Each age carries an archetype, a pattern in the collective unconscious that shapes how we see the world. When the age changes, the archetypes change too; this shows first in the stories we tell and the myths we believe, and later in institutions and daily life.
Why are the dates disputed?
It is hard to say in which year an age begins. The constellations are of unequal size while the signs are equal thirty-degree divisions. Transitions are not sharp either; they are like twilight, with the influences of two ages overlapping for centuries. Ages are therefore often treated in round blocks of 2,000 or 2,160 years. In Bailey's writings the date that stands out for the start of the Aquarian Age is 1945; we discuss it in a separate article.
Did the ancients know about precession?
The discovery of precession is usually credited to Hipparchus in the second century BC. Many researchers argue, however, that ancient cultures encoded this knowledge in myths and architecture rather than writing it down: numbers such as 36, 72, 108, 216 and 432 appear in legends, calendars and the measurements of monuments around the world. Flood stories and images of a broken cosmic mill or a sky pillar that must be guarded may also preserve the memory of this great cycle.
A brief picture of the ages
- ♌The Age of Leo. The end of the Ice Age, great climatic change and memories of floods. In Anatolia the earliest temples of Göbekli Tepe date to around 9600 BC and their orientation is linked with the stars. The Sphinx of Egypt is often proposed as a symbol of this age.
- ♋The Age of Cancer. Home, family, protection and the Great Mother. The domestication of animals, settled villages and pottery. Anatolian settlements such as Çatalhöyük and Nevalı Çori flourish.
- ♉The Age of Taurus. Cults of the bull and cow: Hathor and Apis in Egypt, the Minoan bull in Crete. Stone circles, pyramids and the great agricultural civilisations.
- ♈The Age of Aries. The warrior, the hero and iron. The shift from bull to ram appears in myth: the ram sacrificed by Abraham, the ram-headed Amun-Ra. In the Axial Age great teachers such as the Buddha, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Pythagoras and Plato appear.
- ♓The Age of Pisces. Faith, devotion and authority. The fish symbol of Christianity and the idealism of the sixth ray. See The Piscean Age.
- ♒The Age of Aquarius. Group consciousness, direct knowledge and the order of the seventh ray. See The Aquarian Age.
The esoteric view
For esoteric astrology precession is both a fact and an illusion: the Tibetan Master reminds us that there is constant movement and shifting in space, and that the heavens mean one thing to the Hierarchy, another to astronomers and another to astrologers. It is therefore more fruitful to read the ages as doors opening in human consciousness than as exact dates. Our understanding of history is limited; some developments we think new may be the remembering of something long forgotten.