Jyotisha's words are precise, and this product uses them precisely rather than swapping in something blurrier and friendlier. Here is what each one means.
antardasha अंतर्दशा
Each mahadasha subdivides into nine antardashas, one for every graha, proportioned by that planet's share of the 120-year cycle; the antardasha lord colors the mahadasha's broader chapter with its own shorter theme. This report reads the current antardasha as the 'season' inside the era — the resolution most useful for near-term questions.
See also mahadasha, pratyantardasha, dasha
Anuradha अनुराधा
Anuradha runs 3°20′ – 16°40′ Scorpio, ruled by Saturn with Mitra as its presiding deity, symbolized by a lotus; its animal is the doe. The station is read for alliance-building and loyalty — thriving on ground that isn't native. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Ardra आर्द्रा
Ardra runs 6°40′ – 20°00′ Gemini, ruled by Rahu with Rudra as its presiding deity, symbolized by the teardrop; its animal is the dog (female). The station is read for cathartic, storm-honest clearing, with renewal close behind it. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Ashlesha आश्लेषा
Ashlesha runs 16°40′ – 30°00′ Cancer, ruled by Mercury with the Nagas as its presiding deity, symbolized by a coiled serpent; its animal is the cat (male). The station is read for a penetrating, hypnotic hold — insight and entanglement from the same coil. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Ashwini अश्विनी
Ashwini runs 0°00′ – 13°20′ Aries, ruled by Ketu with the Ashvins as its presiding deity, symbolized by a horse's head; its animal is the stallion. The station is read for speed and first response — arriving before anyone else has found the route. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
ayanamsa अयनांश
Jyotisha measures planetary positions against the actual constellations (sidereal), while Western astrology measures against the seasons (tropical); the two zodiacs have slowly drifted apart — by roughly 24° today — because of the earth's axial precession. The ayanamsa is the correction subtracted from a tropical position to get the sidereal one. This report uses the Lahiri ayanamsa, the standard behind India's official almanacs; other ayanamsas (Raman, Krishnamurti, and others) exist and give slightly different positions, especially near a sign boundary.
Bhadra भद्र
Bhadra is one of the five Pancha Mahapurusha yogas, triggered when Mercury is exalted, in its own sign, or in mooltrikona while in the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house from the lagna or the Moon. Traditionally read as giving sharp intellect and skill with language and number.
See also Pancha Mahapurusha, kendra, Budha-Aditya
Bharani भरणी
Bharani runs 13°20′ – 26°40′ Aries, ruled by Venus with Yama as its presiding deity, symbolized by the yoni — the gate of bearing; its animal is the bull elephant. The station is read for carrying things to term, and unsentimental endings. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
bhava भाव
Bhava literally means 'a state of being.' The twelve bhavas run from the 1st (self, body) around to the 12th (loss, retreat, the unseen), each read as a life-arena rather than a fixed prediction. In the whole-sign system this report uses, a bhava is simply a sign counted in order from the lagna's sign — bhava and rasi (sign) coincide exactly, which is not true in every house system the tradition has used historically.
See also rasi, kendra, trikona, whole-sign
Brihaspati बृहस्पति
Brihaspati is the guru of the gods — wisdom made into policy, counsel that converts power into right action. He is also named as Pushya nakshatra's presiding deity, homelier there: nourishment delivered on a reliable schedule, not by inspiration. As a graha, Brihaspati (also called Guru) rules the Hamsa Mahapurusha yoga and the Gajakesari yoga, and governs wisdom, expansion, and teaching in Jyotisha's usual assignment of significations.
See also Hamsa, Gajakesari, Pushya
Budha बुध
Budha is read in the tradition as the messenger among the grahas, sent to carry exact words between parties that don't share a language — a herald's job depends on getting the wording, the number, or the contract exactly right, not on speaking loudest. As a graha, Budha governs the Budha-Aditya yoga, formed with the Sun, and rules communication, calculation, and craft in Jyotisha's usual assignment of significations.
See also Budha-Aditya, Bhadra
Budha-Aditya बुधादित्य
Budha-Aditya ('Mercury-Sun') needs no orb and no exception for combustion — classical sources (Saravali, Phaladeepika) state it as a bare same-sign conjunction, nothing more. A popular modern rule holds that the yoga only forms if Mercury isn't combust, otherwise calling the same conjunction 'Nipuna Yoga' instead; that distinction has no basis in either source text, and this report doesn't apply it. Traditionally read as sharpening intellect and communication.
