Composite Charts
Introduction to Relationship Astrology - 3
- written by Philip Graves Jan 31 2003
5. Now we are going to consider the astrological factors in the chart for the two people merged together as though one, which is called their Composite Chart. These factors indicate qualities of the relationship itself that are experienced equally and evenly by both individuals, as though they were thinking, feeling and behaving as the single entity that is their relationship. These factors, like synastric factors, are entirely subjective, bearing no ostensible relation to the objective similarity or compatibility of the two individuals involved; but they differ from synastric factors in that where factors in the Composite Chart are concerned the subjectivity is equally shared by both partners and does not link into their respective birth charts at all. The composite chart is as though an autonomous entity into which the two individuals are subsumed on an experiential level. It is particularly active when close relationships are formed, often to the degree that the individuals' senses of their separate identity take second place to it; but it has influence upon all relationships of whatever nature, including business, family, friendship and even enmity.
Think of every human individual as a complex biological and physical organism with its own unique astrological blueprint from birth that charges it up vibrationally in different areas of its nature (corresponding with the luminaries, planets, nodes and angles) in different ways (the signs and houses). Everyone shares the same characteristic set of charged astrological factors (the luminaries and planets), but each factor is subject to a variation on its typical pattern of charge in accordance with the influence of the zodiacal sign and degree it occupied at birth. When two people's astrologically conditioned outwardly radiated personal fields, on whatever physical or metaphysical planes may apply, meet, then a third field, the composite field, takes form on the basis of the averages or midpoints of the variant patterns of charge for each like pair of factors in the two individual personal fields. Thus, the composite field features the characteristic generic blueprints for the radiation or charge patterns of each of the luminaries, planets and Moon's Nodes; but the variations on these patterns for each such factor in the composite chart are determined by the nearer midpoint (the average by the closer of the two possible connecting routes around the zodiac) between its zodiacal positions in the two individual birthcharts.
For example, if the first person has Venus at 19º Pisces and the second has Venus at 23º Cancer, the 19º Pisces variation on the characteristic Venus blueprint manifest in the first person's outwardly radiated field meets with the 23º Cancer variation in that of the second person; and the two variations average out in one corresponding with 21º Taurus, which is their nearer midpoint around the zodiac. The two people's composite field thus takes form with a variation in the characteristic Venus charge blueprint corresponding to the influence of the zodiacal position 21º Taurus.
By the same logic, the composite field is characterised by its own variations of the charges for all the other planets, as well as for the Sun, Moon and Moon's Nodes. All this information can be represented in an astrological chart for the composite field resembling a birth chart, the composite chart.
Once the sign and degree placements of these factors have been established, the aspects between them should be calculated. Interplanetary aspects in the composite chart have a critical bearing upon the energies of the relationship itself as determined by the two people's composite field. The composite chart sign placements are of considerably lesser importance, and were even considered by Robert Hand to be possibly a mere 'abstraction'.
The composite field also has its own variant form of the plane of energies corresponding with the twelve house cusps and houses. According to John Townley, the pioneering and authoritative developer of the composite chart as an analytical technique in the past thirty years, the zodiacal signs and degrees occupied by the house cusps in the composite chart should be calculated in exactly the same way as those occupied by the luminaries, nodes and planets. That is to say, the nearer midpoints of the like pairs of cusps in the respective birth charts, starting with the Ascendant (1st house cusp) and continuing around in the usual anticlockwise direction through the zodiac, form the sign and degree placements of the house cusps in the composite chart. Since occasionally the nearer midpoint of one of the later house cusps may fall on the opposite side of the zodiac from where it would be required if to remain in ordered sequence with the rest of the nearer midpoints around the zodiac, Townley recommends that in such circumstances the further midpoint is taken for the stray cusp - which will automatically entail that the further midpoint is also taken for the cusp of its opposing house.
Once all the composite house cusps have been determined, draw up a vertical list of their positions by zodiacal sign and degree, ideally to the nearest decimal point of a degree. Then fit alongside it the positions of the composite Sun, Moon, planets and Moon's Nodes that you calculated earlier, according to the houses in this framework into which each falls. This then gives you a further set of significant influences in the composite chart to interpret. Whereas the interplanetary aspects in the composite chart describe the energies of the relationship, the house placements in the composite chart describe the areas of manifestation in which each planetary principle will be expressed as a characteristic feature of the relationship.
The guidelines listed for interpreting the synastric house placements and interplanetary aspects in Part 2 of this article can be similarly applied to identifying the influences introduced by the composite field of the two individuals, as described by the composite chart. The main difference is that the composite chart influences affect both individuals in the relationship equally, and operate autonomously as opposed to being tied into birth chart configurations for each individual. They describe the nature of the relationship as an entity in itself, whereas the synastric aspects and house placements describe the potentialities of the two individuals as distinct, separate people for experiencing and interacting with each other.
A composite chart with personal and benefic planets in the 1st, 3rd, 5th or 7th houses, conjunctions and trines involving the benefics and luminaries, and positive Mars linkages to the Moon and / or Venus, if allowed to express itself, may produce a wonderfully positive and rewarding feel to a relationship. Composite personal planets and benefics in the more pratical houses (2nd, 4th, 6th and 10th) can be very helpful in building real-world compatibility, material sharing and domesticity into relationships. However, difficult synastric connections may at any time relegate the composite chart to the subconscious background, as the individuals find from the vantage points of their own separate identities obstacles impeding or dissuading their merging and togetherness. Conversely, strongly positive synastry may bring the composite chart into sharp and clear focus, but harsh aspects between or taking in the malefics (Mars, Saturn, Uranus, and Pluto) in the composite chart can spoil the experience of the relationship itself, prompting the individuals to withdraw from it again and return to admiring each other from a safe and respectful difference.
This article taken from
HOROSCOPESCHAT
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01.10.2006.