MOIETY OF ASPECTS IN HORARY CHARTS

Written by Zane B Stein

Endorsed by Esoteric Technologies Pty Ltd, the Creators of Solar Fire
When a modern astrologer looks at aspects in a Horary chart, he or she usually considers aspects
when applying or exact, and considers the aspect no longer relevant once the two bodies move past
the exact aspect and begin separating. But there were some traditional astrologers, such as William
Lilly, who had an entirely different view of aspects in a Horary chart, something called Moiety.
Deborah Houlding explains Moiety:
- Moiti is a French word derived from the Latin medits, meaning medium
measure, mean value or "half. Its general use in traditional astrological texts is
either to define a half-measure of any planets orb (thereby identifying the distance
that the orb extends on either side of the planet), or to denote the mean value
obtained when two planetary orbs are added together and then halved to find the
distance at which their rays unite.
To understand how the meaning of the word can alter according to context, it helps
to realise that older authors usually expected a planets influence to become
noticeable whenever its conjunction or aspect with another planet fell within the
range of its own planetary orb. A standard set of planetary orbs had become widely
reported by the 8th century (see table below), with most authors reporting that the
Suns orb extends over 30 of the zodiac, 15 either side of the centre of its body. This
15 limit is therefore often described as the moiety of the Suns orb (being only half of
its full radius); and any planet within 15 of a conjunction with the Sun is said to
enter its beams at this distance, regardless of the length of its own planetary orb. The
same approach applied to other planets, so that the Moon was considered to be in
orb of an aspect with any planet that was separated from aspectual contact by less
than 12 (the Moons orb on either side of its body), even in if the other planets orb
was smaller and not making contact with the Moon. Saturn, for example, has a
smaller orb which extends 9 on either side of its body, so at a separation of 10, the
Moon is able to aspect Saturn, but Saturn is not able to aspect the Moon.
Many later authors, such as the 16th century French astrologer Claude Dariot, took a
different approach which became very fashionable in the 17th century. In this, the
two planetary orbs were added together and then halved to find a mean measure at
which both were in aspectual contact with each other. For the Moon and Saturn this
would be 1030 (12 for the Moon, plus 9 for Saturn = 21/2 = 1030). This is widely
referred to as the moiety technique for calculating when the aspect between two
planets begins to become effective - the name deriving from the fact that the two orbs
are added together, and then halved to obtain a mean value that applies to both.

The table to the right shows the standard set of orbs that has been most consistently
reported by historical texts. An early source of these values is Pophyrys Introduction
to the Tetrabiblos, (CCAG, 5, part 4; p.228), where the text reads:
The rays of the Sun come to 30 degrees: 15 in front and 15
behind. The Moon has 24 degrees: 12 in front and 12
behind. Saturn and Jupiter 18: 9 in front and 9 behind.
Mars 16: 8 in front and 8 behind, Venus and Mercury 14: 7
in front and 7 behind.

USING MOIETY IN YOUR HORARY CHARTS

For the astrologer who wishes to work with aspect moieties in their Horary
charts, Solar Fire gives you the option of setting the aspect tables so you can do
this, using Page Designer. You can either edit a page already existant in Solar Fire, or create your
own.
As an example, lets choose a traditional Horary page. You can access the Page Designer a number
of different ways. Lets use the most direct way for this example.
At the top of Solar Fire click View and then click Page Topic Index, which will bring up the Page
Browser. Find the page you wish to use and single click it to highlight it, but dont double click it to
open it.

Once you have the page highlighted, click on the Edit button at the bottom of that screen.

You will now see the framework of the chart and all the tables that appear on your selected page.

Now click a box that shows the aspects which you want to change over to moiety, and you will be
able to see the settings that are able to be edited. Lets click on Aspects of Moon.
Two things occur.
The box stands out with red dots in the corners, which shows you it is now in
edit mode.
And on the right side of the screen you will see the editing tool.

What you are looking for is the line that says

Aspects File. If it doesnt already say moiety,
then this is what you will be changing.

Click on Aspects File to highlight it and you will see the following change at the top of the editing
box. Whatever aspect set was already being used in that page will now also appear in the edit
window at the top. For example, here we see a page where Standard was the chosen aspect set.

Click on the little arrow to the left of the top window to open the
folder with all available aspect sets.

Scroll down until you find Moiety.asp, click to highlight it, then click the Open button.

Moiety should now being showing next to Aspects File.

Change any other aspect boxes if you desire using the same method. Once you are finished, click
File in the upper left corner of the screen, and then Save. You will now be using the moiety
aspects on your chosen page.
Note: your page may have several different file sizes for Screen and
Printer options listed in the upper right corner. You will need to
change the aspect sets on each one of these page sizes.