Archive for July, 2021

Full Moon in Aquarius — July 24, 2021, 02:37 UT

Saturday, July 24th, 2021

The Full Moon in early Aquarius is in conjunction with Chariklo. The Sun entered the opposing sign Leo on July 22. The Sun is in conjunction with Cyllarus. Both Chariklo and Cyllarus are centaurs, minor planets orbiting the Sun between Jupiter and Neptune and crossing the orbits of one or more of the giant planets.


Astrologically Chariklo can be linked to death and mourning, but specifically to holding space for the process of grief. According to Melanie Reinhart, “her qualities and themes include a particular capacity for silent witness and reflection which can be an essential part of healing.” Caring and compassion are important keywords for Chariklo.

July 22, 2021, was the 10th anniversary of the Utøya massacre. Ten years ago the right-wing extremist Anders Behring Breivik killed eight people in central Oslo and 69 people, mostly teenagers, on the island of Utøya at an annual summer camp of the Labour Party’s youth division. In 2011 when the shooting on Utøya started, Chariklo was rising near the ascendant.


When the memorial service in Oslo started on the morning of July 22, the Sun was still in the last degree of Cancer (just like it was ten years ago). Mercury in Cancer was in conjunction with asteroid 2254 Requiem. Mercury represents youth, among other things. Asteroid Requiem was semisquare (45º) to Venus in the first degree of Virgo and sesquiquadrate (135º) to Jupiter in the first degree of Pisces. The Mercury-Requiem conjunction was exactly opposite centaur Hylonome in Capricorn.


2254 Requiem is a main belt asteroid discovered in 1977 and dedicated to the memory of the discoverer’s mother, who died on the same day that this asteroid was discovered. The Requiem is a mass held in honor of the dead. Astrologically, Requiem indicates acknowledgement of grief or acceptance of loss. Centaur Hylonome is another indicator of grief. It has showed up in the event charts of mass grief. Hylonome was a female centaur who lost his beloved husband Cyllarus in the battle against the Lapiths. The Sun is currently conjunct the centaur planet Cyllarus.

At the highest point of the memorial chart, at the Midheaven in Taurus, is asteroid Ceres. In mythology Ceres is the Mother Goddess who grieves the loss of her child. Ceres’s position in the chart in a way reminds us specifically of one of the first victims on Utøya, Monica Bøsei, the island hostess, known as ”Mother Utøya”, who had been organizing the summer camp for over 20 years.

At the descendant of the chart in Pisces is 57 Mnemosyne, a large main belt asteroid. Mnemosyne is the goddess of memory in Greek mythology. The name means “remembrance” or “memory”. The descendant is the angle of relationships; it is the point where the self meets the other. We can encounter the victims of Utøya only by remembering.

Many of the survivors are still suffering from serious health issues. Some of them have been threatened. In ten years hate speech has only increased everywhere and the right-wing extremism is still alive. The 2011 attack was political terrorism aimed at democracy, it was not just an isolated act carried out by some lunatic. “We must not let hate stand unopposed,” said Prime Minister Erna Solberg at the ceremony. We all must work for empathy and tolerance.

Never again July 22!

New Moon in Cancer – July 10, 2021, 01:16 UT

Saturday, July 10th, 2021

The New Moon occurs at 18+ degrees of Cancer on July 10 at 01:16 UT. About nine hours later the Moon has reached the midpoint of Alicanto and ǂKá̦gára at 22+ degrees of Cancer. Alicanto and ǂKá̦gára are the two most recently named trans-Neptunian minor planets. A midpoint halfway between two planets combines the qualities of the planets in question. If there is a third planet at the midpoint, then all three qualities are combined. Alicanto and ǂKá̦gára are trine to each other at the moment.

New Moon in Cancer
474640 Alicanto is an extreme trans-Neptunian object (ETNO), orbiting the Sun well beyond Neptune in the outermost region of our Solar System. Alicanto’s orbital period is about 6070 years. ETNOs may be influenced by gravitational interactions with the hypothetical Planet Nine, predicted to have mass of five to ten times that of the Earth.

474640 Alicanto was discovered by American astronomer Andrew C. Becker in 2004 at Cerro Tololo Observatory in Chile. It reached perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) in 2009. In the astrological chart it is now in conjunction with Ceres at 23+ degrees of Taurus. The object was named from Chilean mythology in May 2021.

The Alicanto is a mythological bird of the Atacama Desert whose wings shine at night with beautiful, metallic colors. Its presence usually represents good luck. It only appears in the nights and guide lost travelers to a safe place with the shine of its feathers. A miner who follows it can find treasures, but if the Alicanto discovers that it’s being followed, it will turn off the shining of its wings and scuttle away in the darkness of the night. Also, if the miner is not of “good heart” the Alicanto will guide the miner off a cliff.

469705 ǂKá̦gára is a trans-Neptunian object and a binary cubewano. The primary body was discovered in 2005 by American astronomer Marc Buie at the Kitt Peak Observatory in Arizona. Its companion ǃHãunu was discovered with the Hubble Space Telescope in 2009. The orbital period is around 290 years. The system is currently undergoing mutual occultation and eclipsing events, which have begun in 2015 and should continue until 2035. Astrologically the binary is now at 22+ degrees of Virgo opposite Neptune in Pisces.

The names ǂKá̦gára and ǃHãunu were officially approved in June 2021 by The International Astronomical Union (IAU). In the mythology of the ǀXam people of the Karoo region of southern Africa, ǂKá̦gára and ǃHãunu fought an epic battle in the east using thunder and lightning, producing mountainous clouds and rain. The conflict was over ǂKá̦gára returning his younger sister, ǃHãunu’s wife, to their parents. ǀXam is considered an extinct language of South Africa. Its last speakers died in the 1910s.

The conjunction aspect also combines energies that are represented by the planets in conjunction. In the chart of the English novelist Mary Shelley (Aug. 30, 1797 – Feb. 1, 1851), the Moon is in conjunction with both Alicanto and ǂKá̦gára in Sagittarius. The conjunction is square to her Mercury in Virgo. Mary Shelley is famous for her novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), which tells about a young scientist who creates a hideous creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment. The novel is considered an early example of science fiction. Mary Shelley also edited and promoted the works of her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, one of the major English romantic poets.