North and South Indian charts

A chart is a drawing of twelve signs or houses with the planets set into them, and the drawing has taken more than one form. Iyer's 1885 translation of the Brihat Jataka says the mode used in Southern India is the one recommended by Jaimini, an author of astrological aphorisms. Its Rasi Chakra, or sign wheel, fixes each sign to its own box, with Meena, Mesha, Vrishabha and Mithuna across the top row.

The 1912 translation by Swami Vijnanananda describes three modes. In the first, used in the United Provinces and Oudh, the ascendant goes in the top house and the signs are numbered round the houses against the direction of a watch's hands, and in the second, used in Bengal, the figure is square or circular with Mesha always at the top. The third repeats the Southern Indian layout, again credited to Jaimini, and says the word Lagna is written in the house of the ascendant. The diagrams do not survive in the text layer we have, so the shapes described are not confirmed.

The North Indian style is the one the sources read cannot confirm. The first mode's wording, with the ascendant on the top house and the rest numbered round, could describe it, but the text does not name the shape, and the second mode as described is not it. This site therefore states no early source for the North Indian style. The drawing is a presentation choice, and the sidereal positions beneath it are the same.