Origin of term "semi-sextile"

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I apologize if this has been covered before, I did a fairly extensive search of the forum and wasn't able to find it.

I'm trying to understand where the term "semi-sextile" comes from. The 30 degree aspect is often referred to as a weak sextile, hence semi-sextile, but in practice it doesn't work that way. it works more like the 150 degree aspect which is usually called an inconjunct, despite the fact that since it is oriented in a 5 pattern (5 signs apart) it seems to me it would be more accurately referred to as a quincunx. The 30 degree aspect to me would be more accurately called an inconjunct.

I'd be very interested to hear what you scholars on this board think about these terms, and thank you in advance.

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I don't know the answer to your question, the traditional astrologers on this board will hopefully answer that.

I can give my own experience of looking at charts, and I agree with you that the semi sextile is part of the inconjuncts, yods and boomerangs. I don't normally really consider trines or sextiles, though a tightly orbed trine has its own meaning as a background in the chart but not for timing events. But I have noticed that inconjuncts, yods and boomerangs are very important for describing creative, maybe tortured souls. Charts with these patterns include the writer Mervyn Peake and the musician and songwriter Robert Smith of The Cure. Mervyn Peake wrote his epic Gormenghast while his physical and mental health were breaking down under financial strain and having been one of the first British people to see inside a concentration camp at the end of the war, as an artist sent by the British government. He drew a girl who died soon after, maybe the model for his heroine Fuchsia in Gormenghast. Robert Smith wrote the song "The Drowning Man" about Mervyn Peake and Fuchsia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tjC7iztmz0. Somebody has kindly given the lyrics in the comments below this video.

For the most part I only use hard aspects, with orbs mostly one degree or under, for events. But these other aspects are probably important in describing the nature of the person. I would never use a transiting trine, much less a transiting sextile.

I have seen charts with beautiful tight trines, or six close sextiles, and they do seem to describe the energies of that person, and the inconjuncts, yods and boomerangs even more strikingly describe the energies of that person.

I agree with you that the semi sextile isn't some minor version of a sextile, but part of the more powerful inconjunct group.

What orb do you use for the semi sextile, when treating it as an inconjunct type aspect? From my observation, inconjuncts, yods and boomerangs work even beyond 1 or 2 degree orbs, being descriptive of the nature of the person and not events in the life, though obviously a transiting conjunction, opposition or square to a planet involved in a natal inconjunct pattern will bring out the quality of that inconjunct pattern attached to the planet. In Mervyn Peake's chart, the wide semi sextile between the Moon and Uranus, and the wide semi sextile between Pluto and the Mercury Neptune Midheaven conjunction seem to be significant? In addition to the two tightly orbed inconjunct aspects between the Moon and the Mercury Neptune Midheaven, and between Pluto and Uranus.

Robert Smith, born 21st Apriil 1959 at 1am, Blackpool, UK.https://www.astro.com/astro-databank/Smith,_Robert

This chart is loaded with these inconjunct group aspects. I especially like the one between the Moon and Pluto; Moon 29 degrees Virgo 12 minutes, antiscion 0 degrees Aries 48 minutes, which is inconjunct Pluto at 1 degree Virgo 48 minutes. Primal emotion. And the Moon's antiscion is more widely conjunct Mercury. But what gave him his worldly fame and success was probably not the inconjuncts, but the 22.5 degree pattern of Mars, IsisTranspluto, Pluto, Saturn and Midheaven, which were going the right way from IsisTranspluto being natally aspecting this pattern making it open and transiting the pattern positively again in the 1980's around 21 degrees Leo. His Midheaven and its aspects would have been open because the Moons Nodes aspect his Ascendant with 22.5 degree aspect within about 1 degree, this is a signifier of fame and twists the normally open Ascendant to closed and the normally closed Midheaven to open.

Time given B data on Astro data bank, from biography.
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Mervyn Peake born 9th July 1911 Lushan (Jiangxi) Chinahttps://www.astro.com/astro-databank/Peake,_Mervyn
Time rated A on Astro data bank, "from memory"
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Last edited by fleur on Mon May 25, 2020 11:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Thanks for your reply. It's always nice when someone agrees with you, and rare among astrologers. Also, I love Robert Smith. :)

That said, I'm very curious to know where this concept of the 30 degree aspect being called a semi-sextile originated.

I generally use fairly tight orbs for these aspects, 3-5 degrees, but so much would depend on how they fit into the rest of the chart. However when these planets are in signs that are invisible to each other as I believe the traditionalists would see these aspects, the planets won't relate to each other because of sign difference no matter what the orb of the aspect.