Chandra चंद्र
Chandra married all 27 nakshatra-daughters of a single father but favored one openly, and was cursed to waste away for it — a curse eventually commuted not into an ending but into a permanent rhythm, waning and returning every fortnight. The tradition reads a Moon-ruled stretch through that whole cycle, not just the low point: predictable in its swings even when each one feels new. As a graha, Chandra sets the nakshatra and dasha balance at birth, and rules the panchanga's tithi and paksha.
See also nakshatra, paksha, tithi, chandra lagna
chandra lagna चंद्र लग्न
Chandra lagna ('Moon ascendant') treats the Moon's own sign as the reference point houses are counted from, in place of the true ascendant. It's a traditional, legitimate fallback for a birth-time-unknown chart, since the Moon's sign — often its nakshatra too — can be fixed for the whole day without an exact clock time, while the true ascendant changes roughly every two hours and can't be. This report labels a chandra lagna reading clearly and skips ascendant-dependent content it can't responsibly compute.
chidra छिद्र
Chidra means an opening or aperture. Classical sources locate the vulnerability in the ruling planet's own condition — a dasha lord that is afflicted, eclipsed, weak, or poorly placed is what earns the name — rather than in its position in the sequence. Some modern treatments, including some software, instead flag the closing sub-period of an era as 'the' chidra, treating the transition itself, rather than the planet's condition, as the vulnerable stretch. The two senses are genuinely different, and this glossary is explicit about which one a given flag means.
See also dasha, antardasha, pratyantardasha
Chitra चित्रा
Chitra runs 23°20′ Virgo – 6°40′ Libra, ruled by Mars with Tvashtar as its presiding deity, symbolized by a bright jewel; its animal is the tigress. The station is read for design brilliance and polish — dazzle that survives being cut down to size. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
cluster
When several planets, or a planet and the ascendant, land in the same nakshatra or the same zodiac sign, this report flags it as a cluster — closer to the Western-astrology idea of a 'stellium' than to any single classical Sanskrit term. A repeated nakshatra especially is treated as a headline: that station's animal, deity, and myth are read as amplified rather than noted once and set aside.
combust
The Sanskrit term is asta, 'set' — as though the planet has set into the Sun's own light and can no longer be seen on its own terms. Classical texts (Bhaskara II's Siddhantasiromani) give a specific combustion orb for each planet — how close counts as combust varies by planet, and slightly by whether it's moving retrograde. This report uses one consistent authority throughout; a few of these numbers are given slightly differently by other classical texts, including the received Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra, usually within a degree or two. A planet under about 1° from the Sun is flagged 'deeply combust,' a stricter reading than the general orb.
dasha दशा
Dasha means 'state' or 'condition.' The Vimshottari system divides a life into nested ruling periods — a 120-year mahadasha cycle, subdivided into antardashas, and those into pratyantardashas — each assigned to one of the nine grahas in a fixed order and length. A dasha describes a season with a particular planetary character, not a schedule of events; the same dasha lord produces a different lived texture in every chart, shaped by that planet's own placement, dignity, and aspects.
See also mahadasha, antardasha, pratyantardasha, Vimshottari, chidra
dasha balance
Because a birth rarely falls exactly at a nakshatra boundary, the mahadasha running at birth is already partway spent — the balance is the fraction still owed. Classical sources (Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra) define this as a ratio of time: how long the Moon actually takes, at its true variable speed, to finish crossing the birth nakshatra, versus how long it had already taken. A simpler shortcut — treating the fraction as pure degrees-crossed over the nakshatra's fixed 13°20′ arc — gives a very similar number in most charts, but because the Moon doesn't move at constant speed, it can shift every later dasha boundary in the life by several days.
See also Vimshottari, dasha, mahadasha
debilitated नीच
Debilitation (neecha) falls in the sign opposite a planet's exaltation sign, at the same specific degree that marks deep exaltation, which is therefore also the degree of 'deep debilitation.' It sits at the bottom of the dignity ladder — but the tradition doesn't treat it as simply bad news: neecha-bhanga describes specific conditions under which a debilitation is classically cancelled, sometimes into real strength.
