E

Earth

Sometimes called Terra. Our planet revolves on its own axis every 24 hours and completes its orbit around the Sun in around 365.25 days. The course of the Earth's orbit lies between that of Venus and Mars. The Moon is the Earth's natural satellite and orbits the Earth in approximately 29 days.

Earth Element

One of the four astrological elements. A feminine element, it stands for materiality, solidity, matters to do with security and so on. The other elements are, Fire, Air and Water.

Earth Signs

Taurus (fixed), Virgo (mutable), Capricorn (cardinal).

Earthy Triplicity

The Earth Signs: Capricorn; Taurus; Virgo. These signs are cold and dry by nature.

Easter

Christian festival of Christ's resurrection, coinciding approximately with the first full moon after the vernal equinox. Easter is named after the ancient German goddess of spring, Eastre. This calendar festival finds its primitive origins in earlier European and Middle Eastern cultures, all of which had major festivals, usually to do with resurrection and/or release from bondage, based around the vernal equinox.

Eclipse

Solar and Lunar eclipses are important keys to political and social events. They are also significant in natal and progressed horoscopes. An eclipse happens when the Sun, Earth and Moon align so that, in a solar eclipse (at the New Moon), the body of the Moon obscures the body of the Sun and in a lunar eclipse (at the Full Moon), the body of the Earth obscures the Moon. In each case the Sun's light is obstructed, causing the eclipse.

• Total Eclipse

When the whole of the eclipsed body (either Sun or Moon) is blocked out and darkened.

• Annular Eclipse

When the body of the Moon does not completely block the light of the Sun, leaving a thin ring of fire (Annulus) visible.

• Partial Eclipse

When only part of the Moon or Sun is blocked out.

Ecliptic

The Sun's apparent path through the zodiac, a belt some 15° – 18° wide around the Earth. The name refers to eclipses, which can only occur here.

Eighth House

The eighth segment of an astrological chart. Governs natural changes in life such as birth and death, clearing the way for something better, self-revelations, marriage and business assets, and partner's funds; inheritance, end-of-life matters; sex, death and taxes.

Election

Chart cast to ascertain the most auspicious time for important events, such as marriages, moving house and so on. Used in Horary Astrology.

Electional Astrology

A branch of astrology in which a chart is cast to determine the ideal time for any significant action, such as buying a house, starting a business, getting married, buying a car, beginning a journey etc.

Elements

The basic structural components of the world are known as elements. In astrology four elements are recognised: Fire, Earth, Air and Water (these elements are easily observed in nature, but have a subtle character, not to be confused with the chemical elements of the periodic table). A fifth element, or quintessence, is held to be the underlying permeating spiritual essence out of which the four material elements are precipitated. The quintessence is not used in practical astrology. See Triplicity, also Humours.

Elevated

The closer a planet is to the midheaven in a chart, the more elevated, and therefore the more potent, it is.

Eleventh House

The eleventh chart segment. Governs friendships, hopes and wishes, personal goals, associations, group aspirations, cooperation, bettering the community and humanitarianism.

Ellipse

A somewhat flattened, elongated circle, or oval shape. Planetary orbits were demonstrated by Kepler to be ellipses, rather than circles as had previously been believed.

Elongation

Distance of a planet, measured in degrees, from the Sun.

Emersion

A planet coming from under the Sun's beams so as to be seen after an eclipse or occultation. See Immersion.

Empyrean

The place in highest heaven in the geocentric model of the universe. It was believed by ancient cosmologists to be occupied by the fiery element, or in the case of the Greeks following Aristotle, by the æther.

Enthroned

A planet placed in its domicile, or home sign, or more strictly, when in a part of a sign where it has more than one dignity.

Ephemeris (Ephemerides)

Tables of planetary places used to find their positions in the zodiac. Now widely available in computerised form.

Equal House System

House system in which the zodiac is divided into 12 equal houses of 30° each, commencing from the first house cusp, the degree of the Ascendant. This means that the MC is not necessarily the cusp of the tenth house, as it is in say Placidus, or Koch systems. Thus the MC is considered a sensitive point, no matter which house it appears in.

Equal Power

Beholding Signs. Ptolemy says: "the parts which are equally removed from the same tropical sign, whichever it may be, are of equal power, because when the sun comes into either of them the days are equal to the days, the nights to the nights, and the lengths of their own hours are the same. These also are said to "behold" one another, both for the reasons stated and because each of the pair rises from the same part of the horizon and sets in the same part."

Equally Ascending

Pairs of signs that take equal lengths of time to rise over the horizon.

Equator

The band of maximum circumference of the Earth, located at 0° Latitude. When the Sun by declination is located above the Equator, this is the time of the Equinox. See Celestial Equator.

Equinoctial Points

First degrees of Aries and Libra respectively.

Equinoctial Signs

Aries and Libra. These signs hold the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. See Solsticial Signs.

Equipollent

Two signs equidistant from an equinoctial point, one being north, the other south. At 0° Aries and 0° Libra the night hours are equal to the day hours. This relation remains constant as you move away from the equinox by inverse degrees. This later became known as contra-antiscia.

Equinox

Equal Night. Point in the ecliptic where the day and night is of equal duration. In the Tropical Zodiac, the vernal equinox is the first degree of Aries and the autumnal equinox is the first degree of Libra (the seasons are reversed in the southern hemisphere). More on the Equinox.

Eris

Transplutonian "dwarf planet" formerly known as Xena. Discovered in 2003, this planet is more massive than Pluto and has a moon, Dysnomia. The most massive object yet found in the Kuiper Belt, it is almost 10 billion miles from the Sun (three times farther out than Pluto) and takes more than twice as long as Pluto to orbit the Sun. Eris is the Greek goddess of discord and strife. She stirs up jealousy and envy to cause fighting and anger among men. At the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, the parents of the Greek hero Achilles, all the gods with the exception of Eris were invited, and, enraged at her exclusion, she spitefully caused a quarrel among the goddesses that led to the Trojan war. Its moon is now officially named Dysnomia, after Eris’s daughter, a demon spirit of lawlessness. Eris has no accepted astrological significance. See Xena.

Essential Dignity

See Dignity

Ether (Aether, Æther)

1. Alchemical quintessence: the fifth and highest element after air, earth, fire and water; once believed to be the substance composing all heavenly bodies. See Akasha, also Quintessence.
2. A medium that was once supposed to fill all space and to support the propagation of electromagnetic waves. See Dark Energy. Read more on the Ether.

Event Astrology

A branch of astrology seeking to explain an event from its timing. Robert Schmidt says: "For example, suppose you receive a letter or message from someone and you wish to know the intentions of the sender, whether the message was tampered with in some way, etc.; to find these things out, cast the chart for the moment you received the letter. Or suppose you wish to know the course of someone's illness; cast the chart for the moment he took to his bed." See Decumbiture.

Exaltation

Essential dignity of a planet, possibly even more powerful than being in its own sign. Traditionally, however, exaltation (4 points) is considered less important than rulership (5 points) on the scale of planetary values. See Table of Planetary Values.