The Sun enters Capricorn I on 21 December 2022 at 4:48 pm EST with the Sun just below the horizon in the decan which Austin Coppock called The Headless Body. T. Susan Chang also notes that this decan is associated with the two of pentacles in the Tarot — a card which to my mind is often about balancing both income and expenses in a never-ending fool’s errand. This is the moment of the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere, and the official first day of winter (running until the spring equinox around March 21 each year).
My Capricorn Ingress 2022 forecast is here.
Jupiter is the ruler of this decan despite being in his fall or exile in Capricorn (due to the sign’s opposition to Cancer). Jupiter is square to the Sun by degree if not by minute at the ingress, while Venus as one of the triplicity rulers is present. Accordingly, this Christmas season is likely to feel like much more of a celebratory experience than usual but with something of an edge to it, based on public events: a recommended practice may be to follow Elinor Farjeon’s advice in The Carol of the Advent:
Make your house fair as you are able, trim the hearth and set the table: people look East, and sing today — Love the guest is on the way!
A practice of cleanliness and purification for the household is appropriate this season, as well as hosting an event for family or friends in the next ten days; purification before and afterward is advisable.
The ancients gave this decan to Asklepios or Asclepius, the divine doctor. Reported as slain by the god Zeus for daring to bring humans back to life, he was nonetheless placed in the sky as the constellation Ophiuchus. Today, Ophiuchus the constellation straddles the line between the constellation of Scorpio and Sagittarius — and the Moon, at 8° Sagittarius, is about to conjunct the fixed star Antares (whose name means “not-Mars”) at about the same time that Mars retrogrades into opposition to Antares. The aspect perfects at about noon Eastern time on December 28, 2022, putting it directly over the Central and Mountain timezones of the US at the culmination.
However, it’s in this decan that Asklepios is considered active, watching over the knees and over the joints of the body more generally, and the practice of health through high-quality food. We tend to regard the winter holiday as a season for sugary foods: candy and cookies, cakes and chocolate. However, ancient and medieval physicians such as Galen and Avicenna thought of themselves as being in the spiritual tradition of Asklepios, and attended to the divine aphorism, “let your food be your medicine, and your medicine be your food.” Additionally, the Asclepian tradition of medicine placed great stock in finding health through the interpretation of dreams. It’s a great season for doing a diet, nutrition, and mental health review, at the darkest time of the year in the northern hemisphere — and asking for Jupiter and Venus’s help in cultivating beauty and moderation in your holiday festivities.
Planetary Placements
The Ascendant is in Cancer I, the Mother and Child, making the relationships between parents and children considerably heightened in the next ten days — given that the coming week or so involves some overlapping holidays for several different religious and cultural traditions, this isn’t surprising. The Lot of Fortune is in the third decan of Cancer, though, The Overflowing Cup, suggesting that excess and abundance are both common themes of the year’s end, at least this year.
The Moon is the principal luminary of this chart, but in late Sagittarius and coming up on the dark of the Moon in just a few days, she’s both peregrine and too much in the Sun’s light. In the twentieth mansion, The Beam, she shines favor on those who gather for reasons of goodwill and happiness, and promises safe journeys by road— but brings challenges to the sick and the imprisoned, and imposes costly services and expenses on friends.
The Sun is just below the horizon in Capricorn at this moment of the Winter Solstice, promising a season of merry-making and joy, where the focus is likely on your romantic partner and their family (or on the lack of partner or partner’s family). Closeness and celebration are important, but you may feel challenged or distressed by the disconnect between yourself and your own family, owing to the Imum Coeli in the third house; and you may find that the financial straits caused by familial celebrations are worrisome. It’s likely to work out all right, but untangling the threads of the financial picture is unlikely; don’t make a bigger deal out of it than it needs to be.
The Sun’s presence below the horizon makes this a Night Chart in which Venus in Capricorn I The Headless Body is considerably more powerful than Mars in Gemini II The Hermaphrodite: she’s angular in Capricorn, approaching a conjunction with communicative and expert Mercury, and dignified by both triplicity and term, while Mars is cadent and retrograde in Gemini, and only dignified by decan. It’s a season in which the feminine principle is expected to make beauty and comfort for others, and the masculine is supposed to adopt allegedly more feminine habits and manners in order to provide the delights of the season —making food, caring for others, providing thoughtful gifts, designing and planning their part of the festivities, hanging lights, wrapping gifts… The reality is that these things are NEVER supposed to be out of a man’s wheelhouse, but he often thinks that these issues are beyond him.