See also exalted, neecha-bhanga, dignity
Dhanishta धनिष्ठा
Dhanishta runs 23°20′ Capricorn – 6°40′ Aquarius, ruled by Mars with the eight Vasus as its presiding deity, symbolized by the drum (damaru); its animal is the lioness. The station is read for rhythm and resonant emptiness — a drum that speaks because it's hollow. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
dignity
The tradition ranks a graha's sign placement on a ladder: exalted (strongest), mooltrikona, own sign, friend's sign, neutral, enemy's sign, and debilitated (weakest). This report shows one label per planet rather than a graded score; classical texts (Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra, Phaladeepika) actually give this ladder as a ratio — full strength, three-quarters, half, and so on — and a fuller six-component strength system (shadbala) besides, which this report doesn't compute. 'Own sign' means the planet sits in a sign it rules outright.
See also exalted, debilitated, mooltrikona, graha
drishti दृष्टि
Drishti literally means 'sight' or 'glance.' Every graha aspects the house seven signs from its own — a full 'sight' opposite itself; Mars additionally aspects the 4th and 8th, Jupiter the 5th and 9th, and Saturn the 3rd and 10th from its own position. This report computes drishti as a house-counted relationship, in the classical style, rather than the tighter degree-orb aspects Western astrology uses.
eclipse ग्रहण
An old appended note to Brihat Samhita's chapter on eclipses ties natal significance to the eclipse falling in the birth Sun's sign, or 19 nakshatras from the birth Moon — a sign-and-nakshatra-scoped rule, not a tight-orb one. This report instead tests a small degree-orb around the natal Sun, Moon, and ascendant, which is a modern precision convention rather than the classical test, and includes the ascendant as a contact point on no textual authority at all. Framed here as a 'loud season' — amplified, temporary inner weather — never as an omen; the guidance is to avoid ratifying big, irreversible decisions until the season passes, not to fear the date.
exalted उच्च
Each graha has one sign of exaltation (uccha) — Jupiter in Cancer, Saturn in Libra, and so on — and within that sign, one specific degree of 'deep exaltation' where the effect peaks most exactly. Exaltation sits at the top of the classical dignity ladder, ranked above mooltrikona and own sign.
See also debilitated, dignity, mooltrikona
Gajakesari गजकेसरी
Gajakesari ('elephant-lion') is triggered, in this report's usage, whenever Jupiter occupies the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house counted from the Moon in the rasi (main birth) chart. Texts differ on how strict the condition should be: Phaladeepika states it this simply, while the Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra additionally requires the Moon be aspected or joined by a benefic, requires Jupiter not be debilitated, combust, or in an enemy's sign, and also allows counting from the lagna. This report uses Phaladeepika's simpler form. It is read in the rasi chart only; a Gajakesari flagged from the navamsa chart alone, rather than the main birth chart, would be a modern extension with no support in either source text, and this report does not compute it there.
See also Hamsa, navamsa, kendra, Brihaspati
graha ग्रह
The navagraha, or nine grahas, are the Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, and the two lunar nodes Rahu and Ketu — not every astronomical planet (Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto sit outside the classical set entirely), and two of the nine, the nodes, aren't physical bodies at all but the points where the Moon's path crosses the Sun's. Graha literally means 'seizer' or 'grasper' — the thing that takes hold of a life. This report computes all nine using a sidereal ephemeris and doesn't add any outer planets.
Hamsa हंस
Hamsa ('swan') is one of the five Pancha Mahapurusha yogas, triggered when Jupiter is exalted, in its own sign, or in mooltrikona while in the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house from the lagna or the Moon. The swan is credited in tradition with the discernment to drink only the milk out of water mixed with milk — this yoga is read as wisdom, counsel, and the ability to extract what's useful from an imperfect situation.
See also Pancha Mahapurusha, kendra, Gajakesari, Brihaspati
Hasta हस्त
Hasta runs 10°00′ – 23°20′ Virgo, ruled by Moon with Savitr as its presiding deity, symbolized by an open hand; its animal is the buffalo (female). The station is read for craft and dexterity — skill trained deliberately rather than simply given. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Jupiter return
This is a modern, Western-influenced convention rather than a classical predictive marker — no Jyotisha text treats a Jupiter return as a life-stage milestone. The underlying 12-year arithmetic does appear classically (Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra ch. 78), but for a different purpose entirely: reconstructing an unknown birth year from a query chart, not marking a moment in a known one. This report shows it because readers are used to the idea from Western astrology, and labels it as the modern addition it is.
