The First Decan of Pisces

This is the first ten-degree segment of Pisces, the mutable water sign, spanning 0 to 10 degrees. Its ruler in the Chaldean order of faces is Saturn, following the continuous sequence of the seven planets around the thirty-six decans. The decans are the oldest stratum of astrology, beginning as thirty-six Egyptian star groups whose successive risings served as a calendar and a star-clock, absorbed into the Greek zodiac as ten-degree subdivisions of the signs only later.

The Golden Dawn, from 1888, mapped the numbered minor cards onto the decans in order; this segment carries the Eight of Cups, to which they gave the title Indolence or Abandoned Success, its Saturn-in-Pisces attribution taken from the face ruler, Saturn's heaviness on the deep water sign matching the card's image of turning away from what no longer satisfies. That tarot layer is a modern Western overlay on the ancient decan scheme, not a feature of the Egyptian or Hellenistic material.