Primary directions (also termed Placidean arcs, primary arcs, and equitorial
arcs) is the name for another method of astrological prognostication—“a degree for a
year” system. As one might anticipate, this method involves predicting events accord-
ing to the movement of a planet through degrees, although primary directions uses
degrees of right ascension (measured along the celestial equator) rather than degrees
of the zodiac (measured along the ecliptic). Prior to the advent of computer chart-
casting programs, primary directions was a comparatively difficult method to use, and
thus fell into disuse.
Other degree-for-year systems are solar arc directions, which measure move-
ment in degrees of celestial longitude (along the ecliptic), and solar declination arc
directions, which measure movement in terms of degrees of declination. Yet other sys-
tems of directions are ascendant arc directions, vertical arc directions, radix direc-
tions, and symbolic directions. The very overabundance of these approaches is a pri-
mary (if not theprimary) reason most astrologers stick with transits and secondary pro-
gressions. Nonetheless, the best contemporary chart-casting programs allow one to
calculate all of them, a provision that vastly simplifies experimentation and research.
Many if not all of these methods are thus likely to be the subjects of renewed interest
to computer-equipped astrologers.Sources:
Brau, Jean-Louis, Helen Weaver, and Allan Edmands. Larousse Encyclopedia of Astrology.New
York: New American Library, 1980.
DeVore, Nicholas. Encyclopedia of Astrology.New York: Philosophical Library, 1947.PROMETHEUS
Prometheus, the rebellious Titan from Greek mythology, has given his name to aster-
oid 1,809 (discovered on September 24, 1960), as well as to one of the moons of Sat-
urn. In contemporary astrological circles, however, Prometheus is most familiar
through the work of Richard Tarnas as the mythological figure best expressing the
astrological nature of the planet Uranus. Astrologers have long noted, though few
expressed the observation, that the traits attributed to the astrological Uranus appear
to have no association whatsoever with the mythological Uranus. Using this discrep-
ancy as his starting point, Tarnas took the further step of observing that the mytholog-
ical figure best expressing the character traits of the astrological Uranus was
Prometheus. In an article in the Journal of the British Astrological Association,, Tarnas
said, “The more I examined the matter the more I realized that every quality
astrologers associate with the planet Uranus was reflected in the myth of Prometheus:
the initiation of radical change, the passion for freedom, the defiance of authority, the
act of cosmic rebellion against a universal structure to free humanity of limitation, the
intellectual brilliance and genius, the element of excitement and risk.”
Tarnas’s ideas have received widespread acceptance in the astrological commu-
nity. Astrologers who hesitate accepting an exception to the widely held principle that
the name given to a celestial body by an astronomer synchronistically corresponds with
its archetypal meaning might note that the mythological Uranus is related to the astro-Prometheus
[546] THEASTROLOGYBOOK