Antares

Alpha Scorpii — the heart of the Scorpion, the rival of Mars

Position (J2000)

9°46′ Sagittarius

Magnitude

1.06

Colour

Deep red

Spectrum

M1.5 Iab

Distance

550 light-years

Nature

Mars · Jupiter

In the sky

Antares is a red supergiant large enough that, placed where the Sun stands, its surface would reach out into the asteroid belt, well beyond the orbit of Mars. At about magnitude 1.06 and slowly variable, it is the most conspicuously red star most observers will see, a heavy smouldering colour quite unlike orange Aldebaran or amber Arcturus. It lies about five hundred and fifty light-years away, though the parallax is poor enough that the true figure could be anywhere from roughly 470 to 690, and it is old enough that it will end as a supernova. It is found low in the south on summer evenings, at the heart of the curved hook of Scorpius.

The myth

The name is Greek for anti-Ares, the rival of Mars, given because the star burns the same angry red and was persistently mistaken for the planet. The Persians made it a Royal Star, the Watcher of the West, set opposite Aldebaran across the width of the sky.

Scorpius is the creature that killed Orion, and Antares is its heart rather than its sting. The astrological material follows that distinction closely: the star does not describe the act but what drives it — what a person feels strongly enough to act upon.

What it gives

• Courage of an uncommon degree The native will go where the situation is worst and remain there after others have withdrawn. The tradition's language about heroism is not exaggerated.
• Depth of feeling There is no comfortable middle register here. Milder temperaments do not reach the intensity this star produces, in either direction.
• Penetration The native gets to the bottom of a person or a problem and has the stomach for what is found there. On the mental faculties this produces formidable insight.
• Endurance under pressure Where a matter will be decided by who is still standing, natives of this star are frequently the ones still standing.

What to watch for

• No internal brake This star has never counselled restraint. Whatever moderation the native has must be supplied from outside the placement's own impulses.
• Grudges held for decades A wound can be carried for thirty years under the name of loyalty. The tradition's warnings about vengefulness concern how much of the native's own life this consumes.
• Victory pursued past its value The characteristic misfortune here is not defeat but a win carried so far that nothing worth having remains at the end of it.
• Self-destruction through excess The old texts are blunt about this, and the mechanism is simply intensity applied without interruption for too long. Idleness does the same work more slowly: this star corrodes as surely in stagnation as in excess, and a native left without a worthy object will manufacture conflict simply to feel the current move.

How to work with it

Build rest and retreat into the plan deliberately, at fixed points, rather than waiting for a natural stopping place that will not arrive.

Keep one person with standing to say that it is enough, and agree in advance that their judgement will be accepted. This is the single most effective measure with this placement, precisely because the native cannot supply the judgement themselves at the relevant moment.

Set down old injuries as a matter of policy rather than as an act of forgiveness. The argument that works here is not moral but practical: the years spent are not returned.

Learn to recognise sufficiency. Establishing in advance what would count as enough, before the matter is under way, is the reliable version of this.

In brief

Antares describes intensity: great courage, depth of feeling, and the capacity to remain in a bad situation after others have left. It supplies no restraint of its own, which is the whole of its difficulty. Natives who build in rest, keep somebody empowered to stop them, and decide in advance what would constitute enough tend to sustain the placement. Those who do not tend to be consumed by it, which is what the tradition recorded.