Chart patterns
Kite
A grand trine given somewhere to go
- Planets involved
- 4
- Built from
- both
- Focal point
- Yes
What it is
A grand trine, three planets 120 degrees apart, plus a fourth sitting opposite one of the three. That fourth planet is automatically sextile to the other two, and the finished shape on a wheel is a kite.
The fourth planet is in the same element as nothing else in the pattern, because it sits opposite one of the trine points. That is what gives the pattern its tension, and it is why the kite is read as mixed rather than flowing.
How it reads
The tradition reads it as the answer to the grand trine problem. A closed triangle has nothing to push against; the opposition supplies exactly that, and the two sextiles supply a route.
What is associated with the pattern is a natural facility that has actually been used, rather than one that sat unexamined. The opposition is the part that makes the demand, and it is usually described as the reason the ease turned into something.
The planet opposite the trine point is where the work is said to happen. It is the least comfortable placement in the pattern and the tradition treats it as the most useful one.
Where the reading sits
The planet at the tail, opposite one point of the trine. It carries the tension that the grand trine on its own lacks.
How common it actually is
Uncommon: 2.4 per cent of charts, about one in 42. Less frequent than a grand trine, which is exactly what you would expect given that every kite contains one.
What to watch for
Counting the grand trine twice. A kite contains one, so a chart with a kite does not also have a separate grand trine to report, and tools that list both are double-counting the same three planets.
Do you have a kite?
The birth chart tool checks for this and the other seven, and names the planets involved. Whether you have one depends on your birth date, time and place, and on the orbs used: this site detects kites on the ten planets, without the angles.
The other patterns
- T-squareTwo planets opposite each other, both square a third
- Grand trineThree planets each 120 degrees from the other two
- Grand crossTwo oppositions at right angles: four planets, four squares
- YodTwo planets sextile, both quincunx a third
- Mystic rectangleTwo oppositions joined by two trines and two sextiles
- Grand sextileSix planets evenly spaced: six sextiles, six trines, three oppositions
- StelliumThree or more planets in one sign