Daughter give us the third Niece; and third and fourth daughter result in the fourth and final Niece.

Four Mothers, four Daughters and four Nieces

At this point, we go over the process once more, pairing up the first and second Niece to obtain the Right Witness and the third and fourth to get the Left Witness.

the four Mothers, four Daughters, four Nieces and two Witnesses

The final addition yields the Judge, which is the only figure of the Geomantic Shield to result from the Left and Right side of the Shield communicating with each other.

The complete Geomantic Shield

This completes the operation. It is customary to derive a sixteenth figure by adding the figure of the querent, i.e., usually the first Mother, with the Judge, but this sixteenth figure is often not explicitly drawn on the shield, though it might sometimes, and there are examples of it in the old literature.

Note: all images are from the App ‘Simple Geomancy’

Divination, Fortune-telling, Geomancy

Toward the Geomancy Shield – The Four Mothers

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Geomancy has changed a bit since Medieval times, but one thing that remains constant is how a Geomantic figure or Geomantic Shield is formed. This is done in order to answer a question.

As I said in the previous article, we don’t draw the whole figure in the same way. We can divide the process in two parts: the creation of the four Mothers on one side; and the deriving of the rest of the figure from the four Mothers on the other side. The first is the “divinely inspired” part, i.e., the part where you allow chance into your life, while the second part is automatic and fixed and will follow with mathematical rigor from the first.

So, how do we get a set of four Mothers? In reality, Geomancy is a rather flexible oracle, as any method is technically valid. Once you are well versed in the main operations required to draw a Geomantic figure, you can pretty much use any method that suits you in order to obtain the four mothers.

Still, some methods are more traditional than others. It seems that the Arab Magi used a stick to poke points in the sands of the desert, a method that is still perfectly valid and has even been accepted and adapted by the Golden Dawn. By the time Geomancy reached Europe in the Middle Ages, it was customary to use a stylus or pen and a tablet or piece of paper or parchment. Dice were also used, and one could, and can use dried beans or pebbles or playing cards. Anything that can give you odd and even numbers will do.

Needless to say, some have devised software that calculate everything automatically. I don’t particularly trust this method, and yes, partly it’s because technology is still so new that my mind doesn’t accept it as a valid substitute for things that are more dependent on my direct manipulation–it may very well be that in five hundred years occultists will use geomantic software without thinking twice about it, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

The Pen and Paper Method

My personal favorite method remains pen and paper. I almost always use it, and I find it has an odd beauty, even power to it. It also reminds me of a playful oracle that we used to use as kids in middle school and high school in Italy to answer yes or no questions. Usually, some love-stricken teen would ask the fateful question, “does he love me?” and would start drawing random numbers of points on a piece of paper. Then she would pair up the points until either one point was left (yes) or none at all (no). I have no idea how this oracle originated, but I remember it being very much in vogue when I was a kid.

A set of geomantic Mothers is obtained in a similar, albeit more complex, manner. First off, it pays to write down the question. This has the incredible advantage that it forces you to think about it seriously, and it also makes it more real and objective.

Then, after concentrating on the question, you should ask for divine help. I’m not saying this to be preachy. Consult any Medieval handbook of Geomancy and you will find the same instruction: it’s the “Unmoved Mover” that sends his “vertue” down from the skies to answer your question. At the very least, you should take a moment to relax.

Once you feel ready, start drawing sixteen consecutive rows of points. Try to be orderly, but don’t worry too much: as long as the rows don’t cross or merge you are fine. Also, I have found that it is better to draw I’s instead of points, for the simple reason that it makes it easier to recognize the marks instead of leaving you wondering “is it a point or a random inkblot?”

Do not count the points or I’s you are making, and do not bother counting the rows as you make them. Do not engage in any kind of mathematical or rational thinking. In fact, I have found it pays to write down numbers from 1 to 16 before starting the operation, so as to be free from the worry of drawing too many or too few rows of points. Still, in the traditional instruction, you are normally told not to bother if you end up with an extra row of two–just go overboard and then discount the extra ones. Either way you will end up with something like this:

  • 1) IIIIIIIIII
  • 2) IIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 3) IIIII
  • 4) IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 5) IIIIIIII
  • 6) IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 7) IIII
  • 8) IIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 9) IIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 10) IIIIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 11) IIIIIIIIIIII
  • 13) IIIIIII
  • 14) IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
  • 15) IIIIIIIII
  • 16) IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Once this operation is over, you have your four Mothers, but only in a raw form. Each Mother figure is made up of four rows (4×4 = 16). Now you need to pair up the I’s in each row until either one is left over or two. Let’s make the example of the first Mother, which is made up of rows 1 through 4:

  • 1) I-I I-I I-I I-I I I = O O
  • 2) I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I = O
  • 3) I-I I-I I = O
  • 4) I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I-I I I = O O

The figure we have received as first Mother is comprised by a sequence of two points on top, then one point, then one point, then two points. The same process of pairing up must be done for all sixteen rows to obtain the four Mothers (the second Mother being made up of rows 5 through 8, etc.) The first Mother we have obtained is called Conjunctio.

