Crowley’s 777, roughly based on the Picatrix description, gives us a great image to work with for Gemini decan 1: “A beautiful woman with her two horses.”
TWO: Gemini. HORSES: Jupiter, ruler of the decan.
Some inspiration for this illustration was also drawn from Ibn Ezra, who says that the beautiful woman is “standing in the air.” Here she is, standing beautifully poised upon her two steeds, seemingly almost floating.
painted version
Welcome to the first decan of Gemini, corresponding to the Eight of Swords otherwise known as Interference, or the Lord of Shortened Force.
Gemini is ruled by Mercury, Eights are ruled by Mercury, and the decan is ruled by Jupiter.
The Eight of Swords, Lord of Interference, is also known as Shortened Force, as in some sort of minor impedance to a trajectory in motion. In the Rider Waite Smith deck, the female figure is bound and blindfolded, surrounded by swords. In the Thoth deck, eight blades of different types form a sort of blocking grid. In Tabula Mundi Tarot, the lion and eagle of the Lovers card are entangled in thread from a bobbin-like circle of swords.
In the Telos Tarot of 777 drawing, there are also eight differing swords, placed directly in front of the rider, forming a hurdle she must leap or go around. Make a choice!
Each gives the impression of a minor snag to deal with or get past. Each sword is a different type. Eight choices: 8 is part of the Fibonacci sequence, so really this represents an infinite number of choices or branches to follow.
Gemini is all about choices, and here with Jupiter’s expansive effect, the number of choices can become overwhelming.
But though Jupiter is not at its best in Gemini, the sign of its detriment, he still brings some measure of luck for getting around obstacles. Especially in combination with dexterous Gemini.
The “36 Airs of the Zodiac” fragment gives the deity as the Tethys, who was portrayed with very Mercurial wings sprouting from her brow, like the woman in the Telos image.
Tethys is a Titan, a daughter of Gaia (Earth) and Ouranos (Sky). Most just consider her as the consort of Okeanos, the primordial sea of fresh water that surrounds the globe. She is mostly known for being a goddess of waters and the mother of many thousands of other water gods and nymphs, for in the ancient world every freshwater source was home to a minor deity.
Tethys draws from the source, the great world sea, to fill the rivers, for she rules over fresh water and river systems. Fresh water is part of a whole cycle which in a simplified way is how water is drawn up from the oceans into the air and then comes down as fresh rain, that rivers then return to the oceans.
The river system shown in the background of the card shows how rivers split, and split, and split again into infinite streams of water or infinite decision points or choices. Follow one, and at certain points as it branches off, a choice is made and thus other choices are eliminated. First as twins (Gemini) – one must be eliminated – and then so many more choices to follow.
In 36 Faces, Austin Coppock calls this decan “the apple of Eden” – Eve’s infamous choice, to eat from the Tree of Knowledge!
Since Gemini loves knowledge and data, here is a great big table, with plenty of choices of deities to research or other decan images to consider and various errata to ponder.
| Astrology | Gemini, the sign ruled by Mercury |
| Modality and Element | Mutable Air |
| Decan degrees Decan ruler | 0°- 9° Gemini; Jupiter rules the decan |
| Triplicity ruler | Mercury |
| Magical image of the decan in 777 | A beautiful woman with her two horses. |
| Picatrix image and significations | A beautiful woman, a mistress of stitching, two calves and two horses Writing, computation and number, giving and taking, the sciences |
| Henry Cornelius Agrippa image and significations (Three Books of Occult Philosophy) | A man in whose hand is a rod, and he is, as it were, serving another. Wisdom, and the knowledge of numbers and arts in which there is no profit |
| Giordano Bruno image (De Umbris Idearum) | A man dressed as a slave, holding a green branch in his right hand. On his face is a happy, even jocular expression |
| Varahamihira Vedic image (Brihat Jataka) | A female fond of needlework, with a beauty equalling that of Rambha or Helen, without any issues, with a penchant for ornamentation, with lifted hands & in menses. |
| Raphael image and significations | A young man girt with a girdle. Of writings, of giving and receiving money, of petition, and wisdom in unprofitable things. |
| Ibn Ezra image (The Beginning of Wisdom) | A beautiful woman standing in the air, and she can sew. |
| Liber Hermetis | An armed man having an ass’s face, holding a sword in his right hand. This rules the climate of the 3 Trojans. |
| Liber Hermetis name | Manuchos |
| Egyptian name (777) | Thesogar |
| Ancient Egyptian name (Budge) | Mestcher-Saḥ |
| Greco-Egyptian name | Θosalk |
| Aristobulos name | Farsan |
| Testament of Solomon name | Sphandor |
| Apotelesmatics Greek name | Thosolk |
| Mathêsis Latin name | Thesogar |
| Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius image | It looks like a man with the head of a donkey. He holds a small key in his right hand, and his left is dropped. He is covered in wrappings down to his knees. |
| Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius name | Xokhá [Xocha] |
| SBHA stone | diamond |
| SBHA plant | orchid |
| SBHA dietary taboo | electric rays |
| Angel of the decanate per 777 | Sagarash |
| Goetic demons Day/Night | Amon/Sabnock |
| Nakshatras/Manazil (lunar mansions) per 777 | 20 ° – 30 ° Hak’ ah |
| Associated minors | King-Knight of Swords |
| “36 Airs of the Zodiac” fragment | Thetys (Tethus) |
| Ptolemaic Egyptian deity (777) | Tautus/Taautus |
| Perfume suffumigation | Mastick |
| Body correspondence | Shoulders, lungs; sometimes arms and hands |
| Some materia | Jupiter: Yellow sapphire, Topaz, Tin, Oak, Cherry, Beech, Maple, balsam, mace, nutmeg, clove, dandelion, borage See also Gemini: Agates, and things of Mercury |
| Talismanic application Arabic Picatrix | Talismans tailored to promote someone losing his mind and becoming deranged are made in the first durayjan of Gemini for Mercury. |
| Talismanic application Latin Picatrix | The first face of Gemini is if Mercury, in which an image is made to harm the senses and intellect. |
I’m curious to see if either 4th house themes or 5th house themes arise for me during the Sun’s passage through Gemini 1. In my chart, using the Placidus and Koch house systems, Gemini decan 1 is all in house 4. In Equal, it is in both house 4 and 5, which I’m going to try to watch to see if there is a shift when the Sun enters the degree that crosses into house5. In whole signs, it is all house 5. So it will be an interesting experiment, and test of house systems, which Gemini loves.
