Sun in Capricorn

Midwinter anchors this placement, at least in the book learning that produced it. Ptolemy (Ashmand's 1822 translation) calls Capricorn tropical since the Sun turns northward at its first point, and he gives it to Saturn on account of its cold and wintry nature. The Sun's warmth in a Saturn sign is the plain contrast the scheme sets up.

Alan Leo 1899 calls Capricorn the strongest of all the signs, and his portrait runs to patience, exactness and thrift. Adams 1928 reads it far more severely, as earth forced into action and a sign overbalanced toward severity. The two writers, under thirty years apart, describe the same thirty degrees in nearly opposite moods.

Lilly 1659 lets the Sun claim degrees 21 through 30 as a face, and he makes Capricorn the exaltation of Mars. Modern Sun-sign pages lean on Saturn's discipline and seldom mention Mars at all.