Exploring Jean-Baptiste Morin’s Scientific Contributions

Penelope Sitter joins the show to talk about the life and work of the 17th century astrologer Jean-Baptiste Morin de Villefranche, and her new translation of his work. Morin was an astrologer from France who lived around the same time as William Lilly, and he wrote a massive tome on astrology titled Astrologia Gallica, which means French Astrology. Penelope just translated book 21 of Morin’s work from Latin, which is the most important book of Astrologia Gallica, where he outlines his unique approach to chart synthesis. Penelope became so excited about Morin's work after being exposed to it in the 2000's through the work of Robert Corre that she actually learned Latin specifically in order to translate Morin's text. During the course of the episode we talk about Morin's life and work, and then we also get into his techniques and discuss what makes his approach interesting and different when compared to some of his contemporaries. Along the way we talk about his birth chart and personality, and use his chart a few times to demonstrate his technical approach, which he does several times in his work. It ended up being a fascinating discussion, introducing an important but often overlooked astrologer who was the last great court astrologer in France before the decline of astrology in the 17th century. Penelope's Translation of Book 21 of Morin You can get Penelope's translation of book 21 of Morin here: Morin's Book 21: Of the Active Determination of the Celestial Bodies & the Passive Determination of Sublunary Things This episode is available in audio and video versions below. Timestamps 00:00:00 Intro 00:01:04 About Jean-Baptiste Morin 00:08:32 Astrologia Gallica volumes 00:15:00 Translations of Astrologia Gallica 00:18:51 Penelope Sitter's background 00:31:45 Why Morin has been difficult to understand 00:35:38 Morin's natal chart 00:41:50 Morin's personality 00:47:59 Triplicity rulers 00:49:20 Morin's significations of the houses 00:55:38 Morin's family 00:57:37 Significations of Sun and Moon 00:58:41 Zoltan Mason 01:00:49 Reestablishing of lineages 01:03:17 Rejection of general significators in book 21 01:10:11 Morin's use of specialized terminology 01:12:27 Planet begins the action and dispositor takes over 01:16:39 Particular significators and local determinations 01:20:51 Essential and accidental meanings of houses 01:23:23 Angular vs. intermediate houses 01:24:58 Chapter on houses 01:31:30 Significators for parents 01:31:58 Jupiter and Mercury significators 01:33:49 Best steps to follow for delineations 01:39:25 Theory of astrological signification 01:49:50 Influence of planets on preceding house 01:57:07 Gustavus Adolphus' natal chart 02:00:14 House distortion 02:02:50 Blending of whole sign and quadrant houses 02:06:30 Cabala of the houses 02:11:57 4 traditional human aims 02:18:23 Rulers of the houses 02:25:21 Influence of Aristotle 02:30:20 Derived houses 02:32:21 Synastry 02:34:10 Timing techniques 02:37:04 Fate and divine will 02:39:34 Penelope's book and projects 02:44:35 Closing credits Watch the Video Version of This Episode Watch the video version of this episode on Morin on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9Ad6dQbmEo – Transcript A full transcript of this episode is available: Episode 449 transcript Listen to the Audio Version of This Episode Listen to the audio version of this episode or download it as an MP3: