Aries in the Tropical Scheme

Aries is the first sign of the tropical zodiac, the thirty degrees that begin at the vernal equinox, the moment when the Sun crosses the celestial equator going north and day and night stand equal. Everything else in the western scheme is counted from that point, which is why Aries is called the first sign at all; the order is astronomical before it is symbolic.

In the classical doctrine it is cardinal, fiery and ruled by Mars, with the Sun taking its exaltation in the sign. Ptolemy derives its character from the season rather than from the stars: the equinoctial spring is changeable, wet turning to warm, quickening and unsettled, and the sign is read accordingly as initiating, impulsive, hot and short in temper. The later tradition of keyword astrology has hardened these into a fixed list of personality traits, but the classical sources present them as qualities of a season and a quadrant of the sky.