This year men may feel more alienated than usual by the winter holidays contrasted with personal blah; the correct response is to lean into the renewal of power suggested by Jupiter in Aries I The Double Bladed Axe — displaying greater generosity and mercy, both toward themselves and others on the one hand, and separating out a sense of responsibility to career and work as unnecessary at this time. Focus mercy and joy at family and friends, and deal with any sense of selfishness as something to be put aside and dealt with later. Jupiter squares the Sun, though, suggesting that some career or matters related to reputation may be at odds with responsibilities to family and spouse or significant other.
Saturn in the eighth house sits in Aquarius I The Knot, indicating some untangling needs to be going on with regard to our responsibilities; some of this may be properly mourning an ancestor or member of your kin who passed due to COVID and related illnesses. Some of it may be about untangling their material remains, or the spiritual legacies that they live behind for both good and ill. Some of it may be literally untangling lights to hang on the tree, though.
The Nodal Axis continues to run between Taurus and Scorpio, with Uranus hugging the North Node’s position during a retrograde. Romance or at least the fantasy of … ahem … connection? … with one or more friends may cross your mind in the next ten days, or at least some unexpected and potentially hot flirtation at a holiday party. However, it’s worth asking what the ulterior motives might be, or what the fallout or consequences will be. Your real-world situation matters, here: don’t be eager to play beyond your game’s usual boundaries, and recognize that sometimes the ‘find out’ portion of the common phrase lasts much longer than the ‘f*cking around’ part.
Neptune is now within 6° of making a sextile with Pluto — a dance they’ll continue to approach and shie away from for the next three and a half years before perfecting in July of 2025 for the first time. Robert Hand indicates that the perfection is a time for letting parts of your material reality fade away, and allowing old parts of your life to die and decay so that new parts can come into play. The first glimmerings of this passing-away of the old reality may start to impinge on our lives.
Horoscopes by Rising Sign
Decan I of any sign (usually covering the 21s of the month to the first of the following month) is free to all visitors; Decan II is only available to Patreon and Ko-Fi.com subscribers; and Decan III is available to Patreon, Ko-Fi, and MailChimp subscribers.
Cancer: issues or concerns about a spouse or significant other are pushed down or out of sight of others, even as they are highlighted to you personally. Connecton and communication are needed to solve the difficulties, but their financial situation may be a thread you need to unravel and re-knit before you make any lasting decisions. Career matters may get in the way of an enjoyable holiday; a surprise offer from a friend opens new options.
Leo: Past legacies from family members require you to thread the needle and knit together what was separated. A surprise request from your workplace puts your own holiday plans in a bit of a bind. As hard as it will be to accept, you should probably look in the direction of what makes the most money in deciding how to act on this situation. Your daily routines would work better if your partner bought into them; some heart-to-heart conversation might be needed.
Virgo: Ask a partner to share some of the driving load if you have a trip to make these next ten days, but do all the local errands yourself, particularly hardware stores and shops with handcrafted items or personal services: you’ll run into the right people, including a surprise encounter with a co-worker with interesting options. Go to any event your spouse or a significant friend suggests: you’ll have a better time than you think.
Libra: Household matters are likely consuming a great deal of your attention, and you’d like nothing better than to be at home with craft supplies and a close friend. A personal treat you got for the holidays fails to arrive on time; you may have to be an unexpected trip to help a colleague. If you don’t live with your significant other, plan to spend part of the holiday at their place. If you live alone, or together with your romantic partner, find ways to celebrate the cold beauty of the season.
Scorpio: You’re probably feeling like the season is shaping up to bring you nothing that you want. Accodingly, it’s best to do a targeted wish list to the people who will likely give you presents. The gifts may arrive after the official day, but they’ll get to you eventually. If you’re spending the holiday with your own family, it may be time to introduce or bring along your significant other. Sometimes the best way to ease this process is to find some practical ways to help: bake, or bring wrapping paper or alcohol, or decorations, and then help ease people into the web of familial dramas or dreams.
Sagittarius: You’ll have to shoot at some daily targets to achieve your goals in these ten days. Financial matters will weigh you down and a partner’s sunny attitude that it will all work out will be hard to bear. But it will. Family issues are likely to be hard and troubling, but your household will be a suitable refuged when tears come. Revel in playing host when you can and nurse any injury so that it stays temporary and doesn’t become permanent.
