History Of Astrology

Astrology has been of great importance in many countries of the world since long before the invention of writing, and until at least the end of the 16th century. But who were the inventor of Astrology? There are different views in this regard. Astronomy-astrology is said to have originated with the Chaldeans, in Babylon, Mesopotamia, (now Iraq) around the fourth millennium BC.

Babylonia during the 18th-17th centuries BC was riddled with superstition. An interest in the earliest form of astrology was common to several early civilizations, not only in the Middle East, but in the Far East and in the Incan, Mayan and Mexican civilizations, where those planets that could be seen by the naked eye - Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn - were identified as gods with various names and personalities. Despite the interest in star patterns, other astrologers were not nearly as advanced as their Babylonian colleagues.

The reason why this works of astrological theory took place in the Middle East rather than other place? Because the Babylonians were better astronomers and mathematicians; they evolved a calendar and by 500 BC were almost moving on the way to invention of the zodiac, which is essential element in the personalization of astrology.

The details history of early calendars and their evolution are complex. Without the aid of mechanical clocks they made the calendars. Julius Caesar had to summon an astronomer from Alexandria to sort out the muddle into which the Roman calendar degenerated, and his Julian calendar eventually fell out of phase by no less than eleven days, so that in 1752 Britain was forced to adopt the Gregorian calendar (established in the rest of Europe by Pope Gregory in 1582), cutting eleven days from the year. At midnight on 2 September came 14 September, and people rioted in the streets because they thought the civil servants were doing them out of eleven days of life.

Babylonian astrology was introduced to the Greeks early in the 4th century B.C. Through the studies of Plato, Aristotle, and others; astrology came to be highly regarded as a science. It was soon embraced by the Romans (the Roman names for the zodiacal signs are still used today) and the Arabs and later spread throughout the entire world.

The earliest Babylonian zodiac of which we know had eighteen constellations: ten of the twelve we still use, and in addition the Pleiades, Hyades, Orion, Perseus, Auriga, Praesepe and the southern and northern fish. The eighteen-sign zodiac was still in use between the 6th and 3rd centuries BC. We cannot know with any certainty when the twelve-sign zodiac came into being.

Indian astrology is Vedic in origin and has been part of Hindu teachings for thousands of years. The earliest Indian astrological textbook was probably written in about 3,000 BC. The great Hindu texts of around 1000BC called the "Vedas" have astrological references.

Between the 5th century BC and the birth of Christ, astrology appealed to various sections of Greek society. Hippo crates, the physician and 'father of medicine', who taught astrology to his students so that they could discover the 'critical days' in an illness.

Around the 2nd century A. D. Ptolemy, a Greek scientist, wrote a colossal work on astrology, which is divided into two parts: The Almagest and The Tetrabiblos. These books are perhaps the most complete written records of ancient astronomy and astrology.

It was the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that began the present revival of interest in Astrology. Much of this is owed to the great Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Gustave Jung, who used astrology in his studies and wrote on the subject extensively.

In the 1950s, French astrologers Michel and Françoise Gauquelin used sophisticated statistical studies to link the positions of the Planets to human nature. The English astrologer Alan Leo, and Russian, Madame Blavatsky did much for the resurgence of astrology in England and Germany. Another American Astrologer, Dane Rudhyar, who came to astrology through studies in music and philosophy, wrote a valuable work on Astrology. Till today many astrologers around the world are doing extensive research on Astrology and adding value to this ancient science.