Twelve segments of sky that say where in a life something plays out.
Houses are the odd ones out. Signs and planets are observable: you can photograph them. Houses are not out there at all. They are a division of the sky around you into twelve segments, anchored to your horizon and your meridian, and they exist because you were standing somewhere.
Two points do the anchoring. The Ascendant, where the ecliptic crosses the eastern horizon, opens the first house. The Midheaven, its highest point in the sky, opens the tenth. Extend both through the centre and you have a cross: four quadrants, each divided into three.
What each house covers
| House | Domain |
|---|---|
| 1st | Self-image, first impressions, how you enter a room |
| 2nd | What you own, and what owning it does for your sense of worth |
| 3rd | Everyday mind, siblings, short journeys, the way you talk |
| 4th | Home, family, roots, the past still working on you |
| 5th | Play, romance, children, whatever you make for the pleasure of it |
| 6th | Routine, work, health, the daily maintenance of a life |
| 7th | Partnership, contracts, what other people show you about yourself |
| 8th | Shared resources, intimacy, debt, crisis, transformation |
| 9th | Belief, philosophy, travel, the widening of your world |
| 10th | Career, public reputation, what gets said about you |
| 11th | Friends, groups, networks, collective hopes |
| 12th | The unconscious, dreams, solitude, self-undoing |
They come in pairs
Opposite houses are two ends of one question, usually a private version and a public one. The first house is how you assert yourself; the seventh is how you function with someone else in the room. The fourth is the family you came from; the tenth is the reputation you are building. Most of the interesting tension in a chart sits across one of these axes.