synastry grids

Hello, all. Get ready for a dumb question.

I am looking at a synastry grid. I know what a synastry grid is and the purpose. What I don't understand is the meaning of what is written below the aspect symbols.

For example, in one block of the grid it shows the symbol for "square" aspect, and under it: IS44. Another block has a sextile symbol with 0S56 under it.

What do IS44 and 0S56 mean?

Baby Owl

hold on...hold on...

I think I've got it. The "S" stands for separating and the "A" stands for "applying." So in my first example, Planet A is separating from a square to Planet B, and they are 1 degree 44 min. apart.

Part of my problem was that I thought the number "1" was the letter "I".

Did I do good?

Baby Owl

Makes sense to me! Maybe if you tell us what software you're using, someone else can tell you for sure...

I'm not using software, just found a grid in a book and could not, for the life of me, find an explanation of the notations!

Baby Owl

You should be able to double check by inspection of the chart.

If the aspect is applying then the faster planet will be in a lower degree than the slower planet. If it is separating then the slower planet will be in a lower degree than the faster planet.

For example Mercury at 15 degrees Aries is Applying to a square with Jupiter at 17 degrees Cancer. Swap the planetary positions and the aspect would be separating.

Minderwiz said:

You should be able to double check by inspection of the chart.

If the aspect is applying then the faster planet will be in a lower degree than the slower planet. If it is separating then the slower planet will be in a lower degree than the faster planet.

For example Mercury at 15 degrees Aries is Applying to a square with Jupiter at 17 degrees Cancer. Swap the planetary positions and the aspect would be separating.

Click to expand...

Thanks, Minderwiz! I understand what applying and separating mean, and I can now see from the grid that my translation of "A" and "S" do mean applying and separating. It was just coming up with that possibility in the first place that was driving me nuts!

Baby Owl

Sorry BabyOwl, couldn't tell from your response to Isthmus whether you had been able to check or not - teaching my grandmother to such eggs LOL

You did well to puzzle it out. It isn't a common way of expressing whether the aspect is applying or separating - though it is quite elegant.

The usual separator in such an expression is the sign - as in 08GE23 (or slight variant) but this needs two letters and it would be fairly obvious from your description that this was not the notation being used.

Well done.

No apology necessary! I appreciate you offering assistance.

I did an internet search and kept seeing that same sort of notation on synastry grids but still couldn't find a simple "key" to explain what the letters meant.

I'm not sure at what point the answer popped into my head, but it finally did.