Decans in Astrology

 What Do Decans Mean in Astrology?

Every sign of the zodiac is divided into three decans. They hold 10 degrees each. So, for example, an Aries First Decan person was born with the Sun at 0-9 degrees. A Second Decan Aries has the Sun at 10-19 degrees. A Third Decan Aries has the Sun at 20-29 degrees. Basically, there are three types of Aries, three types of Taurus, three types of Gemini – and so on.

Your Sun Sign Has Three Parts

Check Your Birth Chart for Your Decan

It’s the same for all the 12 signs. Are you a 0-9 degree, 10-19 degree or 20-29 degree sign person? You will need your time, date and place of birth to get this right.

If you are a Premium Member your chart will already be on the screen, so you can check.

Being born in a different decan to (say) another Cancer person gives you a different kind of Cancer personality and destiny. Prince William has the Sun in Cancer at 0 degrees. He is a First Decan Cancer man.

The Quick Guide to Decans

The decans can also be rounded up and down. A fast and easy way to get it (mostly) right is just to look at the dates for your sign. So with Aries for example, First Decan is March 21-30. Second Decan is March 31-April 9. Third Decan is April 10 to 20.

If you were born right on the cusp of a sign though (like Prince William) do check your timed, dated and ‘placed’ natal chart to be absolutely sure.

Decans At A Glance

If you were born on the first or last date of a decan date bracket, check your birth chart to be sure you are in the right section. Otherwise, this is a good quick guide to decans. You can find out what your decan means here. 

Aries First Decan: March 21 to March 30
Aries Second Decan: March 31 to April 9
Aries Third Decan: April 10 to April 20
Taurus First Decan: April 21 to 30
Taurus Second Decan: May 1 to May 10
Taurus Third Decan: May 11 to May 20
Gemini First Decan: May 21 to May 31
Gemini Second Decan: June 1 to June 10
Gemini Third Decan: June 11 to June 21
Cancer First Decan: June 22 to July 1
Cancer Second Decan: July 2 to July 11
Cancer Third Decan: July 12 to July 22
Leo First Decan: July 23 to August 22
Leo Second Decan: August 2 to August 12
Leo Third Decan: August 13 to August 22
Virgo First Decan: August 23 to September 3
Virgo Second Decan: September 4 to September 13
Virgo Third Decan: September 14 to September 22
Libra First Decan: September 23 to October 2
Libra Second Decan: October 3 to October 13
Libra Third Decan: October 14 to October 22
Scorpio First Decan: October 23 to November 2
Scorpio Second Decan: November 3 to November 12
Scorpio Third Decan: November 13 to November 22
Sagittarius First Decan: November 23 to December 2
Sagittarius Second Decan: December 3 to December 12
Sagittarius Third Decan: December 13 to December 21
Capricorn First Decan: December 22 to January 20
Capricorn Second Decan: January 1 to January 10
Capricorn Third Decan: January 11 to January 20
Aquarius First Decan: January 21 to January 30
Aquarius Second Decan: January 31 to February 9
Aquarius Third Decan: February 10 to February 18
Pisces First Decan: February 19 to 29
Pisces Second Decan: March 1 to 10
Pisces Third Decan: March 10 to 20

Why Astrologers Trust Decans

Astrologers including Sepharial gave every decan its own planet. Sasha Fenton believes your decan explains – why you’re not like everybody else. In fact, the list of distinguished astrologers who use decans is long including Frances Sakoian and Louis Acker as well as Margaret E. Hone.

We know Carl Jung had a chart which showed him, his decan. It was from the Rosicrucian Fellowship in California and was discovered in his archives (source: Liz Greene, Jung’s Studies in Astrology).

Alan Leo (1860-1917) writing in Modern Astrology, called each third of a sign, a decanate or face. He nodded to the Hindu intepretation of decans. The first decan of Aries, for example, was symbolised by a raised battle axe.

