Third Decan of Aries (20°–30°)

Venus and Jupiter at the end of the Mars sign

The third decan of Aries runs from 20° to 30° of the sign. The Chaldean order gives it to Venus, the planet after the Sun in the sequence. The triplicity scheme gives it to Sagittarius, the third fire sign, and so to Jupiter. Both rulers are benefics, and both are strangers to Aries in the usual tables: Venus is in its detriment in the sign of Mars, and Jupiter has no dignity there apart from ruling the fire triplicity by night. The face sits uneasily in its sign, and the unease is part of its character.

Tradition also places Saturn's fall at 21° Aries, inside this face, so the planet of limits is at its weakest in the decan where Aries looks for meaning and pleasure. Mars as sign ruler still provides the drive. Venus asks what the drive is for, and Jupiter widens the answer into a cause, a belief or a shared win. Planets here carry the sign's heat into celebration, art, faith and alliance, with a mutable fire restlessness borrowed from Sagittarius as the sign prepares to hand over to Taurus.

The pale man with the gold bracelet

Agrippa, following the Arabic image lists transmitted through the Picatrix, pictures the third face of Aries as a pale man with reddish hair in a red garment. In one hand he carries a gold bracelet; with the other he holds out a wooden staff. He is restless and angry because he cannot do the good he wants to do. Yet the gifts Agrippa lists for the image are gentle ones: wit, mildness, joy and beauty.

The contradiction is the decan in miniature. The bracelet is Venus, an ornament and a pledge. The staff is the pilgrim's or the teacher's, close to Jupiter. The anger is still Aries, now aimed at whatever stands between the figure and his ideal. This face wants to make something good and lovely happen, and it is not patient with obstacles. The Golden Dawn title of its card, Lord of Perfected Work, gives the image its happy ending: the work finished, the good done, and the frustration released into festival.

The last of the three stars of spring

The Egyptian decans were stars that rose in turn through the year, each marking the hours of night for about ten days. Coffin lids from around 2100 BCE list thirty-six of them, and later sky texts describe each star's cycle: it sets, stays hidden for seventy days in the house of embalming, and is born again in the east.

When Hellenistic astrologers set the decans under the zodiac, every sign received three, and the third came to be read as the face of handover, where a sign finishes its work before the next begins. This face closes the spring fire before the earth of Taurus. The individual star the Egyptians watched for this stretch cannot be named with confidence, since the lists vary from monument to monument. The page on the Egyptian decan gods follows their story.

The Four of Wands, Lord of Perfected Work

The Golden Dawn gave the Four of Wands to Venus in Aries, the third decan of the first fire sign, with the title Lord of Perfected Work. Behind it stand The Empress for Venus and The Emperor for Aries, love and rule on either side of one small card.

In the Rider-Waite image four wands stand upright with a garland slung between them, and two figures behind them raise bouquets in welcome, with a castle and a gathering beyond. It is a picture of arrival: the work of the Two and Three of Wands has come home and can be enjoyed. Read through the decan, the card shows Venus finishing what Mars began, the conquest turned into a place to live and a reason to gather. The four wands also form a frame, open on all sides, and this face is good at building structures that let other people join in.

A Sun or several planets in the third decan of Aries

A Sun here belongs to people born in the last ten days of the sign, roughly the middle of April. You keep the Aries courage but tend to point it at something you love or believe in, a cause, a crew, an art. You can be generous and great company. You can also be thrown into anger by the gap between how things are and how good they could be.

Several planets in this face give a chart enthusiasm for shared projects and a strong sense of taste. The common gift is the ability to make a win feel like everyone's win. The common difficulty is follow-through after the celebration, since mutable fire from Sagittarius makes this face restless once the high point passes. Look at Venus and Jupiter in your chart: their signs and aspects show whether this decan's warmth is well supplied or strained.

Working with the third face of Aries

Name what you are fighting for before you start the fight, and write it down. Mark finished work with some kind of celebration, even a small one, so effort has an ending as well as a beginning. Choose one creative practice where boldness is an asset, such as painting, dance or performance. When anger comes from blocked good intentions, ask which part of the plan is yours to change today and which belongs to other people. Keep a routine for the dull upkeep that festivals leave behind.