Astrology
Lot of the Mother
Direct answer
Lot of the Mother: The Lot of the Mother is a calculated point found by day from Venus to the Moon and by night from the Moon to Venus, laid off from the Ascendant, and read for what a person received from their mother.
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At a glance
- Also called
- part of the mother, lot of mother, arabic part of the mother
- In astrology
- Ptolemy takes the mother from the Moon and Venus in his chapter on the parents (Tetrabiblos, Book III).
- Found in
- Astrology
- Related
- Lot of the Father, Lot of Siblings, Hermetic Lots, Part of Fortune
The Lot of the Mother is a calculated point found by day from Venus to the Moon and by night from the Moon to Venus, laid off from the Ascendant, and read for what a person received from their mother.
A structural orientation; exact placements depend on the chart or technique being discussed.
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What is the Lot of the Mother?
The Lot of the Mother is one of the family lots of Greek astrology. By day, measure the arc from Venus to the Moon and lay it off from the Ascendant; by night, from the Moon to Venus. The Moon and Venus are the two planets the old authors gave to the mother.
The old authors also read a parent's or a sibling's own fortune, illness and death from these lots. That is never done here: a chart is read for its own person, and these lots are read for that person's side of the bond, what was received and how it is carried.
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The formula
Each lot is found the same way: measure the arc from the first point to the second, always forward through the signs, and lay that arc off from the Ascendant. In longitude, "from A to B" is the Ascendant plus B minus A, reduced to the circle. By night the two points swap places.
The worked example, the same invented day chart on every lot page (longitudes counted from 0 Aries in brackets): Ascendant 10 Libra (190), Sun 20 Aries (20), Moon 5 Gemini (65), Mercury 2 Aries (2), Venus 14 Taurus (44), Mars 8 Leo (128), Jupiter 25 Sagittarius (265) and Saturn 12 Capricorn (282). The Sun is above the horizon, so it is a day chart.
- Day chart: Ascendant 190 + Moon 65 - Venus 44 = 211, which is 1 degree of Scorpio.
- Night chart: Ascendant 190 + Venus 44 - Moon 65 = 169, which is 19 degrees of Virgo.
Reading it for your own side of the bond
The Great Almanac reads the lot for what a person received from their mother, in care, in example or in its lack, and how they want to carry it. For someone whose mother was absent, or who was raised by someone else, the lot is read for whoever stood in that place. It never describes the mother's health, fortune or death.
The story behind Lot of the Mother
Dorotheus of Sidon gives these lots in the first book of the Carmen (I.13, I.14, I.19), and Vettius Valens and Paulus Alexandrinus repeat them. They are computed here in Valens's and Paulus's form. The copy of the Carmen we work from is a translation through Arabic, and its wording of the night versions does not read consistently, so where it differs the later Greek authors are followed.
Lot of the Mother in astrology
The lot puts the two into one point measured from the Ascendant.
Lot of the Mother in practice: an example
In the worked example, a day chart with Venus at 14 degrees of Taurus and the Moon at 5 degrees of Gemini, the Lot of the Mother falls at 1 degree of Scorpio.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Astrology
- Aliases
- part of the mother, lot of mother, mother lot astrology, arabic part of the mother
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
See Lot of the Mother in your personal almanac
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Common questions
What is the Lot of the Mother?
The Lot of the Mother is a calculated point found by day from Venus to the Moon and by night from the Moon to Venus, laid off from the Ascendant, and read for what a person received from their mother.
How do you calculate the Lot of the Mother?
By day, the Ascendant plus the Moon minus Venus. By night, the Ascendant plus Venus minus the Moon.
What does the Lot of the Mother mean?
It is the old authors' point for the mother. The Great Almanac reads it for what a person received from their mother and how they carry it, never for the mother's own health or lifespan.
Why Venus and the Moon?
Ptolemy gives the mother to the Moon and Venus, and the father to the Sun and Saturn. The lot follows the same pairing.