Alan Leo and Decans

The third decan of Aries was a ‘wrathful man clothed in red, holding a raised stick’ according to Alan Leo. And what of Leo itself? Well, similar. The first decan of Leo was ‘cruelty and violence’ and the second, ‘warfare and resentment of injury.’ We have to remember this famous British astrologer reached the end of his life near the First World War. I don’t think anybody would buy his interpretation of decans today.

Astrologers do trust decans, historically. But which astrologers can we trust, in the 21st century?

The answer comes from two women who were primarily psychics. One trained in astrology and the other worked closely with a famous astrologer.

The Decans in Tarot

The astonishing accuracy of the Smith Waite Tarot is partly due to its astrological coding. The artist and channel, Pamela Colman Smith and her colleague Arthur E. Waite, both in The Golden Dawn, used the decans to create the Minor Arcana in their cards, using the numbered pictures, without the Aces.

So the power of 36 is in the 78 Tarot cards too.

Professional psychics like Katie-Ellen Hazeldine specialise in working with decans in the Tarot to great effect. There are so many Tarot decks on sale these days, based on everything from rock stars to cats, that the original purity of the psychic vision has gone. The Smith Waite Tarot, free for you to use on this website, has the Ancient Egyptian decans secretly hidden in the Minor Arcana.

Slow-Moving Cycles and Decans

Why do modern astrologers trust decans for a more specific, detailed, personalised Sun Sign reading?

The slow-moving cycles of Pluto are partly to explain. A First Decan Aquarian is experiencing Pluto in a rare conjunction with her or his Sun, for example, from 2024. A Second and Third Decan Aquarian are yet to go through this character-changing experience.

Another reason is the evidence of our own eyes. Why is Prince William so much like his mother, Princess Diana? They are both First Decan Cancerians. This is something they might have understood in Ancient Egypt (below, Ramses II at The Australian Museum). 

Walk Like An Egyptian

Decans come to us from Ancient Egypt. Herodotus tells us the Egyptians, like the Babylonians, made great use of the number 36.

This is of course 12 zodiac signs, multiplied by three decans per sign. Coffin lids from the Middle Kingdom show the Egyptians dividing the sky into 36.

After 332 BC this core idea of 36 sections, fed into the zodiac. Astrology and Tarot professionals have used decans ever since.

I use them in the new book, Your Birthday, written with British history graduate and Sunday Times bestselling author, Rachel Wells.

Two more events in 2024 persuaded me to start using decans in your daily, weekly and monthly predictions.

One was a life-changing visit to the exhibition at The Australian Museum, Ramses and the Gold of the Pharaohs. 

Another, just before, was the ground-breaking discovery of the complete zodiac, hidden under layers of dirt, in the Temple of Esna in Egypt.

See the YouTube Video here.

The Egyptian Decans – Updated

The Egyptians had some odd ideas about the decans. At the Temple of Esna, we find the First Decan of Capricorn is called ‘eyebrow’. The second is ‘grey goose’ and the third is ‘son of the grey goose.’

The 9th century astrologer Abu Ma’shar thought the First Decan of Aries was a black man with red eyes. “Of large stature, outstanding courage and great nobility; he wears a white garment bound in the middle with a rope; he is wrathful, stands erect, watching and observing.”

Well yes, unless you are Lady Gaga (First Decan Aries, born 28th March).

Murals based on Abu Ma’shar’s decans can still be seen at the Hall of the Months (Sala dei Mesi) at Palazzo Schifanoia which dates from 1470.

Three Decans of Gemini

Historically, decans have been interpreted in radically different ways by a range of astrologers. This mural of the three Gemini types from the Hall of the Months is a good example.

Contrast it with the three Gemini types in this original illustration from 1403 based on the ideas of Abu Ma’shar. People liked the idea of decans but could not agree on what they meant.

Women Rescue the Decans

The decans became a lot more relevant (and accurate) in the 20th century when women began to write about them and also draw them.

Notably, Tarot pioneer, Pamela Colman Smith and Sabian Symbols psychic, Elsie Wheeler began to work with the individual degrees of the signs with remarkable results.