See also transit, Saturn return, Brihaspati
Jyeshtha ज्येष्ठा
Jyeshtha runs 16°40′ – 30°00′ Scorpio, ruled by Mercury with Indra as its presiding deity, symbolized by a circular amulet; the royal umbrella; its animal is the stag. The station is read for seniority and protective rank, carried with the weight it deserves. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
karaka कारक
Certain grahas are conventionally read as governing certain domains regardless of where they sit in a specific chart — Jupiter for wisdom and teachers, Venus for relationship and pleasure, Saturn for labor and longevity, and so on. A karaka is used alongside a planet's placement, dignity, and aspects, not instead of them; it's one more layer of reading, not a standalone verdict.
kendra केंद्र
Kendra means 'center' or 'axis.' The four kendra houses are read as the chart's structural pillars — self, home, partnership, and public standing — and a planet strengthening in a kendra (through exaltation, own sign, or mooltrikona) is what triggers several major yogas, including the Pancha Mahapurusha set. 'Kendra from the Moon' and 'kendra from the lagna' are both used, and this report always labels which reference point a given kendra reading is counted from.
See also trikona, bhava, Pancha Mahapurusha
Ketu केतु
Ketu is Rahu's mirror point, sharing the same mean-motion speed and always moving in the same retrograde direction. Mythologically it's the headless remainder of the same decapitated figure — competence still moving through its motions, with no appetite left to ask what it's for. Ketu, like Rahu, is treated in this report as always retrograde and is excluded from the classical combustion test, since neither node is a physical light-emitting body.
Krittika कृत्तिका
Krittika runs 26°40′ Aries – 10°00′ Taurus, ruled by Sun with Agni as its presiding deity, symbolized by the razor; the flame; its animal is the ewe. The station is read for incisive critique paired with fierce nurture. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
lagna लग्न
The lagna sets the whole chart's frame of reference: houses are counted from its sign, and it's treated as a stand-in for the physical self and the way a person meets the world. It moves roughly one sign every two hours, so an accurate birth time matters enormously — this report calculates how many minutes of birth-time error would be enough to shift the lagna into a neighboring sign, and flags it when the margin is close.
See also chandra lagna, whole-sign, kendra
Magha मघा
Magha runs 0°00′ – 13°20′ Leo, ruled by Ketu with the Pitrs as its presiding deity, symbolized by the royal throne; its animal is the rat (male). The station is read for inherited authority and lineage duty, carried rather than self-made. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
mahadasha महादशा
The Vimshottari cycle allots each of the nine grahas a fixed mahadasha length that sums to 120 years — from Ketu's 7 years to Venus's 20 — run in a fixed order, starting wherever the Moon's nakshatra at birth places it. This report reads mahadashas as the life's chapters, each with its own planetary character, texture, and myth; it is not a prediction of what will happen, only of which planetary weather the chapter is under.
See also dasha, antardasha, Vimshottari
Malavya मालव्य
Malavya is one of the five Pancha Mahapurusha yogas, triggered when Venus is exalted, in its own sign, or in mooltrikona while in the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house from the lagna or the Moon. Traditionally read as giving refinement, comfort, and an aesthetic gift.
See also Pancha Mahapurusha, kendra
MC
MC (medium coeli, 'middle of the sky') is Western astrological terminology for a real, computable point: the zodiac degree culminating on the meridian above the birth place. Classical Jyotisha texts do use cusps of this kind for a specific strength calculation (dig bala), but this report keeps the MC as its own marker rather than folding it into the 10th house, since in whole-sign houses — especially at high latitudes — the MC's actual degree can fall outside the 10th sign entirely. It's shown mainly for its nakshatra, as a career-flavored point.
See also whole-sign, bhava
mooltrikona मूलत्रिकोण
Mooltrikona ('root triangle') is a specific stretch of degrees inside each graha's exaltation sign — outside the deep-exaltation zone, but still ranked above a plain own-sign placement in the classical ladder (Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra orders it: exalted, then mooltrikona, then own sign, then friend, then enemy, then debilitated). Each planet's mooltrikona band is a different width and position within its sign, fixed by the classical tables.
