James Condor wrote: Mon Nov 25, 2019 4:37 am
So how were/are they tested against the findings?
Fagan's discovery was purely archaeological, and the evidence was very tight on that.
But I'm guessing you're not asking about confirmation of the archaeology but, rather, if the astrological validity of the "exaltation degree" theory. Evidence has been sparse and mostly (not entirely) anecdotal. The single strongest - probably the only datum we can characterize as statistical confirmation - came from Bradley's study of the 1,113 boxers listed in
The Ring Encyclopedia. The distribution of natal Suns around the zodiac had the anomalous behavior that - aside from the question of which Sun-signs ranked highest - there was a pile-up of Suns at 28° Capricorn, the traditional exaltation degree of Mars. More anecdotally, this same degree has appeared surprisingly often in critical charts for history's worst fires.
This sort of evidence alerted Siderealists that maybe there was indeed something
astrological about these degrees. (It was perfectly possible that they were merely an archaeological artifact and not astrologically efficacious.) Since then, having our eyes on them has
seemed to give credence to their validity as the most concentrated expressions of a specific kind of planetary energy in the same way that the area around 28° Capricorn keeps showing as the most martial two or three degrees of the zodiac.
Much less controversial are the exaltation
signs. If we let go worrying about the exact degrees, the exaltations of
signs of planetary dignity, i.e., sign descriptors is evident all the time in the unfolding of the natures of the zodiacal constellations.
I still remember the time I first clearly got this: I understood how Tropical Leo could be Cancer in the sense of celebrity-style showmanship - an easy confusion of
lunar luminary-influence for
solar luminary-influence - but Moon made no sense for the grandiosity, elevated self-concept, aristocratic or royal-seeming affinity traditional to Tropical Leo that was clearly observable in these people. Then I read a Cyril Fagan remark that Jupiter was exalted in Cancer and - snap! - it all fell into place. I think next was my understanding that the wide feat-and-famine swings Tropicalists attribute to Scorpio was instantly explained by them being as Saturn-like as Venus-like, the two in a constant balancing act - which led to seeing how Taurus and Libra are so similar and yet so grossly different, the difference being evident in one being lunar and the other saturnine. Which led to... well, all the rest.