Celestial omens were not applied to individuals until the very end of Babylonian civilisation, around the 5th, 4th and 3rd centuries BCE, when planetary positions at the moment of birth began to receive consideration in predicting events destined to occur during the course of existence (the earliest nativity so far discovered appears on a cuneiform tablet dating from 410 BCE).
In Alexandria, in Hellenised Egypt, astronomers, Neo-Platonic philosophers and Hermeticists systematised and developed this hitherto fragmentary genethliacal astrology (from Greek genethle: birth). To the original Babylonian astrology, preoccupied with the planets' movements and positions in the zodiacal constellations, they added further doctrines, such as our so-called houses and aspects. Thus was born Greek astrology, which embarked on its triumphal march across the world, spreading from the Roman Empire as far as the Indian subcontinent...read more>>>...