Mrigashira मृगशिरा
Mrigashira runs 23°20′ Taurus – 6°40′ Gemini, ruled by Mars with Soma as its presiding deity, symbolized by a deer's head; its animal is the serpent (female). The station is read for restless, scent-led seeking — the musk deer chasing a source under its own ribs. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Mula मूल
Mula runs 0°00′ – 13°20′ Sagittarius, ruled by Ketu with Nirriti as its presiding deity, symbolized by a tied bundle of roots; its animal is the dog (male). The station is read for root-cause honesty — diagnosis that costs the bloom to reach the root. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
nakshatra नक्षत्र
The zodiac's 27 lunar mansions, each a fixed 13°20′ arc of the ecliptic with its own ruling planet, presiding deity, symbol, and myth. Every point in a chart — not only the Moon — falls in a nakshatra, and each nakshatra further divides into four padas of 3°20′. The Moon's own nakshatra at birth sets the starting point for the Vimshottari dasha sequence.
See also pada, Vimshottari, rasi
neecha-bhanga नीचभंग
Neecha-bhanga ('breaking the fall') describes conditions under which a debilitated planet's weakness is reversed rather than simply endured — chiefly, when the lord of the debilitation sign or the lord of the planet's own exaltation sign stands in a kendra from the lagna or the Moon, or when the debilitated planet is itself aspected by the lord of the sign it's debilitated in. Phaladeepika (ch. 7) treats a strongly cancelled debilitation as approaching a raja yoga in its own right — a debility, fully reversed, can read as more than merely neutral. A planet marked 'debilitated' describes its plain sign-position; it doesn't by itself say whether that debilitation is classically cancelled.
See also debilitated, kendra, dignity
pada पद
Every nakshatra's 13°20′ span splits into four padas of 3°20′ each, and every point in a chart falls not just in a nakshatra but in one of its four padas. Padas also map onto navamsa signs — each pada corresponds to one navamsa division — which is how the two systems interlock. On its own a pada carries a finer-grained flavor than the full nakshatra; texts vary in how much independent weight they give it.
paksha पक्ष
Paksha ('side' or 'wing') names which half of the lunar month is in force: Shukla paksha, the waxing or bright half running new moon to full moon, and Krishna paksha, the waning or dark half running full moon back to new moon. It is one of the panchanga's five elements and, alongside the tithi, gives a chart's lunar timing its own texture distinct from the solar calendar date.
Pancha Mahapurusha पंच महापुरुष
Pancha Mahapurusha ('five great persons') names five related configurations — Ruchaka (Mars), Bhadra (Mercury), Hamsa (Jupiter), Malavya (Venus), Sasa (Saturn) — each formed when its planet is exalted, in its own sign, or in mooltrikona while standing in a kendra (the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house). This report checks the configuration from both the lagna and the Moon, and always labels which reference point a given yoga was found from. Texts differ on whether the planet's overall strength must also be assessed on top of dignity and house placement, or whether dignity-in-kendra is enough by itself; this report uses the simpler, dignity-and-house-only test.
See also Ruchaka, Bhadra, Hamsa, Malavya, Sasa, kendra, dignity
panchanga पंचांग
Panchanga ('five limbs') names the five quantities a traditional almanac tracks for a given day: tithi (lunar day), vara (weekday), nakshatra, yoga, and karana. This report computes the panchanga for the exact birth moment — the natal quantities that seed the dasha — which is a different reckoning from a printed almanac's daily listing, which labels a whole calendar day by what was in force at sunrise.
parivartana परिवर्तन
When planet A sits in the sign planet B rules, and planet B sits in the sign planet A rules, the tradition treats their two houses as wired together into one circuit — what affects one lord's house tends to move the other's too. Classical sources (Phaladeepika) define it purely by lordship, without requiring either house to be otherwise occupied. Some finer classifications split parivartana into three named sub-types (Dainya, Khala, Maha) by which houses are involved, which this report doesn't distinguish.
pratyantardasha प्रत्यंतर्दशा
Pratyantardashas subdivide each antardasha the same way antardashas subdivide a mahadasha, giving three nested layers in total. This report stops at this level on purpose: below it lie sookshma and prana dashas, finer still, at the scale where a reading starts to resemble a daily horoscope column rather than a season's weather.
