- Natural sign
- Aries
- Ruler
- Mars
- House type
- Angular house
- Axis
- 1 / 7
What the house governs
The first house begins at the ascendant, the point rising above the horizon at the moment of birth. It covers how a person enters any situation: the first move, the first impression, the pace and the manner. Appearance belongs here too, along with how a person is seen before being heard.
How to read it in a chart
Look at the sign on the ascendant, its ruler and any planets in the first house. The ruler of the ascendant is the main significator of the person in the chart, and the house it sits in often says more than the ascendant itself. A planet in the first house shows openly and shows first.
The axis of the house
The 1-7 axis is self and other. The first house sets one's own manner, the seventh what a person looks for in a partner and reacts to in someone else's manner. Reading them apart loses half the meaning: a strong first house with an empty seventh reads differently from the reverse.
Common reading mistakes
The first house is often reduced to appearance and left there. The second mistake is confusing the ascendant with the sun sign: saying I am an Aries rising describes delivery, not substance. The third is forgetting the ruler: without it the house is only half read.
Houses depend on the exact time of birth: an error of a quarter of an hour shifts the cusps by a few degrees, an error of two hours moves a planet into the neighbouring house. Without a birth time it is correct to read only the planets by sign.