Astrology Menu
- Home Page
- How Old is Astrology
- Astrology History
- Houses and Signs
- The Houses
- Signs of the Zodiac
- Putting it Together
- Sun Signs
How Old is Astrology
From the first proto-humanoid; a being which was first showing the characteristics which we have come to call "human," we have been looking at the skies and attempting to understand "what it is all about." With very little that could be called "science" and no written language or history except that which could be verbally transferred from generation to generation we were just beginning the search. In effect, the skies were our first chalkboards, and the lessons written in the stars taught us much of what we needed to survive and thrive.
Often causation was ascribed to celestial effects, while the truth, as we know now, was and is more complex than that. These proto-humans, which we will call man for ease of understanding, saw repeating clusters of stars proceeding across the nightly sky, and also saw these same clusters proceeding with the changes of seasons. It was not difficult to view a star cluster and to give it a culturally significant name. Sagittarius, Taurus, etc. for example, are not English but Latin or Greek names which have "stuck" because of our propensity to write everything down and to translate it into each new language that arises.
In the earlier cultures of man, the repositories of this knowledge were given the respect due to one who holds the keys to survival. A person who could "read the sky" and tell the group that "soon the large herds of animals would be coming from 'that' direction" actually did hold the life of the people in his/her head. These people were shamans, priests, and soothsayers. Often they employed other devices to prognosticate, but a lot of it was the "sky talking" (Astro Logos).