Which house system is the best for delineating a chart?

I see that astro.com uses the Placidus system. But some people say they use the equal house and others say they use the whole signs system.

There are also many options on astro.com.

Which system would be best to use?

There is no such thing.

Astrologers have their own views on best. I used to use Koch years ago.

Some systems are time based systems, some of place based systems, some are combinations. Earlier in astrology people in different countries only has access to one or two translations of systems.

I use Placidus because the astrodyne system is central to my astrology and astrodynes was statistically normed on Placidus. Famous astrologer IVY Goldstein Jacobson and Kt Boehrer used Placidus.

William Lilly used Regiomontanus and every horary astrologer thinks that they should use that, except they mostly don't know that it was the only set of tables that Lilly had available to him at his place in England in the mid 1600's.

Zarathu said:

There is no such thing.

Astrologers have their own views on best. I used to use Koch years ago.

Some systems are time based systems, some of place based systems, some are combinations. Earlier in astrology people in different countries only has access to one or two translations of systems.

I use Placidus because the astrodyne system is central to my astrology and astrodynes was statistically normed on Placidus. Famous astrologer IVY Goldstein Jacobson and Kt Boehrer used Placidus.

William Lilly used Regiomontanus and every horary astrologer thinks that they should use that, except they mostly don't know that it was the only set of tables that Lilly had available to him at his place in England in the mid 1600's.

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Ok, that makes sense.

Thank you.

Zarathu said:

William Lilly used Regiomontanus and every horary astrologer thinks that they should use that, except they mostly don't know that it was the only set of tables that Lilly had available to him at his place in England in the mid 1600's.

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Do you know of a book or link that details the different house systems and advantages/disadvantages of them? I've used Koch in the past and moved to Placidus but don't really have a knowledge of all the rest and why they are used / not used.

mdinaz said:

Do you know of a book or link that details the different house systems and advantages/disadvantages of them? I've used Koch in the past and moved to Placidus but don't really have a knowledge of all the rest and why they are used / not used.

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I have a book by Michael Meyer called A HANDBOOK FOR THE HUMANISTIC ASTROLOGER which he published all the way back in 1974. It was one of the first books on astrology I got in this life.

He describes the systems of house division. The rest of the book is pretty interesting too, and it was an early manual of mine to help interpret charts---very very general compared to what I do now, but certainly a good start.

http://www.amazon.com/Handbook-Huma...ywords=handbook+for+the+humanistic+astrologer

I used Placidus for decades (with very good results) In the early 1990's whole sign (which had been lost until that time, except among Jamini Vedic astrologers) began to be rediscovered (as the works of the Hellenist authors began being translated)-I learned of it in 1998, it appealed to me, and when I tested it out I obtained even better (clearer, more accurate) results than I had with Placidus: I have continued to use whole sign (aka "sign = house") exclusively, since that time.

Basically there are 2 types of house division systems: quadrant and non-quadrant.
-non-quadrant formats are whole sign and Equal house
-quadrant formats are all of the rest

Historically, whole sign house format was the original method of house division (Equal house, very closely related to whole sign, may also have originated in very early times)
The earliest quadrant format was Porphyry, although this method was not applied to domification (chart house division) until around the late 5th/early 6th century.
-whole sign format suddenly disappeared (except among Jaimini Vedic astrologers of India) around the late 8th/early 9th century (and remained forgotten, unknown-at least in the West-for the next nearly 1200 years)...
-whole sign was replaced largely by the quadrant Alchabitius format at that time (although Porphyry remained a minority house division format) Alchabitius dominated house division up through about the 13th century...
-the quadrant Campanus format arose around that time, but never really gained much popularity
-next came the Regiomontanus quadrant format, which swept in and dominated European astrology for a couple hundred years, until...
-the quadrant Placidus format appeared in the 17th century: this system rapidly supplanted Regiomontanus (and the remnants of Campanus, Porphyry and Alchabitius) and became the predominant house system in Western astrology (in Vedic astrology during the centuries mentioned Equal house predominanted-as it does today-with a variation of Porphyry-called "sripati" in Vedic astrology-running close in popular application)...
-the other significant quadrant format, developed over the past century or so and a rival to Placidus especially among 20th/21st century European astrologers, is Koch...
-beginning around the middle of the 20th century, some Modernist astrologers began using the oldtime Equal house system, and continue to do so at the present time.

Currently, quadrant house systems (Placidus and Koch) dominate in Western astrology, with Equal house a distant 3rd (whole sign has been gaining adherents but still has only a small % of practitioners in its ranks) Contemporary Traditionalists mostly use either Placidus or Regiomontanus (with a very few using Alchabitius or whole sign)