Signifer and planetary houses · Lexicon

From the book

The Secret Work of the Hermetic Philosophy

Attributed to Jean d’Espagnet · Diotimos Editions · 2026

Orientation

At a Glance

The wordSignifer is the sign-bearing circle, rendered “zodiac” in canon 137. A planetary house is a sign assigned to a planet within the historical astrological scheme; the term does not mean a physical building.
In the bookThe final temporal scheme assigns endings of the white and red works to planetary houses. The later Times of the Stone interpretation expands this into a narrative of signs, colours and stages, accompanied in this edition by a diagram from the 1650 English collection.
In this editionThe 1623 canon, the later English interpretation and the 1650 image have different identifiers and provenance. The image is not an illustration printed beside canon 137 in the governing Latin edition.
A place to readRead Canon 137 (1623, pp. 95–96), Historical reception · Times of the Stone (the interpretation reproduced from 1893, p. 50) and the caption to Signifer diagram · 1650 together.

Meaning

The Latin noun signifer combines the idea of a sign with bearing or carrying it. In the phrase philosophorum signifer, the edition translates the circle as the philosophers’ zodiac. Its immediate object of teaching is Tempora Lapidis, the times of the Stone. This does not by itself furnish a modern calendar: the sentence places times in the symbolic order of the work and then specifies planetary dwellings at which its several parts should end.

The houses in this account are assignments within the traditional zodiacal scheme. The later interpretation gives two houses to each planet except Sun and Moon. It is therefore possible for the text to distinguish a planet’s second house or other throne. “House” here should not be confused with the material vessel or furnace treated earlier in the canons, even though all three vocabularies use images of enclosure and dwelling.

Use in the book

Canon 137 distinguishes more than one ending. It gives a completion for the first work towards white and a further completion for the second, then does the same for the red sequence. The first white work ends in the Moon’s house; the second in Mercury’s second house. The first red work ends in Venus’s second dwelling; the last in Jupiter’s other royal throne. The king’s ruby crown brings the colour and regality of the conclusion into the same picture. These are assertions of the historical work, not independently tested timings.

The final verse says that the year turns back on its own tracks. Recurrence is therefore part of the image, but the recurrence should not erase the different work assigned to successive points. The broader book distinguishes the preparation of sulphur from the further completion of the elixir. A circular year is compatible with an ordered development within it. Calling every return an identical repetition would miss what the planetary endings are meant to distinguish.

The later interpretation makes the sequence more explicit. It begins the philosophical year in winter under Saturn and links the subsequent signs with blackening, the crow, whitening and the solar work. It ends with completion under Jupiter. The imagery encourages a reader to see colour changes as a passage through a cosmic order. It also introduces specificity beyond the compact canon, including a calendar-like elaboration. This lexicon uses that elaboration as evidence of reception, not as an operational timetable or a correction silently added to the Latin.

The diagram’s source is equally important. The supplied edition reproduces an image from the 1650 English collection, sequential page 266, misprinted 252; its caption identifies the Getty Research Institute copy and PDF page 322. The Times interpretation is reproduced from the 1893 volume. According to the supplied edition’s collation report, the complete 1623 Arcanum has no corresponding diagram or separate Interpretation and ends after canon 138. The lexicon relies on that edition report; it has not independently re-collated the historical copies. The claim is therefore not enlarged into a claim that every later printing has the same additions.

The figure is square rather than a modern circular sky map. Its seasonal and directional labels belong to the historical representation, and the modern edition explicitly warns against treating them as modern astronomical orientation. The planetary pairings, however, make the later discussion of houses legible: Saturn has Capricorn and Aquarius; Jupiter Sagittarius and Pisces; Mars Scorpio and Aries; Venus Libra and Taurus; Mercury Virgo and Gemini; the Moon Cancer; the Sun Leo. These labels explain how the reception document organizes the reading. They do not establish a material identity for an eagle, a sulphur or a mercury elsewhere in the book.

Other planetary passages should be compared without being collapsed into this timetable. Saturn in canon 33 is an examiner of inadequate permanence, not simply a label for the opening month. Celestial Mercury in canon 41 supplies an analogy for the elixir’s adaptability through influence, aspect and conjunction. The fact that the same planet names recur does not make the functions identical. A contextual reading asks whether a name is acting as an examiner, an analogue, a colour, a ruler or a place in a sequence.

Places to read

Canon 33; 1623, p. 27LatinSaturn the examiner tests the permanence claimed for an exiled tincture. No assay procedure is supplied by this lexicon.
Canon 41; pp. 31–32LatinCelestial Mercury’s believed adaptability provides the expressly marked analogy with the elixir.
Canons 137–138; pp. 95–96LatinThe several planetary endings precede the dragon, the Fleece and the final instruction to reason and judge.
Historical reception · Times of the Stone; reproduced from 1893, p. 50The later interpretation develops a zodiacal progression through colours and stages.
Signifer diagram · 1650; Guide to the Historical SigniferThe supplied image and its modern guide identify the 1650 witness, its misprinted pagination and the historical orientation of its square scheme.

Translation in this edition

Canon 137 translates signifer as “zodiac,” domo as “house,” domicilio as “dwelling” and solio as “throne.” The different nouns contribute to the passage’s movement from ordinary habitation to royal completion. They should not all be normalized to a single chemical location. secundo and altero mark distinctions within the sequence; dropping them makes the passage less precise.

In canon 41, creditur, “is believed,” qualifies the statement about celestial Mercury. The following analogy is the author’s use of that belief, not this lexicon’s account of a verified planetary force. In the later interpretation, “Significator” is the historical English heading preserved by the supplied edition; it is not a second Latin reading substituted for signifer.

is believed — credo

Attested form. creditur.

Meaning. 'Is believed': the passive verb qualifies the claim about celestial Mercury's disposition to transmit qualities and marks the historical belief supporting the elixir analogy.

Read. Canon 41.

dwelling — domicilium

Attested form. domicilio.

Meaning. The dwelling assigned to Venus at the ending of the first red work; the local phrase specifies the second dwelling.

Read. Canon 137.

house — domus

Attested form. domo.

Meaning. A planetary house in the final zodiacal sequence; an assigned sign rather than an architectural structure or material vessel.

Read. Canon 137.

zodiac — signifer

Attested form. signifer.

Meaning. The sign-bearing zodiac said to teach the times of the Stone; not the later diagram itself, which is absent from the governing 1623 printing according to the supplied edition.

Read. Canon 137.

throne — solium

Attested form. solio.

Meaning. Jupiter's royal throne, a regal variation on the planetary house vocabulary used for the last completion.

Read. Canon 137.