The Geomantic figure Conjunctio. From the App ‘Simple Geomancy’

Once this operation is over, you will be left with four figures, each made up of four rows of either one or two points. From these figures you will need to derive the rest of the chart, which I will go over in the next post.

Divination, Divination Master Post, Fortune-telling, Geomancy, Philosophy

A Step by Step Deconstruction of a Geomancy Reading

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In all Medieval handbooks of Geomancy, this method of divination is called something like “a brief science”, meaning an art that can be mastered with little effort. It was often sold as some kind of quick, “portable” oracle. This, I presume, is in comparison with Astrology, which back then required no small amount of mathematical knowledge, astrological software still being a couple of years away.

By comparison, anyone who can memorize a couple of meanings and rules and is capable of producing a Geomantic Shield (i.e., the chart) can obtain a quick answer.

The more I delve into Geomancy’s Medieval practice, the more I realize that all modern attempts at reviving it hinge on some kind of rationalization or optimization of what was, essentially, a rather chaotic (though not random) method. It is typical of the pre-modern approach to rely on older authority and compile as many observations and rules as possible from previous sources, even when contradictory with each other, so as to have an endless array of techniques to throw at the chart in hopes of teasing out the wanted response. This is not unlike what modern astrologers do when they interpret birth charts, though I must say, unlike contemporary astrology, traditional geomancy does work.

Producing a Geomantic Shield, Step by Step

If rationalization it must be, then it makes sense first to understand what it is that a geomancy reading does, that is, what it accomplishes from a structural standpoint. This is a Geomancy Shield.

Example of Geomantic Shield

In this shield, not all the figures are generated by the querent/diviner. In fact, only the figures circled in red are actively produced by the person interested in the reading. These are made from right to left, following the numbered order.

The Four Mothers produced by the querent are in red, the Four Daughters in blue

Once the four main geomantic figures (called the “four Mothers“) are produced, every other passage is automatic and relies on certain geomantic operations to fill out the Shield. One such operation is very particular, in that it only occurs once throughout the reading, while the other one is repeated many times. I’m talking about the operation that produces the “four Daughters.” This consists in taking the first line from every one of the first four figures (the mothers) to produce the fifth figure or first daughter; then taking the second line from each of the four mothers to produce the sixth figure or second daughter, and so on, until we have four mothers and four daughters (the daughters are circled in blue.)

As you can see, for instance, if you take the first line from each of the four mothers, you get a first line of two points, a second line of one point, then a third line of two points and a last, fourth line of one point, which now occupies the fifth house.

Once this operation is over, it is never repeated again, and it leaves us with a double set of four figures each. These two sets are not unrelated (hence the names of mothers and daughters.) They must of necessity be comprised of the same number of points, albeit differently shuffled around. Still, as much as they are related, they represent a split of some type, a doubling of reality from one into two related but separate sides.

Now it is a matter of producing the rest of the chart. This is done by taking the figures two by two and “adding” them line by line. We pair the first and second mother together, then the third and fourth, then the fist and second daughter together, and then the third and fourth. Adding here means taking the points that comprise each line in the two figures, adding them and seeing if you get an odd or even number: if you get an odd number, the resulting line will have one point; if you get an even number, the resulting figure line will have two points. This produces the “four Nieces” which occupy the second row in the Shield. Take careful notice that, at this point, Mothers and Daughters have not interacted with each other yet.

The Four Nieces in Geomancy

Once we have the Mothers, the Daughters and the Nieces, we repeat the second operation once more by pairing up the Nieces, the first with the second and the third with the fourth. As you can appreciate, once more, Mothers and Daughters haven’t come into contact: the split hasn’t been mended.

The Two Witnesses coming out of the Four Nieces

The two figures resulting from the addition of the four Nieces are the two Witnesses, which are the first two members of the “Geomantic Court.” The Right Witness is the ultimate consequence of the four Mothers, while the Left Witness is the ultimate consequence of the four Daughters. We can’t produce any more figures without finally bridging the gap between the right side of the Shield and the left side. This is done by producing the fifteenth figure, the last one, called the Judge. This brings the operation to a close.

The Geomantic Court complete with the Judge is in blue

So, What are we doing in Geomancy?

Anyone familiar with Hegel’s dialectics cannot but look in admiration at what I have just described. We begin the operation with a set of four symbols (the four Mothers) which represent the querent’s active involvement, in the hope of knowing something. A querent that doesn’t want to know anything does not consult an oracle: he is not a querent, ‘querent’ meaning ‘asker’. Therefore, the four Mothers represent the question itself, not in a divinatory sense, but in a structural one: if someone doesn’t want to know something, the Four Mothers don’t appear.

Once this happens, reality splits into two, the Right side representing the querent, the Left side the quesited. This culminates in the reading of the Geomantic Court, in which the Right Witnesses pleads for the querent and the Left one for the quesited, among other possible interpretations. Other variants are: Right side good, Left side bad, Right side past, Left side future, Right side helpful, Left side hindering. These are all variations on the same theme.

