Gryphon Astrology Blog

Roger Federer is thought to be the best tennis player of modern times; Federer has the birth chart to match that reputation. First, let’s take a look at some special features of Federer’s horoscope. His horoscope is below:

Choosing to be a professional athlete is an unusual career decision, statistically speaking. Let’s take a look at what it was in Federer’s birth chart that indicated such a choice. To determine a person’s profession, William Lilly tells us to start with the first house, and any planets in it. If one of the planets of profession (Mercury, Venus, or Mars) is in the ascendant, this will be the chief indicator of the person’s occupation. In Federer’s horoscope, we have Venus in Virgo in the first house, sextile Mars in Cancer and the Moon in Scorpio.

The first thing we notice is that all three planets are either in their detriment or fall; this is not an auspicious beginning to our analysis. Let us see what William Lilly says about this combination, as far as careers go: contacts to the Moon indicate “credit with the common people,” which we would term popularity. Venus combined with Mars gives “labor and pleasure; boldness, confidence with flattery and dissimulation.” Certainly, playing a sport/game (ruled by the fifth house of pleasure) for a living would fit into Lilly’s description. The “dissimulation” might have to do with behaving oneself on and off the court for the sake of sponsorships, and presenting a pleasant PR front as part of one’s job.

As usual, it is the fixed stars that really tell the tale of fame in Federer’s birth chart, and more than compensate for the difficult essential state of the Moon, Venus, and Mars. The Royal star Aldebaran is conjunct the Midheaven, the house of fame and career. Mars is conjunct Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. Vivian Robson writes that Mars with Sirius is “courageous, generous, [gives] military preferment, work in connection with metals. It gives honor, renown, wealth, ardor, faithfulness, devotion, passion and resentment, and makes its natives custodians, curators, and guardians.” The Moon in Scorpio falls on the North Scale, which “gives good fortune, high ambition, beneficence, honor, riches, and permanent happiness.”

Finally, let us take a look at the meaning of the constellation of Leo on the ascendant. Manilius, an ancient astrology writer, states the following:

The sons of the Lion are filled with the urge to adorn their proud portals with pelts and to hang up on their walls the captured prey, to bring the peace of terror to the woods, and to live upon plunder. There are those whose like bent is not checked by the city gates, but they swagger about in the heart of the capital with droves of beasts; they display mangled limbs at the shop front, slaughter to meet the demands of luxury, and count it gain to kill. Their temper is equally prone to fitful wrath and ready withdrawal, and guileless are the sentiments of their honest hearts.

Bookmark to