Planetary hours

Evolution of hour and week

Latitudes form a ring around the earth. At 0° latitude the ring is the largest and 90° latitude is small as a dot. It is a construction of multiple rings above and below the equator.

In primitive days seven rings were designated in one side of equator inspired by seven rings of various sizes made by prominent celestial objects.

Saturn which makes the largest ring gives it’s name to the base ring on the ground forming the horizon. In the order of sizes,  above it jupiter, mars, sun, venus, mercury and moon are designated at equal intervals. The moon is at apex that is zenith.

This structure is used to describe the position and progress of celestial objects by enlarging the rings. As it is not possible to locate the rings, the section following a ring is called by the same name. Any position is estimated from horizon or zenith using the names in the order and referred in communications.

There are six sections between the seven rings and the seventh section falls beyond. But celestial objects progress beyond the apex down to horizon at opposite side. The progress is lenier and the sections are equidistant. So the first section in the downward movement gets the name of seventh ring at the apex, in this case moon.

we can make a string of the line through the rings covering the seven sections with distinct colours according to  name. The strings can be replicated using the same colour pattern and of same length. Attaching top of one string to the bottom of another a long string can be made for required length.

If we make a length of four strings each represented by colour in the same order described earlier and wind it round the globe starting at the centre and going through the apex at top and down through apex at bottom back to the starting point, we can find the end of third section and start of fourth section. In the case above colour representing sun section will start.

It all started like this and over a time the sections were numbered and seventh section was dropped for convenience and uniformity.

Days were designated by the name of the section at the start of the day and this cycle is maintained.

The planetary hours are an ancient system in which one of the seven classical planets is given rulership over each day and various parts of the day. Developed in Hellenistic astrology, it has possible roots in older Babylonian astrology, and it is the origin of the names of the days of the week as used in English and numerous other languages.

The classical planets are Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the Sun, Venus, Mercury and the Moon, and they take rulership over the hours in this sequence.

The sequence is from slowest- to fastest-moving as the planets appear in the night sky, and so is from furthest to nearest in the planetary spheres model. This order has come to be known as the "Chaldean order".

As each day is divided into 24 hours, the first hour of a day is ruled by the planet three places down in the Chaldean order from the planet ruling the first hour of the preceding day; i.e. a day with its first hour ruled by the Sun ("Sunday") is followed by a day with its first hour ruled by the Moon ("Monday"), followed by Mars ("Tuesday"), Mercury ("Wednesday"), Jupiter ("Thursday"), Venus ("Friday") and Saturn ("Saturday"), again followed by Sunday, yielding the familiar naming of the days of the week.