Second Decan of Aries (10°–20°)

The Sun crowned in the sign of its exaltation

The second decan of Aries runs from 10° to 20° of the sign. The Chaldean order gives it to the Sun, the planet that follows Mars in the sequence. The triplicity scheme gives it to Leo, the second fire sign, and so to the Sun again. No other face in the zodiac has the Sun on both counts. The Sun also rules the fire triplicity by day, and Aries is the sign of its exaltation, with the exact degree at 19°, inside this face. Few ten-degree stretches gather so many solar dignities in one place.

The result is the Mars sign with a solar centre. The first face of Aries cuts new ground; this one decides what the ground is for and who will be responsible for it. Cardinal fire still wants to begin things, but here the beginning has a figurehead. Planets in this decan take on a solar flavour, a wish to be seen, to stand for something and to carry it in public, while the sign's ruler Mars keeps supplying heat and speed underneath.

The woman in red over white

Agrippa, drawing on the Arabic image lists that the Picatrix had carried into Latin, describes the second face of Aries as a woman wearing a red outer garment over a white one that spreads down over her feet. The image, he says, confers nobility, the height of a kingdom and greatness of rule. The colours repeat those of the first face, white cloth and red, but rearranged: the anger and the axe are gone, and what remains is dignity worn as clothing.

That shift is the decan's story. The warrior of the first ten degrees has won, and now he must reign, which is harder. Rule here means visibility and burden as well as glory. The Golden Dawn title, Lord of Established Strength, describes power that has stopped proving itself and started holding steady. A robe that reaches the feet is not made for running, and this face asks its planets to stand still long enough to govern.

A star that rose before the Sun

In Egypt the decans did their work at the edge of dawn. Each star group was watched as it rose in the last hours of darkness, and for about ten days it served as the marker of the night's final hour before another took its place. Coffin lids from about 2100 BCE already carry these tables, and the decan names were written with the sign of a god.

The Hellenistic astrologers who fitted the thirty-six stars under the twelve signs turned that calendar into a scale of degrees, and the face that took the Sun as its ruler landed in the sign where the Sun is exalted. The star behind this face in the old lists is not securely identified, and the monuments disagree with one another, so it is better left unnamed. The page on the Egyptian decan gods tells how the hour stars came to be treated as divine.

The Three of Wands, Lord of Established Strength

The Golden Dawn assigned the Three of Wands to the Sun in Aries, the second decan of the first fire sign, under the title Lord of Established Strength. Behind it stand The Sun and The Emperor, the solar trump and the trump of Aries, a pairing that shows the card's authority twice.

In the Rider-Waite image a figure stands with his back to us on a high cliff, three wands planted in the ground, watching ships cross the water below. The ships are his, or are carrying his business. The man of the Two of Wands looked out from a wall at ground still unclaimed; this one has sent his venture out and waits for it to return. Read through the decan, the card shows solar confidence: enough security to plan at a distance and enough patience to let the plan travel. Its warning is in the posture, since a ruler who only watches the horizon can lose touch with the people close by.

A Sun or several planets in the second decan of Aries

A Sun here belongs to people born roughly in the ten days from the end of March into early April, and it is the Sun close to its strongest in the whole zodiac. You tend to step into leadership without being asked and to feel responsible for whatever you have started. You want your work to carry your name. Praise matters to you, and so does deserving it.

Several planets in this face give a chart a public, commanding tone: whatever they signify, they want to lead it, show it and stand behind it. The usual difficulty is the weight of the role. People with a strong second decan of Aries can find it hard to step back, ask for help or be wrong in front of others. Because the Sun rules this face on both counts, its house in your chart shows where the crown is worn, and its aspects show how comfortably.

Working with the second face of Aries

Choose one area where you accept leadership on purpose, and put the rest down. Ask for feedback from someone who has no reason to flatter you, and treat it as information about the venture, not as a verdict on you. Plan in longer arcs than Aries usually likes: three months, a year, the ship's return. Share credit visibly, which costs a solar face less than it fears. Spend time in daylight when you need to reset, since the tradition ties this decan to the Sun at its height.