Annual profections
Hellenistic time-lord technique — Vettius Valens's Anthology and Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos IV.10
Each year of life 'profects' the Ascendant forward one whole sign, and the ruler of that sign becomes the Lord of the Year. The technique passed through the Arabic tradition into medieval Europe — Bonatti details it around 1277, and Lilly was still teaching it in 1647 — then lapsed with traditional astrology itself in the 18th and 19th centuries. Its Hellenistic form returned only after Project Hindsight (founded 1993 by Robert Schmidt, Ellen Black, Robert Zoller and Robert Hand) began putting the Greek texts into English.
What it measures
A count of whole signs from the natal Ascendant equal to the age: age 0, 12 and 24 activate the 1st sign, age 1 the 2nd, cycling every twelve years. The activated sign's ruler is the year's time lord.
Where practitioners disagree
- How long is a profected month or day?
Ptolemy gives 28 days per sign monthly and 2⅓ days per sign daily; Paulus gives one day per sign
This is a genuine ancient disagreement — the sub-annual units were never standardised.
This engine: We compute the annual profection (one sign per year of life).
Sources
- Vettius Valens, Anthology, Book IV
- Claudius Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos IV.10