The 12 zodiac signs

The zodiac divides the ecliptic - the Sun's apparent path through the sky - into twelve equal thirty-degree segments. Each one describes a distinct way of going about things: not a personality type so much as a style, a set of instincts about what matters and how to pursue it.

Two classifications do most of the interpretive work, and they cut across each other. Every sign belongs to one of four elements, which describes the material it is made of - what it pays attention to. And every sign belongs to one of three modalities, which describes how it moves - whether it starts things, sustains them, or adapts them. Four elements times three modalities gives exactly twelve combinations, and no two signs share both.

That is why the same twelve pages appear twice below. Reading the signs by element groups them by temperament; reading them by modality groups them by timing. Aries and Leo look alike until you notice one starts and the other sustains.