You know, I had another rather lengthy comment and this time when I hit send it blew it out
! I am starting to get superstitious that something doesn't want me to make extensive posts about this subject
!
Anyway, Waybread, you can obtain the Hand whole sign booklet from astroamerica.com which is a very reliable source for astrology books.
I don't know if your thinking of me as the "resident expert" on this matter is justified; I am no historian, and certainly no expert on Hellenistic astrology! I guess I am an accidental historian on this stuff, because I have studied this material, but only in a search for some ideas or methods which might prove of use to me! Purely utilitarian! But in so doing I have gotten a good idea of what I THINK the authors I have read were doing or talking about (Manilius, Ptolemy, Valens, Antiochus, Anubion, Maternus, Hepahestio, Maximus, Sextus Empiricus, Paulus Alexandrianus, Rhetorius are the authors I have read; only a few of the authors to be found in the great collection-12 volumes-of ancient Greek astrological documents called the "C.A.G" most of which remains untranslated into English)
After reading the Hand booklet in the late 1990's, I looked into the material I had from those authors, and-realizing that what non-astrologer academic historians had claimed was Equal house in these authors was in reality the closely related sign=house (whole sign) domification method-EVEN THE METHOD OF FIRMICUS MATERNUS turning out to be whole sign and NOT Equal house
(Hand clears that up by pointing out the incorrect Rhys translation of a defining word in the Maternus description of how to set up the dodecatropos), well, this changed my mind about what I had believed up until then about what the Greeks and Romans did (relative to chart erection), and that is pretty why I continue to accept the idea that sign=house (whole sign) dominated the ancient practice.
Later, in my scavenging for concepts and techniques among the earliest Vedic authors (Parasara, Jaimini, Varahamira, etc)-and being greatly influenced in my outlook by the 2 volume Pingree analysis of Greek influences upon early jyotish*-I came to discover that these guys weren't using Equal house either
(the received wisdom from historians is that the Vedics always used Equal house, from ancient times to today) When I read their original material, what they did (with some possible doubt relative to Parasara) was sign=house (whole sign), just like the Greek and Roman authors-during that same period of time-14 AD up to the mid-500's AD- had done.
Now, can I be mistaken about this? Sure, with my limited intelligence I might have gotten it wrong. Again, I say, I am no academic and am no expert on the history of either Hellenistic or Vedic astrology. I just go on what I've read from the original authors (as translated into English)
But from all of this it seems TO ME that the Hand hypothesis (followed by other experts since the late 1990's) is likely accurate, viz, that sign=house (whole sign is the name of this given to it by Hand) was the predominant domification method from Alexandria to the banks of the Ganges, at least from the time of the beginning of the Current Era, through the beginning of the 6th century AD.
Anyway, Waybread, I will be discussing the Maternus question and some of your other points (which I did in the post that got blown out when I sent it) over the next few days.
Enjoying our discussion
perhaps the information we bring to light will be of interest to some of our AW friends
!
(*"Yavanajataka of Sphujidhavja", 2 volumes, David Pingree; the meaning of the funny sounding title is "Greek astrology", the book dates from 149 AD and the comments by Sphujidhavja from about 100 years later; the book purports to be an outline of Greek astrological docrines and practice of that ancient time; the only domification methodology described in it is sign=house, ie, whole sign; nothing about quadrant houses, nothing about Equal house)