What is an element in astrology?
An element is one of four families the twelve signs fall into: fire, earth, air and water. Each family holds three signs spaced evenly around the zodiac wheel. Fire is Aries, Leo and Sagittarius; earth is Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn; air is Gemini, Libra and Aquarius; water is Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces.
Four families of three
Count round the zodiac in fours and you meet the same element again. Aries, Leo and Sagittarius are four signs apart from each other, 120° on the wheel, and form a triangle; so do the other three families. Astrologers call these groups triplicities, and signs of the same triplicity are said to sit comfortably together. 1,2
The order always runs fire, earth, air, water, then repeats. Fire and air signs were traditionally called masculine or diurnal, earth and water signs feminine or nocturnal: every other sign round the wheel. 2
Where the four come from
The four elements come from Greek natural philosophy, not from astronomy. In the fifth century BCE Empedocles taught that everything is made of four roots, earth, air, fire and water, mixed and separated by Love and Strife. Aristotle credits him as the first to set out the four clearly. 3
Ptolemy, in the 2nd century CE, built the triangles from geometry and from the planets that ruled them, not from the elements: he describes the Aries–Leo–Sagittarius triangle as masculine and under the Sun and Jupiter. Each triangle had planetary rulers by day and by night. The habit of calling the triangles fire, earth, air and water belongs to later astrologers. 2,1
Modern astrology reads the elements as temperament: fire for drive, earth for practicality, air for ideas and talk, water for feeling. Psychological astrology of the 20th century leaned on this heavily, and many readings now begin by counting how many planets fall in each element.
Not the Chinese five elements
Chinese astrology uses a different set of five: wood, fire, earth, metal and water. They belong to the years and the heavenly stems, not to the twelve animals, and they work by cycles of creation and control rather than by triangles on a wheel. 4
How the machine uses it
Calculated facts only, worked out the same way the machine does it.
- Fire: Aries, Leo and Sagittarius.
- Earth: Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn.
- Air: Gemini, Libra and Aquarius.
- Water: Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces.
- Signs of the same element sit 120° apart on the wheel (a trine). The machine labels them "most compatible".
- Fire and air, and earth and water, sit 60° apart (a sextile). The machine labels those "great match".
- The card counts the element of every planet in the chart, not only the Sun.
Where the idea comes from
Era by era, with sources. More in the Reading Room.
- Classical5th century BCEEmpedocles names four roots of all things: earth, air, fire and water. 3
- Classical2nd century CEPtolemy's Tetrabiblos sets out the four triangles of signs and their ruling planets by day and night. 2,5
- Medieval9th–12th centuriesAbu Ma'shar's introduction to astrology is read in Latin in 12th-century Europe, carrying the classical doctrine of the signs with it. 6
- 1930s1930sSun-sign newspaper columns bring the elements to a mass audience as shorthand for temperament. 7
Common misconceptions
“Astrology took the elements from the stars.” The four elements are Greek philosophy, older than horoscopic astrology. Astrologers mapped them onto the zodiac later. 3
“Your element is your sun sign's element.” A chart has ten or more bodies, each in a sign with an element. Many astrologers weigh the whole balance, not the Sun alone.
“The Chinese "fire" year and a fire sign are the same thing.” Different systems with different elements. Chinese astrology has five, including wood and metal, attached to years. 4
Questions people ask
Which element is my sign?
Fire: Aries, Leo, Sagittarius. Earth: Taurus, Virgo, Capricorn. Air: Gemini, Libra, Aquarius. Water: Cancer, Scorpio, Pisces.
Why do the elements repeat every four signs?
Because there are four of them and twelve signs. Each element lands on every fourth sign, giving three signs per element at 120° apart. 1
Are same-element signs compatible?
By tradition they are harmonious: they form a trine, the aspect Ptolemy called harmonious. 2
Sources
- Triplicities, Skyscript, Glossary of Astrological Terms (Deborah Houlding). Read on .
- Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos, Book I, chapters 10–19 (aspects, houses of the planets, triplicities), LacusCurtius, University of Chicago (Loeb Classical Library translation by F. E. Robbins, 1940). Read on .
- Empedocles, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Read on .
- Heaven Stems and Earth Branches, University of California San Diego (David K. Jordan). Read on .
- Ptolemy (by Alexander Raymond Jones), Encyclopaedia Britannica. Read on .
- 'Dicta Albumassar' by Abu Ma'shar, a Latin version of his Introduction to Astrology, 12th century, University of Edinburgh Archives and Manuscript Collections. Read on .
- How Are Horoscopes Still a Thing? (Linda Rodriguez McRobbie), Smithsonian Magazine. Read on .