The Moon in tradition
For thousands of years the Moon was not only a heavenly body to be observed, but a presence to be interpreted. This section gathers the traditions that surrounded her in Europe and beyond: the classical astrology of Ptolemy, with the dignities, the houses and the Lot of Fortune, the twenty-eight lunar mansions that came from the Arabic world, the rules of medieval astrologers such as Guido Bonatti. It then moves on to alchemy, which called silver Luna and celebrated the wedding of the Sun and the Moon, and to the Renaissance natural magic of Marsilio Ficino and Cornelius Agrippa. Ample space is given to Italian and European folk beliefs, weather proverbs, idioms, the lunar rules of farming and the history of almanacs, presented as cultural heritage and not as practices with proven effects. The journey closes with the figures of the imagination: the lunatic, the werewolf, the man in the Moon, the lunar hare and the tarot arcanum.
The Moon in Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos: moisture, soul and childhood
How Claudius Ptolemy described the Moon in the Tetrabiblos: a moist, nocturnal light ruling the sensitive soul, the mother and the first years of life.
02 · 3 min readDomicile, exaltation and fall: the dignities of the Moon
Why astrological tradition placed the Moon in domicile in Cancer and exalted in Taurus: Babylonian roots, the Thema mundi and Ptolemy's explanations.
03 · 3 min readThe Moon in the houses: the joy of the Goddess and the Lot of Fortune
The Moon in the twelve houses of classical astrology: her joy in the third house called the Goddess, the Lot of Fortune of Vettius Valens and the angles.
04 · 3 min readThe twenty-eight lunar mansions of the Arabic tradition
The manazil al-qamar, the twenty-eight dwellings of the Moon: from Bedouin stars to Islamic astronomy, from the Picatrix to Agrippa and our star names.
05 · 3 min readVia combusta and the void Moon: the Moon of medieval astrologers
The Moon in Arabic and Latin medieval astrology: Albumasar, Sahl ibn Bishr, Guido Bonatti, the via combusta and the Moon void of course in horary questions.
06 · 3 min readThe zodiac man: the Moon in medieval astrological medicine
Melothesia and the homo signorum: why medieval calendars linked the Moon to the signs of the body and to bloodletting, from Manilius to the Très Riches Heures.
07 · 3 min readMoon and silver: the lunar metal in the alchemical tradition
Why alchemists called silver Luna: the correspondence of planets and metals, luna cornea, the infernal stone and the stage of the albedo, or whitening.
08 · 3 min readThe King and the Queen: the wedding of Sun and Moon in alchemy
The coniunctio of Sun and Moon in European alchemy: the woodcuts of the Rosarium philosophorum, Splendor solis, Atalanta fugiens and the Chymical Wedding.
09 · 3 min readMarsilio Ficino and the Moon: Renaissance natural magic
The Moon in Marsilio Ficino's De vita (1489): the spirit of the world, the Moon as mediator of celestial influences, the debate with Pico and its legacy.
10 · 3 min readThe Moon in Cornelius Agrippa's De occulta philosophia
Silver, pearls, mansions and the magic square of nine: how Cornelius Agrippa described the Moon in De occulta philosophia, printed in full in 1533.
11 · 3 min readHair, births and feasts: folk beliefs about the Moon in Italy
Italian and European folk beliefs about the Moon: waxing and waning, haircuts and births, moonlight on sleeping children, Sister Moon and the date of Easter.
12 · 3 min readHump to the west: weather proverbs and omens of the Moon
From the hump to the west to Luna mendax, from lunar haloes to the colour of the disc: weather proverbs about the Moon and their roots in Aratus and Virgil.
13 · 3 min readFrom a bad moon to Orlando's wits: the Moon in Italian idioms
A crooked moon, asking for the moon, the moon in the well: origins of Italian lunar idioms, from the Disciplina clericalis to Astolfo in Orlando furioso.
14 · 3 min readSowing by the Moon: the rules of traditional farming
Sowing, pruning, timber and wine by the phases of the Moon: farming rules handed down from Hesiod, Cato, Pliny and Palladius, told as tradition.
15 · 3 min readBarbanera and the others: a history of lunaries and almanacs
From medieval calendars to the Barbanera of Foligno, from Frate Indovino to Franklin's almanac: a history of popular lunaries, saints and forecasts.
16 · 3 min readLunatic: the story of a word between Gospel, medicine and law
From the Greek seleniazesthai to the lunaticus of the Vulgate, from Blackstone to the Lunacy Act of 1845: how the Moon gave its name to madness and moodiness.
17 · 3 min readThe werewolf and the full moon: the history of a legend
From Lycaon to Petronius' soldier, from Gervase of Tilbury to Italian beliefs about Christmas night: how the werewolf came to be linked to the full moon.
18 · 3 min readThe man in the Moon: Cain, the bundle of thorns and the lunar face
Lunar markings read as a face or a man: Plutarch, Cain and the thorns in Dante, the biblical stick-gatherer and the Moon in Shakespeare's comedies.
19 · 3 min readThe hare in the Moon: from the Buddha to China's jade rabbit
The lunar hare in Asia and the Americas: the sacrifice of the Sasa Jataka, Chang'e's jade rabbit, Japanese mochi and the rabbit of the Aztecs.
20 · 3 min readThe Moon arcanum: history and iconography of the eighteenth trump
The Moon card in the tarot: from the Visconti-Sforza trumps to the Marseille decks of Noblet and Conver, to Court de Gébelin, Lévi and the Waite-Smith deck.