See also antardasha, mahadasha, chidra
Punarvasu पुनर्वसु
Punarvasu runs 20°00′ Gemini – 3°20′ Cancer, ruled by Jupiter with Aditi as its presiding deity, symbolized by the bow and quiver; its animal is the cat (female). The station is read for resilient restarts — what leaves tends to return, changed. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
See also nakshatra, pada, Brihaspati
Purva Ashadha पूर्वाषाढ़ा
Purva Ashadha runs 13°20′ – 26°40′ Sagittarius, ruled by Venus with Apas as its presiding deity, symbolized by a winnowing fan; its animal is the monkey (male). The station is read for buoyant, early conviction — persuasion that floats over refutation. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Purva Bhadrapada पूर्वभाद्रपदा
Purva Bhadrapada runs 20°00′ Aquarius – 3°20′ Pisces, ruled by Jupiter with Aja Ekapada as its presiding deity, symbolized by a sword; the front legs of the funeral cot; its animal is the lion. The station is read for one-pointed intensity — the whole flame put on a single wick. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
See also nakshatra, pada, Brihaspati
Purva Phalguni पूर्व फाल्गुनी
Purva Phalguni runs 13°20′ – 26°40′ Leo, ruled by Venus with Bhaga as its presiding deity, symbolized by the swinging hammock; the front legs of the bed; its animal is the rat (female). The station is read for charm and portion-luck — good things arriving disproportionately. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Pushya पुष्य
Pushya runs 3°20′ – 16°40′ Cancer, ruled by Saturn with Brihaspati as its presiding deity, symbolized by the cow's udder; its animal is the ram. The station is read for reliable nourishment and counsel, on a schedule rather than by mood. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Rahu राहु
Rahu isn't a physical body; it's a mathematical point, one of two places (with Ketu, its opposite) where the Moon's orbital plane crosses the ecliptic. Mythologically it's the severed head of the demon who stole a sip of the gods' nectar at the churning of the ocean and was decapitated before swallowing — read in this report as appetite without the means to digest what it wants. This report uses the mean node, a smoothed average position, rather than the true, instantaneous node; the two differ by up to about 2°, occasionally enough to shift a nakshatra.
raja yoga राजयोग
Raja yoga ('king's combination') forms when the ruler of an angular house (kendra) and the ruler of a trine house (trikona) connect — by conjunction, mutual aspect, or sign exchange (parivartana). It is one of the tradition's core markers of strength and standing, and unlike the named Mahapurusha or Gajakesari yogas, it isn't a single fixed configuration but a broad family of kendra-trikona links the tradition treats as auspicious in whatever specific form they take.
See also kendra, trikona, parivartana
rasi राशि
Rasi (rāśi) is the Sanskrit word for a zodiac sign; 'rasi chart' also names the main D1 birth chart, as distinct from divisional charts like the navamsa (D9). Signs are computed sidereally in this report, against the actual constellations rather than the seasons, so a rasi here will often differ from the same date's tropical, Western-astrology sign.
retrograde वक्री
Retrograde motion is a real optical effect of relative orbital speeds, not a change in the planet's actual path — but the tradition reads it as a shift in a graha's expression, often toward introspection, revision, or re-examining settled ground. This report flags retrograde only for the seven true grahas; the lunar nodes (Rahu and Ketu) move retrograde by the nature of their mean-motion calculation essentially always, so flagging them the same way would say nothing distinctive.
See also stationary, graha
Revati रेवती
Revati runs 16°40′ – 30°00′ Pisces, ruled by Mercury with Pushan as its presiding deity, symbolized by a pair of fish; the timekeeper's drum; its animal is the cow elephant. The station is read for gentle completion — a finisher of other people's journeys, last of the 27. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Rohini रोहिणी
Rohini runs 10°00′ – 23°20′ Taurus, ruled by Moon with Prajapati as its presiding deity, symbolized by the ox-cart; its animal is the serpent (male). The station is read for fertility and magnetism — a field where nearly anything planted grows. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Ruchaka रुचक
Ruchaka is one of the five Pancha Mahapurusha yogas, triggered when Mars is exalted, in its own sign, or in mooltrikona while in the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house from the lagna or the Moon. Traditionally read as giving physical courage, initiative, and command.