The point is that from a Geomantic standpoint, duality comes into being as a result of someone either desiring something they don’t have or fearing they might lose something they have. Objective reality comes into being by “lapsing away” as it were from the Subject, creating a would of sort that requires a series of steps in order to be healed again (‘heal’ literally meaning ‘to make whole’). Try to think of a situation where you don’t need anything: you don’t need food, clothes, air, light, aspirations. You’d be very godly or very dead.

What I just said, therefore, is not a disparaging of dualism: without duality, unity cannot manifest, and remains a sterile, barren field. Without the split, the querent wouldn’t be able to know, or, indeed, to get. By pronouncing his sentence, the Judge makes the situation whole again, which is signified by the fact that only the eight figures with an even number of points can become Judge. Either the querent gets his wish or he doesn’t. But the making whole again presupposes the split, just as in dialectics the synthetic moment cannot be understood and appreciated but through the process of opposition that led to it.

What I just described is, as far as I know, never mentioned in Medieval or Renaissance works on Geomancy–one obvious reason being that dialectics in the Hegelian sense hadn’t been invented yet. Platonic dialectics (that is, conceptual dialectics) comes close, but again, all this seems implicit in the operations of Geomancy and never articulated. I harbor no delusion therefore of having discovered the secret meaning of the art. I am conscious, in fact, that I am merely organizing it according to a model that is familiar to me. But I must say Geomancy wears this model beautifully. It contains a whole philosophy of what it means to ask a question and to get an answer.

Divination, Divination Master Post, Fortune-telling, Geomancy

Geomancy | Master Post

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Here I gather all my articles on (mostly European) Geomancy.

Geomancy has been an ongoing interest of mine. It is an ancient divination system that is being rediscovered after a couple of centuries spent in obscurity. It exists in various flavors, the most commonly recognized in the West being the one practiced by Medieval and early Modern magi. It derives in its main lines from Arabic Geomancy, and is only distantly related to African practices that use similar figures.

Of course, at the time when Geomancy was introduced to the West, Astrology was all the rage, which means that European Geomancy has a marked astrological bent. In most of its variations, Geomancers obtain a response by generating a random number of points which are then organized according to a fixed series of rules. Note that geomancy has nothing to do with Feng Shui and related practices (Flying Stars, Qi Men Dun Jia, Ba Gua Sectors, etc.)

Translations of Old Books
Peter of Abano’s Geomancy Handbook
Robert Fludd’s Geomancy Handbook (from the Fasciculus Geomanticus)

General
A step by step Deconstruction of a Geomantic Reading
Obtaining the Four Mothers
From the Four Mothers to the Geomantic Shield
Anatomy of a Geomantic Figure
Meanings of the Houses
Which House is Next to Which?

The Figures
Via
Populus
Fortuna Major
Fortuna Minor
Puer
Albus
Puella
Rubeus
Acquisitio
Amissio
Laetitia
Tristitia
Conjunctio
Carcer
Caput Draconis
Cauda Draconis

Interpretation
Geomantic Perfection: how things come to pass
Interpreting the Judge and Witnesses
Reconciling the Judge with the Chart
The Via Puncti or Way of the Points
The Company of Houses
Astrological Aspects in Geomancy

Readings
A question about Study
Friend or Acquaintance?

My Articles on Geomancy

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Divination, Divination Master Post, Fortune-telling, Geomancy, Reading Example

Geomancy Reading – Study-related question

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I’m currently translating an old manuscript on Geomancy from Italian into English and I wanted to seize the opportunity to give someone a reading. My husband proved to be the guinea pig I needed. He was about to enroll in a course at the local VHS (Volkshochschule, a network of continuing education institutes in Germany) and wanted to know if he would be happy with the course.

Will I be happy with the course I’m about to start?

The lord of the first is Conjunctio, which indicates mental flexibility and the ability to learn. The quesited is the lord of the ninth house, Fortuna Minor, which is outside help. It often indicates good opportunities that need to be seized.

Fortuna Minor moves to the twelfth house, perfecting the chart. This is a very good indication, as it shows contact between querent and quesited, in this case the transfering of knowledge/skill. The perfection happens by the ninth figure moving, showing that the course organizer(s) will do their best.

However, F. Minor also moves to the seventh house, from which it opposes the querent. Furthermore, Minor plus Conjunctio gives Amissio, Loss, which shows either waste of money or the inability/impossibility to learn everything.

Carcer is the Judge, which indicates that overall it’s a wash, especially since the Right Witness is Laetitia but the Left Witness is Tristitia, indicating a downward or negative trend. The Judge of the Judge (Judge + Lord of the First) is Via, which in general can be seen as something of little consequence, something that is there and then is gone.

The Way of the Points leads back to Amissio in the second house, it’s an investment that is not wholly justified.

Outcome: my husband was somewhat happy with the course, but his interest waned with every class, especially because he found that he disagreed with some of what the teacher was saying (that opposition) although the teacher was generally enthusiastic and helpful. He didn’t get buyer’s remorse. He was still happy he had done it, but he had hoped for way more, especially considering the price.

MQS