Star Listing 2 page (stars2.pag)

[Jim Eshelman]

My primary page for viewing technical details of fixed stars is this custom report. I don't remember if it's a Solar Fire standard report that I customized ort one I created from scratch. If you have a stars2.pag in your Solar Fire User Files | Pages then you should rename it (or back up the one that's there). You can download a copy from here:

https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ansnmu2xbktanLJqcS7 ... w?e=F2f4Au

Once this is in place, when you have a chart open click the Pages button. This might appear under the Stars heading or the Added Recently heading.

It's a big report with a lot of information. The main thing that matters for me is that, for my preferred list of 50+ stars (whatever you have listed as your default star list) it gives the Prime Vertical longitude of each star - all of them sorted by PV longitude. Look at values of 0°, 90°, 180°, and 270° (including the very bottom) to catch any that are just shy of 360° = 0°.

Other information included: Each star's name, longitude, altitude; the RAMC at which it rises, sets, and culminates; and the ecliptic longitude with which it rises, culminates, and sets. (CoCulm also works for IC, EP, WP). In case you want to compare them, it also lists the PV longitude and co-angularity longitudes of each planet in your chart. If you follow Bernadette Brady's idea that the only stars that are viable for your chart are those that rise and set at your latitude (I don't, but many do), you can see this instantly: It's clear which stars have no rising or setting longitudes in your chart.

Enjoy!

[Jim Eshelman]

Besides seeing what stars are on angles mundanely, you can have fun experimenting with other things involving stars. One example:

Let's suppose that Steve wanted to find when the heliacal rising of Sirius occurred for his house; in other words, when Sirius first (in a given year) momentarily appeared before sunrise. This report makes that easier, though you still have some work to do to get an answer.

Start be relocating Steve's chart to his current residence. Run the report. It says Sirius co-rises with 9°31' Cancer. Find the day Sun is at about 9°31' Cancer, which in 2021 is July 27.

This still isn't exact because the sun's light leaks around the edge of the horizon before it rises astrologically. Solar Fire has a tool for calculating this, the R/S or Rise/Set tool. Calculate a chart for approximate sunrise (6 am is good enough) 7/27/2021 in Springville, AL then click the R/S button on the toolbar. Pick the Sun, click the "Visual" button in the center-right, click OK and you see that visual sunrise that day (at that place) was 5:54 AM. Edit your sample chart to change the time to 5:54 AM and you'll get Sun at 9°36' Cancer and Ascendant 8°42' Cancer. In other words, Sun first cracks the horizon on that day when it is still almost 1° below Ascendant in longitude. This means we really need to look at one day later - July 28, 2021 - when 9°39' Cancer was on the horizon at visual sunrise - as our first estimate.

So... we know that on July 28, 2021, in Springville, AL, Sirius (which by now rises with 9°13' Cancer) is exactly on Ascendant at visual sunrise. However, we still need one more factor. It's a factor unique to Steve's location. We don't know far above the horizon Sirius has to be to clear any hills, buildings, and surrounding trees and be visible. For example, in Heliopolis during the classic period, Sirius needed to be about 9° ahead of the Sun to be seen. The number for Steve's house might be more (because he doesn't live on a flat desert, there is more atmospheric haze, etc.) - surely at least 15°. And he can only learn this be experimenting to see which morning he can first see Sirius for at least a moment before the Sun rises under it, "the return of the phoenix."

But if, say, the number were again 9°, then he'd just have to move his date nine days later -August 6, 2021 - for the earliest possible date of Sirius' helical rising in his home town. At sunrise on that day, the report says Sirius' altitude will be +8°23'.

Fun stuff...

[SteveS]