See also Pancha Mahapurusha, kendra
sade sati साढ़ेसाती
Sade sati ('seven and a half,' Hindi) covers Saturn's transit through the sign before the natal Moon's sign, the Moon's own sign, and the sign after — about two and a half years in each, reckoned from the Moon because Saturn's cycle relative to the Moon is what the classical transit texts (Brihat Samhita, Phaladeepika) use for this reading. Popular astrology surrounds it with dread; this report treats it as a demanding, slow-moving season rather than a verdict — a texture to work with, not an outcome to fear.
See also Shani, vara, chandra lagna, transit
Sasa शश
Sasa ('hare') is one of the five Pancha Mahapurusha yogas, triggered when Saturn is exalted, in its own sign, or in mooltrikona while in the 1st, 4th, 7th, or 10th house from the lagna or the Moon. Traditionally read as giving discipline, endurance, and authority earned through sustained effort rather than given.
See also Pancha Mahapurusha, kendra, Shani
Saturn return
This has no classical basis at all — it's a Western import, built on the idea of a planet 'returning' to its own natal degree, which isn't how Jyotisha's own transit doctrine treats Saturn. The classical Saturn transit material (Brihat Samhita, Phaladeepika) is anchored entirely to the natal Moon instead — sade sati and the house-by-house Saturn-from-Moon readings are the tradition's real long-cycle Saturn markers. This report includes the return because readers expect it, and marks it as a modern addition rather than a classical one.
Shani शनि
Shani is read in tradition as the son of the Sun's own shadow, sent to stand in for a light too fierce to face directly — which is why, the story goes, his own gaze, aimed the same way the other grahas' gazes burn, instead ripens what it rests on. He arrives last to any configuration and stays longest once there. As a graha, Shani governs sade sati and the Sasa Mahapurusha yoga, and rules discipline, limitation, and labor in Jyotisha's usual assignment of significations.
Shatabhisha शतभिषा
Shatabhisha runs 6°40′ – 20°00′ Aquarius, ruled by Rahu with Varuna as its presiding deity, symbolized by the empty circle; its animal is the mare. The station is read for systems sight and veiled healing, worked quietly behind a screen. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Shravana श्रवण
Shravana runs 10°00′ – 23°20′ Capricorn, ruled by Moon with Vishnu as its presiding deity, symbolized by an ear; three footprints; its animal is the monkey (female). The station is read for deep listening and transmission — whole worlds received through small asks. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Shukra शुक्र
Shukra studied under a demanding teacher and, through single-minded discipline, learned the mantra said to restore the dead — using it first to bring his own fallen students back to life. The tradition reads a Venus-ruled stretch as this same combination: aesthetics and pleasure treated as a craft that takes real time to ripen, not indulgence taken on demand. As a graha, Shukra rules the longest single mahadasha in the Vimshottari sequence, 20 years.
stationary
As a planet's apparent motion slows toward a station — the turning point before or after retrograde — the tradition reads that near-stillness as concentrated, held force: maximum intensity at zero visible movement. Classical texts (Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra) name eight distinct grades of planetary motion but don't fix a numeric threshold for where 'slow' becomes 'stationary'; this report uses an engineering threshold — motion under roughly 5% of the planet's average daily speed — to draw that line, a reasonable convention rather than a classical rule.
See also retrograde, graha
Surya सूर्य
Surya crosses the sky daily in a chariot with a single wheel and seven horses; the tradition reads a Sun-ruled stretch through his refusal to hide — authority in this system is a throne held in the open, not administration run from behind a curtain. As a graha, Surya rules Sunday and is the reference point for combustion, since a planet's nearness to the Sun is what makes it 'combust.'
Swati स्वाती
Swati runs 6°40′ – 20°00′ Libra, ruled by Rahu with Vayu as its presiding deity, symbolized by a young sprout swaying in wind; its animal is the buffalo (male). The station is read for independence and self-made force, tested against small anchored things. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
tithi तिथि
There are 30 tithis in a lunar month, each about a day long but varying somewhat because the Moon's speed isn't constant; they run in two sets of 15 — the paksha — the light half building to Purnima (full moon) and the dark half building to Amavasya (new moon). This report computes the tithi at the exact birth instant, the correct natal quantity since it's what seeds part of the panchanga, but different from the tithi a printed almanac lists for the whole calendar day, which is fixed at sunrise instead.
transit गोचर
Gochara (transit) tracks where the grahas are moving today and compares that to where they sat at your birth — Saturn's slow transit relative to the natal Moon (sade sati) and an eclipse landing near a natal point are both transit readings. This report frames transits as weather passing through a fixed chart, never as separate predictions of what will happen; a transit's effect is always read together with the dasha running at the time, not on its own.
