USNO page for Astrological Magic: Part 1

While there is some good astrological chart drawing software online, for example Astrodient use "chart drawing Ascendant" you need a good deal of training to use full chart software for astrological magic.

For planetary talismans, my PMP, planetary magic program, is an excellent shortcut for planetary elections. It's not 100% as good as using full chart software, but great if you don't understand how to do talismanic elections.

Similarly Decanichron is great software for decan/face talisman elections, that like PMP for planetary talismans, basically automates the whole process.

Ok, Mansion Tracker is software that tells you when the Moon is in a particular Mansion. It doesn't tell you if the Moon is afflicted and doesn't tell you if the Moon is rising or culminating.

Then finally fixed star elections. Unfortunately my software designer was working on a fixed star election program, but then had a serious family illness to deal with.

But I just discovered a great resource! They probably weren't expecting that it would be used for astrology, but the US Naval Observatory website has a great page online software page for the rising, transiting and setting of celestial bodies.

So, what they call rising is also astrological rising,ie conjunct the Ascendant or 1st house cusp, transiting is astrological culminating or conjunct the Midheaven or 10th house cusp and setting we don't tend to use, but it would be conjunct the Descendant or 7th house cusp.

There are two sections, a US section which automatically finds the longitude and latitude of your location and the non-US section where you enter your longitude and latitude. That's easy, Google it! You also need the elevation of your location in meters, again easy, Google it! Pick what celestial object you want to track. Set the date and date range, then click "compute data" You get a page with the rise, transit and set times.

Now this has lots of uses. For the planets, just couple the rising or transit/culminating time with looking at the planets' sign and planetary hour and you are well on the way to getting a good election!

Here are signs ruled by and exaltations of planets:

Saturn rules Capricorn, Aquarius, exalted Libra
Jupiter rules Sagittarius, Pisces, exalted Cancer
Mars rules Aries, Scorpio, exalted Capricorn
Sun rules Leo, exalted Aries
Venus rules Taurus, Libra, exalted Pisces
Mercury rules Gemini, Virgo, exalted Virgo
Moon rules Cancer, exalted Taurus

Ok, so let's try it out! Here's a website showing the signs that planets are currently in

Sun is currently in Aries. Let's try Sun for a week on the USNO page

I have listed just the rising and transit/culminating times. We don't need the other info on the page

2014 Apr 08 (Tue) 06:37 13:08
2014 Apr 09 (Wed) 06:36 13:08
2014 Apr 10 (Thu) 06:34 13:07
2014 Apr 11 (Fri) 06:33 13:07
2014 Apr 12 (Sat) 06:31 13:07
2014 Apr 13 (Sun) 06:29 13:07
2014 Apr 14 (Mon) 06:28 13:06

Ok, then using TPHP, my planetary hours software I looked at the planetary hours for those times.

2014 Apr 08 (Tue) 06:37 Mars 13:08 Jupiter
2014 Apr 09 (Wed) 06:36 Mercury 13:08 Venus
2014 Apr 10 (Thu) 06:34 Jupiter 13:07 Saturn
2014 Apr 11 (Fri) 06:33 Venus 13:07 Sun
2014 Apr 12 (Sat) 06:31 Saturn 13:07 Moon
2014 Apr 13 (Sun) 06:29 Sun 13:07 Mars
2014 Apr 14 (Mon) 06:28 Moon 13:06 Mercury

Ok, interesting thing about the Sun is that it is our timekeeper, so planetary days all begin at Sunrise and the first hour is the planet ruling the day, so Tuesday (Mars day) begins with Mars hour. Then Sun transits/culminates and is directly overhead at local noon, but with time zones this is different from clock time. This is one of the 24 planetary hour starts of the day.

So you could do a Sun Aries rising talisman on Sunday April 13, 2014 at my location at 6:29 am or you could do a Sun Aries culminating talisman on Friday April 11, 2014 at 13:07, ie 1:07 pm.

Cool!