Part of Eros

The Lot of Eros, kleros erotos, is the lot of Venus in the Hermetic set, and it is calculated from the Lot of Spirit rather than from the Ascendant alone, which places it firmly on the volitional side of the scheme. Paulus Alexandrinus gives it for desire and for what a person wishes for, and Vettius Valens connects it with friendship, appetite and the objects to which the will inclines. It is important not to read it as a modern romantic significator: the Greek eros covers wanting in general, including ambition and appetite, and the Hellenistic authors use the lot for what a person is drawn toward rather than for love affairs specifically. Its pairing with Necessity, the lot of Mercury built on Fortune, sets desire against constraint, which is the axis the two are meant to be read on.

The day formula is Ascendant plus Venus minus Spirit; by night the terms reverse, Ascendant plus Spirit minus Venus. Ancient sources are not unanimous even on this much: the Hermetic formula transmitted through Paulus Alexandrinus and Olympiodorus builds Eros from Spirit as given here, while Vettius Valens and Firmicus Maternus in places preserve an older tradition built directly from the two luminary lots, Fortune and Spirit together, rather than from Spirit and Venus. Modern practitioners of revived Hellenistic astrology generally follow the Paulus formula given above, but the variation is well attested in the surviving texts, and it is a caution against assuming any single ancient formula for a lot was used uniformly across all authors and periods.

The day formula stored for this lot is Ascendant plus Venus minus the Lot of Spirit. Spirit is itself Ascendant plus Sun minus Moon by day, and substituting that in gives Ascendant plus Venus minus Ascendant minus Sun plus Moon. The two Ascendant terms cancel, and what is left is Venus plus Moon minus Sun.

That is a real result and not a curiosity. By day the Lot of Eros does not contain the Ascendant at all. It is a function of three planetary longitudes and nothing else, so it does not depend on the place of birth, and it depends on the time of birth only as far as the Moon and Venus move during the day in question.

The practical consequence is unusual among the lots. Most lots inherit the Ascendant's sensitivity and shift a whole sign for every two hours of doubt in a birth time. Eros by day does not. Its terms together move about 13 degrees and 24 minutes a day, so it advances roughly one degree every hour and three quarters, and a birth time uncertain by an hour moves it by less than a degree. A day chart with no recorded time at all still yields an Eros good to within a sign for most of the day.

This holds only for a day birth. A night chart reverses both this lot and Spirit beneath it, and the cancellation does not survive that reversal, so the reduction has to be worked again rather than assumed.