Angular Houses: Understanding Social Structures & Hierarchies Within our Relationships
If astrology is a language, conversations around our birth charts often start in the first person. The embodiment of a marriage counsellor’s worst nightmares, our sentences full of “I”’s are often our first entry points into the ocean of mysteries. Astrology is a world full of odd synchronicities. The best way to familiarise ourselves with this language is often to start with our own experiences. As we start seeing repetitive patterns in this strange jungle, the birth chart expands beyond the horizon of our own private, intimate lives. Suddenly our 6th house Jupiter isn’t just about how we like to work, or organise ourselves — it is the joy of welcoming a pet into our lives when this planet is activated. Like opening a door to a dark room, progressively filling every corner with light, our initial point of entry through the 1st house progressively expands to other houses, painting the pictures of our lives with the colours of the people and experiences.
But as we know, navigating our relationships with others and the roles they have in our lives isn’t easy. “Humans are social animals” or “hell is other people”? What terms does astrology provide us with to explain this paradox?
The words we use to describe our realities are not neutral, just as the concepts that inhabit them: astrology wasn’t born out of nowhere, and the principles we use in the discipline are the result of hundreds of years of rich, layered historical context. Just like everything else, the astrological terms we use are biased and reflect a certain world structure, a certain view on things. For example, a number of astrologers who worked in the 70s had really homophobic and sexist views which transpired in their chart interpretations (New Age synastry books, I’m looking at you). Does that mean we should ditch the symbols associated with planets, houses etc? No. Is it possible to form a richer, more comprehensive perspective if we look at the origin of these principles in the first place? Absolutely!
So please, be my guest as I explore the social structures, obligations and hierarchies that permeate our astrology through the study of houses!
Wait, houses?
Okay, let’s give you a quick rundown of I’m talking about!
The houses are a division of the ecliptic plane (basically a circle that contains the Sun’s orbit), usually into 12 parts. There are many ways to calculate houses, and you’re probably familiar with some of them, such as Placidus, Koch, Porphyry, or Whole Signs… I won’t get into that here, but just know I will be using the whole sign system: every house has the same size and is 30°. There’s also a lot to say about the way houses are used. Today I will be focusing on the concept of angularity. Just keep in mind there are 3 types of houses: angular, succedent and cadent.
Angular houses are the 1st, 4th, 7th and 10th. They are the “power” houses, the ones where shit gets done. A planet in one of these houses is said to have “accidental dignity”, or more power to assert itself. I will come back to this later.
Succedent houses are the 2nd, 5th, 8th and 11th. They are houses of resources, and are named this way because they come after the angular ones. You can see them as the “outcome” of the activities done in the angular houses, but also their pillar.
Cadent houses are the 3rd, 6th, 9th and 12th. They come before the angular houses, and usually represent movement, gestation, the incomplete state of things.
These are the understandings of houses based on Hellenistic astrology. I’m particularly interested here in the concept of “power” vested in the angular houses.
What is power? Power is the ability to act in the way you intend. Power is the ability to influence other people. The type of power described by the angular houses is relational. A planet has essential dignity when it’s in a sign, term or decan where it has power, meaning that the resources it has are tied to that planet’s essential qualities or nature. But accidental dignity isn’t about nature, it’s about circumstances: a planet can have accidental dignity depending on its house placements, but also on its speed, aspects to other planets, etc. In short, accidental dignity isn’t about the core part of a planet but about external factors.
Think of a mildly competent king. As a person, he’s not particularly fit or inclined to rule a kingdom… But he’s still king. The privileges and opportunities he’ll get in life won’t be tied to his character or personal accomplishments as much as they will be to his social position.
As such, angular houses reflect a profoundly interesting component of power: social structures and hierarchy.
The two most powerful mathematical points in a birth chart are the Ascendant (the Eastern horizon) and the Midheaven (the culminating, highest point in the sky at any given time). Next are the Descendant (the most Western point, where the Sun sets) followed by the Nadir, or Imum Coeli (the most northern point, where the Sun is the least visible, hidden below the horizon). The symbolic reasons for these are very ancient and can be traced back to the ancient Egyptians’ view of the Sun as being metaphorically born when it rises above the Ascendant, is at its full power when it culminates on the Midheaven, then slowly fades to join the Descendant (and metaphorically “dies”) before starting to make its way back up again from the underworld after it crosses the Nadir.
Derived from these very literal “life and death” significations, the 1st house symbolises the self and the physical body as it is the point where light & life “enter” the chart , setting its destiny. Opposed to the 1st is the 7th, the house where we find the Descendant, which is fundamentally “other” to us. The 7th house is therefore the house of close relationships but also of “open enemies” because although fundamentally different and representing a distinct entity, it is still visible. The 10th house represents public life, but also “important” people (meaning high up in the social hierarchy). Honours, things that are most visible, put on display, someone’s “peak” are found in the 10th. The 4th house is hidden, it’s “behind the scenes” work. I like to describe the 10th/4th house opposition as a tree and its roots. The visible part that reaches the highest points is actively fed and sustained by an organic, invisible network, just like a powerful individual is often a well-connected one.
Planets in the 4th house/close to the Nadir don’t always represent powerless individuals who are forced into hiding, while the 10th house archetypes reap the benefits: this is still an angle with a lot of power. You can think of clans or families, or groups of influence that help their members. Think Renaissance aristocratic Italian families, or university alumni groups… It’s a different kind of power, and a different kind of work, yet they mutually sustain each other.
The angular houses describe interpersonal and social power structures. I believe that the power and accuracy of astrology result from its incredible capacity to describe human life in symbolic ways; yet it does not condone or support the idea of a “natural order”. Archetypal patriarchal and colonial systems are represented in this house cycle: the individual (the first house) belongs to a larger collectivity that determines their destiny; they are partnered and married off (7th house) in order to constitute alliances between families and communities (4th house) in order to advance their own personal projects and ambitions (10th house).
This is very caricatural and describes only a tiny portion of people who would very literally enact these realities. But on a symbolic level, the relational and dynamic property of these angular houses describe a reality of oppression rooted in hierarchies. However, as I said in the beginning of this article, oppressions and hierarchies itself come from specific contexts. The Hellenistic world was both a rich and brutal one — and we are both incredibly far and close to it. As our world changes and we adopt or rediscover new and old ideas, we must not forget that it doesn’t have to be this way.
As hyper-individualism becomes more and more contested as a way of life, we are also learning to tap into nurturing communities where fulfilling, balanced relationships are possible. As more people fight back against oppressive regimes, wealth inequality, colonial and work exploitation, we begin to envision and build better societies. While we can see that exploitative structures on the scale of the collective are visible in individual birth charts and in the very astrological components we use, they can be reimagined to support new foundations.
This is a reminder that although astrology points to elements of fates in our life trajectories, we are often too ready to accept man-made walls as those of our destiny. Astrology also gives us the power to tear down harmful structures to build better, deeper things in their place.