Chiron in Astrology, Lilith & Asteroids: the Advanced Natal Chart

Most chart readings stop at the Sun, the Moon and the eight planets. The points on this page pick up a few threads those ten leave loose: the old hurt you carry, the part of you that refuses to be tamed, and the smaller bodies that describe how you nurture, plan, commit and devote yourself.

Each point appears on your natal wheel with its sign, degree and a one-line meaning. The positions are free; Plus adds a longer written reading.

Chiron is a small body that orbits between Saturn and Uranus, discovered in 1977 and named after the centaur healer of Greek myth who could not heal his own wound. Astrologers read it as the place where you were hurt early and still feel it. Its sign tells you what the hurt is about, and its house where it keeps getting pressed.

The other half of the story is that the wound often turns into a gift. Where you were hurt is usually where you understand other people best, and many astrologers find Chiron prominent in the charts of therapists, nurses and teachers.

Black Moon Lilith is a point, not a body: the place where the Moon’s orbit swings farthest from Earth. Astrologers link it with the untamed side of you, the desires and instincts you were told to keep quiet, and what happens when they refuse.

By sign and house, Lilith shows where you push back against control, where shame got attached to something in you, and where owning that part of yourself turns into strength.

The four main asteroids each cover one theme. Ceres is about nurture and letting go, Pallas about strategy and spotting patterns, Juno about commitment and what you need from a partner, and Vesta about focus and devotion.

The Vertex is a point on the western side of the chart that astrologers connect with fated meetings and turning points. The Part of Fortune, calculated from your Sun, Moon and Ascendant, marks where things tend to come easily. Both depend on your birth time.

There are well over a million named and numbered minor bodies, and any of them can be computed into a chart. Sigastra shows a deliberately short list: Chiron, Black Moon Lilith, Ceres, Pallas, Juno, Vesta, the Vertex and the Part of Fortune, because those are the ones with an actual interpretive tradition behind them rather than a name that sounded suggestive.

The reason to keep the list short is not tidiness. The more points a chart contains, the more certain it becomes that some point will confirm whatever you already suspected, and the less that confirmation is worth. A chart with two hundred bodies in it can be made to say anything, which is the same as saying nothing.

Each of these also has a different claim to attention. Chiron and the four main asteroids have decades of published interpretation; the Vertex and the Part of Fortune are older still, coming out of the Hellenistic tradition. That is a much stronger footing than an asteroid whose meaning is derived from the myth its discoverer chose to name it after.

The honest answer is: less than the planets, and only when it is close. A minor point sitting within a degree or two of your Sun, Moon or Ascendant is worth reading; the same point eight degrees away from something is usually noise, and treating it otherwise is how a chart reading turns into a search for confirmation.

Two of these depend entirely on your birth time. The Vertex and the Part of Fortune are calculated from the angles of the chart, so without an accurate time they are not worth reading. Chiron, Lilith and the asteroids move slowly enough to use from a date alone.

The order that works is to read the standard chart first and come here second. If the ten planets, the houses and the aspects already describe someone you recognize, a minor point can add detail. If they do not, adding more points will not fix that. It will only make the chart harder to disagree with.

There is one asymmetry in this list worth knowing before you read it. Chiron, the Vertex and the Part of Fortune are single points with a settled calculation, so two pieces of software will agree on them. Black Moon Lilith is not: there is a mean version and a true version, several degrees apart, and different sites use different ones without always saying which. Sigastra computes the mean Lilith, which is the more widely published of the two. If a position here does not match one you have seen elsewhere, that difference, rather than an error in either calculation, is almost always the reason.