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Hyleg
5. Born on a waning Moon: examine the dispositors of Fortuna. If any of its
dispositors also aspects Fortuna, then use Fortuna as hyleg; if not, check the
ascendant for an aspecting dispositor.
6. If all else fails, see what planet has dignity in the degree of the new or full
Moon before birth.
7. If none of these work, then the chart is a third differentia and the child will
die before age 12.
While this might look like a very rigorous system, there is actually one point of
ambiguity. In Bonatti’s original definition, it was not stated that the Sun or Moon, in
order to be hyleg, also had to aspect one of its dispositors. The necessity for an aspect
between any potential hyleg and one of its dispositors was made in Omar of Tiberius’s
commentary, but it was initially unclear whether this was simply a variation introduced
by Omar, or whether it reflected Bonatti’s actual usage. With the availability of
more classical sources, it is likely that Bonatti simply gave a slightly abbreviated version
of his actual working definition.
While this might seem like a relatively minor point, its significance is that one
study of the efficacy of the various classical definitions of the hyleg was done, using
the data from the March 13, 1996, classroom shootings in Dunblane, Scotland, in
which about half the students were killed, and half were not. In an article she wrote
for the January 1998 issue of the Horary Practitioner, Penny Shelton compared methods
from Ptolemy, Dorotheus, Bonatti, William Lilly, John Gadbury, and Henry Coley,
and found the Bonatti system to be the most satisfactory in predicting which of the
children lived and which died. However, Shelton did not incorporate the necessity for
the Sun or the Moon to aspect a dispositor to be counted as hyleg. So perhaps this particular
restriction needs reexamination.
The later methods of Lilly, Gadbury, and Coley that Shelton included represent
various simplifications of the older system. Later, the simplifications became even
more extreme. For one thing, all the earlier definitions were dependent on the five
essential dignities, and this became impractical once these dignities were forgotten.
In the Arabic period, the calculation of the hyleg and its derivatives became
the principal system for evaluating the length of life. In the Hellenistic period, noted
Neugerbauer and Van Hoesen, this function was instead derived from the position of
the ascendant.
The calculation of the length of life proceeds as follows. First, Alcocoden is
examined, which is the almuten of the hyleg in the case of the Sun or Moon, or the
planet which is the aspecting dispositor for the Ascendant and Part of Fortune (also
the Sun and the Moon). The alcocoden is also called the “giver of years” in English.
The condition of the alcocoden is then examined with respect to the Table of
Years given below. If including only the major dignities (i.e., rulership, exaltation, and
triplicity), the alcocoden is essentially dignified, the native’s life span is enumerated
from the “old years” column. As the transition occurs to lesser dignity to no dignity,
and succedent to cadent, then the starting point shifts to one of the other columns.
[346] THE ASTROLOGY BOOK