Guides
Three facts before any other
Three facts before any other, with three different demands on precision. What each one needs, and why the ascendant is the one that goes wrong.
The Sun: the date is enough
The Sun crosses one sign a month, so the day is enough to know which one it was in. It is the fact everybody knows and the only one a newspaper horoscope uses.
There is a caveat at the boundaries: if you were born on the day the Sun changed sign, the time decides which side you fell on. It is a few hours a month, but when it applies it applies.
The Moon: the date, and sometimes the time
The Moon changes sign roughly every two and a half days. The date usually settles it, unless the Moon was changing that day, in which case the time decides.
It is the fact most people discover the first time they see their chart, because popular culture does not hand it down. Nobody knows their Moon by hearsay.
The Ascendant: the time, to the minute
The ascendant is the degree of the zodiac rising over the eastern horizon at that instant. It advances roughly a degree every four minutes and goes all the way round in twenty-four hours.
That means it changes sign about every two hours. A rounded time can hand you the wrong ascendant, and the twelve house cusps with it. It is why we are so insistent about the exact time and the time zone.
Finding them on the print
On the printed piece the ascendant is the marked point on the left of the wheel, where the first house begins. The Sun and the Moon carry their glyphs on the ring, at the degree they occupied.
With the corresponding option on, all three are also written at the foot, with sign and degree, so reading the fact does not require interpreting a glyph.
Why we print them as words and not only as symbols
A glyph is precise for a reader who knows it and opaque to one who does not. Writing Sun in Leo, Moon in Pisces, Ascendant in Scorpio turns the piece into something that can be read aloud the day the parcel is opened.
It is an option, not an imposition: it can be removed before paying if you prefer the wheel clean. What does not change is the certificate, where the calculation data is always recorded.
Why does my ascendant differ from another site's?
Almost always the time conversion: an hour of offset moves the ascendant about fifteen degrees. Our certificate states which time zone was applied, so it can be compared rather than guessed at.
Can I hide this from the print?
Yes. Name, date and place, and the Sun, Moon and Ascendant block, are turned on or off before paying, and the preview reflects it immediately.
Which of the three matters most?
None on its own. They are read together, and if we had to rank them by how much data they demand: the Sun needs the date, the Moon sometimes the time, and the ascendant always.