The Origins of the Concept of Detriment in Astrology

In episode 264 of the podcast Chris Brennan and Benjamin Dykes discuss the origins of the concept of detriment in ancient Hellenistic and Medieval astrology.

Years ago I noted that that the origins of the concept of detriment are somewhat mysterious, because it is mentioned infrequently by the Hellenistic astrologers, and not usually defined along with the other classical “essential dignities” of domicile, exaltation, and fall.

Then suddenly in the work of Rhetorius of Egypt, the last major Hellenistic astrologer who lived around the 6th or 7th century, detriment is present as a full-blown concept and is treated together with the other essential dignities.

In my book Hellenistic Astrology: The Study of Fate and Fortune, I surmised that this meant that either A) detriment had developed as a new concept by the late Hellenistic tradition, or alternatively B) that Rhetorius was simply formalizing a concept that had been taken for granted by some earlier astrologers.

At the time that…