⚻ Quincunx
Mars quincunx South Node
The reflex misfires. Read as the familiar response producing a result it did not used to, which the tradition treats as information.
- Angle
- 150°
- Orb used
- ±3°
- Type
- Hard
- Bodies
- ♂ ☋
What these two are about together
Action and what is already known. Associated with the reflex a person reaches for under pressure, and with whether that reflex still serves them.
What a quincunx does
A quincunx, also called an inconjunct, puts two planets in signs that share nothing at all: not element, not quality, not polarity, and not even the awkward adjacency of the semi-sextile. The tradition is specific that this is not a weak square. A square describes two things in conflict, which at least implies they are on the same terms. A quincunx describes two things that do not have terms in common, so neither can be traded off against the other.
How it reads
The reflex misfires. Read as the familiar response producing a result it did not used to, which the tradition treats as information.
In practice
Read as adjustment rather than conflict. The classical picture is of continually correcting for something that never resolves and never quite becomes a crisis, in the way a person compensates for a limp without noticing they are doing it. Modern practice associates it with health and with habits maintained past the point of usefulness.
What to watch for
The absence of a decision. Squares get resolved. A quincunx tends to get accommodated instead, and the tradition treats the accommodation itself as the thing worth looking at.
The two planets
Mars: Drive, anger and how you go after things
South Node: What comes easily, and what you hide in
Mars and South Node at other angles
- Mars conjunction South NodeTwo bodies at the same degree, acting as one
- Mars semi-sextile South NodeThirty degrees apart: neighbouring signs, with little in common
- Mars semi-square South NodeForty-five degrees apart: half a square, and read as half its weight
- Mars sextile South NodeSixty degrees apart: cooperation that has to be taken up
- Mars quintile South NodeSeventy-two degrees apart: a fifth of the circle, and the odd one out
- Mars square South NodeNinety degrees apart: two things that will not sit still together
- Mars trine South NodeA hundred and twenty degrees apart: the same element, working together
- Mars sesquiquadrate South NodeA hundred and thirty-five degrees: a square and a half
- Mars opposition South NodeDirectly across the chart: two ends of one axis
Find this in your own chart
A reading like this only tells you what the pairing is associated with. Whether Mars and South Node actually make this angle in your chart depends on your birth date, time and place.