Women helped to evolve the idea of three types of sign –  and take it forward.

Egyptian men threw the idea of three divisions in the sky to Babylonian men, who split the zodiac into 36, threw it to Greek men – who then threw it to the Roman men and gave it to Britain, home of modern astrology today.

We’ve ended up with a female-nurtured, intuitively reasoned system of decans. It says a great deal for the idea of a zodiac sign split into three, that it has survived since Egypt, but it took the genius of Londoner Colman Smith to feed the decans into her multi-million selling Tarot.

The Tarot and Decans

The Smith Waite Tarot is encoded by decans. Arthur Edward Waite and Pamela Colman Smith (and Aleister Crowley with Frieda Harris) developed their Tarot Minor Arcana cards using them.

So, for example, the Two of Wands is based on Aries First Decan. The Three of Wands is based on Aries Second Decan and so on.

This all comes from the secret society known as The Golden Dawn, which involved these Tarot creators. Book T, the Golden Dawn’s bible, associated the Minor Arcana numeral cards, minus the Aces, were symbols of the 36 decans.

The Decans and Sabian Symbols

A few months after my visit to The Australian Museum to see the sarcophagus of Ramses II, I headed to the Blue Mountains to see my old friend, the renowned astrologer Lynda Hill.

Lynda is the world’s leading expert on the Sabian Symbols, channelled in 1925 by Elsie Wheeler with Dr. Marc Edmund Jones.

What is fascinating about the symbols is that they cover 360 degrees, so offer us stories about every decan, composed of a series of strong images.

William and Diana in the Sabian Symbols

Going back to the example of Prince William and Princess Diana, both First Decan Cancer people, the sequence of original word-pictures channelled by Elsie Wheeler, associated with the first ten degrees of that sign, makes a story which could apply to either. It is the script for being a First Decan Cancer person.

The individual degrees (set for the day of birth) show the title of the story. The main plot description.

The other lines and illustrations reveal the whole decan. What makes a First Decan Cancerian like William or Diana, different to a Second Decan Cancerian or a Third Decan Cancerian? These are the original Wheeler/Edmund Jones interpretations of the first ten degrees of the sign.

The First Decan of Cancer

• Sailor ready to hoist a new flag to replace old one.
• A man on a magic carpet observes vast vistas below him.
• An arctic explorer leads a reindeer through icy canyons.
• A hungry cat argues with a mouse before eating.
• Driver racing madly with a fast train is killed.
• Innumerable birds are busy feathering their nests.
• In a moonlit fairy glade, two little elves are dancing.
• Rabbits in faultless human attire parade with dignity.
• Naked little miss leans over a pond to catch a gold fish.
• A wonderful diamond is being cut to a perfect shape.

The Sabian Symbols are a gateway for psychic perception, but you don’t need to be a professional clairvoyant to see Cancerian themes in this First Decan Cancer sequence.

The symbols even show the natural squares and oppositions to Cancer from Aries, Capricorn and Libra. The aspects are very much part of the Sabian Symbols.

There is a warning in the First Decan of Cancer about going too fast – racing madly – which suggests the natural clash between Aries and Cancer. One can see both William and Diana in this first decan story.

Your Decan, Personality and Destiny

The Ancient Egyptians’ passion for astrology, recently uncovered in 2024 at the Temple of Esna, included a firm belief that 36 sections or 36 brackets, from 360, contained deep truths.

Astrologers including Deborah Houlding and William Lilly have used the decans to varying degrees (literally) ever since. Starting in November, I will be introducing you to decan prediction, adding this detailed and specific new information to your monthly written horoscope, so you can see just why you are different from others born under your sign – and how that shows up in your prediction too.

If you’d like to see how your decan is used on video, you can become a paid subscriber to The Astrology Show on Substack, where host Alicia Fulton and I look at the Tarot for the 36 decans every month, using the Smith-Waite Tarot. (Alicia Fulton).

Main Image: Creative Commons/Sala dei Mesi
Princess Diana: Shutterstock
Alicia Fulton: Profile Photograph