doublegem,

This chart is done in what they have called GDT time. I wondered if this meant something like Greenwich Daylight Time, the same as British Summer Time. However, they have the time at 0:00hrs, which is definitely GMT. It appears that the time for this chart would be 6:17 BST, not GMT as AstroDatabank appear to have it.

Hi Sue
As far as I can remember, Frank Clifford said that DB had the AC in Taurus.
And to comment on what you said earlier:

[quote]But the 2nd house is not only about finances but what you value. The restrictions may have nothing to do with money.


True but it does also show the conditions of the native's finances.

There is a copy of his birth certificate in the book by his father. You probably can't get more exact than that.

First, there is no requirement in the UK to record times of birth. The recording of a time of birth eo ipso stands in need of some explanation in my view. (It might, for example, knowing astrologers' propensities to sniff around the horoscopes of the rich and famous, have been designed (after the event) to mislead. Can we be really certain that the copy reproduced in the book is a true facsimile of the original record?). Second, pace the arguments over Gauquelin, is the question, salient in those countries (e.g. France) where birth times are recorded, but relevant to the general issue of recording birth times, whether they are recorded correctly, or whether there is some systematic error or bias (not necessarily intentional). Third, there is the astrological-philosophical question of the precise time at which the natal horoscope is to be considered as "switched on". Fourth, house systems are an ongoing open question. Fifth, repeating a falsehood does not make it true or acceptable, merely more accepted. Sixth, while it is possible to convince oneself that a purported birth-time is correct by scoring enough "hits" using progressions and direction to "significant" life events, if you want to convince me of this you will need also to repeat the same progressions and directions for alternative candidate birth times to show me that your candidate is the best one. In the absence of that, I think the requirement must be that a natal chart show a general fit with the native.

[2nd house] does also show the conditions of the native's finances.

This begs the question: when? now? last year? etc. It's true that from some horoscopes we can deduce conditions pertaining specifically at death birth or birth (e.g. Pluto rising and a tenous grip on life in the first weeks), and that this can include judgements as to whether the native is born or dies either wealthy or impoverished. It can also show whether the native's fortunes improve or diminish in life, either steadily or suddenly. Until we are in position to read the epitaphs, we need to be careful to avoid rushing to judgement.

Lacking complete knowledge of Beckham's finances in the future, it seems to me we are on a surer footing (;)) with psychology, since talents, deep motivations, and so on, tend to remain more constant in a person's life than his/her financial position. Sue's reply on my behalf about the possibility of a 2nd house Saturn (thanks, Sue) is along these lines, and has affinities with Adler's terms "superiority complex" and "inferiority complex". Of course I am not ascribing one or other to Beckham: when a perceived lack acts as a stimulus to achievement, that cannot by itself be termed a "complex" or considered pathological in any way.

Finally, there is the (self-evident? beginners?) point that Saturn represent's the natives father (in one of his guises), and we know that Beckham did not come from a wealthy background.

Hi Coder
I admire your thorough, philosophical approach in pursuit of truth but no one but God knows the true time of birth and the recoreded time in a birth cirtificate is a very good place to start with and I don't see any need to conjure up a 'perfect chart' out of nowhere if the chart is workable, yielding consistant results.
If you're a professional astrologer and your client wants to know about his/her finacces, and if you reply that you cannot tell till the client dies, then astrology is useless. With traditional astrology I believe the tripricity rulers are used to divide life into three phases: early, middle and late but the planet who resides in a particular house has usually a strong say on the matters of the house. Saturn in the 2nd often means hard work and restriction in that area of life, which I don't see at all in his life. It becomes questionable when closing eye to the blindingly obvious fact of Beckham's exceptionable financial success througout his proffessional career and put Saturn in the 2nd to apply the psycological theory when you don't know him personally. I know you said you didn't ascribe inferiority/superior theory to Beckham so it seems the sole argument you present for Saturn in the 2nd in his chart is that it represents his father...

Sue, thanks for this link, there are some interesting comments about why football and not some another sport. Do you have some idea why thay used equal houses system? When does this house system deliver best results?

I am not really sure why they use Equal House system. I think it is because they see it as a way of standardising it for the discussion groups to avoid endless arguments about which house system is the best. It is difficult to have discussions about a chart when one person believes Saturn is in the 2nd house and another believes it to be in the 3rd. I would have thought that Placidus is a better choice but I believe that the equal house system is more popular in the United States than many other countries. Certainly in their database program it is possible to choose any house system you want. I personally never use Equal House but one of the arguments for it is to avoid situations where some houses can be smaller than 10 deg while others can be as much as 50 deg. This happens in places like Greenland, which is quite some distance from the equator. With the Equal House system, all houses are the same size. I'm not sure how I feel about this because I haven't spent a lot of time thinking about it but it seems a little artificial to me. It certainly makes it a lot easier to calculate charts by hand though. Unfortunately, there is no perfect house system because we are imposing an artificial construct onto the universe and expecting it to give us non artificial answers.

I just noticed that they have changed the chart on the AstroDatabank site to one with a Taurus ascendant.

Thanks for explanation.