Robert Schmidt Discusses the Inventor of Western Astrology

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Tonight we have something that’s got a touch of history to it: an interview with Robert Schmidt of Project Hindsight, who last week announced that he had discovered the inventor of Greek astrology, which means Western astrology.

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Robert Schmidt in 2006 at the Baltimore NCGR convention. File photo.

From its beginnings in 1993, Project Hindsight tasked itself with the translation of ancient astrological texts, so that astrologers would have them to use and learn from.

Up to that point, the translations were nonexistent or poorly done, and the origins of Western astrology were hazy.

Eventually, as his collaborators Robert Hand and Robert Zoller went in their own directions, Hindsight under Schmidt’s leadership stuck exclusively to Greek astrology, starting with documents from the 4th century BCE.

Those include something called the Thema Mundi, which we discuss in the interview. Images of that have been added below.

Through extensive reading and translation of the literature, Schmidt deduced that there were both founders and a founding era, and his research all points to a Greek mathematician and astronomer named Eudoxus of Cnidus (c. 390–c. 337 BCE) as the leading founder.

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The original Thema Mundi, by Eudoxus of Cnidus. This addresses the domicile rulers (sign rulers) of the first seven signs. The additional sign rulers are implied; they are left out of the document.
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Here is an expanded Thema Mundi per Robert Schmidt, with the additional domicile rulers in red. The exaltations of the planets, by sign, are in green. The joys of the planets, which apply to houses, not to signs, are in blue.

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