See also sade sati, Jupiter return, Saturn return, eclipse
trikona त्रिकोण
Trikona means 'triangle.' Together with the kendras, the trikona houses (1st, 5th, 9th) are the foundation of raja yoga analysis — a planet linking a kendra lord with a trikona lord, by conjunction, aspect, or exchange, is one of the tradition's core markers of a strong, favorable configuration.
Uttara Ashadha उत्तराषाढ़ा
Uttara Ashadha runs 26°40′ Sagittarius – 10°00′ Capricorn, ruled by Sun with the Vishvadevas as its presiding deity, symbolized by an elephant's tusk; its animal is the mongoose. The station is read for durable, late-arriving victory rather than a fast, showy one. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Uttara Bhadrapada उत्तरभाद्रपदा
Uttara Bhadrapada runs 3°20′ – 16°40′ Pisces, ruled by Saturn with Ahir Budhnya as its presiding deity, symbolized by the back legs of the funeral cot; a serpent in deep water; its animal is the cow. The station is read for deep stability and unseen support — a coil steadying a floor no one maps. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
Uttara Phalguni उत्तर फाल्गुनी
Uttara Phalguni runs 26°40′ Leo – 10°00′ Virgo, ruled by Sun with Aryaman as its presiding deity, symbolized by the back legs of the bed; its animal is the bull. The station is read for formalized loyalty — warmth converted into structure that outlasts a mood. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
vara वार
Vara is the Sanskrit weekday, running Sunday (Surya) through Saturday (Shani), each day named for and ruled by one of the seven visible grahas — the likely origin of the seven-day week used far beyond India. Classically the day is reckoned sunrise-to-sunrise rather than midnight-to-midnight, so a birth before dawn belongs to the previous day's vara, not the calendar date's.
vargottama वर्गोत्तम
Vargottama ('best of the divisions') is read as a mark of unusual steadiness — the planet's placement is confirmed rather than contradicted when the chart is examined at finer resolution. This report checks it narrowly, only between the main chart (D1) and the navamsa (D9); some practitioners extend the idea to other divisional charts, but that is a later extension of the classical sense.
Vimshottari विंशोत्तरी
Vimshottari ('the one of 120') assigns each of the nine grahas a fixed period length — Ketu 7, Venus 20, Sun 6, Moon 10, Mars 7, Rahu 18, Jupiter 16, Saturn 19, Mercury 17 years — run in that order and totaling 120 years. Which planet's period is running at birth, and how much of it remains, is set by where the Moon sits within its birth nakshatra. It is the most widely used dasha system in Jyotisha, though not the only one the tradition has developed — Ashtottari and Yogini dashas, among others, use different logics and lengths.
See also dasha, nakshatra, dasha balance
Vishakha विशाखा
Vishakha runs 20°00′ Libra – 3°20′ Scorpio, ruled by Jupiter with Indragni as its presiding deity, symbolized by a triumphal archway; the forked branch; its animal is the tiger. The station is read for doubled ambition aimed, at its best, through a single gate at a time. Its fuller myth, proclivities, and instructions appear in the nakshatra kit.
See also nakshatra, pada, Brihaspati
whole-sign
In whole-sign houses, the sign containing the ascendant is the entire 1st house regardless of the exact degree, the next sign is the entire 2nd, and so on — a graha's house is simply which sign it occupies, counted from the lagna. This is the system used in early classical sources like Brihat Jataka and Saravali, and it's what this report uses throughout. The transmitted Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra also carries material for degree-based house cusps, where a house can start and end partway through a sign; which system is older is an open question among textual scholars, and the two can disagree noticeably for a planet sitting near a sign boundary.
yoga योग
In this context yoga means 'combination' or 'union' — an astrological configuration like Gajakesari or a Pancha Mahapurusha yoga, not the physical or meditative practice the same word names elsewhere in Sanskrit. The tradition has catalogued hundreds of these across its major texts; this report computes and narrates a working subset, always naming which specific yoga and which reference point — lagna, Moon, or navamsa — a reading is drawn from.
See also Pancha Mahapurusha, Gajakesari, Budha-Aditya