Capricorn: The Others in your life are likely to be highly important these next ten days. Focus your thought and attention, creativity and expertise, on being of service to others; and minimize your own expectations for yourself. At the same time, thread back through your credit card expenses, your debit card, and cash: where did the money go? You may find that you’ve spent more than you intended on yourself, or on your duties to others, than you planned; and accordingly you can close up your wallet a bit more in the next few days. Be clear with any subordinates about your expectations of them over the holidays, but don’t take on all of the responsibility yourself. Delegate, but take an hem.appropriate amount of the holiday workload for yourself, so people know you’re not just foisting it off on them. In stores and in public, now might be a good time for a mask to be on your person, even if it’s not right on your face.
Aquarius: Unraveled responsibilities is a theme of the next ten days — some of what you expected to do is now not in your lap; and some of what you expected others to do, won’t be done by them, either. An appropriate mix of delegation and new scheduling of your time is probably appropriate. Finances are likely to be in some flux, but there are some must-spend obligations around either education or travel that are unavoidable even if you think personally that it’s irresponsible. Plan to be the kinder or more merciful voice at the holiday table this year; it will be noticed and appreciated if you keep the peace.
Pisces: It’s expected that you’ll travel for the holidays, and that may feel like a serious trap this year. Try to plan for a more luxurious journey: blankets and hot cocoa in thermos bottles for the cold parts of the trip, and books or games for the parts where you expect to be bored. Remember that activity is a kind of enrichment, and unenriched fish in aquariums tend to pick fights with one another — if your last few winter holidays have divided over politics or culture, try to remember that you can carve the turkey, or each other: food and entertainment are essential, but Scrabble is more fun than a political brawl with your in-laws.
Aries: Oh, is that a list? Are you checking it twice? Why is the naughty column twice as long as the nice column? Yes, it may feel fun to put a bunch of relatives into the “send coal” pile, or rig the dreidel so all their gelt comes to you. But there’s a loneliness that come with that determination to ruin someone else’s holiday cheer, and you may have need of some compassion before the week is out. See in those naughty, naughty folks some measure of good, and think how they’ve filled your cup before; they might not re-fill it next time. Some attention must be paid to your peers in the workplace; you may need their help in the new year, and they may need yours. Minimize conflict, maximize goodwill — don’t think of it as a false front… this year, it’s an investment in the future.
Taurus: Surprises abound, as you face challenges to your autonomy from friends, and use your agency to widen your range of acquaintances. Come in from the cold, friend, and warm yourself, even as challenges to you property and wallet abound, and you must face certain economic issues alone. Your focus is likely on your ‘baby’ in the next ten days, whether it’s a grown human, or a personal project or animal which receives a huge share of your heart. Try to find ways to celebrate the existing abundance in your life, and don’t be afraid of the education and the journeys that you’re called on to undertake; they’re places for growth and learning, even if they feel like they separate you from your friends.
Gemini: It must feel like hard times will never end, and these troubles will never be over; or that these wounds will never heal — and you’re having to care for your resources with much more cautious attitudes than usual, even if you allegedly have more than you have ever had before. Some targeted goals need to be addressed in the next few days, if you’re to meet your annual objectives; set a few focused goals and seek to achieve them before New Year’s Eve arrives. Additionally, take note of and accept that you have some responsibilities to certain others, even in your current state of difficulty: acknowledge the promises you have yet to keep, and begin to work toward fulfilling them; you’ll find that helping others will be a great help to yourself.
Colophon
I have a Patreon account for those who want to support this column as it continues its third year. Those funds support artists, artisans and thinkers that I regard as contributing to the well-being of the world. You can also buy me a Ko-fi in $3 increments; any column I write after receiving a Ko-Fi donation will be open to the public). You can also schedule an appointment with me using Accuity Scheduling, for a natal or solar return consultation.
If you want to read some of my astrologically-oriented poetry, the largest collection is called A Full Volume of Splendor and Starlight, available through my Etsy shop, and containing poems and hymns to the planets, constellations, decan deities, and Moon Mansion angels. While not astrological, Festae contains hymns to some of the older Roman gods and spirits from the calendar created by Numa Pompilius, the second ancient King of Rome.
I use iPhemeris for my charting software, and screenshot it to make charts. I want to thank the team that develops iPhemeris for the addition of Terms and Decans to their charts. I also use Hugh Tran‘s Physis typeface to craft logos for this blog, as well.
I use Christopher Warnock‘s The Mansions of the Moon as the basis of my Moon placement delineations, and Austin Coppock‘s 36 Faces for much of my planetary delineations. Neither gentleman endorses me.
